Jesper Lindell was the breakout star of 2017 on the Swedish music scene, when he released his debut EP. Produced by Benkt Söderberg, father and former producer of the world-renowned sister duo First Aid Kit, “Little Less Blue” presented a collection of songs that were equal parts soul, Americana and rock.
Lindell went on to star in the acclaimed show “Who by Fire”, a tribute concert to Leonard Cohen organized by First Aid Kit at the Royal Dramatic Theatre in Stockholm, where Lindell performed the Cohen classic “Chelsea Hotel #2”.
Jesper Lindell’s enticing debut album Everyday Dreams (out November 29th via Alive Naturalsound Records) is a clever mixture of rock, folk, blues and soul, performed by a 26 year old musician in love with classic pop, Stax-Volt R&B, and that old time rock & roll. The album finds the young guitarist/pianist/songwriter delivering an intimate collections of songs that could have been recorded in the late sixties. This is modern classic rock music, and hearts full of soul will fall in love.
“Stormy Waters”, one of the main singles on the new album. The song is a groovy nugget of throwback soulful rock and roll. Lindell showcases a voice that is completely original and well-suited to lead a band. Speaking of band, his conjures a subtle yet powerful sound, letting the music ebb and flow around the singer’s emotive vocals and the catchy choruses and harmonies. With its stomping piano and revelatory lyrics that feel like Lindell conquering life’s challenges,
Lindell shares his own story behind the song:
“When I wrote ‘Stormy Waters’ I was signed to one of the larger record labels in Sweden. I had just been to a meeting with the label and had played some of my demos, and the head of the company didn’t like any of them. And I remember feeling like a shipwreck when I got home. And that’s when I wrote ‘Stormy Waters.’ Though the song is not about that meeting. It’s about that feeling. And holding onto something that’s dragging you down. The songs I played for him turned out to be my debut album Everyday Dreams.”
Foals are releasing two albums this year: Everything Not Saved Will Be Lost – Part 1 came out in March and Everything Not Saved Will Be Lost – Part 2 is due out October 18th, both via Warner Records.
Now they have shared a video for Part 2’s “The Runner.” Quentin Deronzier directed the cinematic clip, in which frontman Yannis Philippakis fights his doppelgänger (played by Vincent Heneine), including battling in and out of paintings. Previously Foals shared Everything Not Saved Will Be Lost – Part 2’s first three singles: “Black Bull” (via a video for the track), “The Runner,” and “Into the Surf.” They also released a remix album, Everything Not Saved Will Be Lost – Part 1: Remixes,featuring Metronomy and others.
Everything Not Saved Will Be Lost – Part 1 was among the nominees for the Mercury Prize . Previously Foals shared a cinematic video for Part 1’s first single, “Exits” a video for “On the Luna,” and a lyric video for “Sunday” . Then once the album was released album track “In Degrees” . Then the band shared videos for Part 1’s “WhiteOnions,” “Cafe D’Athens,” “In Degrees,” and “Sunday.”
The albums are the follow-up to 2015’s What Went Down. Philippakis produced the albums, which were recorded at 123 Studios in Peckham, London with the help of engineer Brett Shaw. The band also features Jimmy Smith (guitar), Jack Bevan (drums), and Edwin Congreave (keys).
In a previous press release Philippakis had this to say about releasing two albums: “They’re two halves of the same locket. They can be listened to and appreciated individually, but fundamentally, they are companion pieces.”
Philippakis said that the albums do address the environmental crisis our planet faces. “There’s a definite idea about the world being no longer habitable in the way that it was,” he said. “A kind of perilousness lack of predictability and a feeling of being overwhelmed by the magnitudes of the problems we face. What’s the response? And what’s the purpose of any response that one individual can have?”
Philippakis added: “Lyrically, there are resonances with what’s going on in the world at the moment. I just feel like, what’s the utility of being a musician these days, if you can’t engage with at least some of this stuff? These songs are white flags, or they’re SOSs, or they’re cries for help… each in a different way.”
Iggy Pop has shared the official video for his new single ‘Loves Missing’ – Taken from his new record ‘Free”.
The song features on the iconic musician’s new album, ‘Free‘, which was released last month. Following on from 2016’s ‘Post Pop Depression’, the record also contains the songs ‘James Bond‘ and ‘Sonali’.
