Sarah Mary Chadwick is a New Zealand–born and now Melbourne-based singer-songwriter whose songs are defined by her shaky voice and darkly funny lyrics. It features songs called “Shitty Town,” “Sometimes I Just Wanna Feel Bad,” “Angry and Violent,” and “Only Bad Memories Last.” They’re the sort of songs that have prompted fans to approach her after concerts to discuss their tears. “I have got better at not engaging in really long conversations about people’s trauma after every single show,” she said.
“Messages to God” is a beautifully realized record. It’s not happy but it is funny and optimistic. It is melodramatic, self-serving and generous. Sometimes, from way back in the shitty seats of the theatre, you’re at your closest to god. That’s what this record is like, finding beauty in everyday occurrences. Because it’s there. You just gotta look really hard sometimes. And as Chadwick provides, “Because every day’s just one more day / trying to write messages to god”.
New Zealand born, Melbourne-based Sarah Mary Chadwick has announced her eighth studio record “Messages to God” due out on Kill Rock Stars and executive produced by award winning producer, Tony Epsie (oracle to The Avalanches). Composed of broad, brightly coloured spiritual strokes, it consists of dramatic retellings of having your heart broken, existing, movement and growth while always meditating on the past. While her three most recent records were drenched in grief, the new collection signals a change; whether profound or momentary, time will tell.
“In The Throes” was produced by Buddy Miller and features Emmylou Harris, Regina McCrary, Larry Campbell and Teresa Williams, Gurf Morlix, and Matt Slocum of Sixpence None the Richer. The 12-song album follows 2019’s“Breakdown on 20th Ave. South”, which was Buddy & Julie Miller’s first album in a decade.
“In the Throes” is a deeply soulful collision of dusty country, mournful gospel, cosmic blues, and ecstatic R&B. It sounds lively and diverse, eccentric and slightly askew, thorny with desire and blame. The fearless collection came to life during an intensely creative period for Julie. She says, “I got deep into songwriting mode, and they just kept coming along.” Buddy watched with wonder and admiration as his wife filled up notebooks with lyrics and recorded voice memos with melodies.
By his count, she ended up with more than one hundred songs—some of them fully written, others simply fragments. Julie wrote every song on the album with the exception of “Don’t Make Her Cry”, which is a rare co-write between Bob Dylan, Regina McCrary and Julie.”
New West Records, Released on: 22nd September 2023
“The first sound you hear is a sustained feedback note that hangs in the air with the grace of a dragonfly before an acoustic riff spirals out of it, soaring upwards. It’s blissful and sun-soaked, like a late summer haze blurring out all the details on the horizon. When voices join the music, they arrive perfectly locked together, honed in on a single melody. “It’s time to move along / and leave the past behind me…” The message is simple. Don’t look back, only forward. “Foreign Land” is the opening track on Teenage Fanclub’s 11th studio album “Nothing Lasts Forever”. That track — and the rest of this beautifully rich and melodic album — is the sound of a season’s end, of the last warm days of the year while nights begin to draw in and thoughts become reflective and more than a little melancholy.
That reflection is everywhere on the record, whether on the autumnal folk rock of “Tired Of Being Alone” that repositions Laurel Canyon to somewhere deep in the heart of the Wye Valley, the William Blake-quoting Self–Sedation or on the song that preceded “Nothing Lasts Forever’s” completion, last year’s “I Left A Light On”, where a spark of hope is kept alight at the end of a relationship.”
One of the recurring themes on “Nothing Lasts Forever” is light, as a both a metaphor for hope and as an ultimate destination further down the road. Although the band’s songwriters Norman Blake and Raymond McGinley found themselves touching on similar themes, it was pure coincidence.
Raymond: “We never talk about what we’re going to do before we start making a record. We don’t plan much other than the nuts and bolts of where we’re going to record and when. That thing about light was completely accidental; we didn’t realise that until we’d finished half the songs. The record feels reflective, and I think the more we do this thing, the more we become comfortable with going to that place of melancholy, feeling and expressing those feelings.
Norman: “These songs are definitely personal. You’re getting older, you’re going into the cupboard getting the black suit out more often. Thoughts of mortality and the idea of the light must have been playing on our minds a lot. The songs on the last record were influenced by the breakup of my marriage. It was cathartic to write those songs. These new songs are reflective of how I’m feeling now, coming out of that period. They’re fairly optimistic, there’s an acceptance of a situation and all of the experience that comes with that acceptance. When we write, it’s a reflection of our lives, which are pretty ordinary. We’re not extraordinary people, and normal people get older. There’s a lot to write about in the mundane. I love reading Raymond Carver. Very often there’s not a lot that happens in those stories, but they speak to lived experience.”
