Prolific New Zealand-born, Melbourne based singer-songwriter Sarah Mary Chadwick is releasing “Me and Ennui Are Friends Baby” on February 5th via Ba Da Bing Records, and the latest single is “Full Mood,” which Sarah says “is about a Valentine’s Day date I went on. The owner of the bar we were at tried to get us both to fuck her, but she wouldn’t let me be in charge so we didn’t. I remember afterwards we were walking down the road and it was streetlights and still at 3am and everything felt great and shining and I remember thinking that I wish my dad could’ve done this, got drunk and kicked around the city at night when it’s all sparkly, holding onto someone who lights you up, not been stuck in silent dark rural New Zealand, watching other people’s lives on TV, drinking half glasses of box wine while his frowning wife ironed.”
“Me And Ennui Are Friends, Baby” is the latest full-length from New Zealand-born, Melbourne-based singer-songwriter, Sarah Mary Chadwick, whose brutally honest song writing has cast her contrary to the gentleness of most current music. Comprised entirely of minimal solo piano arrangements, the album is despondently clear-eyed and smirkingly self-deprecating, completing a trilogy of records that started with The Queen Who Stole The Sky recorded on Melbourne Town Hall’s grand organ, and her only outing to date featuring a full band, Please Daddy. Each record has followed Chadwick’s internal processing after a traumatic event, with Chadwick’s zeal for psychoanalysis front and centre. On Ennui, Chadwick presents an exacting intensity with her choice to pare back to piano and vocals. It’s in this stark setting that she focuses on the attempt she made on her life in 2019.
Directed by Tristan Scott-Behrends
Starring Daniel Villarreal & Sarah Mary Chadwick “Only Trumpets” Clip featuring Daniel Crook & Xavier Jimenez March ‘Full Mood’ is the third single from forthcoming album ‘Me And Ennui Are Friends, Baby’, out February 5th 2021 through Rice Is Nice Records & Ba Da Bing.
Title Fight co-frontman Ned Russin has shared a second single from his upcoming Glitterer album, “Life Is Not A Lesson”, which arrives 26th febuary via ANTI-Records (pre-order). Like lead single “Are You Sure?”, the just-released “Didn’t Want It” is a little closer to the loud, driving Title Fight sound than the last Glitterer album was, and it’s another very promising taste.
“‘Didn’t Want It’ was the first song I wrote for the new record,” Ned says. “Despite having no road map for how the rest of the songs would turn out, this track established a lot of the qualities that would be further explored as I continued to write – more present and fuzzed out guitars, minimalistic chord changes, and uncertain, longing lyrics.” It comes with an animated lyric video by Rob Fidel, which you can check out below.
Here’s what they say about it: At long last, we’re proud to announce our new album, ‘Green to Gold’ will be released on March 26th via Anti / Transgressive Records! You can pre-order the new album via Bandcamp. And today, we’ve got a new song to share with you. This one’s called “Solstice”.
“Solstice” is a flashback to the infinite days of peak childhood summer, innocent barefoot hikes, staying outside all afternoon and late into the evening, well past it being too dark to see. But it’s remembered from the vantage of a present day that feels unbearably long rather than joyously endless. It’s an invocation of those simpler times, an attempt to conjure the lightness of youth, before life got so damn complicated. Peter Silberman is back with the first Antlers album in seven years, which will be out in March. Here’s the new single.