Over the weekend (September 29), Iggy Pop unveiled the minimal visuals for his latest offering. Focusing on the singer as he performs in front of a black backdrop, the clip – directed by Simon Taylor – includes footage of a woman browsing through records at Miami’s Sweat Records shop.
“Loves Missing” Iggy Pop – Vocal Aaron Nevezie – Guitar, Bass Leron Thomas – Trumpet, Keys Chris Berry – Drums
Bruce Springsteen’s feature-length directorial debut, “Western Stars” opens in movie theaters on October 25th (after limited early screenings on the 19th and 23rd). In the movie, Springsteen performs all the songs from his latest album in his hundred-year-old barn. Springsteen said that the point of the film, which also includes new interviews and archival footage, was to “to get some of the music live to an audience.”
Springsteen was backed by a band and full orchestra for this performance, which took place at Stone Hill Farm in Colts Neck, N.J. He called that the perfect setting during the Western Stars premiere at the 2019 Toronto International Film Festival.
“I think ending up in the barn had a lot to do with the way the thing felt, you know?” Springsteen said. “It was just kind of gritty and intimate. It was very intimate, which is what a lot of the songs are.”
“The [2018] album and the film are both about this fading Western movie B-level star who’s looking back on his life and the decisions he’s made,” said Cameron Bailey, artistic director of the Toronto International Film Festival where the movie debuted. “That narrative and that character shape all the songs. In between the songs, you’ve got Bruce really talking about this character he invented, the story he wrote for the character, and how it reflects back on his own life as he ages and other kind of narratives he’s had in his previous albums.”
Now, the music from the film can be enjoyed outside of the cinema.
On October 25th, Springsteen will release Western Stars: Songs From the Film. It features the live versions of all 13 songs from the album, plus a rousing cover of Glen Campbell’s “Rhinestone Cowboy.” The audio was mixed by Bob Clearmountain and mastered by Bob Ludwig, the same duo behind Springsteen on Broadway.
Bruce Springsteen, “Western Stars: Songs From the Film” (Columbia, 2019)
Deerhunter’s Bradford Cox and Cate Le Bon were artists in residence at 2018’s Marfa Myths festival, and the collaboration led to Cate co-producing the new Deerhunter album, “Why Hasn’t Everything Already Disappeared?.” That album came out earlier this year, followed a few months later by the new Cate Le Bon album Reward, and now Cate and Bradford Cox are releasing a collaborative EP for the Marfa Myths record series, Myths 004, on November 1st via Mexican Summer Records.
The songs for the EP were created and recorded from scratch over the course of a week at Marfa Myths. “Writing and recording in a week is a tall order – especially when such chemistry exists between all the musicians involved, and the possibilities are boundless,” Le Bon says. “We committed ourselves to embracing the chaos, surrendering to all moments and moods that travelled through. It’s a crude holiday scrapbook shared by all involved, an amalgamation of the changes in mood and light that shaped the days.”
The first single is the melancholic “Secretary” which details a humdrum life behind a desk and doesn’t seem miles away from the music Cate made on this year’s Reward, and includes some spoken word from Bradford. It’s cool stuff, as you can hear for yourself below.
The EP features contributions from Stella Mozgawa of Warpaint, Stephen Black of Sweet Baboo, Tim Presley of White Fence, and Samur Khouja. There’s also a new mini-documentary by Eli Welbourne, Have a Seat, which “[chronicles] Le Bon’s furniture building residency during Marfa Myths 2019″ and also features Bradford,
As sure as if it had been mapped in the stars, or written in a prophecy buried deep beneath the sands of the marfa desert, a collaboration between Cate le Bon and Bradford Cox was always something of an inevitability.
Fourth in Mexican Summer’s Myths ep series (and following previous tie-ups between Dev Hynes and Connan Mockasin, Ariel Pink and Weyes Blood, and Dungen and Woods), Myths 004 sees Cate le Bon and Bradford Cox–each a much-revered musical innovator in their own right–finally united. for both artists, Myths 004 signals a change of tack: meticulousness thrown to the wind as spontaneous, jammy tales of firemen and 5p plastic bags, unbrushed hair and shoelessness and makeup-daubed landscapes–all miraculously written and recorded in just one week– roll effortlessly off their cuffs. though this ep materialises after two individual 2019 album campaign.
