If there’s one good thing to be drawn from the music industry’s pandemic-led collapse, it’s the fact that a lot of artists have spent their enforced vacations making records that neither we nor they expected to hear. The fruits of those labours are now beginning to emerge, but few are so direct, and so utterly enjoyable, as TV Smith’s contribution.
Unequivocally titled, passionately performed and, as always, brilliantly lyric-ed (is that even a word?), “Lockdown Holiday” is effectively a concept album, tracing the course of both the pandemic and the UK authorities’ response to it. It builds, however, not out of simple observation, but also from Smith’s own first-hand encounter with the bug… picked up, ironically, on his way to one of the final shows he was able to play before it became prudent to stop altogether. “One sneeze in a service station, that’s where my calendar ends.”
The overall mood is acoustic, an atmosphere that always brings out the best in Smith – he plays guitar like he sings, his plectrum rushing to keep up with the lyrics that fall as fast from his mouth today as they ever did back in the days of the Adverts. Likewise, the shifts in emphasis which hit you as hard as a crate full of bass drums, as “The Lucky Ones” shifts from an account of his own Covid-fired sufferings to those of others who don’t have the luxury of a comfortable bed and hot running water to see them through their convalescence.
It’s not a feelgood album… some folk might even find it depressing; it’s bad enough that this bloody bug dominates the news and conversation, do we really need to singalong to songs about it? The difference is, Smith’s commentary is worth hearing (and singing along with); and, besides, the lessons that he draws from what we’ve been going through is applicable to a lot more than the pandemic.
Rather, it is the conditions in which the pandemic has flourished, social and cultural, that interest him the most, targets that shift from the government misinformation we’ve all heard about, to the fact that society in general has become so used to technology solving all our problems instantly that we don’t have a clue what to do about something that can’t be fixed with a quick Google search. But it can certainly be unfixed, if you believe most of what you read.
All of which makes things sound a lot more dour than they are – “Lockdown Holiday” itself might not have the most cheerful lyrics, but there are tunes here that will lock themselves into your brain first time, to go with the thoughts that will linger even longer. This should be included in the best new releases of 2020 (it was released at the end of November).
the TV Smith album “Lockdown Holiday,” release date November 27th. 2020
Back in the early ’70s, riding the wave of the England’s glam rock/glitter rock movement, Slade delivered a supersonic knockout punch of fist waving anthems that helped transform them into superstars in the U.K. and other territories. While Slade is best remembered for their trademark foot stomping stadium-sized rockers like “Mama Weer All Crazee Now,” “Cum On Feel the Noize,” “Gudbuy T’ Jane,” “Skweeze Me, Pleeze Me” and “Take Me Back ‘Ome,” the band’s versatility was evidenced by their ability to come up with a batch of consummately melodic jewels like the tour de force “How Does It Feel,” “Far Far Away,” “Everyday” and “Nobody’s Fool.”
A superb new book, The Noize: The Slade Discography, penned by Ian Edmundson and Chris Selby, is a long awaited chronicle of the band’s releases. What makes this more essential than a dry trainspotting guide to their robust catalogue is the painstaking detail supplied by the authors about each release, from their first hit “Coz I Luv You” to latter day smashes “”Run Runaway.” Beyond the meticulously curated discography details, each entry is crammed with information, description of the songs, relevant quotes from band members, reviews and more. Generously filled with hundreds of images of the band’s various releases, The Noize is a long overdue tome exhaustively examining the band’s rich and varied recording career.
Skating Polly is an American rock band formed in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma in 2009. The band consists of multi-instrumentalists Kelli Mayo and Peyton Bighorse, who were 9 and 14 years old when the band formed. The band is noted for its members alternating instruments, childlike yet mature and poetic lyrics, melodic arrangements, rudimentary musicianship and an eclectic array of songs that vary in style from riot grrrl to piano-based indie pop.
