For their sophomore LP as Drinks,Cate Le Bon and Tim Presley (a.k.a. White Fence) absconded to the South of France, holed up in an old stone house, and spent their days sleeping through the heat and recording come nightfall. Without distractions like Wi-Fi and civilization, the pair lived in their own little Shangri-La, and Hippo Lite, the album born of it, conveys the intimacy of two artists free to make whatever sounds they please. The insular nature of the recording process lends an honesty to the album, like children playing away from the watchful eyes of adults. And Hippo Lite is playful; “Real Outside” pairs household object percussion with tangy blurts of guitar, and “Greasing Up” sounds like a campfire lullaby. More than anything, Hippo Lite is a document of intimate creativity, of what happens when you can build a fort with someone you trust and live in shared merriment.
With soft gorgeous pop sensibilities that know how to turn up the overdrive. these tracks are meticulous–the textures, the way the songs build, just gorgeous. fourth track had me impulse buying, second to last track had my jaw physically dropping
You might expect something akin to goofy surf rock from an LA-based project called Illuminati Hotties. And while Sarah Tudzin can certainly play to that note, it’s far from the only one she’s well-versed in. On her debut LP Kiss Yr Frenemies, Tudzin draws from a wide ranging palette — encompassing acoustic balladry, bouncy surf rock, and simmering noise pop — from which she doodles detailed scenes and stories of young adulthood. Also in her toolbox: keen self-awareness, vulnerability, poignant wit, nuanced social observations, and a sense of optimism that recognizes the beauty that can grow out of growing pains. Tudzin is both personal and personable; her anecdotes are relatable without sufficing the intimate specificity of her experience. Lighthearted odes to past flings with lame dudes carry the same weight as heart-wrenching letters that begin with sleeping in her car on her 24th birthday. Kiss Yr Frenemies is the fruitful aftermath of emotional labor and hindsight.
I don’t know for sure if this Los Angeles DIY four-piece purposefully chose to release Gentle Leader on the weekend that is traditionally considered the gateway to summer. But either way, it is a match made in heaven, as Peach KelliPop’s vibrant tracks are perfect for warm weather and bright days. It’s the first record that the band has released as a collaborative effort, which only benefits the music’s urgency.
Interdependence Day comes late this year – it won’t be until July 20th that it comes down, and we’re celebrating with a new Ty Segall & White Fence album! Ever since 2012, we’ve been asked when there might be another one from this duo – that was how compelling their Hair album was (and is). If you loved Hair, you’ll definitely be jumping for Joy in late July. Given that Tim Presley aka Mr. White Fence‘s – collaboration with Cate Le Bon, Drinks’
Hippo Lite, is still cooling on the sill, this is pure bonus, and we dig it for that, just as we feel great for scoring bonus Ty too – but when we do this, we’re really missing the point. Having made one record together already, Ty and Tim know what it’s like to bring themselves into a project like this. In fact, they’re transcended it. This time, they came to collaboration expecting to find themselves there. And darn if they didn’t – in shared space, as one entity. It’s interesting to see them mingled amoebically, and as a result, Joy has a whole new thing about it that takes it far beyond any “Hair 2”. Come July, you’ll know what we mean by this. For now, just get “Good Boy” on repeat – before you know it, Joy will have arrived!
The Lord Huron song “The Night We Met” found its way into the massively popular, albeit oft-maudlin, series, 13 Reasons Why with a new take on their hit song featuring the noir-ish indie songstress Phoebe Bridgers.
“The Night We Met” is a track from Lord Huron’s 2015 release, the spacey indie-folk travel log “Strange Trails”. Bridgers’ vocal contribution expands the song’s already-haunting melody to encompass a deeper sense of melancholia, something she also comfortably emits on her critically adored 2017 LP Stranger in the Alps. Lord Huron’s Ben Schneider and Bridgers are likely collaborators, too: Each have traversed the spectrum of indie-folk sounds, though Bridgers says she isn’t yet committed to a confined style.
Lyrically, her gorgeous 2017 debut album Stranger in the Alps – which she recorded independently before being signed to the Dead Oceans label – grapples a lot with death. The late Lemmy from Motörhead and David Bowie are both referred to, while the song Funeral was inspired by a boy Bridgers knew who died of a heroin overdose. “Jesus Christ, I’m so blue all the time and that’s just how I feel, always have and always will,” she sings, the mournful mood recalling the late American miserabilist Elliott Smith. Yet, in person, Bridgers could hardly be sunnier. “I didn’t realise there was such a heavy theme on the record until I started recording the album.
The standout single from Stranger in the Alps, was “Motion Sickness” it has amassed more than half-a-million views on YouTube and is an exquisite evisceration of a former lover. “I faked it every time,” she sings, before landing another blow to the solar plexus: “And why do you sing with an English accent?/ I guess it’s too late to change it now.”
The song, she tells me, is about the Grammy-nominated singer- songwriter Ryan Adams, whom she met in 2015. “A mutual friend in LA was like, ‘Ryan would like you’. He really was just trying to get me recording and trying to get Ryan to hear me, but Ryan was like, ‘Let me see a picture of her’.” Bridgers says that she and Adams “ended up hanging out all night and recording a song together called Killer. Then, a couple of weeks later, he was suddenly trying to hook up with me. I was super-down and had just broken up with my high-school boyfriend. We slept together on his 40th birthday and I’d just turned 20.”
