Scottish Fiction and Last Night From Glasgow are proud to present ‘Magic 8’, the lead single from Annie Booth’s new EP ‘Spectral’.
Lead single ‘Magic 8’ showcases perfectly Booth’s lyrical frankness as she concedes “This is all I have to give to you and it’s nothing”, atop elegant acoustic guitar playing and building instrumentation; exposing herself and her shortcomings to the listener with a touching sincerity. It is a song which freely admits the writer does not have the answers; delving into the feeling of hopelessness and melancholy which permeates in all our lives, whether we admit it or not.
‘Spectral’, the EP from which ‘Magic 8’ is taken from, follows on from 2017’s triumphant debut album ‘An Unforgiving Light’, and is a far more intimate collection of songs. Working with acclaimed producer Chris McCrory (Catholic Action, Siobhan Wilson) ‘Spectral’ showcases bittersweet notions set against sparse and creeping instrumentation. Affecting and dense in subject matter, ‘Spectral’ traces Booth’s maturing development as a songwriter both musically and lyrically.
Released March 29th, 2019
Composed and arranged by Annie Booth.Vocals, acoustic guitar, keys, synths and additional electric guitar performed by Annie Booth.
Electric guitar, synths and monotron performed by Chris McCrory.
Debut album from new band led by Against Me!’s Laura Jane Grace.
To say musician, author and activist Laura Jane Grace has had a defiant career would be the understatement of the year. Whether being accused of leaving the DIY punk scene to pursue a major label career over a decade ago, or courageously challenging people’s conceptions of gender identity with a bombshell Rolling Stone article, Grace has remained a daring and influential cultural figure in her over 20+ years of creating dynamic art across various mediums. Sure, she’s bound to worry some fans with her decision to press pause on Against Me! to release a more intimate singer-songwriter leaning solo album under the name Laura Jane Grace & the Devouring Mothers, but her artistic motivation cast her determination in steel. “In the back of my head I was thinking, ‘f**k all of you, I’m going to do this anyway,’” she says with a smile.
With this conviction came liberation, because few expectations equals total freedom. Indeed on the record’s opening cut, “China Beach,” Grace delivers a bold, lip-curled statement of intent: “Learn to trust yourself, no one else matters / Respect the source and always welcome failure.” And it’s in this spirit—with the help of Against Me! drummer Atom Willard and long-term AM! producer Marc Jacob Hudson on bass—that Bought to Rot, the debut album from Laura Jane Grace & the Devouring Mothers, came into existence.
Bought to Rot was written largely in motion—on tour, in Spain, Australia, Amsterdam hotel rooms, and some at home in Chicago. It’s a record scorched with honesty, unapologetically confessional, capturing many moments snipped from Grace’s life and stitched together in song. Although it’s a step and a twist away from Against Me!’s sonic blueprint, there’s still a kinetic punk energy that vibrates throughout. These compositions are looser, stripped, but with a melodic pop immediacy pushing to the fore. “I have my main gig, but I’m still doing this thing,” she continues. “It’s undeniable and it’s really good and here’s the proof … so what are you going to do with that?” Well, it has to go out into the world: via Bloodshot Records, the storied Chicago indie boasting a past & present roster that includes Ryan Adams, Neko Case, Murder by Death, Old 97’s and Justin Townes Earle.
The seeds of this project were initially sown when Grace, Hudson and Willard introduced the band on a small run of dates in 2016 that included Grace delivering impassioned readings of journal entries between stripped-down Against Me! songs, most of which were featured in her critically acclaimed memoir Tranny: Confessions Of Punk Rock’s Most Infamous Anarchist Sellout. Coming off the cycle for Shape Shift With Me, Against Me!’s latest full-length studio album, and a North American arena tour with Green Day, Grace was asked to perform a Mountain Goats cover on the podcast Welcome to Night Vale, and it was then that she received a massive sense of renewed momentum overall.
With additional songs penned that felt more stand-alone than a proper Against Me! offering, Bought to Rot resulted in 14 gripping tracks detailing Grace’s fractured relationship with her adopted hometown of Chicago (“I Hate Chicago”), the act of interpersonal acceptance (“The Friendship Song”), all-consuming affection until our ultimate demise [“Apocalypse Now (& Later)”], complicated romance (“The Airplane Song”), and reconciling everything in the end. As a complete body of work, the album stands as the most musically diverse collection of songs Grace has written to date, and is what she affectionately calls her “Scorpio” record – redolent in sex, drugs, and rock ’n’ roll.
