With a new EP and a follow-up single “Grab the Wheel” released since this summer, young L.A. rockers Milly are winding up a big national tour with a show at the Lodge Room on Wednesday, Nov. 8. Toner and Rocket open the night. Milly is a rock band from Los Angeles fronted by songwriter and multi-instrumentalist Brendan Dyer. Their sound melds together elements of classic shoegaze, slowcore, and lo-fi indie rock, coalescing into an intense, singular musical impression. Milly began as Dyer’s home recording project in his hometown of Bristol, Connecticut before finally taking its current formation as a live band in Los Angeles.
the new single, “Grab The Wheel”, out now on Dangerbird Records.
Christine McVie is being celebrated with the release of remastered versions of her final two solo albums. Two of the beloved singer-songwriter’s work as a solo artist were reissued on November 3rd, 2023: 1984’s self-titled “Christine McVie” and 2004’s “In the Meantime” have been released on CD and LP via Rhino.
From the original July 12th announcement (on what would have been her 80th birthday): McVie’s solo journey began in 1970 with her debut, “Christine Perfect”, her maiden name. Soon after its release, she put her solo career on hold when she joined Fleetwood Mac as a full-time member. For the next 14 years, she wrote some of the band’s biggest hits “Don’t Stop” and “You Make Loving Fun” before releasing her second solo album “Christine McVie” in 1984. The record produced two Top 40 hits on the Hot 100, “Got a Hold on Me” and “Love Will Show Us How” . The album has been unavailable on vinyl since its original release.
Although McVie semi-retired from Fleetwood Mac and public life in 1998, she continued to write music. In 2004, she returned with her third and final solo album, This re-release of Christine McVie’s 1984 solo album features some of the most evocative songwriting of Christine’s career. Produced by the legendary Russ Titelman (Rickie Lee Jones, Eric Clapton), the album boasts guest appearances from fellow Fleetwood Mac members Lindsey Buckingham and Mick Fleetwood and contributions from Steve Winwood and Eric Clapton.
“In the Meantime”. McVie produced the album with her nephew, Dan Perfect. The album was remastered and remixed for the upcoming release, including the previously unreleased outtake, “Little Darlin’.” “In the Meantime” has never been available on vinyl until now. The 2-LP set features a “songbird” etching on the final side.
McVie was involved in the creation of the new Atmos mixes for “In the Meantime” before she died in November 2022. In the liner notes, Dan Perfect writes: “When my aunt Christine McVie died unexpectedly last year, plans were already afoot for the re-release of this solo album, which is perhaps her most personal and intimate project. Chris and I had been working for some time on remixing the original tracks in Dolby Atmos, and Chris was excited and intrigued by this process, which was bringing fresh life and contemporaneity to the songs… I dearly wish that she could have lived to see this re-release as she would have been delighted.”
Mick Fleetwood, the legendary drummer and co-founder of Fleetwood Mac, paid tribute to his bandmate on her 80th birthday with a touching new instrumental version of “Songbird” featuring ‘ukulele virtuoso Jake Shimabukuro.
Got a live album out next month! MJ Lenderman ‘And The Wind“Live and Loose!” was recorded at sold-out summer 2023 shows at Chicago’s Lincoln Hall and the Lodge Room in Los Angeles. The full album is out November 17th digitally via @antirecords and on cassette via @dearliferecs. The first track + live vid by @half_state @jakenokovic for “You Have Bought Yourself a Boat” is out now.
releases November 17th, 2023
MJ Lenderman – Vocals and Guitar Xandy Chelmis – Pedal Steel Ethan Baechtold – Bass Jon Samuels – Guitar Colin Miller – Drums Karly Hartzman – Vocals on “Toontown” Guest appearance on “Long Black Veil” by Styrofoam Winos
Recorded live at Lincoln Hall in Chicago, IL and Lodge Room in Los Angeles, CA
Following on from the release of their fifth album, ‘Neanderthal Jam’, West Australian boogie masters DATURA4 are back with “Invisible Hits”, an album collecting unreleased out-takes and selected tracks that were not previously available on vinyl. This superb collection of brilliantly crafted songs, is only available on LIMITED CLEAR BLUE VINYL!
