The Fat Angel Sings

Singer/songwriter and ace guitarist Nils Lofgren has never hit the big time, but he has never been far from those who have. Working next to Neil Young on “After the Gold Rush” when he was just 18, co-penning tunes with Lou Reed, and (since 1984) joining Springsteen’s E Street Band, Lofgren has carved out a career for being best known as a side man for others.

But that shouldn’t dismiss his clutch of occasionally terrific, solo albums from the mid-’70s, in addition to years as frontman for the bubbling-under but never boiling band Grin in the early part of that decade. Nevertheless, Lofgren stayed busy in music even if he never broke through commercially on his own.

Assisting on these ten songs are legends like jazz bassist Ron Carter (on the lovely ballad “Only Your Smile”), the late David Crosby for one of his final album appearances, Neil Young (providing subtle harmonies on the love song to Nils’ wife “Nothing’s Easy”) and Ringo Starr who brings drums for one tune and momentary vocals to the thumping pop-rocker “We Better Find It.” That track also includes, for better or worse, a children’s choir.   

Lofgren’s strength lies in upbeat compositions like “Won’t Cry No More” (dedicated to Charlie Watts), the mid-tempo rocking opener “Ain’t the Truth Enough” and its follow-up, the slower yet insistent pumper “Only Ticket Out.” The latter is enhanced by an organic, bluesy guitar solo and soulful, often intense approach to a song about an alcoholic who has reached the bottom and is looking for a way out. Lofgren goes to church for the touching love song “Back in Your Arms” bringing in a full gospel choir for arguably one of the finest, most moving, and fully formed items in his catalogue. It deserves to be a hit. Maybe Bruce will let him sing it at a show.

But the set suffers maybe suffers from an excess of ballads. Some, like “I Remember Her Name,” a song about searching for love that he finally found with his wife, are well-meaning but hew towards the cheesier side. Other piano-based narratives like the closing “Angel Blues” are delicate, pretty, and charming, but edge dangerously close to schlocky and don’t play to Lofgren’s tougher talents.

On this album, his first of original material in over a decade, he is credited with keyboards, bass, drums, vibes, and even harp. And of course guitar, an instrument on which he has established a specific, identifiable sound through the decades. Add a distinctive youthful voice and you have the potential for a credible one-man band. It helps to have your own studio for overdubbing at will, and inputting others’ contributions when needed there’s enough solid material here displaying Lofgren’s impressive vocal, instrumental, and song writing qualities.

Swedish rock band GOAT are to release their soundtrack to the recent BBC Television programme “The Gallows Pole” digitally through Rocket Recordings on July 7th.

There was plenty of noise on social media from prog fans while the programme, penned by sometime , given the proggy nature of the music and the quasi mystical and pagan backdrop of the programme. “The Gallows Pole” was adapted for television by acclaimed director Shane Meadows (Dead Man’s Shoes, This Is England).

“In the beginning, we would get inspiration just through reading the book, trying to get a sense of its vibration and then translate that into music, with passages from the book as a springboard for those jams,” the band explain of the writing process for the soundtrack. The themes and imagery of Benjamin Myers’ source novel seem to be the perfect fit for GOAT’s mystical, pagan aesthetic.

“The Gallows Pole” is GOAT’s second soundtrack release, following their score for the 2017 British independent horror film Double Date. The album includes five brand new tracks from the score and three existing tracks director Meadows selected from their back catalogue.

The series, which was based in rural 18th century Yorkshire, tells a fictionalised tale based on the true story of David Hartley and the Cragg Vale Coiners, which became the biggest fraud in British history.

Like a lucid Shane MacGowan fronting a frazzled house band, YOWL are a South London based 5 piece band of menacing-indie storytellers, swinging from intense proto-punk to swooning balladry. Born from the grit and gristle of South London, their debut album is both a curdled, anxiety-riddled reaction and a bitter antidote to our times.

The South London group YOWL are ready to introduce debut album ‘Milksick’.