Eager to share the rest of ‘Green to Gold’ with you this spring. Thank you for listening. With love,The Antlers”
Vocals, guitar, bass, pedal steel, piano, and organ by Peter Silberman Drums and percussion by Michael Lerner
Bass clarinet on “Wheels Roll Home” by Jon Natchez Violin and viola on “Solstice” by Will Harvey Cello on “Stubborn Man” by Brent Arnold Banjo on “Just One Sec” and “Volunteer” by David Moore Slide Guitar on “Just One Sec” by Dave Harrington Baritone saxophone, flute, clarinet, and french horn on “It Is What It Is” by Kelly Pratt Guitar on “Green to Gold” by Tim Mislock
While the days when you might spot David Byrne at a Clap Your Hands Say Yeah show are behind us, Alec Ounsworth has continued to hone his skills as a songwriter. Born out of a dark year, “New Fragility” finds Ounsworth inspired and the songs shared so far are terrific. If it doesn’t end up being Clap Your Hands Say Yeah’s best since 2005 it definitely will be the best to feature a song called “CYHSY, 2005.” New single “CYHSY, 2005” isn’t about the days when David Byrne would come to their shows, it’s about home. “Part of being away so often is leaving people behind, and never feeling you’re able to establish conventionally meaningful relationships,” says Ounsworth. “You can be searching for stability – being in one place – and discover that that’s an illusion.”
In any discussion regarding songwriters and lyricists of 21st century indie music, Alec Ounsworth and his moniker, Clap Your Hands Say Yeah, will feature prominently. Few have been as consistently brilliant, eclectic, and intimate; fewer still remain defiantly independent, refusing to sign deals that compromise artistic vision. That is what characterizes Ounsworth’s oeuvre, especially the lifetime project he initiated sometime in the early 2000s, Clap Your Hands Say Yeah. And with each release since its landmark self-titled debut, he has refined and broadened his sound, indulging an ever wider set of influences.
Prolific and enigmatic as ever, his recent works marry the quirky, left-field spirit of the early years with a well-earned confidence, and grander sense of scale and ambition. Always heading down new avenues of song arrangement and organic connection to his audience, after nearly two decades Ounsworth remains one of music’s most distinctive voices.
The upcoming album New Fragility (February 12th, 2021 CYHSY/Secretly Distribution), including the advance singles Hesitating Nation / Thousand Oaks and Where They Perform Miracles, was produced by Alec Ounsworth, with additional production from Will Johnson,
The Sonder Bombs will follow their great 2018 debut album “Modern Female Rockstar” with “Clothbound” on 1/29, and the singles find them taking their ukulele-fuelled indie-pop punk in all kinds of exciting new directions. The Sonder Bombs have doubled down on their second record. 2018’s debut “Modern Female Rockstar” was their first bet: an all-caps attack against a male-dominated scene brandishing a ukulele and dry wit as chosen weapons. A year and some change passed, where the Cleveland band’s relentless touring ethic and tough love caused a homegrown fan base to explode worldwide. Clothbound, like the title suggests, weaves a different narrative—one of loss, letting go, and losing patience with losers. If the first record introduced unapologetic sensitivity, Clothbound searches for the root causes of other key elements.
Produced in Philadelphia during quarantine with Joe Reinhart (Hop Along, Beach Bunny, Modern Baseball), “Clothbound” captures a band burning at both ends. Fans of vocalist/ukulele/guitarist Willow Hawks’ exasperated kiss-offs will have plenty to unpack here, from the frantic goodbyes spat through “Swing on Sight” or “What Are Friends For,” where Hawks entertains this question while the background smoulders around the punctuation—a ukulele strum here, Willow Hawks’ vocal line trailing like an asteroid collision there. As this is the second volume in the Sondie songbook, evolved moments, like the acoustic-electric elegy “Scattered,” sit near the band at their most sloganeering and effective. “Crying is Cool” a live staple eagerly awaiting its reveal, teaches listeners of all ages that it’s okay to hole up with your feelings as long as you give them room to grow. The band’s also not afraid of taking their own advice, letting their emotions run wild on “k.,” an absolute barnstormer of a track where the Bombs fire off all cylinders while winking to hardcore and metal. The chips are down and the deck is stacked here. The band’s all in. Are you?
releases January 29th, 2021
The Sonder Bombs – “k.” From their album “Clothbound” Out January 29th via Take This To Heart Records/Big Scary Monsters (UK/EU)/Dew Process (AUZ/NZ)
Judging by the first single, “Faith Healer,” Julien Baker’s official solo follow-up to 2017’s Turn Out The Lights will be her most fleshed-out sounding solo album yet. A departure from her more stark, minimalistic material, “Faith Healer” features a full band, drums included, while losing none of the power of Julien’s emotionally charged vocals and lyrics. The album — her first release since 2018’s Boygenius EP that had her teamed up with Lucy Dacus and Phoebe Bridgers — was recorded before the pandemic, but we’re counting on its arrival to resonate deeply in lockdown all the same.
