The Fat Angel Sings

Fenne Lily’s “Big Picture“, a vivid exploration of her past two years, balances love, comfort, and claustrophobic feelings. Despite personal and global chaos, the album is her most cohesive, addressing fear, uncertainty, and liberation in an unexpectedly inspirational manner. Each song showcases her evolving understanding of love as a journey, not a discovery. “Big Picture’s” ten tracks, penned during a relationship, diverge from her past works centered on heartbreak, offering insights on love, self-reflection during closeness, and the obligations of being crucial in someone’s life.

UK-born but now New York-based artist Fenne Lily shared the tender and life-affirming lead ‘Lights Light Up’  from her album “Big Picture” this year. ‘Lights Light Up,’ a soothing,  prophetic and insightful account of love at its temporary best. Invested with Lily’s delicate yet enveloping vocal that wraps around you like a big hug. It’s paired with simmering guitars, muted percussion, and gently burnished and forgiving production. 

Written partially as a conversation, it vividly tracks the details of a burgeoning relationship and recognizes the transitory nature of any shared thing; the bittersweet truth that you can only walk hand in hand with someone as long as you’re going in the same direction. 

Fenne later expands on these themes with the release of “Big Picture (Expanded Edition)” featuring five bonus tracks including the beautifully evocative “Hollywood and Fears”

Though not a million miles away sonically from her 2017 debut album ‘Weighing Of The Heart’, Nabihah Iqbal’s second long player ‘Dreamer’ does sound like the London based musician, producer and DJ has taken on a new creative direction, deconstructing her trademark sound of electronic shoegaze and dreamy synth-pop into its core elements. While sounding more mature and confident than its predecessor, the record also shows more vulnerability, as if past struggles (among them stolen equipment and a family emergency during the pandemic) have left her visibly exposed. The ethereal, otherworldly opener “In Light” is followed by a catchy dream pop number, the aptly titled “Dreamer”, before “This World Couldn’t See Us” introduces more electronic elements and spoken vocals without interrupting the sonic theme of melancholy that is undisputedly making its mark throughout the entire the album.

‘Dreamer’ sounds like it was written by someone who feels just as at home at an intimate gig as at a rave, but it manages to combine Iqbal’s influences so effortlessly that the album flows and never strays from what it set out to do, despite featuring tracks as wildly different as the introspective, stripped back “Lilac Twilight”, the haunting, beatless “Sweet Emotion (Lost In Devotion)” and the anthemic, trance influenced “Sky River”; one of the songs on the album that showcases her love for dance music. Awash with ambient synth pads, reverb laden guitars, textured melodies and big beats, ‘Dreamer’ manages to please both stargazers and night-time ravers. A truly beautiful record by an artist who is at a creative peak in her career.

With a family connection between them, the Chicago indie bands Horsegirl and Lifeguard have always been close. We would expect that Horsegirl guitarist and vocalist Penelope Lowenstein and her brother, Lifeguard drummer Isaac Lowenstein, would have had similar musical experiences growing up.  The two bands are currently stablemates on Matador Records and they also are both enthusiastic about acknowledging their influences, such as when Lifeguard covered The Jam earlier this year. Now they have released a joint effort, covering The Stone Roses’ “I Wanna Be Adored.”

One of the many amazing things about The Stone Roses’ debut album is its certainty, right from this opening track. As soon as Mani’s bassline emerges from the sound soup at the start no doubt is broached. The Stone Roses do not want to become the biggest band in the world. They already are, but perhaps the world does not know it yet. Ian Brown and John Squire’s writing conceives of a world where there is no downside to being exalted, only how long it takes to be achieved.

1989 was a world without internet social media, the world was much less wary of the downsides of parasocial interactions. Perhaps it is natural then that Nora Cheng and Penelope Lowenstein’s vocals are much less enthusiastic about the chance of being virtually or actually followed by those who love their work. Overall the tone is darker than the original. The musicianship is excellent but there is no hiding that the bands do not have the certainty of their predecessors, as ready for the world of 2023 as the original was for its time.

The Black Delta Movement Hailing from Kingston-Upon-Hull, could be the most inspired psychedelic heavy blues rock band we’ve encountered for some time in the UK. “The album’s a love letter to the band and all the emotions that come with it,” explains Matt Burr, chief creative force behind both this album, “Recovery Effects”, and the outfit behind it. This time recruiting celebrated guitar slinger Barrie Cadogan, also known as the frontman in Little Barrie, he joins familiar faces in bassist Lewis Wharton and Tony Coote on drums, with legendary producer Malcolm Catto (The Heliocentrics) also stepping up.

The result is intoxicating, it’s gritty, it’s weird and at times space-y, it feels like you’ve stepped into a dive bar at the right time to experience something raw, deep, hypnotic, but constantly evolving and engaging. A record that does what records should.

The Black Delta Movement’s new album ‘Recovery Effects’, out April 14 on Fuzz Club

“The brief, reflective ‘Another Year Gone’ pairs rueful, dissociative lyrics with a jauntily vintage sunshine-pop instrumental.” Flood Magazine “‘Another Year Gone’ is an anthem for these disorienting times. It’s a narrative of contrasts—between those grappling with stress, fear, and economic hardship, and those who profited from the chaos. Above all, this song is a musical embrace, a reassurance to hold close the ones you love and to tell them that, despite the world’s turmoil, everything will be okay.” – Rishi Dhir

Montreal’s Elephant Stone close out 2023 with ‘Another Year Gone’, the latest single from their upcoming ‘Back Into the Dream’ LP out February 23rd! 2024

The Telescopes have shared ‘(In The) Hidden Fields’, the second single from their incoming album ‘Growing Eyes Becoming String’ out February 9th on Fuzz Club Records Watch the video and pre-order the album on vinyl and CD now!