The band caused a ruckus with 2019 EP ‘Atrophy’, with their sludge-driven proto-punk sound aiming for the jugular. Taking time out, YOWL have now uncovered fresh focus, and return with some razor-sharp material.

Out on September 14th, debut album ‘Milksick’ is the result of endless late night sessions, with YOWL pushing themselves to the brink. In a note, the band label the songs “a collection of outlandish cautionary tales, uneasy odes to imaginary characters and late night pedal-fuckery”.

New scorcher ‘Idiot Daughters, Idiot Sons’ is out now, with Gabriel Byrne’s unhinged vocal performance taking the band to fresh heights of oblivion. He comments…

“This one’s about those introspective times you spend lying awake at night sometimes, head buzzing with wasted time, missed opportunities and the chastising carousel of humiliating moments that nobody except you probably noticed or remembered. It’s self-flagellation via upbeat falsettos, a cheery groove dedicated to times when personal resentment turns into a maddening cycle of internal finger-wagging.” 

Our debut album ‘Milksick’ is out on the 14th September.

The Wytches need very little introduction, but it is with no little excitement that we welcome back Brighton’s purveyors of melody for album number four – all raucous and unruly, yet glistening with jagged edged poetic wistfulness and undeniable emotional clout.

The former Transgressive/ Heavenly Records act return with their fourth studio album in September on Alcopop! Records this year – and it’s definitely their best yet, all raw-throat punk, stoner/doom psych, riffing swagger, and perhaps just the tiniest hint of delicious folk twinkling… Just get it in your ears. It’s glorious.

LIMITED DINKED EDITION
Black & White, Half & Half Vinyl / 5” x 2” Glow-in-the-Dark Album Patch / Individual, Original Super 8 film cells from the ‘Maria’ Video on a signed collectors card / Limited Pressing of 500

Released: 22/09/2023

“Twice Removed” was the second album by Canadian rock band Sloan, released on Geffen Records in 1994. The album took seven weeks and cost $120,000 to record. More melodic than their previous album, “Smeared”, Geffen gave the record little promotion because it defied the label’s commercially dominant grunge rock style of the time. The band and Geffen parted ways after “Twice Removed’s” release. After the band’s trouble with the label, they took time off from touring and writing and were broken up for a brief period.  the album received a deluxe reissue on vinyl. This edition includes another three discs: one containing demo versions of the “Twice Removed” songs; another containing B-sides that were originally intended for the album but left off; and a 7-inch, 45 RPM disc containing songs that, in the words of guitarist Jay Ferguson, “didn’t really fit anywhere else in the package”. The release also includes a 12×12, 32-page colour booklet containing photos, interviews and other stories from the band’s members. The reissue was made available exclusively via the band’s website.

In celebration of the deluxe reissue of Sloan’s album “Twice Removed”,

When listening, it feels as though Frankie Cosmos, the musical project through which Greta Kline and her band have been releasing shyly impactful indie/pop for about a decade, knows you. 

As though there is some cosmic emotional synchronization between the narratives expressed within the music, and the crushes, dogs, misfortunes, and happy inexplicability of your own life, Frankie Cosmos’ concise, even minimalistic lyricism and compositions cut through to the most earnest bits of you. Uncomplicated and without drawing too much attention, the group makes music quietly, but with a vulnerability and endearment that distinguishes them from their contemporaries within the often-too-mushy indie/pop scene.

Like diary entries, or impassioned love letters with strict word counts, Frankie Cosmos’ style is simple, direct, honest, and is comfortable not knowing exactly what that feeling is or why it is, as long as it is being felt and expressed. It is music that endears itself, exposes itself, and does its best for you.

“Clean Weird Prone” (Inner World Peace Deluxe) is an expanded edition of the band’s critically acclaimed 2022 album, “Inner World Peace”.