Julien Baker has shared the second single off her highly-anticipated third album, “Little Oblivions”, the highly-anticipated third album, is due out February 26th via Matador, and she’s just shared its second single, first track “Hardline.” Like “Faith Healer,” it’s a more fleshed-out sounding song than many others we’ve heard from Julien in the past, but it’s still as emotionally resonant as her more spare, bare bones material.
“A few years ago I started collecting travel ephemera again with a loose idea of making a piece of art with it,” Julien writes. “I had been touring pretty consistently since 2015 and had been traveling so much that items like plane tickets and hotel key cards didn’t have much novelty anymore. So I saved all my travel stuff and made a little collage of a house and a van out of it. I wanted to incorporate it into the record and when we were brainstorming ideas for videos we came across Joe Baughman and really liked his work so we reached out with the idea of making a stop-motion video that had similar aesthetic qualities as the house I built did. I don’t know why I have the impulse to write songs or make tiny sculptures out of plane tickets. But here it is anyway: a bunch of things I’ve collected and carried with me that I’ve re-organized into a new shape.”
Baughman directed the video for “Hardline,” he writes, “even after having spent 600 hours immersed in ‘Hardline’ and having listened to it thousands of times, I am still moved by it. It was a fun and ambitious challenge creating something that could accompany such a compelling song. The style of the set design, inspired by a sculpture that Julien created, was especially fun to work in. I loved sifting through magazines, maps, and newspapers from the 60s and 70s and finding the right colours, shapes, and quotes to cover almost every surface in the video.”
Meanwhile, Julien recently taped a performance for KEXP Radio a week ago, which just came out today; it includes a solo acoustic performance of Soundgarden’s “Fell on Black Days” around the 43 minute mark, and you can watch the whole thing below.
Julien Baker sharing a live performance recorded exclusively for KEXP and talking to Cheryl Waters. Recorded January 6th, 2021.
Songs: Faith Healer Song in E Hardline Fell on Black Days
Julien Baker – vocals / guitar / keys Calvin Lauber – bass Mariah Schneider – guitar / bg vocals Matt Gilliam – drums Noah Forbes – keys (overdubbed) Becca Mancari – guest bg vocals Session recorded at Third Man Records in Nashville, TN
Julien also appeared on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert last week performing “Faith Healer.”
Julien Baker makes her return to A Late Show with this performance of “Faith Healer” from her upcoming album “Little Oblivions,” available everywhere on February 26th.
It might seem that British artist Katy J Pearson appeared out of nowhere, fully formed at 24 with her quirky but confident debut album “Return.” But looks can be deceiving.
Released last November the album seemingly effortlessly blends folksy acoustic guitar chords with synth-looped percussion and effervescent, vibrato-edged vocals reminiscent of classic American country. Yet it’s the end product of nearly a decade of struggle that started with the pop duo Ardyn she and her co-vocalist brother Rob formed as teenagers while living at home with their parents in Gloucestershire.
“It’s taken me such a long time to get this baby up and out,” she says. “But I really get it now, that sometimes it really does take a long while to find art that’s worth doing and find your own voice.”
The fascination was romantic at first — as a kid on vacations to Devon, she would often gaze wistfully at Kate Bush’s cliffside home and dream of a showbiz career. When she and her brother formed Ardyn, the siblings’ ethereal harmonies set them on that path via an unexpected recording contract with Universal offshoot imprint Method. But Pearson quickly discovered that youthful experimentation wasn’t welcomed. “It was very corporate,” she says in retrospect. “They weren’t bad people. They were just businessmen, and as soon as we signed, it was like, ‘Oh, can you write another song that sounds like that song that we signed you for? Ten more times?’ They weren’t really interested in any artistic progression.”