“This track was written before our 2015 album “Hidden Fields”. The lyrics originally accompanied a drawing I did of eyes growing in a field which was sold to a collector around the time. I managed to dig up a scan of the drawing and used that to make a DIY visualiser for the track, which feels like a nice cross between Fluxus art, Dogma film, early educational TV and the video diary of a psychopath…” – Stephen Lawrie

‘(In The) Hidden Fields’ is lifted from The Telescopes’ sixteenth studio album ‘Growing Eyes Becoming String’, out February 9th 2024 on Fuzz Club.

With Beach Fossils being one of the bands we’ve always come to champion over recent years. However, when on the first hearing of new album ‘Bunny’ floating along the speakers, we knew we were in for something special.

Lead single “Don’t Fade Away” is Beach Fossils at their very best – a perfect indie-pop track whose infectious melody you’ll be humming non-stop. Similarly with “Sleeping On My Own” and “Tough Love”, tracks that have so much jangle they’ll scratch any C86 (or should I say C23) itch.

Elsewhere on the album, “Anything Is Anything”, “Feel So High” and “Numb” all skirt the line of treading into shoegaze, with the latter culminating in an expansive and rousing wall of sound. “Run To The Moon”s slide guitar results in Slowdive-meets-country (yes it works), whilst “(Just Like The) Setting Sun” is a shimmering slice of dream-pop. As for “Dare Me” and “Seconds”, both fit nicely into the garage/post-punky sound Beach Fossils carved out on their second record ‘Clash The Truth’.

With Beach Fossils’ music in the past, there was always a sense that Dustin Payseur was making music that explored the nostalgia of a period he wasn’t able to experience firsthand. But with ‘Bunny’, Payseur is able to look back at Beach Fossils as a whole and reminisce on a nostalgia that he himself created. In turn, this results in a flawless Beach Fossils record that is undoubtedly their best yet.

“I’m always trying to do the exact opposite of what I’ve done in the past. We did the self-titled album and the ‘What A Pleasure’ EP, which were more relaxed and dreamy. Then I wanted to do something that represented the live Beach Fossils more and had more of the punk and post-punk stylings in it, so we did ‘Clash The Truth’. Then the opposite of that was something grand – the opposite of what Beach Fossils was – leaning into the baroque pop influences with strings and saxophone and pedal steel and harpsichord- just seeing how far we can take our sound.

When we started working on ‘Bunny’, I didn’t know what to do at first, but what felt the most natural was to go minimal – back to the original Beach Fossils sound – but pushing our song structure as best it can be and pushing ourselves to create something that had more pop sensibilities that we had ignored in the past.”
Dustin Payseur (Beach Fossils).

We’re over the moon to have influential dream-pop band Beach Fossils back with a new album “Bunny” (2023) continues the stunning evolution of Beach Fossils’ sound, pulling elements from the jangly melancholy of the self-titled debut “Beach Fossils” (2010) and “What a Pleasure” (2011), the gritty, post-punk inspired tracks from “Clash the Truth” (2013), and the lush arrangements of “Somersault” (2017).

New Zealand-based indie legends The Veils returned after a seven year long absence with a new double album ‘…And Out of the Void Came Love’ and a single ‘No Limit of Stars’ to whet the appetite.

The single is a rich, luxurious delight – delivered with a preacher-like intensity that recalls Nick Cave on the pulpit, and cloaked in an anthemic statuesque finery with sweeping strings and shimmering, sparkling instrumentation. This is a grand presentation: an ebbing and flowing sonic embrace with an endless horizon and a celestial glory. ‘No Limit of Stars’ has the passion and euphoric glory of The National with an antipodean flavour that nods to the pop sensibilities of The Chills.

Finn Andrews says the track reflects the themes of his song writing going into recording the new album:

…the certainty of death, the power of new life, and the dizziness of contemplating your place in an unknowably vast cosmos.

Indeed, the song is expansive and thrilling: bold and imperial with a presence as awe-inspiring as the limitless universe.

Andrews is an enigmatic figure who was signed to Rough Trade at the age of sixteen – is a mesmerising figure fronting the band in the accompanying video directed by Alexander Gandar and produced by Frith Armstrong. Daubed in lush colours and against a stunning backdrop of the night skies and an engrossing melange of images projected on a screen, it is a compelling and immersive film that perfectly matches the celestial music. The band’s absence was the result of a series of unfortunate events.

Following the release of The Veils’ last album ‘Total Depravity’, Andrews released a solo album and began a worldwide tour. One night, while lashing out at a particularly intense moment on piano, he broke his wrist on stage: It sounds wild and Jerry Lee Lewis-esque, but it was an absolute fucking nightmare, e played on and finished the rest of the tour, but it wasn’t until he got it examined much later that he realized what a bad move that was. “

The scaphoid bone in my wrist had died, which I didn’t know was possible. My sister said that at least it was a really ‘on brand’ injury for me. Andrews’s convalescence meant a lengthy hiatus from touring, so he stayed at home and wrote songs. I was in a cast and couldn’t use my right hand. I sang the melody lines, then recorded the right hand piano part, then the left hand part. It might have been an interesting, avant-garde process if it wasn’t also just profoundly annoying.

The years of pent up creativity has resulted in a double album, beautifully entitled ‘And Out Of The Void Came Love’, hinting at a powerful resolve to the wilderness years. It is an album intended to be listened to in two sittings with a short break in the middle, or as Andrews instructs:

The Veils are:

Finn Andrews – Vocals and Guitar
Cass Basil – Bass
Tom Healy – Pedal steel
Joe McCallum – Drums
Liam Gerrard – Piano