The band recorded “Nothing Lasts Forever” – Blake, McGinley along with Francis Macdonald on drums, Dave McGowan on bass and Euros Childs on keyboards during an intense ten-day period in the bucolic Welsh countryside at Rockfield Studios, near Monmouth in late August. You can hear the effect of that environment on the record – it’s full of soft breeze, wide skies, beauty and space.
One of the most striking lyrics on the record is on the closing track “I Will Love You”. A gorgeous seven minute almost Kosmiche acoustic daydream drone, it looks to a point beyond the fury and polarisation of our modern discourse, to a time when “the bigots are gone/after they apologise/for all the harm that they’ve done”. Looking for positives while faced with the grim realities of the 21st century feels very Teenage Fanclub – a band who’ve been a force for good for over three decades and who can effortlessly turn melancholy into glorious, chiming harmony.
Teenage Fanclub release their new album “Nothing Lasts Forever” via their own label PeMa.
This year marks the 50th anniversary of what is widely regarded as Thin Lizzy’s breakthrough album: “Vagabonds Of The Western World”, featuring their first U.K. Top 10 single “Whiskey In The Jar”, along with “The Rocker”, which would go on to be one of the band’s signature tunes — and the last song they performed at their final show in 1983.
To celebrate the album’s golden anniversary, deluxe CD and LP sets featuring rarities, radio sessions, unreleased music, rare photos, extensive sleevenotes by Mark Blake, and memorabilia will be released on November 17th. The reissue suite also includes the album remixed in Dolby Atmos, a first for any Thin Lizzy record.
“Vagabonds Of The Western World” was Thin Lizzy’s third studio album and was initially released on the September 21st 1973. It was the first to feature artwork by Jim Fitzpatrick, the creator of the famous red and black portrait of Che Guevara, who would go on to work with the band on classic albums such as “Nightlife”, “Jailbreak”, “Johnny The Fox”, “Black Rose” and Chinatown. The album was the band’s last roll of the dice, as they had been working for two years with limited success. After the band moved to London from Dublin, they played every gig they could to keep themselves afloat. While messing around in their rehearsal studio, Phil Lynott started busking the old Irish folk song “Whiskey In The Jar”, which dates back to the 1700s.
Their then-manager remarked upon it and insisted that the band recorded, against their gut instincts. The single was released in November 1972 and rose to No. 6 on the U.K. singles chart. However, the song didn’t sit well with the band, and despite its success, they left it off their forthcoming album.
Since then, the song, in arrangements influenced by the Lizzy version, has gone on to be covered by artists such as U2, Metallica, Belle & Sebastian, The Pogues, Pulp, Bryan Adams, Gary Moore and Simple Minds.
After a two-year struggle for recognition, Thin Lizzy had finally scored a breakthrough hit. It paved the way for the “Vagabonds Of The Western World” album, but it would be their last with original guitarist Eric Bell. After an unsuccessful New Year’s Eve show in Belfast, Bell was no longer in the band, which left the door open for Lynott’s latest idea: Twin lead guitarists. After a short spell with very young Gary Moore filling in, Phil and Brian recruited American Scott Gorham and 18-year-old Glaswegian Brian Robertson, and a new adventure started.
The 50th anniversary of “Vagabonds Of The Western World” is the sound of nascent Lizzy finally finding their feet and starting on their journey to be one of the greatest rock bands of the ’70s — and for Lynott to be recognised as one of the best songwriters of his generation.
To celebrate the album’s golden anniversary, deluxe CD and LP sets featuring rarities, radio sessions, unreleased music, rare photos, extensive sleeve notes, and memorabilia will be released on 17th November. The reissue suite also includes the album remixed in Dolby Atmos, a first for any Thin Lizzy record.
Thin Lizzy are a hard rock band formed in Dublin, Ireland in 1969. Two of the founding members, drummer Brian Downey and bass guitarist and lead vocalist Phil Lynott, met while still in school. Lynott led the group throughout their recording career of twelve studio albums, writing most of the material. The singles “Whiskey in the Jar” (a traditional Irish ballad), “Jailbreak”, and “The Boys Are Back in Town” were major international hits. After Lynott’s death in 1986, various incarnations of the band emerged over the years based initially around guitarists Scott Gorham and John Sykes, though Sykes left the band in 2009. Gorham later continued with a new line-up including Downey.