Le Bon’s mercury nominated fifth album reward, and Cox’s eighth with his band Deerhunter,“Why Hasn’t Everything Already Disappeared?” (which Le Bon co-produced)–the chronologies are tangled: Myths 004 is in fact a snapshot of the pair’s very first meeting. after years of admiring each other’s work from afar, Cox and Le Bon finally converged on Marfa, Texas in 2018, at Mexican Summer’s annual Marfa myths music, visual art, and film festival.
“Marfa is an extraordinary town,” says Le Bon. “it feels like nothing else exists when you’re in it which is both comforting and unnerving.” in this otherworldly enclave, and with a band of frequent Cate le Bon co-conspirators on hand to putty the gaps with drums, saxophone, percussion, keys, and additional guitar (Stella Mozgawa of Warpaint, Stephen Black of Sweet Baboo, and Samur Khouja), the ep was assembled whiplash-quick. “writing and recording in a week is a tall order – especially when such chemistry exists between all the musicians involved, and the possibilities are boundless,” Le Bon explains. “we committed ourselves to embracing the chaos, surrendering to all moments and moods that travelled through. it’s a crude holiday scrapbook shared by all involved, an amalgamation of the changes in mood and light that shaped the days.” indeed, myths 004 is wondrous in its variety. on the opening song “Canto!”, Cox dons the illfitting leathers of an ageing biker and urges us to come ride with him, baby. he and Le Bon gaze into one another’s eyes with semi-serious sweetness as tough, wiry guitars stab through the romance. everything shrinks and softens on the ep’s sole single, the gently melancholic “Secretary,” as Le Bon and Cox spout verse over a mysterious percussive rhythm; perhaps made by miniature cymbals from a mantric parade.,
Cate and Deerhunter will also be on tour together in the UK in November ahead of their appearances at Le Guess Who? in the Netherlands,
Later this year, Pink Floyd will release “The Later Years”. Due November 29th, the massive box set collects the iconic rockers’ post-Roger Waters work, including rare live recordings and previously unreleased tracks. As the title suggests, this version of High Hopes is an early version of the song and features an electric guitar solo and slightly different lyrics.
Today we get to hear one of those unreleased offerings, as Pink Floyd have shared an early demo version of “High Hopes” off 1994’sThe Division Bell. “High Hopes” originally closed out The Division Bell, and actually features the title lyric. This newly revealed demo version of the track has some distinct differences in the level mixing, with David Gilmour’s vocals riding high alongside the ringing piano. Most notably, drums appear to be almost entirely absent, interestingly giving it a heavier, more ominous feel.
Among the other highlights featured The Later Years is a new version of 1987’s A Momentary Lapse of Reason. It utilizes freshly restored keyboard tracks from Richard Wright and completely new drums from Nick Mason. The box is filled out with a number of live albums, concert films, and more previously unreleased rarities.
Included on ‘The Later Years’, a 16-disc box set (5xCDs, 6xBlu-Rays, 5xDVDs) covering the material created by David Gilmour, Nick Mason and Richard Wright from 1987 onwards, with unreleased audio and audiovisual material, including the 1989 Venice and 1990 Knebworth concerts, as well as updated, restored and remixed audio and video, 2 x 7” singles, 60-page hardback Photo Book, 40-page hardback Credits Book, Lyrics Book, 3 x reproduction tour programmes, card envelope containing collectible memorabilia, plus Blu-rays and DVDs in individual wallets. Release date is 29th November 2019, with a 12-track ‘Highlights’ package (2-LP or 1-CD) available on the same day.
The Hold Steady had three different focal points – guitarist Tad Kubler was a classic rock riff machine, emulating the bar band rock of Thin Lizzy. Vocalist Craig Finn was inspired by hip hop, weaving interlocking narratives of Catholic teenagers in sin and redemption in Minneapolis. Keyboardist Franz Nicolay added an extra layer to their sound, his piano and organ drawing comparisons to Springsteen’s E Street Band.