Additionally inspired in large part by Tom Petty’s Full Moon Fever, the first album Grace ever owned, Bought to Rot finds her at the same age Tom Petty was when he created his classic solo debut. In light of his recent passing, Grace was even able to pay direct homage to him on the recording. “I bought a ’64 Fender Jaguar off Stan Lynch, drummer of the Heartbreakers, and I always like to think that maybe Petty had picked it up and strummed a couple chords on it,” she says. “I always liked the idea of having my fingers dance on the same fret board as my hero.”
There’s a refreshing sense of variety present on Bought to Rot, an album that features a vast array of musical textures and lyrics that read like separate short stories throughout. “My approach musically to the record was that I wanted it to feel like a mixtape,” Grace recently said “Like OK, you’ve got this Nirvana-like song, you’ve got a Cure song. It was musically freeing, in that way, to just be playing whatever was coming to me as I was writing and not having to think about it.” As such, “I Hate Chicago,” a tongue-in-cheek centerpiece to the album that has become a bit of a live favorite to Chicagoans and non-locals alike, finds Grace at her most wry and entertainingly venomous, lambasting the city’s sports teams and revered bands, its festivals and its unfriendly denizens over an Americana-angled jaunt.
Created at a breakneck pace, Bought to Rot is finally here and ready to be consumed & dissected: to be loved, to be hated. It’s an album propelled by a sense of restless, forward motion and the inherent need for Grace to continue evolving as an artist and person the only way she knows how. “I don’t want to write about these same things anymore,” she says. “I need some new sources of inspiration. And I don’t want to be negative. I want to write some positive, happy songs, and I wanted that to be inspired by positive, happy living, too.”
Zappa In New York – Deluxe consists of five CDs from the Vault celebrating the 40th Anniversary of the album’s release in 1978. Featured is the main album in its original mix, remastered by Bob Ludwig and available for the first time digitally. Also included is a disc of relevant Vault nuggets and over 3 hours of unreleased live performances from the NYC Palladium concerts, representing every composition played during the post-Christmas 4 show engagement of 1976 and newly mixed in 2018. Extensive Liner Notes by Ruth Underwood, Ray White & Joe Travers with Jen Jewel Brown. Limited edition metal tin mimicking a New York street manhole houses the 5CD collection.
To celebrate the 50th anniversary of their experimental 1969 release Aoxomoxoa, Grateful Dead Inc. has prepared a special, deluxe edition of the record, featuring two exclusive mixes of the album (“one fully remastered from the original 1969 mix and the other remastered from the definitive 1971 band-produced mix”), as well as a third disc of unreleased live music dating back to January 24th-26th, 1969.
“Aoxomoxoa” is a 1969 album by the Grateful Dead. One of the first rock albums to be recorded using 16-track technology, fans and critics alike consider this era to be the band’s experimental apex. The title is a meaningless palindrome, usually pronounced “ox-oh-mox-oh-ah”.
“In 1969, for their third album, the Grateful Dead eschewed outside producers and created Aoxomoxoa themselves, beginning a run of self-produced albums that would continue until 1977,” Grateful Dead archivist David Lemieux said in an official statement. “Scrapping the first sessions, which were recorded to eight-track tape, the Dead now had 16 tracks with which to experiment their psychedelic sound, with an album that included entirely Robert Hunter-penned lyrics for the first time.”
The newly compiled edition of Aoxomoxoa will be available on June 7th in a CD and digital format. The band will also release a limited edition picture disc vinyl of the record, boasting the remastered version of the LP (only 10,000 available). The reissue’s bonus disc of live music recorded January 24th to 26th, 1969 at the Avalon Ballroom in San Francisco, California (the recordings were among the first live performances recorded to 16-track tape). including two early versions of Aoxomoxoa tracks, “Durpee’s Diamond Blues” and “Doin’ That Rag,” as well as the final live performance of “Clementine,” a song the Dead began playing in 1968 but never released on a studio album. The Dead lineup at the time of the Avalon shows was Jerry Garcia, Bob Weir, Ron “Pigpen” McKernan, Phil Lesh, Tom Constanten, Mickey Hart, and Bill Kreutzmann.
