The Fat Angel Sings

Brooklyn post-punk five-piece Geese are releasing a new album, “3D Country”, on June 23rd via Partisan/Play It Again Sam. Now they have shared its third single, “Mysterious Love,” via a self-directed music video, and announced some new tour dates.

Geese frontman Cameron Winter had this to say about “Mysterious Love” in a press release: “This song is about a dozen ’90s rock cliches mixed into one little over-produced package. We like the contrast in mood between the first and second halves. We used to punctuate the very end with one last hit and be done with it, but then one day Max Bassin, our drummer just kept hitting his drums, and we kept doing the same ending hit for like, two minutes. When we recorded it, there were about 40 hits, but our label begged us to cut them out. We ended up at around 15 after negotiations.”

Drummer Max Bassin ominously summed up the new album this way: “It feels like going to the circus and instead of having a good time, everyone is trying to kill you.”

“3D Country” includes “Cowboy Nudes,” a new song the band shared back in January. When the album was announced in March they shared its second single, and the title track “3D Country,” .

“3D Country” is the band’s sophomore album. Their debut album, “Projector”, was released in 2021, also via Partisan/Play It Again Sam.

The new album “3D Country” out June 23rd, 2023 on Partisan Records and Play It Again Sam.

Bright Eyes (Conor Oberst, Mike Mogis, and Nathaniel Wolcott) have announced the third wave of their companion EP releases that tie into previous albums: “Cassadaga: A Companion”, “The People’s Key: A Companion”, and “Noise Floor (Rarities 1998-2005): A Companion”.

They have also shared three tracks, one from each EP: “Middleman (Companion Version)” (from Cassadaga), “When You Were Mine” (from “The People’s Key“), and “Blue Angels Air Show (Companion Version)” (from “Noise Floor“).

The EPs are all due out June 16th via Dead Oceans. Check out the tracks below.

The EPs feature various notable guest musicians, including: Johanna and Klara Söderberg of First Aid Kit (“JeJune Stars,” “Coatcheck Dream Song,” “Wrecking Ball”), Gillian Welch (“Napolean’s Hat”), and Alynda Segarra of Hurray for the Riff Raff (“Clairaudients (Kill or Be Killed),” “Firewall,” ‘When You Were Mine”).

Dead Oceans has been reissuing the newly-acquired Bright Eyes back catalogue on vinyl over the past year, and we’re thrilled to present the Bandbox editions of the campaign’s third wave – the 2006 rarities collection “Noise Floor“, 2007’s chart-topping “Cassadaga” and the 2011 LP that closed the book on the band’s first chapter, “The People’s Key”.

“Middleman: Companion Version”, the first single from ‘Cassadaga: A Companion’ in the Bright Eyes reissue series.

Oberst had this to say about the EPs in a press release: “We are really excited about the final installment of our companion EPs. It’s been an interesting journey revisiting and reimagining all of these old songs. 54 songs total seems ridiculous now looking back, but I’m glad we did it. This new batch includes great contributions from Alynda Segarra (Hurray For The Riff Raff), Johanna and Klara Söderberg (First Aid Kit), and an amazing cast of other fantastic musicians that brought these songs into the present tense. I hope all of the fun and neo-nostalgia we experienced recording these comes through to the listeners.”

“When You Were Mine”, the first single from ‘The People’s Key: A Companion’ in the Bright Eyes reissue series.

“Blue Angels Air Show: Companion Version”, the first single from ‘Noise Floor: A Companion’ in the Bright Eyes reissue series

The beloved Omaha indie group’s “Noise Floor (Rarities: 1998-2005)” [2xLP clear smoke] and “Cassadaga” [yellow vortex] are coming to colored #vinyl for the very first time, while “The People’s Key” [fiery orange splatter] is making its standalone colour debut.

Tracks Cassadaga: A Companion, The People’s Key: A Companion, and Noise Floor (Rarities 1998-2005): A Companion All Due Out June 16th via Dead Oceans All three Bandbox exclusive color pressings come with our signature artist #fanzine, this time sporting career-spanning features on Conor Oberst & co., rare photos, and a Bright Eyes crossword puzzle!

In 2022 they released the first two waves of the Companion EP series, with the first set out in May and the second set out in November.

Bright Eyes’ most recent album, Down in the Weeds, Where the World Once Was, came out in 2020 via Dead Oceans.

The Drums (the project led by Jonny Pierce) have shared two new songs, “Plastic Envelope” and “Protect Him Always.” They are interconnected songs that play as one complete piece and have been shared via one YouTube post featuring both songs. The singles are out now via ANTI-Records.

Pierce had this to say about the songs in a press release: “‘Plastic Envelope’ is about the pain that comes when your trust has been violated and the dread of not knowing if you could open your heart again the same way. The second song, ‘Protect Him Always,’ is an apology to the young boy in me, who I try my best to protect, knowing that when I get hurt, he gets hurt all over again.”