Between 2004 and 2006, the Hold Steady released three albums “Almost Killed Me, Separation Sunday”, and “Boys and Girls in America” that set a different standard for what indie rock could sound like. When their Brooklyn peers were mining postpunk and dance music, the Hold Steady channeled Springsteen, Thin Lizzy and ‘70s hard rock radio to back Finn’s bleeding heart missives about bad girlfriends and boring boyfriends, summer beers with your best friends, lovers who were bad news, kids getting high by the river and waking up in different cities. There was nothing like his voice, either; he sounded like someone nursing the world’s worst head cold while trying to talk through a mouthful of margarita mix. On top of kick-ass guitar riffs, he invented an entire universe in a ubiquitous speak-sing cadence with the persistence of a drunk stranger yelling a story at you.
The Hold Steady peaked with three great records in the 2000s; 2005’s Seperation Sunday featured their densest narratives, 2006’s Boys and Girls in America was their most accessible, while 2008’s Stay Positive was their most eclectic. Nicolay left the band before 2010’s Teeth Dreams, and without Nicolay, and as Finn moved from shouting to singing, they lost some of their identity and critics started comparing them disparagingly to Weezer and Counting Crows.
Originally together in Lifter Puller, vocalist Craig Finn and guitarist Tab Kubler were inspired to form The Hold Steady while watching The Band’s The Last Waltz. Kubler plays classic rock inspired riffs while Finn spits out dense lyrics inspired by hip hop, interweaving stories about sex, drugs, and Catholicism. Almost Killed Me is a strong debut, but in light of what follows it feels like a rough draft – Finn’s narratives would become even more complex and the band’s sounds both became more complex.
Their 2004 debut album, Almost Killed Me, sounds like the E Street Band after they slipped into the gutter, Thin Lizzy if they got fat and American, and a hundred other bands from Southside Johnny to the early-’70s Kinks that liked to party, but did it with the occasional tear-filled eyes and desperate hearts. Like the best of these classic rock staples, the Hold Steady can flat out rock. Kubler can rip off a fret-searing solo with bullfighter style, which he does quite frequently, and the rhythm section has enough muscle power to stop a speeding locomotive. On top of this vintage rock chassis, the band drop Finn’s vocals and vision. Without him, the music is straightforward enough to appeal to the AOR masses and backstreet fanatics; with him they are far too weird and wild. His pop culture name-drops, knowing references to obscure musicians like Andre Cymone, real-sounding tales of the streets, and flights of knuckle-busting anger are far out in left field, and his bracing, eye-bulging delivery of said lyrics pushes it even further over the top. It’s a high-wire balancing act of sorts, and it would be easy for the band to topple over into boring mainstream rock cliches or veer into embarrassing drunken poetry territory but it never happens, not even once. The group plays with intense energy at all times, propping Finn up and giving his words the dramatic backdrop they deserve. Finn holds up his end of the bargain by being hilarious and oddly touching as he rambles, coughs, and shouts his way through what sounds like a lifetime of journal entries, inside jokes, and record store soliloquies.
Franz Nicolay only guests on a few tracks here, but his keyboards would beef up their sound on future releases. The strongest tracks include ‘Knuckles’, with its repetitive lyrical formula (eg. “I’ve been trying to get people to call me Freddie Mercury/But people keep calling me Drop Dead Fred”, and ‘Certain Songs’, which still feels like a prototype for later piano based Hold Steady tracks.
Almost Killed Me is a strong debut, but at the same time it’s like a rough sketch for The Hold Steady’s future releases.
Separation Sunday notches up everything from the excellent start of Almost Killed Me; The Hold Steady’s arrangements are more muscular and detailed, with Franz Nicolay as a full-time member on keyboards, while CraigFinn’s lyrics tell fragments of inter-weaved narratives. Thematically dense, Separation Sunday revolves around four characters: the narrator Craig, the pimp Charlemagne, the skinhead Gideon, and Holly/Hallelujah, who veers between faith, addiction, and prostitution.