“If you were lucky enough to grow up in the 60s and 70s, you know that the music coming out at that time had a certain vibe. We’re not talking about the bubble-gum pop that was prevalent on the AM stations of the day. This is that blues based, uber-overdriven, gritty sound that blasted on many a stereo. Australian rockers Datura4 have captured not just the sound, but that whole atmospheric ambience.” – AMERICAN BLUES SCENE
Datura4 released through Alive NaturalSound 2023-11-03
Sonic Youth“Live at Rockpalast”, Dusseldorf, Germany, 1996, Released as a double Box Set: DVD & Audio CD, Sonic Youth is an American alternative rock band from NewYork City, formed in 1981. In their early career, Sonic Youth was associated with the No Wave art and music scene in New York City. Part of the first wave of American noise rock groups, the band carried out their interpretation of the hardcore punk ethos throughout the evolving American underground that focused more on the DIY ethic of the genre rather than its specific sound. As a result, some consider Sonic Youth as pivotal in the rise of the alternative rock and indie rock movements.
All songs written by Sonic Youth“Live at Rockpalast” – Dusseldorf, Germany (Apr-07-1996)
Setlist: 00:00 Teenage Riot 07:45 Bull In The Heather 10:38 Starfield Road 13:30 Washing Machine 23:00 Junkie’s Promise 27:30 Saucer-Like 31:42 Becuz 38:01 Sugar Kane 46:14 Skip Tracer (additional lyrics by Leah Singer) 50:19 Skink 54:58 The Diamond Sea
Brighton-based Falmouth garage rockers Holiday Ghosts announced a brand-new album ‘Absolute Reality’, back in April 2023 via FatCat Records (TRAAMS, Honeyblood, The Twilight Sad, We Were Promised Jetpacks), the band shared the rollicking lead track ‘Vulture’, .
Arriving hot on the heels of acclaimed 2022 EP ‘Credit Note’, ‘Absolute Reality’ tackles different themes of social commentary, with fiery lyrics and hard-picked guitars, holding both honest confessions and tall tales, lived stories and movielike landscapes. Bringing the noise and texture that Holiday Ghosts love from New York punk and the new wave era, ‘Vulture’ cements their status within today’s alt-rock scene.
Between their last album ‘North Street Air’, to the present day of ‘Absolute Reality’, Holiday Ghosts have rocked iconic stages throughout the UK & Europe, from Latitude Festival to Left Of The Dial, from Dot to Dot to ‘Misty Fields’ from the Pyrenees mountains to the chapels of Chester. They’ve shared stages with acts including Black Lips, Bodega and The Bug Club, attracted widespread praise across the press landscape (The Guardian, Stereogum, Brooklyn Vegan, KEXP, DIY, So Young, The Line Of Best Fit, Clash, Gigwise), and clocked-up live sessions/interviews aplenty on BBC 6Music with key tastemakers such as Steve Lamacq and Marc Riley.
“Falmouth’s finest blend primal garage rock, rock’n’roll, DIY punk, blues and giddy exuberant tunefulness” The Guardian
“Holiday Ghosts’ scrappy, snappy rock & roll feels almost timeless” KEXP
“Rough-hewn jingle-jangle with a heartwarming feel” Clash
Speaking ahead ‘Vulture’ single release, Holiday Ghosts’ Samuel Stacpoole revealed: “This song has had two lives. I remember playing it a lot five or six years ago on acoustic guitar as a kind of spaghetti western instrumental. It was half the speed and really atmospherically menacing. I’ve lost interest in musically pretending that I’m in a western movie now. When reimagining this track I’d been obsessively listening to the first The Cure compilation ‘Boys Don’t Cry’ and Young Marble Giants/Weekend. That style of production which has so much emphasis on space really got under my skin”.
