The Fat Angel Sings

The former Loft and Weather Prophets frontman rescues deep cuts from his past and reworks them for a wonderful new album. “Twenty Twenty-Four” marks the 40th anniversary of Pete Astor’s musical career, which started with early Creation Records bands The Loft and The Weather Prophets, and later The Wisdom of Harry (who were signed to Matador) and a long and rewarding solo career. To mark the occasion, he’s gone back through his discography to re-record and rework a few songs. To help him do it, he’s got an amazing band: drummer Ian Button (Death in Vegas, Go Kart Mozart), bassist Andy Lewis (Paul Weller), guitarist Wilson Neil Scott (Felt, Everything But the Girl) and keyboardist Sean Read (Beth Orton, Iggy Pop, Edwyn Collins, etc).

Where most artists would pick their most well-known material, Astor eschews singles like The Loft’s “Up and Down the Slope” and The Weather Prophets’ “Why Does the Rain” in favour of songs that meant more to him and that he felt would benefit from dusting off and getting a new coat of paint. “Throughout this record I was able to revisit the songs,” Astor says in the album’s detailed, thoughtful liner notes, “which allowed me to sit inside what I’d written in a way that I felt I was able to balance the way that they still made sense to me now, looking to the future and that big, new country, the past.”

Astor’s voice has aged like a fine wine, and I don’t think he’s ever made a better-sounding album; rich and warm with inspired production touches like the arpeggiated synths and spaghetti western guitars on one-chord-wonder “Chinese Cadillac” that was originally a Weather Prophets b-side, and the sun-dappled folk of “The Emperor, The Dealer and The Birthday Boy” (originally on his 1991 solo album, “Zoo”). He’s managed to flip a few of his own forgotten properties into something truly special. Sometimes, the best cuts are the deepest.

released March 15th, 2024

James Hoare of Veronica Falls, Ultimate Painting and The Proper Ornaments has a new solo project called Penny Arcade and is gearing up to release his debut album. It’s titled “Backwater Collage” and will be out May 3rd via Tapete, It is his first new music in four years.

James Hoare said about the Track: “Don’t Cry No Tears” was one of the last songs written for the record. I had the chord sequence knocking around for awhile then one day I realised what the song was about and wrote the lyrics down quickly. The lyrics are partly self referential and in part a message to someone else. My friend Toby Kidd played guitar on the track and helped with the arrangement. I used a guiro effect on a late 70’s Roland drum machine and built the song around that. The initial recording was done over the space of a couple of hours with the end section done later on, layering up organs and guitars.”

Both “Don’t Cry No Tears” and the album’s opening track, “Jona,” are warm, melodic and gently psychedelic, and if you have liked any of Hoare’s other projects you’ll dig this. 

Hailing from a place of ancient mariners’ secret coves and vast moors beaten by the wind and rain, “Backwater Collage” is James Hoare’s first solo album under the name of Penny Arcade. Despite leaving London for the West country he grew up in, the Englishman is no stranger to the scene.

For this dreamy, hand-stitched record, Hoare has taken his time. Maybe because he had to rescue his songs from various recording sessions tinged with a number of mishaps he amusedly admits he is accustomed to: broken multitracks, failing tape machines, rarely available drummers living in the capital. The eleven intimate and solitary songs which make up the album, delivered in the greatest home recording tradition, are nonetheless cautiously produced. James unfurls pure, uncluttered melodies in which his gentle, melancholic voice mingles with smooth, warm vocals by Nathalia Bruno. Barely saturated guitar solos sometimes disrupt the clear, unpolished musical line. Hopping onboard, longtime friend Max Claps has added keyboard parts which manage to embrace the minimal nostalgia of the tracks while preventing any teary pathos. Similar to Jack Name or Syd Barrett – only less psychedelic – in terms of songwriting and stripped back atmosphere, Hoare is sitting on the Velvet Underground’s black-and-white sofa and gives his album a subterranean feel.

At times restless but light-footed, deprived of any unnecessary effects, the record follows in the steps of a less noisy but just as raw and unadorned Jesus and Mary Chain. With “Backwater Collage”, alone at the helm under a stormy sky, James Hoare invites his listeners to settle in the sheltered comfort of a cup of tea.

Track is taken from the upcoming album “Backwater Collage” out May 3rd 2024!

King Crimson’s 1969 debut album, “In The Court of the Crimson King”, is being celebrated with a brand new star-studded tribute album.