While a lot of the appeal of Separation Sunday comes from Craig Finn’s intertwining stories, there’s plenty of musical punch here too. Separation Sunday though. It is a much darker record, revolving around drug casualties, broken lives, a hoodrat fixation, spiritual and physical dissipation, and general despair, and there aren’t as many easy laughs this time out — but instead the listener gets lots of head-shaking wonderment at Craig Finn’s genius lyrics and voice. His gruff, in-your-ear vocals negotiate the twisting torrent of words like a world-class skater kid. He is insanely literate and insanely insistent: he is strangely brilliant. He is also just about the best rock & roll frontman Whipping up a classic rock-inspired frenzy of monitor-straddling guitar riffs, dual harmony leads, E Street piano flourishes, and galloping horns, the band behind Finn sounds like nothing less than Jim Steinman’s dream group. You could talk about great individual songs (the epic “How a Resurrection Really Feels,” the piledriving album opener “Hornets! Hornets!,” the weird and almost funky “Charlemagne in Sweatpants”), but the strength of the album is in the flow from song to song and the way the intensity level (which starts off at a near fever pitch) elevates until your head is just about ready to burst from the thrill of it all. Call it a quaint idea in 2005, but Separation Sunday is truly an album, one that sounds almost perfect when played from beginning to end in the proper running order. Block out about 42 minutes sometime, hold steady, and get ready for indie rock — no, rock & roll — at its sweatiest, most intense, and most impressive.
The most immediate track here is perhaps ‘Your Little Hoodrat Friend’, with its rhythmic guitar fills and powerful organ backdrops. As Finn is largely talk singing, Kubler is free to play almost anything, and the riff that fuels ‘Stevie Nix’ is both brutal and intricate. The record climaxes with the double punch of the short mournful ‘Crucifixion Cruise’ and the celebratory ‘How A Resurrection Really Feels’, which bounces along with an optimistic horn line.
Separation Sunday is fascinating; all the literary and classic rock allusions make it fodder for aging music critics, but it’s accessible all the same, although you might want to start with the more conventional next record.
Boys And Girls In America is more accessible than its predecessors, with Craig Finn employing vocal melodies on many of the tracks, while the band’s approach is less brutal and is reminiscent of the E-Street band in their prime. Some of Separation Sunday’s characters make return appearances (“Charlemagne pulls street corner scams/Gideon’s got a pipe made from a Pringles can/Holly’s insatiable/She still looks incredible”), while Finn’s still endlessly quotable (“We started recreational/It ended up all medical/It came on hot and soft and then/It tightened up its tentacles”).
One of the ballads here, “First Night,” begins with a piano and an acoustic guitar lilting a rather loose melody that gives Craig Finn the support he needs to get out of his pent-up, novelistic, wordsmithing mouth. All of these characters are young, desperate, and fleeing from their inner fear, except for Holly who is wise enough to tell the protagonist that “words alone never could save us”….and then “cried when she told us about Jesus.” The piano fills out that unfillable hole in Holly and the rest, no matter where they run. Finn can do nothing but repeat his lines and find a last verse somewhere to let the song just fade into silence, because it never really ends. Boys and Girls in America is a sophisticated shambles. There’s still a barely-on-the-rail feel, despite the literate compositions. Finn’s always either behind or ahead of the beat, but it’s alright, his bandmates can more than handle that because they’re as engaged as he is. There are a few guests, and even a horn section on one track, and the classic girl group chorus call and response . There’s real sadness in the Wall of Sound and chanted chorus in “You Can Make Him Like You,” which examines everything from addiction to betrayal, to the insecurity in love that can push someone over the edge, never to return. Thin Lizzy makes a return on “Massive Nights,” complete with roiling bass as Finn opens the whole escapist mix, swinging and setting up a hedonist’s dream: “The guys were feeling good about their liquor run…” There are low expectations and drama where only the music counts. The tune turns back on itself when the singer is trying to convince himself and the huge, wailing, responsorial chorus, that something so utterly suburban could be cool, until “She had the gun in her mouth/She was shooting up at her dreams/When the chaperone said that/We’d been crowned/the king and the queen.” And it just ends. The reason this record is worth embracing, and even celebrating, is because it’s an honest to God rock & roll album. It exposes in the first and third person what it means to grow up right now in the midst of suburban waste. It’s angsty, but Finn’s got a sense of humor, and the band can play their asses off. That they so readily embrace rock history as a means of unfolding Finn’s stories suggests that “cool” and “indie” are simply terms in the larger dialogue. This is a smoking little record.
Boys And Girls In America is one of the most instantly visceral rock records of its decade; ‘First Night’ is a pretty piano ballad for most of its duration, until it switches gears into a torrent of guitars and some of Finn’s most incisive lyrics. ‘Southtown Girls’ builds from a single a capella vocal into another tour de force, while ‘Citrus’ never raises its pulse above a simple acoustic lament (“Lost in fog and love and faithless fear/I’ve had kisses that make Judas seem sincere). Meanwhile, the trio of rockers that open the record are all incredible, with Nicolay fluidly filling the gaps between Kubler’s propulsive riffs.
