Pinkshift is a rock band new to the scene from MarylandBaltimore. With writing inspired by 90s grunge and 2000s pop punk, the band walks the lines between riot grrl, punk rock, and post-hardcore. Comprised of vocalist Ashrita Kumar, guitarist Paul Vallejo, drummer Myron Houngbedji, and bassist Erich Weinroth, the self-described ‘rat city rock nerds’ formed in college in 2018. All studying at a research university in Baltimore, they’re the first to admit there’s not much of a scene at their school, so they found each other through music clubs and – would you believe it – a Tinder search party. Reminiscing on their formative days, Ashrita recalls the tipping point: she and Paul had written so many songs that they thought “logically, we should play these out loud, and how do we do that? We have to start a band to do that.”
Punk bands have taken a stand against subjugation and Pinkshift continue the legacy by kicking back against their modern oppressor; smartphones and social media. “nothing (in my head)” is a heavy AF ode to turning off your devices and embracing the smooth brain lifestyle.
The official music video for Pinkshift’s new single “nothing (in my head)” available now on Hopeless Records!
A grassroots, no-label/DIY, compilation album project benefiting 501(c)(3) nonprofits. 100 percent of the funds raised go directly to the respective charity (less the cost of processing fees).
“Through The Soil II” is a great compilation raising funds for the National Network of Abortion Funds with the help of new music from Julien Baker, MJ Lendermann, and Faye Webster among many others (seriously, this thing is stacked). It’s also a great spotlight for lesser-known artists such as LA’s Cryogeser, whose shoegaze-y pop hit “Obvious” stands out among the crowd.
These charity compilations would be absolutely nothing without the generosity from all the artists involved. Thank you to all who took part in the making of this release, for sharing a piece of your art for this project and for your continued support.
Cat Power is set to recreate Bob Dylan’s iconic recording and performance at the Free Trade Hall in Manchester on May 17th 1966, which was mistakenly labelled as taking place at the Royal Albert Hall, with her own performance at the latter venue in London on November 5th.
Cat Power, real name Charlyn Marie Marshall, will recreate Dylan’s entire set and play the same songs he did in ’66, and in the same order. Also keeping to Dylan’s original format, Marshall will play the first half of the set acoustic before switching to electric for the second half. When Dylan originally switched to electric during his 1966 show, he was backed by The Hawks, who went on famously to become The Band.
No stranger to covering Dylan songs, Marshall has performed a number of his songs, including “Paths of Victory,” “Hard Times in New York Town,” “Moonshiner,” and “Kingsport Town” during past concerts, in addition to recording “Stuck Inside of Mobile With the Memphis Blues Again” for the 2007 Dylan biopic “I’m Not There”. “When I finally got the opportunity to play the Royal Albert Hall, it was a no-brainer,” said Marshall in a statement. “I just wanted to sing Dylan songs. And as much as any, this collection of his songs, to me, belong there.”
Dylan’s 1966 concert was officially released as the fourth volume of Dylan’s The Bootleg Series and subtitled as the “Royal Albert Hall” concert. The concert took place several months after Dylan went electric at the Newport Folk Festival in the summer of 1965. At the Manchester concert, a fan famously yelled “Judas,” a moment that has appeared on bootlegs over the years before being featured in Martin Scorsese’s 2005 Dylan documentary “No Direction Home“.
Marshall, who recently finished the European leg of her tour—supporting her most recent album “Covers“, and featuring her renditions of songs by Bob Seger, Iggy Pop, Ella Fitzgerald, The Pogues, Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds, and more.
If the “Summer of Love” had a theme song, it would have to be “Get Together”, by The Youngbloods. With its warm cascade of chords and message of aspirational brotherhood, “Together” swirled the hippie ethic into a song.
As far as choruses go, few are as instantly identifiable as this one: “Come on, people now, smile on your brother, everybody get together, try to love one another right now.”
The song, “Get Together” (sometimes called “Let’s Get Together”), has a fascinating, convoluted history. For most people, it will always be associated with the Youngbloods, whose primary lead singer, Jesse Colin Young originally born Perry Miller in November 1941 in Queens, N.Y. Young got his start in the early ’60s as a solo folk-blues singer on the Boston-Cambridge club circuit. He released two acoustic albums, “The Soul of a City Boy” (Capitol Records, 1964) and “Young Blood” (Mercury, 1965), before the rock and roll bug bit him.