Brian Fallon recently felt a powerful impulse. He wanted to reconvene The Gaslight Anthem, the New Jersey indie-punk band he co-founded in 2006 and then put on indefinite hiatus nine years later. At heart, Fallon still felt like “a rock guy,” he says. And now, he needed his band back.
Fallon decided to reach for “the Bat Phone,” as he puts it. In search of some guidance, he texted his most famous friend and biggest musical influence: Bruce Springsteen. The Boss quickly responded, and during a summit at a local pizza parlor, he urged Fallon to reignite Gaslight. Surprisingly, Bruce’s demeanor during the tête-à-tête was more “enthusiastic fan” than “wise sage.”
“He was so excited at the end of our meeting that he texted me like, ‘You’ve got to write a duet for us!’” Fallon recalled with a laugh during a recent interview. “I was like, ‘What do you mean? You want me to write a song that you sing on?’ He’s like, ‘Yeah! It’s going to be great! People are going to love it!’ He was so pumped. I’m not sure if he was more pumped than I was.”
That song ended up being “History Books,” the title track of The Gaslight Anthem’s recently released LP, their first in nine years. Coming on the heels of a 2022 reunion tour, “History Books”picks up where the band left off after 2014’s “Get Hurt”, effectively centering their signature penchant for brawny songs with outsized, heart-rending choruses. An unrepentant fan of classic rock and ’90s alternative bands, Fallon has long since abandoned the punk pretenses that marked The Gaslight Anthem’s early work. Instead, he’s dedicated himself to making the sort of meat-and-potatoes rock that resides at the midpoint of Springsteen and Pearl Jam, a relentlessly earnest approach that regards the “Anthem” part of the band name with extreme literalism.
The Gaslight Anthem’s career, there have been many ups and downs. But now, Fallon insists, the band is in a better place than ever.
Sink Or Swim (2007)
Recorded in three days in Bayonne, New Jersey. It was at My Chemical Romance’s management offices. There’s a studio in the back there, and we had to be there when it was closed. The label we were on was just a friend — meaning it really wasn’t a label. There was this element of are we allowed to be here? It was definitely fun, because it was the first time we’d ever been in a real studio making a real record. Everything before that was either 7-inches or demos. So, for us, it was like, “There’s time to set up an acoustic guitar track? Sweet!” I remember very distinctly reading about The Killers, who had just come out with the second record,“Sam’s Town“. And I was sitting there like, “We’re going to end up like The Killers!” .
My grandmother had recently passed away, and her effect on me was pretty heavy growing up. Most of the time, my mom was working, so I would spend a lot of time with her. It was a typical American “No Dad” family. She would play movies all the time and she had posters on her wall, everyone from Rita Hayworth to these old radio shows, like The Shadow. As a kid, I’d be sitting there in her house, looking at these things. There would be Rita Hayworth as Gilda, and I was like, “What is this?” I would invent these stories in my head of high drama, and it just all coalesced into this thing.
We had one or two songs, and then we just wrote the rest in this blur of a winter. It was the fall time, like September or October, when we really started to get everything together, and then we recorded “Sink OrSwim” in February. It was before the record with “Radio Nowhere” came out. I know that it was the year before that. We all pushed each other a little bit, But with this band, the most important part of the show was the show. And the songs.
We had a talk about whether we could have acoustic songs on the record, which sounds insane but we were a punk rock band at the time. I was like, “Well, The Jam has an acoustic song.” Then somebody would be like, “Well, The Clash doesn’t.” I was like, “Yeah, but we’re not The Clash.” I’m glad that we did it, because it gave us permission to bring in the punk and the Springsteen for the rest of our career. I know it’s hard to imagine now, but back then, the people that we played for were really punks. And for all the anarchy and freedom the punks have, there’s a lot of rules.
The ’59 Sound (2008)
That was the first record we actually left home to make. For us, being from New Jersey, Los Angeles was essentially the promised land. I remember feeling very electrified. We had a real record label and a budget. We were all staying together at this really strange place where I believe Lemmy was living for a while. It was called The Oakwood. There was all these kids that were trying to be famous, and they were rude as hell.