In some ways Separation Sunday is the more interesting, unique album, but when Boys And Girls In America hits full flight, it’s amazingly compelling.
Stay Positive is a worthy sequel to Boys and Girls in America. Lyrically it has Craig Finn’s usual themes, but it’s less dense than before, and it also feels like a love letter to rock music; they’re referencing The Clash and Hüsker Dü in the opening ‘Constructive Summer’, while Led Zeppelin are referenced on ‘Joke About Jamaica’.
Musically, The Hold Steady are exploring similar territory to Boys and Girls in America – again there’s a big piano ballad at track 5, this time with an epic guitar solo (‘Lord I’m Discouraged’), and again there’s a great song at the end with the propulsive ‘Slapped Actress’. The weaker tracks are the most sonically adventurous – ‘One For The Cutters’ rides Franz Nicolay’s harpsichord, while ‘Navy Sheets’ is built around a synth riff, but neither is particularly interesting beyond the lyrics. The bonus track ‘Two Handed Handshake’ is also noteworthy.
The Hold Steady have lost even more of their edge on Stay Positive, but the material here is mostly great.
After that virtuosic run of albums, the Hold Steady released the very good Stay Positive in 2008, capitalizing on their newfound status as the most righteous band in indie rock. (I mean, look at that title.) What happened next was, by the band’s account, a little trying. A European tour was canceled on the eve of setting out because of Kubler’s bout with pancreatitis. After putting out four albums in five years, the band found themselves pushing harder to complete out the next. “It was rushed,” Kubler says of the 2010 release, Heaven is Whenever. “Not everybody was on the same page, and I don’t think there was a lot of communication. Longtime keyboardist Franz Nicolay, whose contributions were crucial to the sweeping melodrama of Separation Sunday and Boys and Girls in America, left during the making of Heaven is Whenever,
Four years passed between that record and Teeth Dreams—longer than it took for the first three albums to come out. In between, Finn recorded a solo album and the band added a new guitarist, Steve Selvidge, which allowed Finn to drop the pretense of being a guitar player. (During the show, he will play without one—usually, one would just dangle untouched around his neck like a dead limb.) Selvidge joined during the Heaven is Whenevertour, and helped write the music for Teeth Dreams. You can hear his influence in the guitar interplay, which is the most nuanced of the band’s career.
Nicolay rejoined The Hold Steady in 2016. Thrashing Thru the Passion is their first album since his return, and it’s been hailed as a return to form. It clocks in at a brief thirty six minutes, and it feels less conceptually ambitious than their early records, a collection of songs rather than a grand statement. The second half of the album will be already familiar to fans, already released as advance singles.
Craig Finn had this to say, It’s our 7th LP, Thrashing Thru The Passion, is out . It’s our first album with the six piece lineup of The Hold Steady, and our first in five years! We are very proud of it. Lots of people deserve thanks for major contributions to the project.
Producer Josh Kaufman helped us a ton and made the sessions super fun. Annie Nero gave us some amazing vocals. Horns were expertly provided by Stuart Bogie, Jordan McLean, Dave Nelson and Michael Leonhart.
One of our oldest friends Dave Gardner mastered the record. Nick Hollomon created the fantastic art for this and all the preceding singles. Frenchkiss Records was kind enough to put it out into the world. We raise a glass to all of these folks. We will continue celebrating this release two more nights in Seattle, and then on to Chicago, Nashville, and Boston. Thanks for listening, Thanks for understanding. Stay Positive!
Despite the lack of thematic weight, Thrashing Thru the Passion is fast-moving and fun. Finn’s still playing with words, throwing in rapid-fire cultural references like this couplet from opener ‘Denver Haircut’. Elsewhere the band sound great, whether they’re crunching rock and roll like ‘Confusion in the Marketplace’ and ‘Star 18’, or drifting closer to Van Morrison territory than you might expect with Nicolay’s classy piano and horns of ‘Blackout Sam’.
It doesn’t feel as significant as their earlier masterpieces, but Thrashing Thru The Passion is a tight, fun record that captures more of The Hold Steady’s past glories than you might expect.