Along with guitarist-singer Jerry Corbitt, keyboardist-guitarist Lowell “Banana” Levinger and drummer Joe Bauer, Young (who switched to bass in the band) formed the Youngbloods in Boston in 1966 and, after signing with RCA Records, they recorded their self-titled debut album the following year. Corbitt and Young started playing together on his back porch. Then one day after the Beatles came out we said, “Could we just transition into a band?” Banana lived down the street from Corbitt, and Joe Bauer had just come up from Memphis and moved in upstairs from Banana. There weren’t a lot of drummers around, because the folk thing was pretty strong. Pretty soon I was playing duo and then we were Jesse ColinYoung and the Lonely Nights or the Jerry Corbitt Three. We had a bunch of names before we got around to Youngbloods.
The debut album produced by Mountain‘s Felix Pappalardi, who had a reputation as an gifted arranger on the New York folk scene, later he would also produce Cream around the same time, the folk-rock album, which bore a resemblance to the sound of the Lovin’ Spoonful. Even while they were moving forward, the Youngbloods experienced a surprise hit when “Get Together,” from the debut, was re-released in the summer of ’69. This time it resonated with the larger audience, The Youngbloods’ debut album, a self-titled work which minted a signature sound sifting together folk, jazz, ragtime, country-rock and psychedelia. During their 5 year run, The Youngbloods recorded a deep trove of elegant tunes
A single taken from the album, “Get Together,” credited to Chet Powers (who was actually future Quicksilver Messenger Service singer Dino Valenti), The Youngbloods’ sophomore LP, “Earth Music”, in the same vein musically. Jefferson Airplane had already recorded the song for their pre-Grace Slick debut album in ’66 (Jefferson Airplane “Takes Off“). But The Youngbloods‘ version idealized its melody with their finely-twined harmonies. “I got a chill down my whole body,” Young said. “The song was became a hit in San Francisco!”
The Youngbloods’ second album was “Earth Music” and then, during the 1967 Summer of Love, The band all moved to the West Coast.
We played the Avalon [Ballroom, in San Francisco] and it was full of freaks and they all looked like Banana with the big hair. So we realized we could work there. Then we walked into this cheap motel and there’s this funny little radio built into the bed and I turn it on and there’s “Get Together.” Wow!.
When the time came for “Elephant Mountain” we had been on the West Coast for a year. Clearly, they needed a change if they were to survive, so in mid-’67, the band yanked up its roots and relocated from its then-current home of New York City to the San Francisco Bay Area. There they found greater acceptance among the local rock aficionados, and set out to make their third album for RCA, which would be titled “Elephant Mountain” (named after an actual peak near Pt. Reyes Station in Marin County, north of San Francisco, where the band, now reduced to a trio with the departure of Corbitt, resided). With Charlie Daniels producing,
Images of wind, sunlight and mountains began to inform Young’s songs. “Love of the natural world is as much a theme in my music as romantic love,” he said. “Sometimes, it’s even more dominant. I got more out of walking over the ridge top in Marin and looking out at the national sea shore than any drugs I ever took.”
The inspiration that gave found full focus on the band’s third, and best, studio album, “ElephantMountain”, released in 1969. featured the seminal tracks, At the same time, the band experienced a serious rupture. Corbett ditched the band three songs into recording ‘Elephant Mountain.’ The guitarist had developed a fear or flying, got into serious drugs, and also pined to focus on country-rock rather than The Youngbloods’ more eclectic mix. But instead of subverting the band, Corbitt’s parting opened them up to a new sound. Continuing as a spare trio allowed them to experiment, employing more improvisation to fill the space. The players were greatly encouraged in that regard by their producer, the later country-rock star Charlie Daniels. “He said to us ‘some bands need a push, and some need you to get out in front of them and say ‘woe,'” Young recalled. “‘But you guys just need me to be there.
The album, despite its underwhelming chart performance, gave The Youngbloods a large credibility boost it is considered not only the band’s finest but a sleeper classic from that era, with jazz-informed songs like “Ride the Wind,” “Sunlight,” kissed by a luminous melody and a rapturous lyric. “Darkness, Darkness,” (Mott The Hoople recorded their own haunted version for their 1971 album “Brain Capers“). A bad acid trip had inspired the song. “It put me in touch with terror,” Young said. “Later, I came to think of my friends in Vietnam. They live with this terror every night. After the war, we played a lot of veteran’s benefits. The veterans told me that ‘Darkness, Darkness’ and ‘Get Together’ were the songs that really got to them in that period. Other songs “Quicksand” and “Beautiful” receiving massive amounts of airplay on the FM rock stations of the day.