“Reimagining The Court Of The Crimson King” will feature a variety of artists reinterpreting the album’s classic tunes. Those contributing to the record include King Crimson alumni Mel Collins and Jakko M. Jakszyk, as well as guitarist Chris Poland, Deep Purple‘s Ian Paice, Rainbow‘s Joe Lynn Turner, guitarist Marty Friedman, Dream Theater‘s James LaBrie and drummer Carmine Appice.

Fans are getting their first preview of the record with the release of the album’s lead off classic track, “21st Century Schizoid Man,” featuring vocals by Todd Rundgren and Arthur “God Of Hellfire” Brown, Collins on sax, Poland on guitar and Paice on drums.

“Reimagining The Court Of The Crimson King” will be released on April 19th digitally and on CD with two bonus tracks.

“21st Century Schizoid Man” feat. Todd Rundgren, Arthur Brown, Mel Collins, Chris Poland & Ian Paice
“I Talk To The Wind” feat. Mel Collins, Django Jakszyk & Jakko M Jakszyk
“Epitaph” feat. Alan Davey, Paul Rudolph, Nik Turner, Adam Hamilton & Danny Faulkner
“Moonchild” feat. Joe Lynn Turner, Marty Friedman, Jah Wobble & Chester Thompson
“The Court Of The Crimson King” feat. James LaBrie, Carmine Appice & Steve Hillage

Bonus Tracks
“21st Century Schizoid Man” feat. Arthur Brown, Brian Auger, Chris Poland & Ian Paice
“21st Century Schizoid Man” (Instrumental Version)

One of the hardest working singer-songwriters in the game is named Katie Crutchfield.

She was born in Alabama, grew up near Waxahatchee Creek. Skipped town and struck out on her own as Waxahatchee. That was over a decade ago. Crutchfield says she never knew the road would lead her here, but after six critically acclaimed albums, she’s never felt more confident in herself as an artist. While her sound has evolved from lo-fi folk to lush alt-tinged country, her voice has always remained the same. Honest and close, poetic with Southern lilting. Much like Carson McCullers’s Mick Kelly, determined in her desires and convictions, ready to tell whoever will listen.

And after years of being sober and stable in Kansas City-after years of sacrificing herself to her work and the road-Crutchfield has arrived at her most potent songwriting yet.

On her new album, “Tigers Blood”, Crutchfield emerges as a powerhouse-an ethnologist of the self-forever dedicated to revisiting her wins and losses. But now she’s arriving at revelations and she ain’t holding them back.

‘Tigers Blood’, out on March 22nd, 2024

A reputation for independence, altruism, and single-minded expression has attached itself to The Pastels since their inception in 1980. A cornerstone of the Glasgow scene, The Pastels are credited with giving Scottish rock the confidence to flourish, independent of major label backing. Another C86 staple, The Pastel’s blend of jangle-pop with post-punk, can be heard vicariously in almost every indie band today, including The 1975.

Yo La Tengo, Primal Scream and even Kurt Cobain cited them as heroes, and it says it all. They’re so legendary that in 2015, celebrated Danish beer company Mikkeller made a beer honouring their career entitled ‘Pastelism’. Their label Geographic boasts an internationally-facing roster with which the band champion their love of and belief in outsider music. Notable as these achievements are, The Pastels’ status is based on their canon of records, a magical journey through worlds of possibility, from the Glaswegian West End classicism of “Mobile Safari” to their more contemporary impressionistic dreamscapes, which has no sign of ending.

‘Check My Heart’ is all optimism, boldly announced by Katrina Mitchell’s intrepid vocal overlaps and Stephen McRobbie’s more melancholic counter. The sound is 3D, vivid – The Pastels’ love of garage punk, soul crossover and first-wave independent clatter converging all too briefly, winding down the window and racing off into the summertime. Shot on 16mm film with minimum set-ups, Blair Young’s ‘Check My Heart’ promo is the story of one early spring Saturday in Glasgow. Lives overlap, connect, coincide, the music is a constant; sometimes it’s only playing in our heads.

“Slow Summits” will be released on May 27th through Domino Recordings.

The new MOJO comes with a Pearl Jam world exclusive interview AND an ultra-collectable CD of their live rarities. Plus amazing new Jimi Hendrix finds, David Bowie and Ronno by Suzi Ronson, Wayne Kramer, The Lemon Twigs, Anne Briggs, Shabaka Hutchings, Nico, Roxy Music, Cymande, The Pretenders, Richard Hawley, Bill Frisell, Damo Suzuki, Slint, Brian Wilson and much more.