“Clean Weird Prone” includes the original 15-track “Inner World Peace” track-list, along with unreleased tracks, demos, and alternate versions of the album’s songs. Frankie Cosmos’s mastermind, Greta Kline, shares about this release:

Maybe it’s ego, maybe it’s an obsession with archiving, maybe it’s just for fun. But I have always had a bit of a focus on preserving the first way the song went. It’s hard for me to let go of my demos. These are some of the many seeds of the album. I wanted to share a sampling (I have about 5 times as much material) because “Inner World Peace” was a drawn-out and unique album process.

Since forming the band, I have always had tours breaking up writing and arranging time…until 2020. This was also the first album since “Zentropy” that I wrote without any release plan or hopes to tour. I think that freeness can be felt in the album and the demos.

My demo-ing process is extremely stripped down, and until 2020 I recorded my vocals straight into my computer mic or my earbud mic (track 5, “hey whatsup” is from that era). I can still carry my whole recording setup (sans instruments) in a tote bag. When I think about these recordings, I can physically place myself in a lot of them. Beds, floors, sometimes desks or tables. The internal and personal moment with the core of the song before it gets shared with bandmates* and producers and expanded into the butterfly. These are my cocoons!

*Actually, there are two of these that were made by bandmate Alex Bailey based on my first demo. By “shared with bandmates” I mean “brought into practice and worked on the arrangement together”!

the album, ‘Inner World Peace,’ out October 21st, 2022 on Sub Pop Records.

Body Maintenance are a post-punk band, but they don’t sound like Joy Division, they sound like Body Maintenance. The band started in 2017 and now it’s 2023, I’ve been in the band since 2018. We’ve always wanted to put out an album.

Hailing from Melbourne, Body Maintenance sounds like a band you would hear in a club in 1980s Manchester rather than at Melbourne’s The Curtin Hotel in 2023. While taking inspiration from the likes of Sisters of Mercy, The Sound and Echo and the Bunnymen, their sound is unique and unlike any other bands in the realm. In April released their debut album “Beside You”, the follow-up to their 2021 self-titled EP.

Zoe Mulcahy said, I think for bands that have been around for that long and don’t put anything out, there is a lot of pressure associated with that first big release.

That’s something that I think we’ve done well with, not letting that pressure get the best of us and overthink the songs too much, overdoing how it flows and what it means. I think because we write our own parts and come together as a group, we were all able to help make sure we wouldn’t psych ourselves out. Luckily the EP release took the weight of doing an LP.

“This six track EP merges melodic post-punk with elements of stark goth adversity. With nods to The Chameleons and Second Empire Justice era Blitz, these songs are evocative of the anxiously bleak yet anthemic sounds of early 80’s Manchester, delivered in a contemporary Australian context.”

‘Ends’ on the latest record, Riley wrote that himself before the band existed. In the original recording, he recorded it in his bedroom and dubbed the vocals over the top with the microphone of his headphones. A few of the other songs on “Beside You” were ideas that James, Riley or I had been bouncing around during lockdown. We would send them to the group and when we’d finally get the chance to get together, we would work on them and evolve them into what they eventually came to be. Usually, for most songs, there’s an initial idea that someone has that gets brought to the group and we’ll jam it and decide ‘let’s run that’, ‘let’s not run that’ and then everyone adds their own parts from there. There’s a lot of brainstorming at practice between us all but everyone is usually on the same page.

Listening to “Beside You”, you are taken on a journey beginning at the hard, fast and uplifting ‘Silver Yarns’ that makes you feel as if you can take on the world. Four songs in you are met with ‘Time Enough’ which brings you back to the sad reality of the world that we really live in. Isolating yet inspiring, aggressive yet intricate, their music is the perfect soundtrack to accompany a walk home or even a late-night drive.

The band consists of Riley Stafford on Vocals and Guitar, James Kane who is also on guitar, Nick Garth who plays the synth and bass and Zoe Mulcahy on the drums.