We were all together, all four of us in one apartment with one bedroom, and it was insane. There were cigarettes all over. Those pictures of Guns N’ Roses living in 1987, that’s us. All literally on the same couch. It was complete bedlam. We were just there by ourselves. There was no one else with us. There were no parties. We didn’t know anyone. Occasionally, [our label] SideOneDummy would have a taco truck and we’d go and hang out with them.
The studio that we went to was called Mad Dog Studios and I think Lucinda Williams’ husband owned it. I remember everybody being like, “This is definitely a step up.”
I remember writing “The ’59 Sound,” and I remember being done with it and being like, “Okay, this song is a lot better than the rest of the songs.” I knew that it was better, and then when we played it, I knew something was different. Then we recorded the songs, and all the people around us — like [producer] Ted Hutt and our manager and the people at SideOne — started to get nervous. It was like everyone knew something was happening. It started to feel like, “Oh my goodness, this could actually go somewhere.” Later, we got played on KROQ, and we were like, “This is nuts. The punk thing that we did, we did it so hard, and it sucked. It was so bad.
We slept in the worst places. All of our accommodations every day were painful. Our van was painful, it was overly packed. It’s just your typical band on the road. It was like all those photos you see of The Replacements freezing in the winter. That’s us, we did all of that. We were like, “No, this is awesome. We’re going to be in a rock ‘n’ roll band.” The only one that felt some punk guilt was probably Benny, because he came from the hardcore scene. He might have been like, “Are we lame now?” I was like, “Dude, you know what’s lame? This room. Let’s get out of here.”
American Slang (2010)
it’s all about being successful. “AmericanSlang” is like, “Everybody likes us. What does that mean?” .
By that time, we all had apartments. A lot of us moved to Jersey City and I moved to New York. I was in love with the city, because I could never afford to live in the city. I’m thinking, “We made it!” Meanwhile my apartment was essentially one room and a closet that was turned into a kitchen. But I was like, “We freaking made it!.
The songs could have ended up being terrible with the sort of mindset that we had back then, because we were all just trying to define everything. Who are we? What kind of band are we? What do we mean? Are we going to be Bruce Springsteen or are we going to be The Replacements?
It was partly turning 30, too — you’re not a kid anymore. We had some success, but we didn’t understand what that meant, because we weren’t rich. It wasn’t an overnight success. It wasn’t like we released Dookie. We just released this punk record that people kind of liked. Though, to be fair, there were magazines especially in the U.K.being like, “This is the second coming of rock ‘n’ roll,” or whatever.
When I look back now, I am so relieved that the songs retain their quality. I remember nothing but pressure about that record.
Handwritten (2012)
When “American Slang” came out, that was definitely the changing moment where we were like, “We’re not a punk band anymore.” We had just signed to a major label, so things were different. We got a publishing deal and we were like, “Whoa, I could buy a house.” You definitely had this feeling of, “Did we actually make it as a rock band?” Maybe not a famous band but we made it, we’re not going to work at the gas station anymore.
We were in Blackbird Studios in Nashville, and Taylor Swift was in the next building over. Kings of Leon were recording the album with “Sex On Fire.” It was all famous people all the time, but none of them were peeking over their fences at us.
Brendan really taught us a lot. He wouldn’t settle for anything being not in time or out of tune or anything like that. He would just make you do it 100 times. We all became a real band, because we would sit in the room and just play the song over and over again. And if one guy messed up, you had to play it again. It was the most connected we were as a band since the very beginning. No one was pulling in a different direction. We were all on this trip together. It was like grunge college.
After that record came out, and “45” was on the radio all the time, we’d look out at the audiences and be like, “I cannot believe that we did this.” It was wild, to be able to look out and see that this thing that we built was working. It was a point where you definitely felt like this could go on forever. We could be a big band now.