They released their next album, a live set called “Rock Festival”.
Informed by a sensibility finely attuned to the natural world. Young’s flexible tenor expressed unalloyed freedom, while the band played their instruments with supple care. Their 1971 live album, “Ride The Wind”, remains one of the greatest concert documents of the classic-rock era. The nine minute take on the title track remains the ultimate Youngbloods’ jam. “We were playing music at the edge of my learning curve,” Young said. “There’s not a lot of half-step chord changes in pop music. With that success in hand, the Youngbloods were able to launch their own RCA-distributed label, Raccoon Records.
No live album of the prime San Francisco era so perfectly captured the lightness of the scene. Appropriately, ‘Ride The Wind’ documents a free concert in the city’s park. “The most transformational thing about that scene was playing for free,” Young said. “You could pull a permit from the city for $100, get a flat bed truck, pull up in the pan handle of the park and people would come hear you play. Free music was like two halves of a great being meeting.”
After ‘Ride,’ the band released two more studio works, though neither captured their essence as sweetly as their previous work. Young went on to create solo albums with more elaborate instrumentation while still retaining his commitment to the character of Marin. Some observers have speculated that the reason The Youngbloods didn’t become bigger had to do with their home base in low-key Marin rather than in the city centre. Observers also believe the press’ snubbing of the band had to do with a prevailing critical bias against “mellow music” in favour of more aggressive sounds. Young isn’t sure about either of those things, but he does feel that one factor in the band’s low profile has to do with him being a reluctant performer. “I don’t feed on adulation,” he said, Young is simply content to have made a living in music. He’s also proud of the band’s catalogue
For over a decade, Joyce Manor have epitomised pop-punk’s cathartic power. Although they bear some of the genre’s conventions – namely their impassioned expression of suburban angst and songs that breeze by in one or two minutes – they don’t sit squarely within its walls. If you go back through their albums so far, you’ll find traces of Midwest emo, chugging power-pop and delicate, jangly indie rock. Their channelling of influences posits them as one of the most curious yet inventive bands of their ilk.
This lead single from Joyce Manor’s sixth studio album, “40 oz. To Fresno” (due for release on June 10), feels like a release of pressure. The feeling of a valve being eased in singer/guitarist Barry Johnson’s head as he barks his way through evocative lines like “Big Yellow Shell All Fucked Up And Haunted” is palpable.
It results in some of the catchiest songs in the band’s arsenal. Take ‘NBTSA’, a 2017 single given a fresh lick of paint. It’s the musical equivalent to dropping Mentos into a bottle of Diet Coke; guitars fizz as Thaxton’s drums and Matt Ebert’s bass drive towards the eruptive chorus. As jubilant as the song is, it reflects Johnson’s bubbling anxiety, which intensifies at the titular refrain.
The dichotomy between fragility and buoyancy is well-trodden ground for Johnson. “40 oz. to Fresno” is strewn with familiar weariness. On pop-punk throwback ‘Gotta Let It Go’, he reminisces about walking aimlessly at night and hitching a ride in his friend’s stolen car, ultimately coming to terms with his lost youth. He’s at his most direct on ‘Don’t Try’, where he achingly admits to his loneliness (“I feel so far away/I missed you so much today”).
It’s Joyce Manor’s ability to meld disparate styles that still sets them apart. Whether it’s the wistful ‘Reason to Believe’ with its chiming guitar, or the heartfelt Weezer soundalike ‘Secret Sisters’, every song is quintessentially them. While their pop-punk peers stagnate, Joyce Manor continue to take interesting and surprising shapes.
It’s all change for this, the fourth long-player from the Warmduscher camp. Not only have the fuzzed-out London-based outfit moved from one excellent label (Tony Morley’s The Leaf Label) to another (Simon Raymonde’s Bella Union), but there’s been a last-minute substitution in the producer’s chair.