After a jam session at the girls’ Halloween party. Their sophomore album, Lost Wonderfuls, was produced by Exene Cervenka of X and mixed by Kliph Scurlock of The Flaming Lips. “LostWonderfuls” was released in April, 2013. They are now on their third album, Fuzz Steilacoom, Raised on ‘70s punk and early-‘90s alt-rock, Mayo (age 13) and Bighorse (18) inspiration from artists as disparate as Johnny Cash, The Ramones, NWA, Nirvana, and Bikini Kill and saturate their own songs with a raw energy reminiscent of their musical heroes. Skating Polly takes a minimalist approach to song writing, with the two largely self-taught musicians (Bighorse plays guitar, Mayo plays a guitar/bass hybrid called a basitar, and both girls play drums and piano) crafting super-catchy melodies mainly by “messing around with our instruments and figuring out how to make cool noises,” according to Bighorse. But despite their stripped-down aesthetic brutally in-your-face, gut-wrenchingly tender, and irresistibly fun.
Along with earning the adoration of Cervenka (whom they befriended after attending one of the X singer’s 2010 solo shows and playing their demos on a cell phone), Skating Polly has found fans in Rosanne Cash and Sean Lennon, taken the stage with punk legends like Mike Watt, and opened up for such indie heavy-hitters as Deerhoof and Band of Horses. Tapping Mayo’s dad as their tour manager, the stepsisters typically hit the road with their entire family and optimize their travel time by making up songs on their ukulele.
Skating Polly also feature in the soundtrack for Viggo Mortensen’s movie “Falling” is out on Bandcamp, Itunes, Apple Music, Amazon Music, and Google Play!!!
Skating Polly “Little Girl Blue and The Battle Envy” from their record “The Make It All Show”
On his fourth full-length, “Tasjan! Tasjan! Tasjan!”, East Nashville country-to-not-country songwriter Aaron Lee Tasjan is as eager to flesh out the contours of his narrative as the exclamation points imply. Only a month into 2021 and we already have a strong contender for Album of the Year. Just a glorious sound – pop, Americana, psychedelia, it’s a little of everything.
For all of the album’s autobiographical tendencies (often taking shape in references to his bisexuality), Tasjan’s search for meaning is most satisfying when he adopts a hedonistic, albeit good-natured, nihilism. The faster the tempo, the glammier the synth, the brighter the key, the more room for pomp and panache, the more at home Tasjan sounds. This isn’t wholly surprising, given the rhinestone cowboy gallop of 2016’s “Silver Tears” and the enormous hooks trotted out in 2018’s “Karma For Cheap”—the latter’s “If Not Now When” and “The Truth Is So Hard To Believe” paraphrase Oasis in more ways than one. There are so many gems on this album! Up All Night was the first song birthed into the world, and I was immediately hooked. Aaron Lee Tasjan has reinvented himself previously, and expands into new territory yet again with sounds both novel and familiar.
Tasjan nails it on “Don’t Overthink It,” with its meaty bass, gossamer guitar line, and matter-of-fact “I know the bad is getting badder/ It doesn’t matter” message. He adopts a similar approach on lead single “Up All Night,” shot through with ‘80s Springsteen optimism and devil-may-care sparkle: “Broke up with my boyfriend/ To go out with my girlfriend/ Because love is like, love is like, love is like that.” So it is.
If the neon car he drives through the galaxy in the video for “Computer of Love” is any indication, Tasjan isn’t especially self-serious. But he’s susceptible to the self-titled trap of needing capital-S something to capital-S say. The album finishes with a trio of meandering ballads that feel meant to offer some positive personal resolution. “Now You Know,” the best of the three, manages a deft minor-key change with the old school tremolo of an electric organ. But Tasjan is at his best when he throws his hands up in gleeful and messy resignation, the kind of mentality befitting an album with this many exclamation points built in.
