The Fat Angel Sings

The Cure may have ended 2024 by seeing in goth winter with a magnum opus, but it was NewDad who laid the table with spiderwebs and cracked crockery on this aching dose of glorious gloom, gossamer dream-pop and hazy shoegaze. ‘Madra’ is Irish for ‘dog’ – and this one is purebred.

The Irish alt / rock collective NewDad released their debut album, MADRA on Fair Youth / Atlantic. An album awash with spiralling guitars and a hypnotic bassline, singer/guitarist Julie Dawson finds inspiration in TV show Euphoria, as she ruminates on the destructive relationship of characters, Rue and Jules: a storyline that she herself gravitated towards.

“Madra” is an 11-song, guitar-stacked visceral outing, as singer/guitarist Julie Dawson embarks on a journey of self-exploration, self-sabotage, and reflection. Soaked in dysfunction, “Madra” searches for solace in pain, tackling themes of bullying (‘Where I Go’), self-medication/depression (‘Madra’, ‘Let Go’), destruction (‘Change My Mind’, ‘White Ribbons’), co-dependency (‘Nosebleed’) and resistance (‘Nightmares’). The album artwork, photographed by Irish creative, Joshua Gordon, shows a broken doll that serves as a metaphor for the album’s themes of fragility and vulnerability.

The album finds NewDad reconnect with their musical roots, digging deep into the shoegaze/rock sonics that soundtracked their formative years (the band cite Pixies, The Cure and Slowdive as some of their biggest early influences), together with glimmers of indie/pop that harks back to their earlier material: ‘Waves EP’ (2021) and ‘Banshee EP’ (2022). Written in their home city of Galway, Ireland, before the band moved to London this year, and recorded at the legendry Rockfield Studios (Black Sabbath, Queen), the album has been produced by NewDad’s long-time collaborator Chris Ryan (Just Mustard) and mixed by Alan Moulder (The Smashing Pumpkins, Nine Inch Nails, Wet Leg). Bound together by Julie’s ghostly vocal – a vessel for her weighty, introspective songwriting – “Madra” firmly marks NewDad as one of Ireland’s most promising debut guitar bands.

Ten years in the making, Beth Gibbons’ solo album lived up to its title and meticulously found beauty in life’s pivotal moments of decline and regrowth. Capturing the ethereal charm that catapulted Portishead to fame, ‘Lives Outgrown’ isn’t only Gibbon’s most raw and grounding music to date, it’s also her most mesmerising.

Billed as her debut solo album, this feels like a more than worthy follow up to 2002’s amazing “Out of Season” (credited as a collaboration with Rustin Man). “Lives Outgrown” features production by another Talk Talk alumni, Lee Harris, and contains sonic ghosts of Gibbons‘ past; some haunting, subtle echoes of the anxious moods explored on Portishead’s Third – but there’s a general tilt away from the jazz and soul that has previously informed her work in favour of some kind of ancient British folk through a dreamlike prism. 30 years of music and not one single miss. A masterpiece. 

Beth Gibbons Featuring 10 beautiful new songs recorded over a period of 10 years, the album was produced by James Ford and Beth Gibbons with additional production by Lee Harris (Talk Talk).

“Lives Outgrown” is, by some measure, Beth’s most personal work to date, the result of a period of sustained reflection and change — “lots of goodbyes,” in Beth’s words. Farewells to family, to friends, even to her former self. These are songs from the mid-course of life, when looking ahead no longer yields what it used to, and looking back has a sudden, sharper focus.

The beautiful thing about Juliana’s voice is that it is “ageless & timeless.”
As smooth today as it was way back when. Her backtrack harmonies are still heavenly to to behold.
This is a more mature JH able to look back on past relationships & the stuff that life throws your way.
This more laid back Lady still has it going on. Great Compositions & musicianship throughout this release.

First time ever on vinyl! Using the original audio files from producer Andy Chase, Scott Hull at Masterdisk remastered for vinyl and cut lacquers. Aaron Tanner at Melodic Virtue handled artwork using the original photography by Jonathan Gershon Stark. The good folks at Gotta Groove Records in Cleveland, OH pressed the vinyl.

released December 13th, 2024

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Matthew Sweet’s iconic album “100% Fun” is back!, This Expanded Edition is available for pre-order on CD/SACD, featuring remastering that delivers a rich, immersive listening experience.
Matthew Sweet’s “100% Fun” is the third cornerstone of his Holy Trinity of Power Pop, released in 1995. Produced by Brendan O’Brien, the album delivers a rich, layered sound featuring grinding guitars, powerful bass lines, and thunderous drums.