Having been at the controls for the last two albums, Speedy Wonderground’s Dan Carey (the hardest working man in show business) was lined up for this one, but just as everyone was ready to go Carey got Covid. Warmduscher aren’t a band known for hanging around (their last outing, 2019’s frantic ‘Tainted Lunch’, was recorded in four days) so with the clock ticking they turned to Hot Chip’s Joe Goddard and Al Doyle for some expert knob twiddling. The result is still very much the scuzzy Warmduscher we’ve come to love, but this time it’s super-charged with a polished funk sound. “Like stumbling home to your squatted loft after a drunken night at the local disco” say their people.
Just to lull you into a false sense of security, opener ‘Live At The Hotspot’ is a late-night smoocher. A kind of tuxe-no-bow-tie set-closing kind of tune, played in a smoky, underground, backstreet jazz bar, you know, the sort of place you’d imagine Clams Baker Jr and co to hang out. It gives way to ‘Hot Shot’, which revs like a motorbike, opening up the throttle as the pressure builds towards ‘Eight Minute Machines’, which is where things really start cooking. Its scattergun Sigue Sigue Sputnik/kosmische pulse locks down as everything they’ve got is chucked over the top.
Summed up by the powers that been: Electric transmissions from the kitchens of twitch! Busy signals, threats of bodily harm, the pan-fried doom of grandma’s palpitations, a k2 carpet ride you can’t hop off of. Pick it up Jan & Jimmy, you’re all alone!
Behold, “Twitchin’ In The Kitchen,” our latest offering to you and the gods featuring a video tale to join us made possible by the following professionals of the industry.
Warmduscher “Twitchin’ In The Kitchen” from their forthcoming album “Live at the Hotspot”
Ola’s Kool Kitchen is on KCLA 99.3 FM in Los Angeles, 107.5 andhow.FM, Maximum Threshold Radio, Rock Radio UK, Sword Radio UK, Jammerstream One, Kor Radio, Bombshell Radio, Pop Radio UK, Radio Wigwam, Rock XS Radio, Dirty Chai Radio, Radio Candy Radio and Radio Lantau you can hear more shows here https://hearthis.at/olaskoolkitchen/ Show 470 1. Fontaines D.C.-Jackie Down the Line 2. Blue States—Alarms 3. Psychedelic Porn Crumpets-Bubblegum Infinity 4. Undrejground Feat Iamnotsemi-Films 5. Fozzy Mare-Patio-single-self release 6. Just the Wolves Feat Delta Mono-Fog-single-Tipping Point Records 7. Dreamcoaster-Step Outside-DREAMCOASTER Ep-SPINOUT NUGGETS 8. Bodega-Pillar on the Bridge of You- Broken Equipment What’s Yr Rupture? 9. Holodrum-Clean-Holodrum-Gringo Records 10. Vaqo-Chiche Chkua-single-self release 11. Goat Girl-Pest-On All Fours-Rough Trade
Eric Clapton has released a new song titled “Pompous Fool.” It’s an Upbeat tune bounces along a jovial beat, with Clapton singling lines such as: “Don’t you worry, don’t be blue / Let your woman, take care of you / Live your life, by the golden rule / Pay no mind, to the pompous fool.”
The new song arrived unexpectedly, with no accompanying press release or explanation. Considering it was released the same day that U.K. Prime Minister Boris Johnson retired from office due to ongoing scandals, many fans online have theorized that the tune was inspired by the controversial politician.
Clapton has been critical of Johnson in the past, specifically on the leader’s handling of the COVID pandemic. Roughly a year ago, the prime minister announced that proof of vaccination would be required for patrons attending concerts in U.K. venues, drawing Clapton’s ire.
“Following the PM’s announcement,” the guitarist said at the time, “I feel honour bound to make an announcement of my own: I wish to say that I will not perform on any stage where there is a discriminated audience present. Unless there is provision made for all people to attend, I reserve the right to cancel the show.”
A month later, Clapton released “This Has Gotta Stop,” which further condemned Johnson’s COVID-related rules with lines like, “This has gotta stop / Enough is enough / I can’t take this BS any longer / It’s gone far enough.”
Clapton, it should be noted, claimed to suffer “severe reactions” from the AstraZenaca vaccine. “My hands and feet were either frozen, numb or burning, and pretty much useless for two weeks,” the rocker later detailed. “I feared I would never play again.”
Los Angeles psych-rock band Hooveriii (pronounced “Hoover Three”) have announced the July 29th release of their new album “A Round of Applause”.
