Melbourne scratchy pop favourites The Stevens reveal “Pulling All The Facts Together”, the second single from their simply titled new album Good.
First single Chancer was premiered on NPR last month, and now “Pulling All The Facts Together”, calling it “a song that brims with harmonies and pop smarts. What’s more, Good is now available via the Chapter Music webstore, Bandcamp . The album came out on July 14th on vinyl, CD and digital,
Good picks up where the Stevens’ 2014 debut A History Of Hygiene left off – 18 short songs, alternately frenetic or laconic, packed with twists and hooks that merge lo-fi outsider songcraft with 70s prog wizardry and classic rock swagger.
Gemma Thompson, perhaps best known for her work in British rock band Savages, is one of the most inventive guitarists of her generation. In performance, she can be seen wrestling her instrument with the kind of looseness that comes from having complete faith in her ability; her style is a delicate tangle of feedback, reverb, and ostinato. In Savages, her guitar leads are threaded together with her bandmates on bass, vocal, and drums to form structured rock ‘n’ roll songs. But her most recent experiments with sound have freed her from those constraints.
In a studio and at her apartment in Leipzig, Germany this past summer, Thompson spent several months experimenting with different guitar frequencies, with the goal of letting the sounds lead the songwriting. She wanted to find an audible way to describe landscapes, using the way it travels to represent different physical formations: cliffs, rocks, waves. The results of these experiments, recorded with her partner Sam Sherry of the band A DeadForest Index, are presented as four unique compositions, written as complementary to one another. They offer a journey into the mind of an artist who’s passionate about finding new ways to interpret sound.
For Bashan—EP1, Thompson took cues from several projects she’d recorded with Savages, as well as a film score she was asked to record for a documentary about Dennis Hopper. Using those as a launching pad, she set about to create something she wanted to listen to, that also reflected her desire to expand the scope of her work.
A Quality of Mercy is the debut album from Melbourne band RVG—an acronym for “Romy Vager Group,” honoring namesake singer-songwriter, Romy Vager. The album was self-released quietly in early 2017, and is full of songs that are imaginative, passionate, and witty. Sometimes they’re sad and raw, too. But at their core, all of the songs—which are inspired by bands like Echo and The Bunnymen and The Go-Betweens. The LP is an eight-track collection of tight, incisive post-punk/retro-pop infused with a liberal dose of downcast catharsis, confessional lyrics and downright infectious hooks.
The roots of the music on A Quality of Mercy began taking shape when Vager moved to Melbourne from the South Australian city of Adelaide in 2004. She was 17 at the time, and she hadn’t come out as transgender yet.
“I’d just started dating someone, a friend from high school, and I said to them, ‘Do you want to move to Melbourne?’ And a week later, we were in Melbourne. I spent probably five years after that just trying to keep afloat, in varying degrees of poverty.
While A Quality of Mercy touches on the challenges of being trans, Vager says it’s not a strong theme as much as “an underlying current. A lot of the songs were about re-evaluating things and moving things about.” She refers to a line in Rowland S. Howard’s 1999 song “Dead Radio”: “‘What to ignite and what to extinguish’—I had that running through my head,” she says. All the songs are striking in their own way, and Vager certainly hadn’t anticipated their positive reception.
The Grease Band was formed in 1966 and probably the most well-known backing group of the late 1960s backing Joe Cocker admired by critics and rival musicians on both sides of the Atlantic, they emerged to a brief flurry of activity in their own right at the start of the ’70s, as well as backing Marianne Faithfull in her first significant solo work of the ’70s.
The original line-up underwent several changes over the ensuing years. They appeared with Cocker during the 1960s, including his performance at the Woodstock Festival in August 1969. After Cocker formed the Mad Dogs & Englishmen band, the group released two albums without him in the 1970s.
Henry McCullough (guitar), Alan Spenner (bass) and Bruce Rowlands (drums) joined Chris Stainton in the group’s best-known incarnation, but this unit split from Cocker in 1970 at the end of an arduous American tour. Spenner, Rowlands and McCullough were then joined by guitarist Neil Hubbard as the Grease Band embarked on an independent career.
