The Fat Angel Sings

Phoebe Bridgers wrote her first song at age 11, spent her adolescence at open mic nights, and busked through her teenage years at farmers markets in her native Los Angeles. By age 20, she’d caught the ear of Ryan Adams, who listened to her perform her song “Killer” and invited her to record it in his studio the next day. The session grew into the three-song ‘Killer’ EP, and she hasn’t looked back since.

Phoebe Bridgers started touring again last month and at a lot of her shows she’s been performing a cover of Bo Burnham’s “That Funny Feeling,” which appeared in the comedian’s Netflix special Inside. Today, Bridgers has released her version “That Funny Feeling” cover on Bandcamp for the latest Bandcamp Friday, with all proceeds from the song going to a wide variety of Texas abortion funds. In a statement, Bridgers had a message for the Texas governor: “This one’s for Greg Abbott.”

The Band Of Musicians:
Phoebe Bridgers : Guitar, Vocal
Ethan Gruska : Keys, Cacophony
Harrison Whitford : Guitars
Rob Moose : Violin
Sebastian Steinberg : Bass
Marshall Vore : Drums
Nate Walcott : Trumpet
Maria Taylor : Vocals

Released October 1st, 2021

San Francisco four-piece band , Cindy is a vehicle for the song writing talents of Karina Gill. Karina has spoken of spending her life sat on the musical sidelines, watching as ex-partners and friends, “made their stabs at it”. A chance encounter with a Squire Strat in a basement, “mummified in electrical tape”, became a catalyst for experimentation and led to the self-release of the debut Cindy album. That record was followed in the Summer of 2020 by the band’s second record, “Free Advice”, which went from a limited edition cassette on the local Paisley Shirt label, to vinyl pressings on both sides of the Atlantic, including a UK release via Tough Love Records. Wasting no time, the band are set to return with their third album, 1:2, this October, and today they’re premiering the latest track from it, “Party Store“. 

Discussing the inspiration behind “Party Store” Karina has suggested it is a song, “about repetition – generation to generation and within a life”. The song seems to exist in the corner store, places that sometimes feel like time has forgotten to move on, amid, “lucky charms” and “ancient advertisements”. The title comes not from a fancy dress or Balloon Animal emporium, but from the Midwestern American word for a corner shop, “party store”, in their eyes a much better name for a song than Corner Store or Bodega, and one which, “we figured we could get away with it as Aaron (Diko – keyboardist) is from Indiana”.

It’s not just the title that Aaron Diko provides to the track, as the meandering Casio-like keyboard line is a delight throughout, bring a certain Jeffrey Lewis-like lo-fi antifolk feel to proceedings. The keyboard is a perfect foil to Karin’s vocals, a sort of sing-speak delivery, bringing to mind the bedroom-pop perfection of Oh Peas or early Frankie Cosmos. Despite the warm musicality on show, the lyrics seem to hint at a certain melancholic indifference, “sometimes I say are you feeling small, you plan all day for your funeral”. In a way the song seems to hint about the ease in avoiding difficult situations, contrasting the interactions with a check-out clerk, “it’s late at night and I’m not going to ask about the tiny affairs behind the plexiglass”, with an interaction with someone much closer to home, “it’s late at night, but you want me to ask about your mothers love and your sordid past”.

If the song reaches any conclusion, it’s that obsessing over the past, be it your own or someone else’s, isn’t going to help, “I’m not a fool who wants to turn back time, erase that jagged line, there was no time before you, there was just you the time before”. The music of Cindy sounds on first listen so serene and charming, it would be easy to miss the depth lurking within. Cindy’s music is the uneasy calm in the eye of the storm, the comforting arm around your shoulders as you face up to the apocalypse, undeniably charming and equally unsettling sure: you won’t be able to tear your ears away.

Released through Tough Love Records October 1st

Co-led by guitarist Violet Mayugba and singer Alexia Roditis, Sacramento punk band Destroy Boys debuted with the 2015 studio EP “Mom Jeans“. The band’s profile got an early boost when they were favourably mentioned in a 2016 Rolling Stone feature on Green Day. And by 2018 — around the time of the release of their second LP Make Room — the group had cultivated a loyal and growing base of followers. That support led to their pick as a fan-selected act to play the 2018 Noise Pop Festival.

While the pandemic sidelined Destroy Boys from live performance, it doesn’t seem to have blunted the group’s momentum. Now based in San Francisco, the band released two singles in 2020: “Fences” and “Honey I’m Home,” and this year they signed with Hopeless Records, cranking out three new singles. The first was a minute-long adrenaline blast called “Muzzle,” which earned nearly a million plays on Spotify alone. Released August. 4th, “Locker Room Bully” was accompanied by a new video and the news of a forthcoming full-length.

“Locker Room Bully” is timely and topical, exploring the consequences of misinformation spread via social media. But Roditis rages rather than ruminates on the subject, and the band — Roditis, Mayugba and drummer Narsai Malik provides instrumental muscle to match.