Pendant is the new project of Oakland based Christopher Adams (calculator, Never Young, Dye). ‘Through A Coil’ is the debut full-length album from Pendant. The album was recorded and mixed by Melina Duterte of Jay Som. ‘Through A Coil’ will release on Tiny Engines in November of 2019. formerly of the noisy rock band Never Young. In a couple months, he’ll release his debut album, Through A Coil, which was recorded with Jay Som’s Melina Duterte.
He’s sharing its title track, a fuzzy blowout that rips and roars and takes over your entire head as Adams’ voice peeks through the layers with spiritualistic mantras: “Oh, the lives we never live/ And the ones we have to come/ Sing and weep concurrently/ In rotation through a coil.” – Stereogum
“Recorded by Melina Duterte of Jay Som fame, Pendant melds tender songwriting with an atmosphere that plunges the listener right in to the heart of the compositions…a muted display of guitar-pop, laced with a poignancy that becomes more prevalent with each passing, somewhat faded hook.” – Gold Flake Paint
Pendant is the project of Christopher Adams (calculator, Never Young, Dye). Through A Coil is the debut full-length album from Pendant. Recorded and mixed by Melina Duterte of Jay Som.
The album will release on Tiny Engines in November of 2019.
House of Sugar – (Sandy) Alex G’s ninth overall album and his third for Domino – is a highly meticulous, cohesive album: a statement of artistic purpose, showing off his ear for both persistent earworms and sonic adventurism.
At the southern tip of Philadelphia’s Fishtown neighborhood, there’s an imposing structure on the Delaware River that somehow looks equal parts parking garage, hospital and convention center. The building is none of these things, but it’s just as overwhelming as each one of them. It houses Sugar House Casino, a dystopian abyss of colorful images leaping forth from slot machines and laser-bright ceiling lights hovering over card tables where gamblers can earn $150 in blackjack, lose it and swear off gambling forever (which may or may not have happened to this writer). Philly resident (Sandy) Alex G’s newest album, House of Sugar, his third for storied label DominoRecordings (and eighth or ninth overall, depending on who you ask), is named for this casino.
As unsettling as its namesake, the newest record from Alex Giannascoli at times improves on the inscrutable, circuitous experimentation of his Domino debut, Beach Music. At other times, it refines the accessible but still characteristically sauntering country-lite of Rocket, his masterful second album for the British indie label. In other words, House of Sugar sounds like a middle ground between the two albums that preceded it.
“Hope” appears on (Sandy) Alex G’s new album ‘House of Sugar’ – out September 13, 2019 on Domino Recordings.
“Gretel” appears on (Sandy) Alex G’s new album ‘House of Sugar’ – out September 1th3, 2019 on Domino Recordings.
“Southern Sky” appears on (Sandy) Alex G’s new album ‘House of Sugar’ – out September 13, 2019 on Domino Recordings.
House of Sugar, the new album from (Sandy) Alex G. Out September 13th on Domino Record Co.
Vivian Girls are returning to a music world far different from the misogynistic melee that met them on the Internet prior to their 2014 breakup. The biggest names in alternative music these days include a roster of formidable women Mistki, Angel Olsen, Snail Mail, the list goes on. This doesn’t mean that the sexism which dogged Vivian Girls has been purged from indie and DIY scenes—far from it—but being a give-no-fucks band made up of women is thankfully no longer the anomaly it once was. Vivian Girls inspired groups like Potty Mouth to take to the stage, and now the punk trio find themselves in a community much more welcoming than before, in no small part due to their influence. That said, their new album, Memory, is a perfectly adequate addition to the band’s discography: Neither a huge departure from their earlier work (much of it is reminiscent of their moody sophomore LP Everything Goes Wrong) nor a disappointment to their legacy. Vivian Girls’ haunting three-part harmonies remain a mainstay of their sound, nearly droning on opener “Most of All,” but light and airy on later tracks like “Your Kind of Life” and “Lonely Girl.” Many of the LP’s dozen tracks are drenched in a darkness that has always permeated Vivian Girls’ songs, and is fitting considering the album’s sobering subject matter, from toxic relationships to mental health
“Something To Do” is taken from Vivian Girls‘ new full length album, “Memory”, out September 20, 2019.