Night Time, My Time? Sky Ferreira’s 2013 debut album was acclaimed upon release, but at the time it was overshadowed . Time has been good to it, though. It holds up better than almost every other 2013 LP. To call it anything other than a modern classic is to severely underrate it. Go back and listen. But first, listen to a brand new Sky Ferreira song!
Ferreira has really at last begun rolling out “Masochism”, her “Night Time, My Time” follow-up. “Downhill Lullaby,” will be her first new original song in six years, It’s a string-laden epic. Nils Gröndahl handled the strings on “Downhill Lullaby” and Twin Peaks: The Return music director Dean Hurley co-produced the song alongside Ferreira and Jorge Elbrecht. The song was written by Ferreira, Elbrecht, and Tamaryn, and Iceage frontman Elias Bender Rønnenfelt contributed guitar.
Ferreira has been trickling out clues about her new album on Twitter lately. Acknowledging the aforementioned involvement of Tamaryn, she wrote, “Some of these songs might lean -accidentally – little -far -too-deep- v agro bittersweet symphony but…whatever.” About “Downhill Lullaby” specifically, the first song isn’t a pop song…because I really want to make a video for it (& I love it). I’m confident about all of the pop songs on my record so I decided to start with something different.”
The road to this moment has been long and bumpy. Way back in April of 2015, Ferreira confirmed her second LP would be titled Masochism. By June she was teasing a lead single called “Guardian” for release that summer, but despite being performed live in 2014, the record never materialized.
After leaving the Virgin Records label, and a one-off album with Chrysalis, Simple Minds took stock and decided to make records for themselves. An album of cover versions of songs dear to Jim Kerr and Charlie Burchill, “Neon Lights”, was released in 2001, followed by “Cry” in 2002, an album of new compositions recorded in Glasgow and Sicily. The recordings for “Black and White 050505” were completed on the 5th May 2005, hence the title. “Graffiti Soul” continued the band’s return to the top, charting at # 10 in May 2009. “Big Music” [2 LP] was released in October 2014, charting at # 12.
This 7 CD + DVD 12 x 12 book set features the five albums plus twenty-four bonus tracks – non-album B-sides and originally limited bonus CD tracks, including the rare album of covers “Searching For The Lost Boys” (now including a cover of T. Rex’s “Children Of The Revolution”), and the “Big Music” Bonus CD (now including the Simple Minds/Stranglers collaboration). The remixes include the four acclaimed Johnson Somerset remixes of the singles from “Big Music”. The DVD features the ten rare single promo videos from these albums, along with the even more rare EPKs made for the albums’ promotion. Housed in a handsome 12 x 12 book, the booklet features photos and newly-written extensive and revealing album-by-album notes by Jim Kerr himself.
Simple Minds’ Rejuvenation 2001-2014 – was previously released on LP in 2018 it now has been expanded too as a 7CD/1-DVD box set courtesy of Edsel. The set boasts expanded versions of five of the band’s 21st century albums: Neon Lights (2001), Cry (2002), Black and White 050505(2005), Graffiti Soul (2009) and Big Music (2014). The DVD gathers contemporaneous music videos, behind-the scenes footage, EPKs, and interviews. The set is presented in a 12×12″ book with album-by-album liner notes by Jim Kerr and a wealth of photos.
‘May Your Kindness Remain’ is a year old today. It has been a magical and wild journey of a year. Thank you to all who’ve been a part of it.
After a decade spent at the height of the music industry, touring solo and with large pop bands, she realized her desire for a place to come home to. She found that in a small rural town in the deep forests of Washington State. There, she posted up at a local bar, slinging drinks, basking in the simplicity and reflection it allowed.
Thank you to Rolling Stone magazine for naming my song “May Your Kindness Remain” the number one country/americana song of the year. I write music with the intention of connecting with myself and others through words and feelings, and I’m so happy to know this song has resonated with so many folks this year.
An indie rock band from the land of lakes , led by Kerry Alexander who when she wants to write a song, turns on the radio. That’s because Alexander, the lead singer and songwriter of the Minneapolis band Bad Bad Hats, is interested in pop tropes – how to play around with them, why they work the way they do.