But the company had deep pockets. Before they knew it, the kids were being whisked off to Los Angeles to work with a cavalcade of renowned collaborators, like Semisonic’s Dan Wilson and Andrew Wyatt from Miike Snow, a process they found both humbling and enjoyable. “But when we got back, we got told off for not writing a hit,” Pearson says. “They said, ‘We sent you to America to write something really big, and you’ve given us all this left-field stuff!’ And I was like, ‘What? But this is what I do!’ I was supposed to write something that only they like?”
After discovering that all future co-writers had been warned to stop Ardyn sessions if they turned too eccentric, she begged to be released from her contract. Luckily, the imprint let her go, and returned ownership of her material, as well. The duo moved to more bustling Bristol, but after Rob contracted glandular fever and moved back home with the folks, Katy, at 21, was left alone in a strange new city and unsure of her own abilities.
Nearly eight fallow months passed with no inspiration, at which point she was seriously considering giving up music for good and becoming a gardener. After finding a writing-recording space at a community arts center called The Island, she decided to treat song writing like an actual job. “So I’d wake up at 9 every morning, grab a coffee, walk to the studio and get to work,” she says. The routine provided her with renewed purpose. That’s when she found her idiosyncratic solo style, inspired by Kate Bush, Carole King and Win Butler’s co-vocalist wife in Arcade Fire, Régine Chassagne. “In Ardyn, I was singing in a more artificial pop way,” she says. “But now when I hear myself sing, I’m singing as natural as possible and my vibrato is there, and I’m writing things that suit my voice much better.”
Visualizing a perfect blend of the electronic and organic, she arrived at playful folk-synth janglers like “Beautiful Soul,” “Take Back the Radio” and the fluttery “Fix Me Up,” a pep song she penned to herself at her lowest post-Ardyn point.
“I was glad I found a happy sonic medium,” she says, proud that the posh imprint Heavenly Recordings is releasing it all. Pearson admits to being blindsided by the pandemic, which shut down the spring tour for her and her band, which now includes her brother on guitar; he moved in with her in Bristol a year and a half ago, after recovery.
“Because I was kind of pushed around by people that were older than me, and I felt like I had to give in to them. But now I think it’s all about really putting your foot down and saying no when something doesn’t feel right. It’s about staying true to yourself and the things that you believe in.” The Bristolian songstress Katy J Pearson released her debut LP last year to critical acclaim, and it’s great to hear one of the stand-out tracks released as a single in its own right. Melancholic apreggiated chords and driving acoustics propel Pearson’s exquisite vocals.
My debut album ‘Return’ is out ! I am so proud and overjoyed to share it with you all + have so many people to thank for making this record and project a reality. My brother Bob who has been my musical collaborator and support since the beginning,
“Beautiful Soul” is taken from the debut album ‘Return’, out now via Heavenly Recordings.
Parlophone Records have announced the third in a series of six very special David Bowie live releases from the 90s that will be released on CD and vinyl over the coming months.
The suitably-titled “LIVEANDWELL.COM” (yes, it’s intentionally-capitalised) references the Thin White Duke’s some might say, soothsayer-like obsession with the quaint old concept of “the information superhighway.” Previously released in 2000 in limited quantities to BowieNet subscribers, the LP has been expanded to include two bonus tracks – “Pallas Athena” and “V-2 Schneider” – to help stretch it across four sides.
The set was recorded in New York, Amsterdam and Rio De Janeiro during the 1997 Earthling tour. Its first 10 tracks have until now been physically available only on the BowieNet release, while the two bonus tracks were released as a 12” single under the name The Tao Jones Index (the alias Bowie and his band employed to play an unannounced set in the dance tent at the Phoenix Festival in England in 1997).