The group’s brand of blues-rock was perfectly captured on their debut album released in April 1971 and they enjoyed a reputation as an exciting live attraction. Signed to EMI’s progressive label Harvest the band fitted in well with the burgeoning UK country rock scene. Stainton remained an associate member, although Mick Weaver, aka WynderK. Frog, subsequently augmented the line-up. John ‘Pugwash’ Weathers came in for the defecting Rowlands, but the band broke up in December 1971 when McCullough joinedWings
Alan Spenner and rhythm guitarist Neil Hubbard went on to play in the UK white soul band Kokomo, while Drummer Bruce Rowland later joined Fairport Convention.
Rowland, Spenner, Hubbard and McCullough all played on the original 1970 soundtrack recording of Jesus Christ Superstar. But even 40 years later, the mention of the Grease Band still brings flashes of recognition to those aware of Woodstock, or the original Jesus Christ, Superstar, or that second Joe Cocker album, and their debut record is still available on CD in the 21st century.
Tim Darcy had a great solo album in 2017. It’s nice to see him back so soon in 2018 with a new LP by the whole band. The follow-up 2015’s solid Sun Coming Down was recorded at Rare Book Room in Brooklyn with producer Nicolas Vernhes (Deerhunter, Animal Collective). Along with the usual instruments, vibraphone, drum machines, a 70-piece choir, and “justly intonated synthesizers” were employed in the studio, as the Canadian post-punks explored themes of “identity, connection, survival in a precarious world.”
Our first taste of Room comes with lead single “These 3 Things” and its corresponding music video, which features mannequins and a host of random objects like leaf blowers and a dirt bike. Directors Jonny Look (Grizzly Bear, Cloud Nothings) and Scottie Cameron talked about the visual in a statement:
“Life can be problematic. Everything takes time and energy. We challenged ourselves to create devices of great inconvenience using three items. When initially testing the convenience machines without the human variable, we discovered luxury and success. However, it was sterile. The beauty only came with the unpredictable moments brought by the human element. Being human is better than looking for an easy way out.”
Though it was essentially an salvaged outtake from their abandoned sophomore full length record, “Of The City” hinted at a brand new direction from the orchestral pop sextet Young Dreams. Though it made use of organs and strings, there was a reliance on synths and they were utilized far differently than they were on the band’s debut Between Places. And when they released r&b tinged single “Sinner (I’m Sorry)” earlier this year, the potential direction of their new album was once again up in the air.
“Cells” however finds the band at a sound that is perhaps far more sustainable for a full record. Another indicator that the band has largely left behind the symphonic layering that defined much of their debut, instead “Cells” finds Young Dreams drawing closer to those psych rock grooves that inspired them do a Tame Impala rework. But unlike “Sinner”, the musical direction doesn’t seem as far of a leap away from their original sound than it ends up being. “Cells” certainly doesn’t lack for experimentation but elaborates more on the band’s previous ventures in tropicalia and psychedelica. “Cells” is a laid back soak in the sun very in line with Young Dreams‘ normal sun-kissed musical escapism but is much more than a traipse down Young Dreams sounds past. Much like how the titual “Young Dreams”/”Flight 376” and “Expectations”/”Dream alone, wake together” singles informed the direction of Between Places, those same building blocks serve as a sort of alternate timeline here. One that relies more on the band’s immediately presentable skills than in Matias Tellez’s incredible production talents. Not that Tellez’s production is missing on “Cells” but unlike “Sinner” and even “Of The City”, they’re reigned in and honed in a bit more. Though Tellez utilizes a number of percussive effects and samples as well as synths, they’re treated with a lighter touch than the previous singles. Also Rune Vandaskog’s vocals remain largely untouched by effects unlike the persistent autotune that they were run through before.
“Cells” is a picture of a subtler Young Dreams. Where Between Places captured these incredible emotional reflections and paired them with grand arrangements and intricate layers, “Cells” finds a bit of a balance between what the band can accomplish live and what works in the studio. It’s the first song (and potentially the only one that’ll actually be on the upcoming sophomore record) that you can actually imagine the band playing live even as it dips into it’s electronic moments.