After alternating between acoustic offerings and revved-up, garage-leaning rock on their debut, the band settles into a comfortable mid-tempo groove on the new LP, with richly-produced synth-pop sound.
“‘Human Question’ cements The Yawpers’ position as one of the best rock and roll bands around at the moment. They’ve developed their musical palette beyond the potential shown on previous releases and this has resulted in their most complete-sounding record yet… This may well be The Yawpers’ masterpiece…Flawless.”
Denver three-piece The Yawpers return with their third record‘Human Question’. There are few acts around with a back catalogue as strong as they have over the space of two full-lengths, with killer rock n’ roll their speciality. This latest release takes the bona fida Yawpers sound and ramps it up infinite notches.
On the opening, ‘Child Of Mercy’ frontman Nate Cook howls and hollers his way through a three-minute thrill ride, and results in easily one of the most exciting singles of the year. There is little respite as the frantic White Stripes-esque riff of ‘Dancing On My Knees’ follows, as Cook wails “I’ve taken all the medicine, but I’ve still got your disease”. On the rip-roaring ‘Earn Your Heaven,’ the frontman takes on the role of preacher, at one point welcoming the ghost of Harry Connick Jr to a crucifix, amidst maniacal, crashing drums and frenzied solos. It’s another highlight on a record choc-a-bloc with them.
The growth of The Yawpers’ sound has come alongside the frontman’s development as a lyricist. Cook has said that the songs were written as a form of therapy for this record, as opposed to his previous method of an excuse to wallow in his own misery. The results are certainly candid. He sings of an “elegant fear” on the title track questioning religion and existentialism, which is more abundant when he howls to “please show me something I can believe in, something that takes it away” on ‘Child Of Mercy.’ Cook also questions his own self-doubt and acute self-awareness as the root cause of his anxieties, singing “how I look in darkness, is what makes me quiet in the light” and “I’ve been looking for some comfort in this world that’s escaping me” on ‘Man As Ghost’ and ‘Can’t Wait’ respectively.
Despite the near-morbidity of the lyrics, the latter is as radio-friendly as The Yawpers have ever sounded. The pounding drums of new member Alex Koshak set the pace, as frontman Cook does his best Springsteen impression, and more than pulls it off. Ending on a mellow note with ‘Where The Winters End,’The Yawpers give a tender send-off to an absolutely wonderful record.
‘Human Question’ cements The Yawpers’ position as one of the best rock and roll bands around at the moment. They’ve developed their musical palette beyond the potential shown on previous releases and this has resulted in their most complete-sounding record yet. Incorporating country, punk, rock n roll, gospel, indie, blues, and pretty much anything that sounds good alongside excellent songwriting, they have created an extremely special body of work. This may well be The Yawpers’ masterpiece.
Memphis, TN-based songwriter Julien Baker is the latest addition to the Matador Records roster. The 21-year-old’s devastating and vulnerable debut album, Sprained Ankle, which was originally released in 2015 and now gets re-released by Matador. The album was recorded at Spacebomb Studios, though Julien’s songs don’t share the down-home gloss of the other albums produced there. Instead of beefing up her honest tunes with rich layering like Natalie Prass or Matthew E. White, Baker pares her songs down to their simplest possible format: alone, singing and playing acoustic guitar directly into the microphone, sometimes in a single take.
That decision resulted in a remarkable record, one full of beautiful, personal explorations revealed in stark intimacy. That choice makes a lot of sense for Baker’s voice, both in the literal and figurative sense. Rather than Prass’ sweet, soaring tones or White’s blue-eyed soul, Sprained Ankle is delivered in reedy whispers and chilled coos. Released just before she turned 20 years old, the record still sounds raw – not that her voice lacks control or power, but rather that the weariness of songs about death, breakups, and existential questioning are sung with incredible presence. They’re coming of age songs from someone still coming of age, the wounds still fresh, the big truths currently being revealed. There are the struggles of depression, drugs, loneliness, but the clear-eyed way she faces it all supersedes any platitude.
LP – The album comes with a new 7″ Funeral Pyre. Only Baker can make a song with such a darkly macabre title so heartbreakingly gorgeous, with her signature hushed-yet-lofty vocals soaring over a quietly fingerpicked melody that crescendos into layered, almost-orchestral beauty. The B-side, Distant Solar System, is another unheard song from the Sprained Ankle sessions.