All songs written by Aaron Lee Tasjan
Released February 5th, 2021
Instruments & vocals by: Aaron Lee Tasjan, Tommy Scifres, Dylan Sevey. Gregory Lattimer, Keith Christopher, Fred Eltringham, Josh Kaler, Devon Ashley, Dom Billet, Jon Radford, Matt Rowlands,
Aerial East’s life as well as her new album “Try Harder”, released this week on Partisan Records (IDLES, Fontaines DC), is infused with a sense of disconnectedness and alienation. The daughter of a military family, East moved around a lot in her early years, including living in Germany for six years from the age of nine until fifteen. “We went to an American school and lived in American neighbourhoods,” she explains. “So I didn’t learn German or anything, it was a very small and isolated community, there were like 300 kids in my school. There weren’t any malls, any popular culture that we would get would come late! I was a teenager and I wanted to go to malls and see boys that weren’t the 150 boys that were available to me.”
Yet when it came time to leave Germany and move to Abilene in West Texas, she was initially hesitant: “When I lived in Germany and found out I was moving to Texas, I was like ‘oh no, guys with pickup trucks everywhere’, but it wasn’t really like that.” Her fondness for her time in West Texas soon becomes clear. “It was beautiful,” she says, smiling. “I learned how to drive there which is such a big deal, when you suddenly are so free. We drove around a lot – if you drive 30 minutes toward Buffalo Gap, you get to the middle of nowhere, you turn after the second gas station, you drive up this rocky hill and you get to this secret campsite that we used to go to. It was like that mostly, we’d just drive around and explore.”
It was being a musician that East only ever wanted to do – the alienated American in a foreign land, dreaming of the glitz and glamour of the pop stars from back home she would hear belatedly about. When she returned to the US, she did talent shows, she got professional voice lessons, she sung the national anthem at a major league baseball training game. East then lets out a surprise revelation: she also auditioned for American Idol. “It was in 2004,” she explained, somewhat shyly. “I didn’t get past the first round and my mum was really upset, it was more her dream than mine.”
Wanderlust and aimlessness provoked her move to New York aged eighteen but it was mostly inspired by am Abilene high school friend Katharine, who she sings about in the touching song of the same name on the album. “My best friend Katherine moved to New York to go to fashion school and be a model. My family was moving away from Texas and I was living with my ex boyfriend at the time and she needed a roommate and I just thought why not?” Katharine was the first person East shared her songs with and she insisted that East share them with others too. “She’s still an important figure in my life even though we haven’t seen each other in a while,” adds East.
Once I moved to New York City, I quickly met a bunch of artists and musicians who showed me that there was this other possibility.” Shortly after arriving in the big city, she also underwent a formative musical experience. “I saw Sharon Van Etten play in Brooklyn and it blew my mind and opened up my world,” she explains. It’s been a long time since we last heard from East. Her debut album Rooms was released back in 2016. “I had been working on this album pretty quickly after Rooms came out but not in a focused way until after I signed the deal with Partisan, which was around 2017 or 2018,” she explains. “It takes me a long time to write and record. I also did a full pendulum swing, I really wanted it to be different. I loved Rooms, I wanted it to be really big and orchestral and loungey but I wanted this record to be the opposite, very minimal, very quiet, very direct, very intentional.”
And Try Harder reflects this swing. Her lyrics are simple but meaningful, songs of heartbreak, coming-of-age, and the beauty of small things all whispered beautifully. It’s not surprising that it’s all so hushed and intimate when you realise that there are no drums behind her on the record, reflecting East’s anxious state when she was recording. Any accompanying instrumentation – swooning strings or wilting guitars – is sweetly minimal, delicately sparse. It all feels precise and intentional, and it allows the soft beauty of East’s spellbinding voice to suspend and transport the listener.
East is a very serious person; ponderous in reply and thoughtful with her answers. It feels authentic: she isn’t trying to put on any pretensions for the purposes of our conversation. East is also now 32, having had to wait patiently for her time, something that just doesn’t happen on such reality shows.