At its inception was a compendium of hymns, how far could I go and how many I could record. Presented here is a selection of unreleased recorded work from the “SAVED!” sessions, which Seth and I began referring to as The Index. Featuring works as disparate as “A Beautiful Life” from the Western-themed children’s show “Howdy Doody” to the puritanical English choral piece “Abide With Me” and the Pentecostal “Running For My Life” — as well as field recordings muttered to one’s self on the porch in the rain, the index features a variety of tones and sources arranged with my special unhinged panache.

A hymn I found lyrics to but could not find music to,: “O Death Where Is Thy Sting,” left me to compose on my own, as is the case with a few other works here and on “SAVED!” — Blind Willy Johnson’s “I Know His Blood Can Make Me Whole” does not use his music but re-contextualizes his lyrics — draws attention to the complicated history of sacred music, how cultural shifts, oral histories, the advent of recording, systemically forgotten legacies, and appropriation make the origins of so much of this music very difficult to pinpoint; forgotten-ness, a major theme from “SAVED!”. This index also features, for the glossolalia die-hards out there (a small subsection to be sure) the extended version of the tongues recording that appears on “SAVED!” in all its feral weirdness, ending with laughter (??) that I could not control.

Please enjoy. Released February 2nd, 2024, all songs arranged & performed by Kristin Hayter, 

Recorded in Gordon’s native Los Angeles, The Collective follows her 2019 full-length debut “No Home Record” and continues her collaboration with producer Justin Raisen (Lil Yachty, John Cale, Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Charli XCX, Yves Tumor), with additional production from Anthony Paul Lopez. The album advances their joint world building, with Raisin’s damaged, blown out dub and trap constructions playing the foil to Gordon’s intuitive word collages and hooky mantras, which conjure communication, commercial sublimation and sensory overload.

With the release of her second solo album The Collective imminent, Sonic Youth’s former bassist/vocalist . Musician and visual artist Kim Gordon returns with her second solo album, “The Collective“, which will be released March 8th on Matador. Its lead track, “BYE BYE,” is out now, driven by a snaking bassline which guides us through a haunting packing list.

The Collective: There was a space in Kim Gordon’s “No Home Record”. It might not have been a home and it might not have been a record, but I seem to recall there was a space. Boulevards, bedrooms, instruments were played, recorded, the voice and its utterances, straining a way through the rhythms and the chords, threaded in some shared place, we met there, the guitar came too, there fell a peal of cymbals, driving on the music. We listened, we turned our back to the walls, slithered through the city at night. Kim Gordon’s words in our ears, her eyes, she saw, she knew, she remembered, she liked. We were moving somewhere.

Now I’m listening to “The Collective”. And I’m thinking, what has been done to this space, how has she treated it, it’s not here the same way, not quite. I mean, not at all. On this evidence, it splintered, glittered, crashed and burned. It’s dark here. Can I love you with my eyes open? “It’s Dark Inside.” Haunted by synthesized voices bodiless. Planes of projections. Mirrors get your gun and the echo of a well-known tune, comes in liminal, yet never not hanging around, part of the atmosphere, fading in and out, like she says – Grinding at the edges. Grinding at us all, grinding us away. Hurting, scraping. Sediments, layers, of recorded emissions, mined, twisted, refracted.

That makes the music. This shimmering, airless geology, agitated, quarried, cries made in data, bounced down underground tunnels, reaching our ears. We recalled it – but not as a memory, more like how you recall a product, when it’s flawed.

She sings “Shelf Warmer” so it sounds like shelf life, it sounds radioactive, inside our relationships, juddering, the beats chattering, edgy, the pain of love in the gift shop, assembled in hollow booms, in scratching claps. Non-reciprocal gift giving, there is a return policy. But – novel idea – A hand and a kiss. How about that. Disruption. I would say that Kim Gordon is thinking about how thinking is, now. Conceptual artists do that, did that. “I Don’t Miss My Mind.” The record opens with a list, but the list is under the title “BYE BYE.” The list says milk thistle, dog sitter…. And much more. She’s leaving. Why is the list anxious? How divisive is mascara? It’s on the list. I am packing, listening to the list. Is it mine, or hers.She began seeking images from behind her closed eyes. Putting them to music. But I need to keep my eyes open as I walk the streets, with noise cancelled by the airbuds rammed in my ears. quiet, aware, quiet, aware, they chant at me. What could be going through Kim’s head as she goes through mine?