The most fascinating of this year’s trio of Destroy Boys singles is “Drink.” Released in June, the song displays impressive lyrical depth. On a casual listen, it sounds like a love song wrapped in a pop-punk arrangement. Closer inspection reveals that “Drink” is describing something closer to a love-hate relationship, and the subject of affection and revulsion is alcohol. It’s a candid, nuanced look at addiction. And right from the start, Roditis delivers a line full of self awareness: “I’m about to turn this confession to a smoke cloud,” they sing.

“I love some nuance,” laughs Roditis, the group’s primary lyricist who co-writes with Mayugba. “Things are always more complex than one opinion or another.” Roditis says they made a point of working multiple perspectives into the song. And while the tune explicitly mentions alcohol, booze is meant as a wider metaphor for anything that’s the focus of addiction. “Whatever you’re addicted to can be like a little sanctuary,” Roditis says. “But then you also feel like garbage for it.”

Destroy Boys puts thought into lyrics. “I really like to have an arc of some sort, so that there’s a change,” Roditis says. “The two perspectives — ‘She loves me / she loathes me’ and ‘something isn’t right / she holds me tight’ — that inner conflict is really important.” Roditis says in the case of “Drink,” a nuanced approach was the truthful one. And it’s one that — in Destroy Boys’ experience, at least isn’t often found in popular music. “I hadn’t heard a song that showed that, aside from Interpol’s ‘Read My Chemistry,’” Roditis says.

Destroy Boys’ music is the result of a collaborative creative process, though, and how a song eventually turns out might not closely resemble the form in which it began. “The original intention of the song was different,” says Mayugba. The song was more literal: “Drink understands me.” Changing that third “person” to a “she” not only made the metaphor less heavy-handed, it subtly introduced the idea of same-sex love. Even though that’s not what “Drink” is about either, the multilayered lyric ends up working on a number of levels.

The fact that it’s all contained in a dramatic, catchy melody doesn’t hurt a bit. Listeners who trill along to the “She really loves me” chorus may miss the song’s point entirely. And that’s OK: In Destroy Boys’ world, there’s room for messages and melodies. “Our band is a very lucky example of being able to do both simultaneously,” says Mayugba. “Everything that we write about is super important to us. And music is the way I communicate who I am; without it, I wouldn’t be able to function very well.”

Destroy Boys hasn’t released any music that’s overtly political. But at the same time Roditis subscribes to the personal-is-political philosophy. “What we’re trying to get to is life: interpreting being queer and being mad at the patriarchy and trauma,” they say. “That can all be seen as political. And I don’t really know what to do about that.”

But Roditis does in fact know what to do about that. “I hadn’t written an explicitly political song until recently,” they say. That song isn’t out yet. “But it’s a banger,” Roditis teases with a smile. “Writing about our own experiences can be seen as controversial by some people, but I think [music and politics] go hand in hand. Music is a vessel to communicate my thoughts on society.”

The upcoming “Open Mouth, Open Heart” promises to build on the catchy music and thoughtful lyrics of the albums, EPs and singles that preceded it. Due October 8th, the band’s third LP will be its first for Hopeless Records. Destroy Boys approached the prospect of a label change with caution. “I was really worried about a label trying to make us do something that we don’t want to do,” Roditis explains. “But it was clear that [Hopeless] wanted to give us a lot of creative control. And they haven’t tried to infringe upon our vision; they trust us as artists to know what we’re doing.”

Destroy Boys’ line up has changed over the years, with rhythm sections coming and going, but Roditis and Mayugba seem to have found the right mix with drummer Malik… and without a full-time bassist.

“I’ve had a lot of fun playing bass parts in the studio,” says Mayugba. And the idea of rotating bass players suits the band. “We get to play with all of our friends and bring them out on the road whenever we can,” Mayugba says.

With the kind of candor that characterizes Destroy Boys’ music, Roditis cuts straight to the heart of that subject: “Working with three people is easier than working with four!”

‘Open Mouth, Open Heart’ from Destroy Boys released October. 8th, Hopeless Records

thanks Bill Klopp

AC/DC return with a fifth video from “Power Up”, the nostalgic “Through The Mists Of Time“,  the latest single to be issued from their hugely-successful 2020 comeback album “Power Up”. It’s the third video released this year from one of the best Album’s of 2020, following on from the January release of a promo clip for the album’s opening track “Realize“, and June’s performance video for “Witch’s Spell”.

Vocalist Brian Johnson previously said that the song gives him “goosebumps”. The singer also discussed “Through The Mists Of Time” in a November 2020 interview with Radio X.
“Angus wrote the lyrics for that song,” said Johnson, “and I believe he captured everything about the early days when the band started, when rock and roll was just carefree, when nobody gave a flying thought about anything except just having a good time and playing. And all this lovely innocence was gone. And I think [the lyrics] encapsulated [the sentiment]. To tell you the truth, every time I hear it, I still get a goosebump, and it’s a tribute to Malcolm: Through The Mists Of Time. And it’s different. I don’t know if it’s different from anything we’ve done before, but it certainly stands apart.”
“It’s just a ride through time, in a kind of way,” Angus Young said “It’s a bit of a journey.” 