Written, performed, produced, engineered and mixed by Jonny Pierce All Instruments played by Jonny Pierce

The tracks follow an earlier song “I Want It All,” The Drums shared in April.

The Drums’ last album, “Brutalism”, came out in 2019 via ANTI-Records. Jonny Pierce has a new Drums album in the works.

Dream-pop band Beach Fossils are releasing a new album, “Bunny”, on June 2nd via Bayonet. The band have shared another song from it, “Seconds,” via a music video. The band’s frontman, Dustin Payseur, directed the video, which features footage shot on the band’s Australian tour. .

Payseur had this to say about “Seconds” in a press release: “‘Seconds’ is a song about realizing you love somebody more than they love you.”

The music video is a collection of iPhone footage taken by us and our friends over the past 8 years of touring. I love it because it’s not a traditional “music video” it’s just a straightforward and candid representation of our life on the road and the love we have for each other as a band. I know I talk about that a lot, but it’s important for me to express how much my bandmates mean to me. On tour, the fact that I get to go out there every night and play music with my best fiends is the greatest feeling in the world. I’m so grateful for it and I never want to take it for granted. I’ve said this before but I mean it, the only reason we’re able to do all of this is because of you. Because you’re listening to the music, you’re coming out to the shows, you’re supporting us when you get a record or a t-shirt… Beach Fossils has always largely been a DIY band from the beginning through now, so it only makes sense that half of the videos for this record are DIY as well. I’m proud of how far we’ve come, and I owe so much of it to all of you. Big love,

Beach Fossils also features Tommy Davidson (guitar), Jack Doyle Smith (bass), and Anton Hochheim (drums). Previously the band had shared two other “Bunny” songs: “Dare Me” and “Don’t Fade Away.” Then they posted the album’s third single, “Run to the Moon,” .

Lyrically this is my favorite song off the new album “Bunny”. I told myself I’d never write a song about becoming a dad but here we are! Through my music, I’ve been lucky enough to live a life where I can do whatever I want whenever I want, and the idea of becoming a parent terrified me because I was scared I would lose that freedom. But the second my daughter was born, I was so immensely full of love, it fully changed me and made me a better person. It’s like this puzzle piece I never knew was missing was finally found and made me feel whole. I still deal with personal and internal struggles despite all of this love, but that’s life, that’s the human experience. One day, my wife and I were at a park and the moon was big in the sky, our daughter grabbed our hands and yelled “Run to the moon!!” and we took off running (I even got a voice memo of it in the song). The combination of these big and small moments make life what it is, it can be hard to express in words alone, so I do it through song.

As for the music video, this is the most fun I’ve ever had making a video. It’s like a beautiful and candid homage to the friendship and love we have within the band. It really shows how close we are with each other in a way that you don’t usually see with bands.

“Bunny” follows Beach Fossils’ 2017 album “Somersault”, as well as the 2021 release “The Other Side of Life: Piano Ballads”, an album of jazz re-imaginings of songs from across their catalogue.

In the brand new issue of MOJO, we break into the LA court of Queen Joni Mitchell. There are hair-raising tales of Love, The Teardrop Explodes and Mink DeVille. The unique path of The Zombies and Colin Blunstone. Nick Drake: the making of a genius. WITCH’s Zamrock revolution. Absolute scenes with punk supergroup Generation Sex. Paul Simon’s new masterpiece. How To Buy Keith Jarrett. New interviews with Gang Of Four, Alan Sparhawk, Sparks, Angeline Morrison and the man who could’ve been Freddie Mercury!

Raised in a remote dale in the middle of the North York Moors, Amy May Ellis invites you on a journey through the history and mysticism of this wide-open landscape. Now based in Bristol, Amy’s warm and delicate folk-leaning songs are steeped in the culture, scenery, folklore and wildlife of the countryside that surrounded and shaped her as a child. She makes her debut for Lost Map Records with the PostMap Club postcard single ‘Rain From The East’, a song about “feeling unsteady and the weariness that comes with grief”, formed in time with the shovelling of coal under a gathering storm.

Recorded live with Rob Pemberton on drums and Alex Heane on double bass, it’s the opening track and first taster of Amy’s mesmerising forthcoming debut album “Over Ling and Bell“, which is due for release on limited-edition eco-friendly 12” vinyl and digital platforms on May 12th, 2023.

Amy will play live around the UK in February, as tour support for James Yorkston and Nina Persson.

Brought up singing around the house with her mother, Amy May Ellis was first inspired to start writing songs aged 15 on a ukulele bought for her by her grandad. She began making her mark as a musician through support slots for touring artists including Michael Chapman, Alessi’s Ark, Hiss Golden Messenger, Tiny Ruins, Ryley Walker and Willy Mason at her local music venue The Band Room in Farndale. “Having artists from all over the world come and play in the tin shed at the bottom of the hill was pretty special,” she reflects.