Except for the new record that we just made, this was the most fun I ever had making a record. It was so awesome. It was every ’90s dream that I had of grunge because we got Brendan O’Brien to do the record. He produced some of my favourite records of all time, and I would incessantly ask him questions. “What was it like recording “BloodSugarSexMagik?” “What did Jeff Ament smell like?” I was obsessively punishing this man with every question I could think of, and he was so gracious. Every single day I asked some new stupid question about Chris Cornell, and he was just humouring me the entire time.
Get Hurt (2014)
Everybody hits that point where they go, “I’m not really sure what to do right now.” And you want to go against it, and be like, “No, just ignore that, keep going.” I don’t really know what we were doing there. It was sort of like everything that was working, we decided to change. Like, “Hey, I write the songs, so why don’t you guys bring in some songs?”.
Here’s something that nobody knows: Brendan was going to do that record. What happened was our label and the band was like, “No, we’re not going to do another record with Brendan.” Especially the label. They were like, “No, fuck Brendan, you can’t work with him again.” There was a little divide there. I didn’t make the call that I probably should have made, which is to put my foot down and say, “No, we’re going to go with Brendan.” Instead I said, “All right, we’re going to fire Brendan.” And that was the biggest mistake, because Brendan is still pissed at me about that. That ended my friendship with Brendan. I don’t think he ever got over that. But I was like, “Dude, I want to make a record with you, but my band doesn’t. What am I supposed to do? I’m in a band, man.” At the same time, I was going through a divorce. I had just gotten a house and now I’m giving the house away. That shit is weird. It’s like you get to the mountain top and then your life falls apart.
With all this said, there are still songs on “Get Hurt” that I really enjoy playing. We still play the song “Get Hurt” that’s one of the best pop-oriented songs that the band ever wrote. I love the song “Stay Vicious.” I know some people really hate it but I don’t care, because to me that’s a Soundgarden song in my head. That song rips.
Every band has the time where they fall apart a little bit. Some bands don’t survive it. Generally, when you watch a band’s career if they have a career that’s longer than five years — they go on this arc and then all of a sudden, the band becomes not cool anymore. Everybody has it. Green Day had it, Pearl Jam had it, everybody had it. And then they either come back up or they disappear into the ether. We felt that coming. Benny and I got together, we were in the back of the bus, and I was like, “Dude, this sucks. It’s not fun. I can’t do it.” He was like, “Yeah, I can’t do it either.” Then we called the other guys and we said, “Does anyone think this is fun anymore?” Everyone was like, “No.” All right. We need to shut this down. Then everybody was like, “Permanently?” We were like, “No, but we need to shut it down for now.” None of us thought it was going to be forever but we didn’t know how long it was going to take.
History Books (2023)
At the end of the pandemic, after we were stuck inside for two years, I was like, “There’s no way that younger me would let 40-year-old me sit here with this thing in his back pocket that he could do called The Gaslight Anthem and just let it go.” I started thinking about the Foo Fighters and all these guys that are all doing things that I still think are cool, but they are not young. Or Lucinda Williams, who I think was 10 years older than me when she did Car Wheels On A Gravel Road. I was like, “There is still an avenue for us.”
Then I used the Bat Phone for the first time in my life — I’m going to text Bruce. I was like, “Dude, I need your help.” I’ve never asked him for anything in all the 10 years that I’ve known him. I’ve never, ever called him and been like, “Help me out” or whatever. And he hit me right back and was like, “100 percent. Let’s go.” We went to a pizza place and he laid it out for me. He’s like, “Listen man, you can do a solo thing and that’s cool. Your solo songs are great. And I can go do a solo thing. But if I go out with The E Street Band … ” And you know how he sells it, he says it like [affects a Springsteen voice] “The Gaslight Anthem!” And it’s this big thing, like a wind gust blows through the pizzeria and I fall off my chair. He just pumped me up. I was flipping over tables by the end of it, like, “We’re ready to go!”