The new, limited edition vinyl edition of LIVEANDWELL.COM comes in newly-designed artwork featuring a cover shot of Bowie taken by Scarlet Page during rehearsals for the June 1997 London Hanover Grand shows. The album marks the third of six releases that will comprise the “Brilliant Live Adventures” set, with the first two releases being “David Bowie Ouvrez Le Chien (Live Dallas 95)”, and “No Trendy Réchauffé (Live Birmingham 95)”.
Produced by David Bowie, co-produced by Reeves Gabrels and Mark Plati, the musicians featured include Zachary Alford (drums), Gail Ann Dorsey (bass, vocals, keyboards), Reeves Gabrels (guitars, synthesisers, vocals) and Mike Garson (piano, keyboards, synthesisers).
New Year, New Lockdown, New Single.“Believer” is coming out soon, We are so excited to share our new song and video with you all! We filmed the video back in the summer of 2019 and have been wanting to show you for aaaages! Black Honey have released their first offering of 2021, new single, ‘Believer’.
‘Believer’, taken from the Brighton-based band’s upcoming second album ‘Written and Directed’, set for release on March 19th, follows the previous ‘I Like The Way You Die’, and is a foot-stomping, cathartic outing. “’Believer’ is a song to accompany your existential crisis,” she explains. “I wanted a religious satire that was eye rolling at all the patriarchal nonsense of spiritual sense of self. I wanna believe in me, the outsider and the underdog. It’s like coming of age, coming out and coming up.”
The accompanying video is set in a dusty, deserted Mexican village, with a ‘dead behind the eyes’ Izzy B. Phillips.
It features the final performance from our beloved Tom Dewhurst, nuns, the desert, a beautiful drag queen and kidnapping. Everything you’d want from a Black Honey video: Set to appear on the band’s upcoming album ‘Written & Directed’, the band’s first release of the year features percussive acoustic guitars, reverb-drenched surf guitar and brass. Speaking of the new LP, lead singer and guitarist Izzy B. Phillips said that she “made this record for young women to feel invincible”.
Written & Directed, the new album released March 19th
Ariel Posen’s music occupies the space between genres. It’s a rootsy sound that nods to his influences — heartland rock & roll, electrified Americana, blue-eyed soul, R&B, Beatles-inspired pop — while still moving forward, pushing Posen into territory that’s uniquely his own. He turns a new corner with “Headway”, a solo album that finds the songwriter taking stock of his personal and musical progress.
Posen began recording Headway in December 2019, one week after wrapping up international touring in support of his acclaimed debut, How Long. He’d been on the road for a year and a half, playing shows across the U.K., Europe, America, and his native Canada. Along the way, Posen had received standing ovations not only from his audiences, but also from outlets like Rolling Stone, who dubbed him “a modern-day guitar hero,”.
Coming back home to Winnipeg, he began sifting through the new songs he’d written between tour dates. Many of them had already been tested on the road, their arrangements whittled into shape by a group of road warriors at the top of their game. Practically all of them were about the process of evolution — of making progress in life, love, and all points in between. Those themes were reflected in the music itself, which presented a crisper, clearer picture of Posen as a songwriter.
Famed for his exquisite slide technique and soulful vocals, Ariel Posen is now one of the most revered guitar players in the industry. However, his guitar choice is a little leftfield. Singer/songwriter. Internationally-renowned guitarist. Producer. Solo artist. A lifelong musician, there are few roles Ariel Posen hasn’t played. Utilising instruments that echo familiar models and vintage classics, he’s usually found playing a custom model by Josh Williams, a Collings 360 LTM and most notably, his signature StratoMule from Mule Resophonic Guitars, which he affectionately calls the ‘Posencaster’.
If How Long had been his introduction to the roots-music world, then Headway was something different: a sharply-defined snapshot of a musician who has truly crystallized his sound.
Like its title suggests, Headway is all about growth. Already celebrated as a frontman, multi-instrumentalist, and producer, Ariel Posen hits a new high-water mark with his second album — an album that prioritizes song writing above all else, showcasing the progress of a lifelong musician who’s still in the middle of an upward trajectory.
The Fat Angel Sings 