Since 2018, with the support of a growing band of friends, collaborators and fans, Amy has released a series of four EPs, each exploring an element – “Weathered by Waves”, “We Got Fire”, “Where My Garden Lies”, and “When In The Wind”. She has received support from BBC 6 Music, BBC introducing, Uncut Magazine and Rough Trade, and has played headline tours around the UK and Ireland, as well as performed at Brighton’s Great Escape festival.

Taken from the album “Over Ling And Bell“, released on Eco mix vinyl LP on Lost Map. 

At what point in an artist’s career do rumour and conjecture solidify into myth – and at what point do those myths then become accepted as fact? In the case of our cover star, Nick Drake, it seems as if they began to swirl not long after his death, in 1974, and have continued to grow ever since. What Nick Hasted has done in his cover story is transcend the tragic myth to discover a very different young man. Far from the shy introvert wracked by crippling self-doubt, he has found another Nick Drake: a confident, receptive young man, as happy to perform in folk clubs as busk in the streets, as he passes through France and North Africa on what one of his companions calls “a great adventure”. Our piece begins, meanwhile, in London, in the front room of an old school friend of Drake, who opens to us his notebooks from their travels, full of lists of records and books they shared. It feels like a significant piece of work as we head towards what would have been Drake’s 75th birthday in June.

To accompany this, Tom has also compiled a stunning CD of music in the spirit of Nick Drake, featuring beautiful tracks from Joan Shelley, Juana Molina, Adrianne Lenker and many more. It is, we humbly think, another indispensable Uncut CD for your collection.

Elsewhere in the issue, you’ll find lively interviews with Stephen Stills, Julian Cope, David Johansen, Evan Dando and more as well as Gareth Sager’s tribute to Mark Stewart and – as a positive affirmation of the healing power of music after great tragedy – an interview with Low’s Alan Sparhawk about his new band, Damien. It’s a feast, in other words. And I genuinely can’t think of another magazine where you’ll read major pieces on Nick Drake and Flowered Up in the same issue.

Joni Mitchell stunned the Newport Folk Festival audience last summer when she gave a surprise performance – her first in 20 years – delivering a heartfelt set filled with some of her greatest songs. Mitchell’s triumphant return to the stage on 24th July, 2022, will be featured on a new live album,

“Angels of Newport, let’s make history together,” [Brandi Carlile] said with growing emotion. “Hold nothing back in this moment and please welcome back to the Newport stage for the first time since 1969 . . . Joni Mitchell!” 

Mitchell emerged from the side of the stage, swaying smoothly, in fine summer-style with beret and sunglasses. Her good-natured mood instantly set the tone. This performance would be an intimate gathering of friends, not unlike the Joni Jams she’d been hosting in her own living room over the last few years of recovery. Smiling broadly, Mitchell took her on-stage seat alongside Carlile and began the extraordinary performance that was on nobody’s bingo card. Within minutes, the news had rocketed around the globe. Mitchell was back, sparkling with enthusiasm, delivering a tender and passionate set of 13 songs, ending with a joyful sing-along of “The Circle Game.”  

One of the world’s most remarkable and beloved artists, Joni Mitchell has influenced musicians across a vast cross-section of genres with her ethereal songs that reflect social and environmental ideals. The prolific singer-songwriter-painter-poet has not only written and produced her music, but also designed most of her album covers and packaging. A journey into Joni Mitchell’s artistry is one of a highly original, harmonically innovative, and emotionally charged, familiar yet fresh adventure.

“Mitchell emerged from the side of the stage, swaying smoothly, in fine summer-style with beret and sunglasses. Her good-natured mood instantly set the tone. This performance would be an intimate gathering of friends, not unlike the Joni Jams she’d been hosting in her own living room over the last few years of recovery. Smiling broadly, Mitchell made her surprise appearance, taking her on-stage seat alongside Carlile. Within minutes, the news had rocketed around the globe. Mitchell was back, sparkling with enthusiasm, delivering a tender and passionate set of 13 songs, – Cameron Crowe

Joni Mitchell stunned the Newport Folk Festival audience last summer when she gave a surprise performance – her first in 20 years

As “On Account Of Exile Vol.1” first looms into view like some amalgam of the central theme to the film Taxi Driver and Dennis Wilson’s “Pacific Ocean Blue” you immediately feel that this record is going to be a little bit special. And by the time that Trevor Sensor suggests  “it made me question who I am” on opening track ‘Twilight of Idols’ – his grizzled, weather-beaten voice already breaking with emotion – you know this much to be true.