East shares with me a playlist of the songs that she listened to during the recording of Try Harder. Despite Spotify once informing her that the genre she most listened to was art pop, it’s indie folk that dominates: Angel Olsen, Big Thief, Cat Power, Julia Holter, and Jessica Pratt are some of the prominent names. It was a lesser-known Ethiopian artist that unexpectedly provided the biggest inspiration though. “I really wanted the album to sound like this solo piano album made by Tsegue-Maryam Guebrou (Ethiopiques, Vol. 21: “Emahoy (Piano Solo)”). I heard her at the restaurant I was working at. I became obsessed with it, it’s so beautiful and charming.
Texan characters – former flames and lost friends – and places – “San Angelo”, Abilene, Amarillo – populate the record. It was a sincere and pointed act, to portray a better side to the state. “Everything is so politicised now,” she sighs. “There’s shadow and light to that. I definitely did want to tell stories about people that my New York social bubble don’t have any idea about.
Perhaps this memorialisation is an act of necessity for East herself. Having lived in New York for so long now, this new sense of permanence is perhaps daunting for someone whose life was so aimless and itinerant before it. Remembering West Texas, then, becomes about acknowledging the temporality from which she emerged; a message to Katharine, to ex-partners, to the small towns that they won’t be forgotten.
Everything happens for a reason: Try Harder was supposed to come out last September but it was pushed back because of Covid. East, forever used to temporality and fragility, adapted as she’s always done. “I remember Jessica Pratt’s record (Quiet Signs) came out in January or February in 2019 and everyone I knew was listening to that record because those were the darkest days of the year and it’s such a pretty, introspective record. And I think that Try Harder is a good winter record so it actually feels better being released now.” In a time where many are locked in our homes, thinking of old and better times, East’s record, a remembrance of things past, is comforting, for both her and us.
“Katharine” from her new album, “Try Harder” is released on 12th February via Partisan Recordings.
Close on the heels of “Summerlong” (still in heavy rotation on our turntables), Ripley Johnson (Wooden Shjips, Moon Duo) adds another gem of an album of soon-to-be classics. Hop in your car, roll down your window – or pop in the earbuds and go on a hike. Most importantly, TURN UP THE VOLUME! These tunes are made for travels of the mind and body! Rich melodies, intimate vocals, elongated epic guitar solos and just a dash of country-rock twang, “Earth Trip” takes you to summers spent in the company of friends, and celebrates mediation, nature, space and stillness.
Rose City Band is celebrated guitarist Ripley Johnson. A prolific songwriter, Johnson started Rose City Band as an outlet nimble enough to match the pace of his writing as well as to explore song writing styles apart from Wooden Shjips and Moon Duo. Rose City Band allows him to follow his musical muses as they greet him and not be bound by the schedules of bandmates and demands of a touring group. On Earth Trip, Johnson colours songs with a country-rock twang and a melancholic, wistful undertone. Themes recur such as pining for summers spent in the company of friends to newer meditations on space, stillness and the splendour of the natural world. Johnson’s laid-back and classically West Coast songs communicate emotions entirely of the moment with both his lyrics, intimate vocal style as well as his elegant elongated guitar lines and astute use of counter-melodies on the pedal steel.
Earth Trip was written during the period of sudden shocks and drastic lifestyle changes of 2020, quite literally “called down off the road” as he sings in elegiac album opener “Silver Places”. Home for an extended period for the first time in years, he was able to reconnect with simple pleasures of home life: hikes in nature, bathing outside and waking with the dawn. Johnson found hope and healing in forming a more mindful relationship with the natural world, from the simple pleasures of tending a garden to sleeping out under the stars. “Lonely Places” in particular captures the sheer joy and freedom of losing oneself in nature, an ode to the wealth of natural beauty the west coast provides, as well as the importance of appreciating wild, open spaces. “In the Rain” seeks beauty and hope in life’s darker moments, while “Dawn Patrol” finds solace in the earth’s natural rhythms.