“Cells” is an incredibly catchy work of pristinely plotted psych-infused pop and one that highlights just what makes Young Dreams work so well as a unit. They don’t need orchestral flourishes to define them; what they have instead is an tight-knit precision and a pursuit of sounds and colors that make their hometown of Bergen sound a little brighter.
Young Dreams are back with their new single “Cells” taken from their sophomore album “Waves 2 You” which will be released January 12th via Blanca Records thanks all-aroundsound.blogspot
A young punk and a green giant hit the road in the goofy yet poignant new video for the War on Drugs‘ “Nothing to Find.” The track appears on the Philadelphia outfit’s new album, A Deeper Understanding.
Still riding the momentum from the recent release of their acclaimed fourth album A Deeper Understanding, The War on Drugs have shared the video for “Nothing to Find,” starring young actress Sophia Lillis (of IT fame), who embarks on a road trip with some sort of plant covered alien and car. Throughout the journey, Lillis’ character tries to keep her mate trimmed and watered, but no amount of care can stave off the inevitable march of nature. As the sun falls, the green giant – many of his leaves now brown – collapses to the ground. When Lillis’ character wakes up the next morning, her partner has returned to the earth, leaving a lone branch in her arms.
‘A Deeper Understanding,’ the new album from The War On Drugs, available now.
I’m Nai Palm, singer, songwriter, musician and frontwoman of Hiatus Kaiyote Songwriter, vocalist and guitarist from Hiatus Kaiyote. A sonic seer, based in Melbourne, Australia.. I’ll be releasing my solo, debut album, Needle Paw, on October 20 on Sony Masterworks. This record is a very personal leap into the deep end. I wanted to make something with no landmarks to hide behind and no team to fall back on.
The ridiculously talented Hiatus Kaiyote frontwoman is stepping out with her solo debut, Needle Paw, which strips away much of the band’s lush future-soul instrumentation in favor of a guitar and a voice. Watch her cover Jimi Hendrix’s “Have You Ever Been (To Electric Ladyland).”
Nai Palm – Electric Ladyland Recorded Live: 10/5/2017 – Paste Studios – New York, NY
Sketches Of Brunswick East is King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard 3rd album of five in 2017 and a collaboration with LA’s Mild High Club. Just when you think you have King Gizzard and The Lizard Wizard sussed they throw a curveball – in the wake of two albums released in 2017 already, including most recently the dystopian end-times concept album Murder Of The Universe, which tackled in no uncertain terms the rise of robots and the downfall of mankind, comes Sketches Of Brunswick East, an entirely altered beast. Australia’s finest and most productive rock band have done this before, of course: while the world was still reeling from their 2014 breakthrough psych-punk masterpiece I’m In Your Mind Fuzz(2014) they casually released 2015’s expectation-confounding Paper Mache Dream Balloon(2015), a pastoral, sun-drenched acid-folk album. Sketches Of Brunswick Eastis a collaboration between King Gizzard and Mild High Club, the LosAngeles based tripster troupe signed to Stones Throw Records and led by Alex Brettin – the two bands formed a strong friendship touring together throughout the USA, Europe, and Australia. Recorded at the band’s own Flightless HQ in East Brunswick, Melbourne Australia earlier this year and mixed at Stones Throw studios in L.A. it’s the third of five projected albums to be released in 2017.
its their 11th studio album, released August 18th, 2017.
Willie Breeding hurts to listen to (in a good way, of course). The hooks of this Kentucky native’s songs cut immediately and don’t let up until the last note.This newcomer Willie Breeding will release his debut album of beguiling, off-kilter Americana Big Sky in early 2018.Willie’s remarkably good sorrow-laden voice is bait, and we are hungry fish. The arrangements are sumptuous and beautifully thought out – with haunting pedal steel, mandolin, fiddle and even the occasional Spanish horn melding with piano, a taut rhythm section and acoustic & electric guitars “- –
Written by: Willie Breeding and Caitlin Rose
Produced by: Duane Lundy and Willie Breeding
Guitars: Jeremy Fetzer
Keys and Bass: Jon Estes
Drums: Jon Radford
Strings: Mark Evitts