The Australian hard rock band’s 17th studio album, “Power Up” topped the charts in 21 countries following its release on November 13th 2020. The album is dedicated to the memory of Malcolm Young, AC/DC’s founding rhythm guitarist, who died in 2017. 

“It’s just rock’n’roll, you know?,” Brian Johnson. “It’s a powerful thing. Everybody loves rock’n’roll. And by crikey the world needs it right now!”

“Weltschmerz” is a seductive and cinematic track that invokes shoegaze, goth rock and psych vibes driven by corrossive fuzzy guitars, clean chorused strings and a massive bassline which are led by the beats of dancing drums and tambourine plus some charming vocals.

The production crew is exactly the same from their previous album Trópicos, the British Producer Daniel Knowles on mixing (Amusement Parks on Fire/The Know), and the Italian producer Maurizio Baggio on mastering, known for his work with The Soft Moon and Holygram. The single will also contain two more alternative versions including a club remix and another more 90s oriented sound mastered by the Argentinian producer Nicolas Castello (NAX) .

“ Within Weltschmerz we escape from pain while dancing into the flames. “ – Patricio Temples

The art cover was made by the Canadian visual artist Teresa Lobos (Lagomorphosis). The clip was directed by Francisca Lynch (Spaceman Films) and it includes an intriguing performarce by Mary Kankava (Hellcatfairy) who is a well-known dark artist from Russia.
“Weltschmerz” was released on October 1st via post-punk.com and it’s available on a Maxii single version only on our Bandcamp account.

Released October 1st, 2021

The Band were:

Patricio Zenteno: Vocals, guitars & drums
Priscila Ugalde: Backing vocals and bass.

Based in Austin, Texas, Hovvdy (pronounced “howdy”) is the writing and recording project of Charlie Martin and Will Taylor. The duo, both primarily drummers, first met in the fall of 2014 and quickly bonded over a love for quiet music. Within a few weeks, they had combined songs and began recording their first EP in bedrooms and family homes across Texas. By 2016 the two had committed to each others growth in song-writing and recording, resulting in their debut album Taster, originally released on Sports Day Records and reissued in 2017 by Double Double Whammy. Hovvdy has found a unique identity in rhythmic, down-tempo pop songs that are hopeful, yet melancholy; relatable, yet distinguishable. Hovvdy’s sophomore

Austin indie folk duo make their Grand Jury debut with True Love. Recorded over winter 2020 in Los Angeles with producer Andrew Sarlo (Big Thief, Bon Iver, etc.). This album is about growth and nostalgia. Both band members got married. One had a kid. They’ve found themselves individually away from the band, but settling into their most creatively fertile moment as a duo.

Releases October 1st, 2021

All songs performed by:
Charlie Martin
Will Taylor
Ben Littlejohn
Andrew Sarlo

“True Love” out October 1st on Grand Jury Music

In these tumultuous times, it’s easy to forget that our natural state isn’t meant to involve chronic anxiety, fear, depression, or boredom. We all could use a reminder that our default setting as human beings should be one of hope, wonder, and love. Death Valley Girls’ ongoing mission is to use their scorching blend of garage punk, communal music, fiery riffage, and desert psychedelia as a vehicle for reconfiguring our perception and tapping into the beauty of the human experience. On their latest single, “It’s All Really Kind of Amazing,” Death Valley Girls continue their mystical quest for transcending the mire of our modern reality with divine rock n’ roll mantras, goosebump-inducing hooks, and Bonnie Bloomgarden’s impassioned vocal performances. While the band built their reputation on sweat-drenched, electrically charged anthems, “It’s All Really Kind of Amazing” delves into their more recent penchant for Larry Schemel’s chiming guitar chords, Bloomgarden’s nimble electric piano lines, big choral hooks, and intoxicating layers of instrumentation. Further bolstered by Rikki Styxx on drums, Emily Retsas on bass, and the gang vocals of Little Ghost, Pickle, and Kelsey Whatever NBD, the newest entry into the Death Valley Girls songbook exudes the aura of a tight-knit collective in the throes of ecstasy.

“We are streams of eternal consciousness experiencing reality through our personal lens,” Bloomgarden says of the song’s intention. “And we have been programmed and have forgotten we are gods because of trauma, capitalism, and religion. So this song is a call to wake up! To remember you are magic! Abundance is the normal state… look for the signs from your guides and your higher self.” Death Valley Girls’ melding of classic, old-school AOR FM radio sound, modern sonics, and heady life-affirmations have never been as fully realized as they are on their latest cosmic hymn. Suicide Squeeze Records is proud to release the digital single “It’s All Really Kind of Amazing” on September 28th, 2021. 

Written & Performed by Death Valley Girls
Bonnie Bloomgarden – vocals
Larry Schemel – guitar
Emily Retsas – bass
Rikki Styxx – drums
Little Ghost, Pickle, Kelsey Whatever NBD – gang vocals

Released October 1st, 2021