Recorded primarily at his home in Portland and mixed by Cooper Crain (Bitchin’ Bajas, Cave), the songs on “Earth Trip” make deft use of space through their lean arrangements, guest Barry Walker’s shimmering pedal steel, open and elongated guitar melodies, and upfront and intimate vocals. Johnson describes the arrangements this way; “I was trying to capture that feeling when you take psychedelics and they just start coming on – maybe objects start buzzing in the edges of your vision, you start seeing slight trails, maybe the characteristics of sound change subtly. But you’re not fully tripping yet. Cooper got the idea right away and his mix really captures that feeling.” Johnson’s lithe guitar playing treads an equally fine line between country and cosmic, melodies blooming into long reverb trails and solos evocative of radiant summer warmth.
Earth Trip’s message of interconnectedness with the environment expands on a long country music tradition that draws a symbiotic relationship between storyteller and the land, celebrating the beauty of the natural world without forgetting our responsibility to preserve it for future generations. It cements Johnson’s place as a musician and songwriter of inimitable skill.
“Earth Trip” is available in a few different merch packs – keep reading to learn more, there are only a super limited amount of The Rambler Pack available only to our newsletter subscribers: Rambler Pack includes: A tasty tote bag (back by popular demand), custom printed rolling papers, a sweet sticker, die cut jacket (picture window) with printing on the inside of the jacket (think on the beach, amigo…) as well as heavy stock inner jacket and a mail order exclusive Wood coloured vinyl.
Very happy to announce our new album, Earth Trip, coming out May 21st on Thrill Jockey Records
Limited edition “Rambler Pack”, which comes with the ltd-edition LP, tote bag, rolling papers and sticker, available on the Thrill Jockey website
Cocteau Twins, former CT bassist Simon Raymonde and Richie Thomas of Dif Juz are gearing up to release their second Lost Horizons albums, In Quiet Moments, on February 26th via Bella Union Records. It’s a double and packed with notable guest vocalists to help them achieve their cinematic vision. The terrific first half, which came out digitally back in November, features guest vocals from John Grant, Porridge Radio, Penelope Isles, former Midlake frontman Tim Smith and more, while Pt 2 features Marissa Nadler, Ural Thomas, The Innocence Mission’s Karen Peris, and more.
As you’d expect from two men who released records during the ’80s arty heyday of 4AD, the artwork is as important as the music itself. The packaging for the Deluxe Edtion vinyl of In Quiet Moments is especially lovely and comes on ocean blue and green vinyl, with a wide-spinned sleeve on uncoated/reverse board and is housed in a cool PVC outer sleeve with printed text. (There’s also a sticker, for those looking to cover logos on your laptop or decorating your fridge.) We’ve got a special edition in our store where the first 100 orders come with an art print postcard signed by Simon Raymonde.
While we wait for the whole thing to drop, you can listen toIn Quiet Moments Part 1 now along with the Marissa Nadler song, “Marie,” from Part 2:
Hailing originally from Melbourne, Australia, Heligoland have been making oceanic dreampop for over 20 years, forming in 1999 and having released their debut album in 2003. The band’s inspirations are pretty clear, right down from their name (which means “Holy Land” in Dutch), drawing from the gentler side of ’80s/’90s shoegaze and slowcore. Cocteau Twins’ Robin Guthrie produced their third album, 2010’s All Your Ships are White, which tells you a lot but their sound is more in the Slowdive (Mojave 3 )/ Low / Cowboy Junkies style, evoking sun-baked cracked earth and sand as much as the sea.
Heligoland went dormant after All Your Ships, though they popped up from time to time with new EPs, all produced by Guthrie. They also left Australia for the suburbs of Paris. Now just the core duo of Karen Vogt (vocals, guitar) and Steve Wheeler (bass, guitar), Heligoland are back with their first album in 11 years. Guthrie is back for this one as well, and in addition to producing the record, he also plays on it — everything but guitar, contributing drums, bass and keyboards. No real surprise, but This Quiet Fire is gorgeous stuff. Vogt is an emotive singer, a quality you don’t usually associate with dreampop like this, sounding closer to Tracy Thorn than Elizabeth Fraser. Her voice elevates stunners like “Hope,” “Running” and “Palomino,” distinguishing This Quiet Fire in a genre that in too many less-skilled hand can play like ethereal wallpaper.