In the very beginning, before I called anyone, I said to myself, “I’m going to try and write four songs.” Because I didn’t want to come back and do a tour and have everybody get excited again, and then as soon as you do a tour, everyone thinks you’re making a record. I really tried to prepare myself beforehand and make sure that I was 100 percent in, because the way that the Gaslight Anthem works is if I’m 100 percent excited, I can get everybody else excited. It’s just the way it works, because I have enough excitement for everybody.
I said, “Look, I’m not just talking here. I got songs, and I think they’re good. Here’s four of them, not just one.” I think that helped a lot. “Positive Charge,” that was the first one. The second one was “The Weathermen.” The third one was “A Lifetime Of Preludes.” The fourth one was “Autumn.” When we were on tour, we knew we had those songs, and every day we were jamming together, so we were writing more songs. It worked. Every day was just confirming it more that it was the right decision.
When I was writing for myself, I thought I had to do a certain kind of thing, I was like, “Well, I got to put on my singer/songwriter boots over here and write some singer/songwriter stuff and don’t rock too hard, because you’re not allowed to do that.” I don’t know why. If you try to boil it down to the truest sense of who I feel I am as a writer, I’m a rock guy.
I like songwriter stuff and I like doing it, but the big thing that really closed the gap for me was that I realized there is nothing that I can do in The Gaslight Anthem that I would need to go and make a record solo for, because we left that avenue open back on “Sink Or Swim” when we did “The Navesink Banks” and all those songs. I don’t see why there has to be a difference. There doesn’t have to be a difference.
Chicago, IL record label founded in 2009, Indie music has grown to include so much. It’s not just music that is released on independent labels, but speaks to an aesthetic that deviates from the norm and follows its own weirdo heart. It can come in the form of rock music, pop, or folk. In a sense, it says as much about the people that are drawn to it as it does about the people that make it.
2023 was our best year yet, and here are ten tracks from our ten mainline releases to prove it. One dollar gets you the goods (but feel free to pay more if you like). Enjoy.
The fantastic new album from tireless seeker Emily Robb. It’s a no-frills, high-minded celebration of guitar and sound and tone and string and amp and adventure committed to tape at Emily’s own Suddenly Studio in Philadelphia in fits and spurts stretching over 2022/23. These are economical tunes of utter trance and tightrope pulsations, with a fearless spirit and a devotion to energy and personality that digs into previously untapped mines. With zero fuss and pomp, “If I Am Misery Then Give Me Affection” builds a wholly new palette of expression, and Emily follows her Les Paul like it’s a divining rod. It’s anyone’s guess where it points next, but we’re all fortunate enough to be invited along for the ride.
Emily Robb is back with another slab of unearthly (but also quite earthy somehow) six-string workouts. Robb’s sometime tourmate Rosali Middleman recently released a great collection of electric guitar instrumentals under the Edsel Axle moniker and “If I Am Misery” is a perfect chaser.
The pieces here take great pleasure in the simple essentials — pure volume, amp buzz, feedback, raw melodies. Robb is a master at coaxing unusual sounds from her axe, always going in unexpected directions, but still remaining deeply rooted to the source. While this is a solo album, it definitely rocks — like a VU bootleg or a vintage PSF LP. Don’t forget to boogie.
With a band name like Bong Wish (and an album title like “Hazy Road“), you might think you’re in for something spectacularly stoner-ific. And I’m not saying you couldn’t get nicely toasted while listening to this LP, but it is actually quite sharp and alert. Led by Mariam Saleh, this Boston based group has put together a stellar collection of perfectly jangly folk rock, calling to mind the west coast sounds of The Byrds and Love (as well as their Paisley Underground spawn Opal and Rain Parade). I also get a little hint of vintage Barbara Manning in Saleh’s vocals — always a good thing. Maybe even a little Talullah-era Go-Betweens?! Whatever — each tune here is a little gem whether Bong Wish is choogling mightily on the title track (who plays that awesome guitar solo?!) or drifting dreamily on the autoharp-led “Moon For You.”
The Fat Angel Sings 