Thin Lizzy’s campaign celebrating 50 years of “Vagabonds of the Western World” kicks off with 2LP and 4LP vinyl editions. The 2LP version has the original album plus a selection of live bonus tracks from the 4LP edition. Next Friday, November 24th, a Blu-ray will arrive with Dolby Atmos and 5.1 surround mixes, and on December 15, the 3CD box (equivalent to the 4LP set, with studio bonuses in addition to the live cuts) hits stores.
Tiny Ruins are a band based in Tāmaki Makaurau Auckland, comprising singer-songwriter & guitarist Hollie Fullbrook, bass player Cass Basil, drummer Alex Freer and electric guitarist/producer Tom Healy.
A rare blend of eloquent lyrical craft and explorative musicianship, the songs of Tiny Ruins are etched into the memories of crowds and critics worldwide.
Traversing influences that cross genre and era, the artistry of Hollie Fullbrook and her band spans delicate folk, lustrous dream pop and ebullient psychedelia. Building on the sparse arrangements and a novelist’s eye for detailcultivated over the past several years, the group’s greatly anticipated fourth album is out on Marathon Artists and Courtney Barnett’s label Milk! Records.
Where the third album “Olympic Girls” was suffused with loss and existential emptiness, with fourth album “Ceremony”, Hollie Fullbrook’s evolution as Tiny Ruins has reached an apex of power, as she’s become a deft bandleader of incredible musicians. “Ceremony” has many moods, ranging from intense minimalist ‘Diving & Soaring’ that evokes a classic folk vibe through to the heavier Neil-Young and Crazy Horse inspired ‘Dorothy Bay’, boppy danceable ‘In Light of Everything’, and the hooky, uplifting ‘Dogs Dreaming’. Noodly 70s electric guitars, eclectic percussion and prominent bass make it their most listenable and accessible album to date. The songs are all of a theme – exploring the coastal shores of the Manukau Harbour and working through a psychological ‘shellscape’, while tending toward a joyful / hopeful take on the passing of time.
Tiny Ruins are currently touring in Brighton tonight, Birmingham tomorrow, Leeds the next day, then Hebden Bridge on Thursday, London on Friday and Manchester on Saturday! Then a secret Berlin show (reply if you want to know those details)…and France later next week. If you’re in any of those towns, we would love to see you ❤
Cass and I are playing most of the album in duo-mode – ‘classic ruins’! Feraturing 4 guitars & shiny new cases made in Hull.
There isn’t one. Mainly because nobody outside of the band and their inner circle even knew about this album before Friday night, when frontman Matt Berninger announced its impending arrival from the stage Friday night at the band’s Homecoming festival in Cincinnati. The National’s second album of the year — and the follow up to “The First Two Pages Of Frankenstein” — will be out digitally at midnight Sunday.
This surprise companion to The National’s April release “First Two Pages of Frankenstein”, “Laugh Track” is the band’s most freewheeling, all-hands-on-deck album in years. If “Frankenstein” represented a rebuilding of trust between group members after 20+ years together, the vibrant, exploratory “LaughTrack” is both the product of that faith and a new statement of intent.
Revelling in the license to radically upend its creative process, The National honed most of this material in live performances on tour, and captured those invigorated versions in impromptu sessions at producer Tucker Martine’s Portland studio. Two nights later in Vancouver, the nearly eight-minute album closer “Smoke Detector” was recorded during soundcheck, completing a body of work bristling with spontaneity and vintage rock energy that makes a perfect complement to the songs found on its more introspective predecessor.
‘Smoke Detector’ is taken from ‘Laugh Track’ , via 4AD Records
As Nashville-based band Dallas Ugly gears up to record their second album with Grammy winner Justin Ryan Francis, they have settled into a sound that is equal parts playful and mature. Their 2022 debut album, “Watch Me Learn”, was described by critics as “full of shimmering magic” (Under the Radar), “as unique as it is dreamy” (Glide), and “a record that deserves a lyric sheet”
Libby recalls how the song came from, “a reckoning about a sense of stagnation—in my life and personal growth. Nothing was bad but nothing was great either, and I knew it was time to blow my life up a little and make some space for new things”. The band’s ever-evolving sound makes for a fine backdrop for reimagining a life, there’s a mischievousness both to the playful bounce of the bass, and the almost comically twangy lead guitar, which wouldn’t sound out of place on a comedy western.