An organ chord, a drumroll and an almost Procul Harum-ish intro leads into “On Account of Exile, Vol. 1” as the voice of Trevor Sensor, sounding like a man who has smoked too many cigarettes and is feeling the effects of it, begins to sing. Yet the music, filled with sounds of brass, grasps your shirt while Sensor begins to work his magic, sounding maybe like Roger Chapman’s of Family decades ago. Yet this voice is angrier, as Sensor looks at a world that no longer makes sense and seems to be verging on the brink of extinction.

Still, Sensor isn’t going to go quietly, he’s determined to have his say. He admits that he lives in the present moment, “I believe in just doing things – in action – and doing things well. Anything outside of that is just speculation or dreaming. We’re only living as well as we’re able to remain in the present moment…and that’s what I’m trying to get at each day.” Which is probably the only way to look at things as the world teeters on the edge of destruction, a point made abundantly clear on “Twilight of Idols” as he hammers the piano while singing, “Then I call my friends/ I say this is the end/ It made me question who I am.” Yet there is still a bit of the imp left in him as he segues from majestic swells to a gut crushing scream entering “Madison Square Garden” where he envisions, “a manic pontification on how we lose ourselves in the delirious night while death hovers over our heads—the whole show waiting to end on a single push of a button.”

Recounting the malaise that crept over him, “Days Drag On” illustrates the pain he lived in for five years. The music fills a void, creating something almost jaunty as the piano and drums fight the lyrical doom of not knowing who you are. Yet the song ends down in the dumps, leading into the soft focus of “Sawdust Chokes the Wind,” a sombre recounting of a mill town that lived and died along with its citizenry while the politicians prevailed despite the hard times.

Dominated by organ and piano, “I’s Hads Me Revelations” is a Dylanish blast getting to the heart of who we are and how we survive. “On a stump of gold I’ve wept my tears/ cause nothing’s worked after all these years.” Yet Sensor has survived, mostly by understanding that we must find our own sense of motivation to live despite a world that seems to often leave us with a sense of desperation. We have our own answers.

Trevor Sensor has been to the edge, he’s peered over and decided that despite all the evidence to the contrary there are still reasons to live. “On Account of Exile, Vol. 1” doesn’t offer us a lot of answers because that’s not Sensor’s job. He can’t find reasons for anyone else to live, it’s enough that he finds them for himself.

“Chiron, Galactus” is the second single from the album “On Account of Exile Vol.1” to be released June 18th 2021 on High Black Desert Records

High Black Desert Records Released on: April 2021.

“Live in St. Kilda” was a rare appearance at which Powers was backed by a group other than his longtime combo the Pink Monkey Birds. The November. 9th, 2019 show at the titular Australian city’s MEMO Music Hall was mounted to launch “Nine Parts Water, One Part Sand: Kim Salmon and the Formula for Grunge”, the autobiography of the singer-songwriter-guitarist of the famed Antipodean band the Scientists.

The hard-rocking group that ended up backing Powers on the show flashed some storied credentials of their own. Guitarist Harry Howard is the brother of the late Rowland S. Howard of the Bad Seeds, and played with Rowland in Crime and the City Solution and These Immortal Souls. Harry’s partner Edwina Preston is a keyboardist, a member of ATOM and the tribute unit Pop Crimes (playing the songs of Rowland Howard), and a well-known novelist and nonfiction writer. The group’s other couple, bassist Dave Graney and drummer Clare Moore, are well known Down Under for their earlier groups the Moodists and the Coral Snakes.

The show captured on this recording is incredible! This one-time-only performance includes Pink Monkey Birds favourites as well as covers of the Cramps, Gun Club, Shangri-Las and Suicide!

This is a twelve song live album from a one-time-only show in which Kid Congo Powers was backed by the Near Death Experience.

Kid Congo says, “how did i hook up with the Near Death Experience you may ask? one fine day Kim Salmon, my long time Scientists surrealist beast of a friend, wrote from Australia to ask me to play at his book launch for his biography nine parts water, one part sand: Kim Salmon and the formula for grunge on November 9th, 2019. the launch was to take place at the memo music hall in st. kilda, a seaside suburb of melbourne. a royal command performance for the king of Kim? how could I say no to such an honour? what to do about a band? it did not take more than a minute for each of us to suggest Harry Howard and the Near Death Experience. as the logical choice.Ii was a massive fan of the band already and we shared crossed paths as expats claiming out our musical in 1980s London. Harry with Crime and the City Solution and These Immortal Souls, Dave and Clare with the Moodists, Kim with the Scientists and me with Gun Club and Fur Bible.

Needless to say it was fantastical to get together and make a playlist for Kim featuring covers by Suicide and Shangri La, with mine and Near Death Experience‘s songs as well. the night was magic—I still am floating on a surrealistic pillow remembering the night. enjoy the racket, enjoy the love, enjoy this record of friendship and celebration.”

Kid Congo & the Near Death Experience · “Live in St. Kilda” In The Red Records