Today the band shares the first take of the album by way of “A Round of Applause” opening track, “See.” The band’s Bert Hoover notes, “‘See’ is about trying not to take life for granted. Some things are easier said than done. It’s our first song to feature Anna Wallace singing along with us and it came together rather seamlessly. It was a pretty bare bones jangle jam until the band filled it with ear candy.” The video was filmed on 16mm at the Trona Pinnacles in Trona CA. Conceived and co-directed by the mighty Nikki Houston and Owen Summers it features aliens stranded on earth try to find their way home until things go very wrong.
Though created in large part by founder Bert Hoover, Hooveriii has grown to include Gabe Flores (lead guitar and vocals), Kaz Mirblouk (bass and synths), James Novick (synths), and Owen Barrett (drums). Prior to delving into “A Round of Applause”Hoveriii’s second album through The Reverberation Appreciation Society —the band had stuck to a routine of issuing about two releases a year (including singles, live albums, etc.). After the rise of a certain five-letter word that starts with a C, they realized that time really shouldn’t be taken for granted. Finding additional inspiration via Nick Cave, who once said that dabbling with new ideas continues to fuel his near-50-year career, the band decidedly took a different approach with their new album and gave themselves the freedom to explore in the studio.
The end result is “A Round of Applause”, an expansive and even, at times, experimental record. Whereas 2021’s “Water for the Frogs” was akin to a jam-band record most of its seven songs are about five minutes long (including a closing track that lasts nearly 10) — “A Round of Applause” could be considered their “pop” album. Occasionally paying homage to the Canterbury scene, the band consider it to be a palette cleanser of sorts. “I am not really a playlist guy or a singles guy,” Hoover admits. “I’m really into the album experience. … So yeah, we made a pop record. But also, to me, this record is very progressive as well, and I think that that provides a nice balance.” He previously referred to “Water for the Frogs” as the band’s equivalent of Iggy Pop’s The Idiot. Playing with that idea he says “A Round of Applause” is the kindred spirit of Lust For Life.
Hooveriii derived the album title from the late-‘80s Roky Erickson song “Click Your Fingers Applauding the Play.” “That’s too much of a mouthful,” Hoover qualified. “My title, “A Round of Applause”, just came one day, and we were like, ‘Yo, that sounds like a Gentle Giant record.’”
Reflecting the mostly lighthearted and uplifting record, “A Round of Applause” closes cheekily — but not sarcastically — with the sound of people clapping. Hoover adds graciously: “We’ve been lucky so far. I don’t think we really have a, you know, ‘bad song.’ ” Maybe one will, someday. But Hoover doesn’t dwell on that; after all, his band has more records to make — and time is of the essence.
The Wave Pictures bring to an end a four year hiatus with a double LP ‘When The Emperor Spreads His Purple Wings’. Lead single ‘This Heart Of Mine’ is a beautifully gentle, autumnal tune, inspired by Neil Young’s country-tinged output and features lyrics about memories, space and time travel. The band are known for playing a variety of styles from garage rock to jazz and blues.
With a nuance of autumn, ‘This Heart Of Mine’ references time and space travel & memory all rolled into one. Musically inspired by classic Neil Young, ‘This Heart Of Mine’ witnesses The Wave Pictures going full-on country and features cowboy harmonica from Dominic ‘Hotdog’ Brider, Franic Rozycki on mandolin, alongside Dave Tattersall’s gentle acoustic guitar strum. The first of four seasonal videos made by Nina Garthwaite for “When The Purple Emperor Spreads His Wings” album, ‘This Heart Of Mine’ is Autumn: “The week I made it autumn was at its best, sunny and cold with long shadows. The best thing about autumn is that the days somehow feel like they contain all the autumn days that ever were, just right for a song about memories and time. I’m still exploring animation and this is much more multimedia in style than I’ve done so far – there are mono-prints, photos, paintings and photocopies and I probably got over-excited about the flicker technique! It is also inspired a lot by the bonkers collage posters Franic likes to do. Towards the end, when when the band appears as if inside a planet, brings to mind how long it’s been since they have been able to tour properly. Hopefully by the time the album is released they’ll be back, rocking, doing what they love.”
The Wave Pictures, industrious and prolific as ever, return today with ‘This Heart Of Mine’, taken from the forthcoming double album “When The Purple Emperor Spreads His Wings”, out in 2022:
The Fat Angel Sings 