Atop it all is Libby’s vocal which is wonderfully contradictory, on the one hand, it sounds joyous, the playful pulsing melody delivered with a wink and a nod, even as the words depict a moment of anarchic release, “I must be looking for a fight with my future, I’ve got no reason why I should torch this ship and watch it die, I just think I get tired of feeling fine”. It’s the musical equivalent of pressing the big red button, of turning over a blank page in your life story, of letting it all burn and seeing what fresh shoots emerge from the fertile ash – thrilling, a little bit dangerous and an awful lot of fun,
Hailing from Nashville, Dallas Ugly are the trio of Libby Weitnauer, Eli Broxham, and Owen Burton,
Our live recorded version of Leonard Cohens ‘So long Marianne’ is out today, I could give a long boring explanation about what part this songs played in my life but we each have our own story with it so I’ll just leave you to reflect on your own.
Naima Bock shares about the cover: “I first found out about Leonard Cohen’s ‘So Long Marianne’ when I was walking in Fordham Park in New Cross, London as a young teenager. I saw ‘To laugh and cry and cry and laugh about it all again’ inscribed on a bench plate in memory of a woman called Marianne (this bench has now sadly gone). The lyrics touched me in a profound way, and I remember crying a little when I saw them. These words in the context of someone’s passing were so profound and (for me) encompassed all of life and its constant tides. Of course, I later went home and listened to the hell out of Mr. Cohen, which I would continue to do for many years after, always finding safety in his voice and words.”
We (myself and the band) had been playing this song as a cover during our tours in 2022, and when we went in with Ali Chant, we decided to record a live version of it. I always felt nervous about recording a cover of Leonard Cohen. it obviously never stands up to the original, but I wanted to do it justice and, if nothing else, try not to diminish it in any way. My feelings around this recording were somewhat complicated, and although I could recognize how good the band (Meitar Wegman on Saxophone, Cassidy Hansen on drums, Clem Appleby on bass/ electric guitar, and Oliver Hamilton on violin, everyone on backing vocals) sounded, I didn’t like my vocal delivery. That is until I heard the backing vocals come in on a later chorus, and something inside me clicked, and I fell in love with what we had done.
I have always felt hugely supported by the musicians I play with, and when I heard their voices in this recording, it reminded me to be accepting and LOVING of imperfections, imperfections in my voice, which I have always (like many singers) been painfully aware of, imperfections in art, in myself. I thought if I didn’t want to present something imperfect to the world, then where do I stand morally in regards to what people consume, perfection only? This is the reality for many people, not just in artistic expression but in appearance, career trajectory etc. perfection only pleases. This is not only unrealistic but also detrimental to our minds and souls, we never will be perfect and if all we consume feels like it is, then we must be less. This is not a game that I will support, so here it is, my lovingly given imperfect version of ‘So long, Marianne’. I also altered the lyrics from ‘Violet park’ to ‘Fordham park’ to honour the Marianne who introduced me (from the other side) to Leonard Cohen. “
The new issue of Uncut doesn’t just have The Who on the cover, it comes with an exclusive Who CD featuring 10 revelatory tracks from the upcoming “Who’s Next | Life House” box set. Inside the issue, Pete Townshend unravels the complex relationship between their enduring masterpiece and this legendary ‘lost’ album. Additional copies of the issue – only available from participating Tesco’s stores and in the Republic or Ireland – come bagged with a double-sided Who poster and a 32-page guide to all The Who’s albums.
“Drop everything. This is a left-field minimal garage classic gem from the fever swamps of Houston, Texas, w/ a fantastic female singer Bex whose throaty pipes relay this sort of bored, seen-it-all world-weariness and condescension that’s absolutely disarming. You think you’ve seen it all? Try being a “Rich Man’s Commodity”, or living in a “Political Wasteland”, or attempting to engage with a trusted partner in a little “Leather Love”. No lie – I can actually hear her eyes rolling. The rest of Vivienne Styg play a stripped down, basement-level cornpone punk – the occasional burst of slide guitar & countrified drum stutter confirms some true Lone Star State blood – that also has its roots in DIY postpunk weirdness of the early 80s, as made clear in some of the blooping & bleeping connective tissue between the songs. Absolutely love it. I’m pretty sure the Styg are my favorite new rock band of the past year, and I’m going to try and patiently sit on my hands til their debut LP .
Vivienne Styg is Bex, Jessy, Shan & Mark recorded August 2018 Francisco’s studios in Houston, Texas
The Fat Angel Sings 