Fourth album from UK trio finds them pivoting again, this time into Big ’80s R&Bish synthpop, trio Virginia Wing made 2018’s fantastic Ecstatic Arrow under idyllic conditions — in Switzerland at the family home of a good friend, surrounded by the country’s alpine beauty. This one was made stuck at home in Manchester, England in their “jogging bottoms.” There’s no doubt this is the same group, but “Private Life feels forcibly contained while anxious to break free.
All the sounds on “Private Life are big, the drum sounds, the thick synthy basslines, the blasts of keyboards — not unlike those early Art of Noise records, hitting like punches in a Shaw Brothers martial arts fantasy or a buzzsaw to the hood of a car. But then they fill the stereo field with wondrous, beautiful organic sounds, from delicate strings, to lilting saxophones and flutes, tinkly windchimes, jazzy piano loops, “nature,” and warm harmonies. It all sort of floats, at times almost anchorless, through the mix. These sounds have also been run through severe digital processing, chopped up, degraded, and warped, giving songs a slightly unmoored feel that, like Merida Richards‘ icy vocals, is distinctly Virginia Wing.
Virginia Wing continue to toy with pop and dance music, but largely keep things at arms length. “I’m Holding Out for Something” flirts with a decidedly R&B beat and synth strings that suggest Prince, while pitched up vocal samples may make some think of Kate Bush. But Richards’ declaring “There will come a time when you have to satisfy the ache face to face” yanks the song in an entirely different direction. (Laurie Anderson may be a more apt ’80s comparison.) Likewise, part of “Moon Turns Tides” wants to be an electro funk jam that will tear the roof off, but before that can happen Richards dryly notes, “Whilst you’re here, it’s important that you don’t touch anything / it’s all very, very expensive.” There’s a distinct look-but-don’t-touch sense of detachment — the kind where you end up having more conversations with yourself than other people — that’s a relatable feeling these days when our lives may be too private. If that’s you, welcome to the party.
Raised in the rolling hills of North Yorkshire on artists such as Nick Drake, Joni Mitchell, Joan Armatrading, and Kate Bush, Billie Marten’s critically acclaimed debut album ‘Writing of Blues and Yellows’, was released in 2016 when she was still just 17, while its follow-up ‘Feeding Seahorses By Hand’ was similarly lauded in 2019.
“Flora Fauna”, was recorded with Rich Cooper in London. Marten’s new material blends those signature hushed, resonant vocals with a rapid pulse and rich instrumentation, her inspirations now stretching from krautrockers Can, to Broadcast, Arthur Russell, and Fiona Apple.
Also completing musical Top Trumps is Guy Garvey from the band Elbow, providing guest vocals on the ‘Walnut’ track.
Built on the minimalist acoustic folk foundations she made a name for herself with, ‘Flora Fauna’ is a more mature, embodied album fostered around a strong backbone of bass and rhythm. Shedding the timidity of previous work in favour of a more urgent sound, the songs mark a period of personal independence for Marten as she learned to nurture herself and break free from toxic relationships – and a big part of that was returning to nature.
“I wasn’t really treating myself very well, it was a bit of a disruptive time. All these songs are about getting myself out of that hole – they’re quite strong affirmations. The name Flora Fauna is like a green bath for my eyes. If the album was a painting, it would look like flora and fauna – it encompasses every organism, every corner of Earth, and a feeling of total abundance.”
I can’t begin to express to you how much I’ve wanted this to be in the world, I am so excited and ready. We started this thing a while back and it’s all stringing together quite beautifully now. A total fresh and untouched slate. Thank you ever so much for your patience and kindness throughout, and in the meantime, here is “Garden of Eden”. It’s about the competition to grow and constantly be better, about how we all desperately need to be fed and watered and given space to thrive, and yet we’re so subscribed to this idea of pushing and evolving that we’re not actually doing the living part. So my message to you is thank you and I hope you can slow down and FEEL again. X
There’s an absolute bombardment of new things to come so stay with me, Billie Marten.
The Fat Angel Sings 