Intervention Record’s 19-track Expanded Edition SACD set is the ultimate way to experience this classic album, offering unmatched sound and stunning presentation. Iconic tracks like “Sick of Myself,” “Not When I Need It,” and “We’re the Same” come to life in incredible detail, making this release an essential addition for music lovers and collectors alike.

“… an album that rocks its worries away without ever getting rid of them.”
– Stephen Thomas Erlewine, All Music

“…a classic power-pop record full of chiming guitar, powerful hooks and sing-a-long choruses … a record I keep coming back to year after year …”
– DS Barrett

“Intervention Records prides itself on the sound and packaging of its products, and the sound quality and overall listening experience of 100% Fun is second to none. It’s about time this album be revisited; Intervention’s set should be obsessed over.”
– Frank Valish 

“On top of the superb audio and visual aspects of this “100% Fun” reissue, Sweet has also included seven outtake bonus tracks that were a part of the original “100% Fun” master tapes.”
– Will Hodge

In December of 1974, an Island Records A&R exec out of London put together a demo session for punk pioneers Television. They were joined in the studio by Brian Eno, formerly of Roxy Music, who had gone solo that same year. With hopes of a promising endeavor to pitch the band to label heads, the sessions instead were a complete failure with the band and Eno leaving frustrated. This is the story of those fateful demo sessions, the stakes on the table for both Television and Eno, and why they went so catastrophically wrong.

Tracks

1 Prove It (Long Version)
2 Give Me A Friction
3 Venus
4 Marquee Moon (Long Version)
5 Obsession
6 High Voltage Pleasure

1974, Hollywood Session Live At The “Fairland Studios”
Bass, Backing Vocals Fred Smith
Drums, Percussion Billy Ficca
Guitar, Backing Vocals Richard Lloyd
Lead Guitar, Lead Vocals Tom Verlaine
Vocals, Arranged By, Engineer Bryan Eno

This nine-track debut, delving into the pre-Christian Irish tradition of grieving songs known as caoineadh (keening), shows us a young artist’s arresting engagement with the intensity of emotions surrounding loss. Rose Connolly has a beautiful voice with a wide melodic range, which she bends, twists, strains and warps through both her physical exertions and a sample-based granular synthesiser. The results recall both the Gaelic tradition of séan-nos singing, and the work of experimental artists such as Meredith Monk, Yoko Ono and Hatis Noit, while the beats meld folk with gothic, 4AD-era soundscapes unmatched since the glory days of This Mortal Coil. 

“Mo Lean” features several new original recordings and reworks of songs and hymns based around the concept of death, life, mourning and catharsis. Rois re-imagines the tradition of keening in Ireland that goes back to pre-christian times, a practice in which women, or bean caointe, would keen a lamenting wail at the side of a coffin during a wake.

After discovering two out three lasting recordings of keening songs, Rois was inspired by their ethereal melodies to give them a modern reworking.
Rois aspires to express the power of the voice to transcend death and help us relinquish our fear of it. 

released October 4th, 2024

Written & produced by RÓIS

In 1976, following an extensive tour, The Who took a hiatus to focus on individual projects. Ronnie Lane initially approached Pete Townshend to produce his album but later invited him to collaborate on songwriting. Townshend, hesitant as he had never co-written songs before, declined. However, they did succeed in co-writing the album’s title track, “Rough Mix”. The album featured a mix of songs written individually by Lane and Townshend, with the two performing on most tracks together. This song is the one cover they did. The producer was the legendary Glyn Johns. 

When I hear this song I think to myself…it’s pretty cool that I met the writer several times. It’s a song written by Don Williams and Wayland Holyfield. I’ll get in a mood where I have to hear something rootsy or down to earth. I usually pick either The Band or Ronnie Lane. This music is something you could play on your back porch. 

An album with Pete Townshend and Ronnie Lane you would figure to be huge at the time. It wasn’t huge but it was a great album and has been highly regarded since. Personally, it’s high on my list of albums made in the 1970s along with Lane’s solo material.   

Don Williams’s music was really hot during this period. Eric Clapton was covering it and suddenly country music was popular. The album peaked at #44 in the Billboard Album Charts, #70 in Canada, and #45 in the UK in 1977.

Following the success of previous albums, 1992’s “It’s A Shame About Ray” and 1993’s “Come on Feel The Lemonheads”, “Car Button Cloth” saw a shift to a darker sound, one more reflective lead singer Evan Dando’s struggles in this period. Whilst much of the power-pop that saw the band garner that initial success is still present, there is a noticeable shift in Dando’s song writing, particularly on tracks such as ‘Losing My Mind’ and ‘One More Time’. The album would be the band’s last studio album for almost ten years and has gained something of a cult following in the years since its initial release. 