Wunderhorse is the alias of British musician Jacob Slater. Jacob fronted The Dead Pretties, a London band who arrived in a haze of hedonism and hype, bowing out before the dust had time to settle. Blink and you’d have missed them. Time-stamped yet timeless. If there’s any justice, he’ll soon be played out live in sticky basement rooms up and down the country, limbs everywhere, sweat dripping from the walls. An absolute mess, but what a beautiful one. The band’s debut record, 2022’s, “Cub”, was gritty and honest, brimming with reflections on heartache, self-exploration, and the strain of youth: relatable in ways you might wish it wasn’t. Stitching together the old and the new with snaking guitar licks, electrifying vocals, and magnetic bass lines, the drums acting as the backbone to a sizzling body of sound.

Wunderhorse is THE band right now. We’re totally obsessed – their fuzzy, warm, grunge rock-infused debut record ‘Cub’ is easily one of the best things we’ve heard in 2022 – and it’s just the beginning for this band. “Teal”, “Leader Of The Pack”, and “Girl Behind The Glass” are a good place to start. “Teal” is devastating track.

This new project arrives no less frenetically. “Teal” is a feral, romantic, visceral, chaotic and enchanting cacophony of sound that contradicts itself with each sleight of hand and change of chord. A rare, raw and assured talent, “Teal” is an urgent fever-dream of a number, tumbling downhill with the brakes off. Belligerent and unblinking. Arthouse indie-rock, but without the connotations. It’s one of those.

If this all sounds exciting that’s because it is. “Teal” is one of those tunes that has a rare ability to define the very moment in which its heard and forever associate itself with the memories long after. Time-stamped yet timeless. If there’s any justice, it’ll soon be played out live in sticky basement rooms up and down the country, limbs everywhere, sweat dripping from the walls. An absolute mess, but what a beautiful one.

“Cub” turns a year old in October. Jacob comments I think we all feel as a group that we’ve left it behind quite quickly, because there’s been a really long build up to writing and recording and releasing. We knew the songs so well by the time it came out. We’ve just recently done our next record, and those are the songs we’re really excited about now. We’re still playing some of the “Cub” stuff, but musically I feel like we’ve moved on from it. 

Trust me when I say Wunderhorse are going to be a name you’ll hear a ton more about in the future.

Co-produced by the band and James Ford (Arctic Monkeys, Depeche Mode, Shame), “3d Country” the album’s 11 tracks are an explosion in both scope and vision for the group. On a practical level, Geese are still the group we were introduced to in 2021: one of New York City’s most promising young bands and voted Bright Young Things 2023 participants vocalist Cameron Winter, guitarist Gus Green, guitarist Foster Hudson, bassist Dom DiGesu, and drummer Max Bassin. But spiritually, Geese have returned as an entirely different prospect. ‘3D Country’ is the sound of a restless, adventurous band redefining themselves. With a lead up that included hypnotic and somewhat-misleading singles like, ‘Cowboy Nudes’, and ‘Mysterious Love’. Geese have so much fun making their art that it can be felt on the track, on the album, and live in front of you.

The singles, the themes, the videos, and the artwork, all appeared to be a misdirect; some suspicious and eclectic body that on their own seemed to point in any sarcastic direction. However, when placed within the body of the album, we see these bits and pieces aren’t disjointed so much as only every other piece of a puzzle that when placed in with the remaining pieces, take on a beautiful, funny, threatening, exciting, and highly-listenable form. The idea behind “3D Country” at first was to make it a lot longer. The first version was nine minutes long and started with this free wheeling, laid back, and then it starts to get really fucking intense. It had a lot of craziness in it,

The last single the band put out, ‘Cowboy Nudes’, sounds very easy going and a bit like 90’s Beck, but then I saw the music video, and now when I listen to that single, it sounds very sarcastic and maniacal and a bit threatening.

The song is an explosion in both scope and ambition for the band, as they hold a funhouse mirror up to the annals of rock while anchoring an album full of meditations on daily life in a world sliding out of view.

The new album from Geese will be out June 23rd. “3D Country” on Partisan Records and Play It Again Sam.