Lemonheads leader Evan Dando the man is just such a talented tunesmith. Just as you shouldn’t have been fooled by an overreaching, inane record company that marketed him for the teenyboppers as an “alterna-hunk” , nor should anyone dismiss him just because his LPs always have a few outright duds on them like “Secular Rockulidge” , making it seem that he writes too off-the-cuff or is too easily pleased. Nor should you write him off because his lyrics still stray into the sublimely idiotic “Khmer Rouge, Genocide qua” is not clever,

All the more so in the middle of the near-perfect pop single “If I Could Talk I’d Tell You.”. And on the other side of the coin, I could rave about how “Car Button Cloth” is such a mature work, more scattershot but ultimately more satisfying than the well-venerated “It’s a Shame About Ray” and better thought out than the up-and-down, spastic “C’mon Feel The Lemonheads“. The important things are the hooks, which are plentiful and often instantly timeless, and Dando’s voice, which becomes more convincing, sensitive, throaty, introspective, humble, and edgy each time out. And the overall attitude, which is loose but dripping with sincerity, earnestness, and real feeling. Sure, Dando’s got the goods, and songs such as “It’s All True” and “Break Me” are the sort that a million bands would work years at 7-11 to call their own. It almost seems unfair; he’s written so many great ones this decade.

But just as importantly, Dando has perfected the art of just being himself, without pretension, and it’s a hell of a lot more honest and real and enjoyable than a truck load of overhyped, super-hip, underground product this year that, though far more high-brow, is ultimately tight-assed, calculating, suffocating, and worthless in comparison. I’d rather go where the real fun is, and it’s here. Previously reissued as a 2CD set by Edsel in 2013 (with 15 bonus tracks), this new deluxe edition is vinyl only, with the 2LP sets offering 13 bonus tracks on LP 2. The only extra track not on the 2013 2CD deluxe is the unreleased ‘Arise’ which was later reworked into ‘Rancho Santa Fe’ on Dando’s first solo album.

The Lemonheads’ 1996 album, ‘Car Button Cloth’, will be reissued as a 2LP set with bonus tracks early next year in a deluxe cloth-bound gatefold sleeve, “Car Button Cloth” was the band’s seventh studio album, and their last with Atlantic Records.

The first three songs alone are like love at first hearing for this album.

Pretty Lightning are today announcing their new album ‘Night Wobble’ and sharing the lead single ‘Glade Runner’ Their sixth full-length to date and second instrumental record arrives February 21st 2025.

The newly-announced ‘Night Wobble’ LP is a set of downtempo, repetitive grooves that course through dusty spaghetti-western psychedelia, Tuareg-derived desert-blues, library music and progressive. It’s always cinematic but shot through with trippy, off-kilter moments that bring a sense of alien to the widescreen panoramas here – this is an “oozy, woozy cowboy groove”, as they put it.

On lead single ‘Glade Runner’, they add: “The first single ‘Glade Runner’ is track #6 and marks the middle of the trip. We’re halfway through the woods, have crossed some muddy ditches and already made it through the rather earthy part of the journey. We´re now in the glade and just about to reach the portal, from where we take off or sneak even deeper into the forest, you never know.…”

Pretty Lightning will play next year’s Fuzz Club Festival on May 9th-10th at the Effenaar, Eindhoven, NL

Wussy are one of America’s great bands on the order of Wilco or Yo La Tengo, or maybe the weird aunt and uncles of Wednesday and Kevin Morby — strange and messy and beautiful and dark and noisy, with an exquisite core of song writing. There’s no middle ground with Wussy: They are either one of your very favourite bands or you just haven’t heard them yet.”

It features all the regular Wussy folks – me (Lisa), Chuck, Mark, Joe – plus John E. on two songs, and newest member Travis on four songs. Producer and honorary member John Hoffman helmed and steadied the ship (and added some extra flourishes, too). Speaking of honorary members, John Curley recorded some of the basic tracks, and it was nice to have him back on board for those early days, as it was kind of an emotional rollercoaster to start recording again. He helped us navigate those first difficult sessions with a lot of grace and patience. There were many moments where we were all thinking – “is this even gonna work without John E”?

I can’t say enough about how proud I am of these guys and how much they poured their heart and soul into this record. Chuck’s voice and fingerpicking are better than ever. Mark channels some serious Hook-meets-Quadrophenia vibes on these tracks. Joe is the master of both subtlety and explosion – and also adds the coolest synth tracks. Travis – now the youngest member yet oldest soul of the band – stepped in and played some pedal steel parts that literally made me weep.

Wussy’s new album CINCINNATI OHIO – Released November 15th,