She wrote Motion Sickness after they broke up. What did he think of it? “We were back on good terms by then but after I sent him the song he didn’t talk to me for 24 hours. Then he sent me a sweet text saying ‘it’s a great song’,” she says. “Yes, interesting character…”
Bridgers wrote “Smoke Signals” in a cabin outside Ketchum, Idaho, last spring. It finds her somberly emoting against a backdrop of guitar chords and orchestral swells. Sometimes her words are poetic: “I wanna live at a Holiday Inn where somebody else makes the bed/ We’ll watch TV while the lights on the street put all the stars to death.” Other times she’s more straightforward but just as powerful: “All of our problems, I’m gonna solve them/ With you riding shotgun, speeding ’cause fuck the cops.” References to Bowie, the Smiths, and Motörhead might capture your attention, but the recurring image of trash burning on the beach is what will linger with you.
Freedom’s Goblin is honkin’ down the highway as we speak. With axes, electric keys, vocal cords and full batterie, natch (plus saxophone), Ty Segall and the gang on the Freedom’s Goblin World Freedom Tour (with the Europe legs kicking in late May) are lifting up our people one city at a time, with music played in exchange for a slice of OUR LIVES (and a measly few bux)! What better a time for a new single! It’s a different take on the album-opener (and live fave) “Fanny Dog”! Recorded with Boo Mitchell in Memphis at Royal Studios, the chooglin’ groove, dancing barrelhouse piano and fat horns on this version send a ‘specially warm, soulful vibration out to the listener everywhere! GO see the show – get tix for the one coming down the road – but if you’re out of the way, or just simply can’t, why not give “Fanny Dog” a walk – she’ll love you for it!
Oooh-ooh that smell, can’t you smell that smell? The smell of Wand surrounds you! Yes – “Perfume” is on the wind, and time is inching closer and closer to the much-anticipated May 25th EP drop, but how about another snoot-ful to carry you through until then? A bit of “Pure Romance” perhaps, with chimes of guitars, crisp and fresh melodies and a core-shattering thump that takes hold with an iron grip, drawing you tight into a dangerous liaison of pop and rock, as both long for one another powerfully. Wand paints electrifying hues, beaming shocks of light that flagrantly provoke the dark with a bright balayage of sound and vision for your ears. YES! “Perfume” is coming soon, so take in the creamy, spiky aroma of “Pure Romance”.
Phoebe Bridgers is an Music favorite she’s already been one of our ones to watch. Her ” Stranger in the Alps” was one of last year’s best debuts.Singer Songwriter Noah Gundersen has spent the last decade breaking out slowly and steadily, releasing a long string of well-received albums and EPs.
Last fall, Bridgers opened for Gundersen on a tour that stopped in the latter’s Seattle hometown. The two actually go way back she used to sell merch at his shows — so sharing a stage gave them the idea to visit Seattle’s Studio X and record an eight-minute medley of their songs with help from Gundersen’s sister Abby. It’s remarkable how well their voices and songwriting blend as they swap verses and share choruses: Bridgers’ “Killer” stuns in any setting, and Gundersen’s “The Sound” is a revelation in their collective hands. Performed back to back, the two songs sound hauntingly beautiful.
Bridgers is one of Gundersen’s biggest fans: “I’ve been a fanatic Noah fan since I was a teenager,” she writes via email. “He changed the way I write music, made me more comfortable with being honest in my songs. Getting to sing with him was like getting pulled onstage by your favorite band during a show.” The feeling, it turns out, is mutual.
“I’m just a big fan of her work,” Gundersen writes. “I listened to her record obsessively and I wanted to make something with her. This was recorded on our last day of tour together, when we all had a few spare hours in the afternoon.”
Phoebe Bridgers’ debut album, Stranger in the Alps, is out now via Dead Oceans Records. Noah Gundersen’s new record, White Noise, is out now via Cooking Vinyl.
When first arriving on the Bay Area music scene in late 2014, Pllush made a dent with a powerful set of tracks that fit nicely within the rising wave of shoegaze/dream pop revival bands at the time. However, due to an undeniable songwriting prowess that extends far beyond convoluted pedal-board setups or louder amps, Pllush had elevated themselves into a league of sonic mastery, not dissimilar from obvious touchstone influences (i.e. Mazzy Star, Slowdive, Portishead). The quartet’s second batch of songs, Please, furthered their growing following and replaced their initial gravitation towards maxed-out guitars and splashed cymbals with an eerie, groove-filled bent, channeling Drop Nineteens at their most tender, and imbuing Grass Widow-esque layers of harmony into songs already dense with melody.
As the world around the band has changed in the interim between releases, they have followed suit- they added an “L” to the name, and undergone the whirlwinds of personal flux that naturally occur in such extended periods of time. But rest assured: the only dynamic of the band that has changed is by each member doubling down into the personal qualities that made this group so special in the first place. Which brings us to the year 2018, and the release of Pllush’s debut LP, Stranger to the Pain.
Whereas on earlier releases, singer/guitarist Karli Helm merely teased her abilities as a singer, here she fully embraces her natural pop-tinged mastery of the human voice, on standouts like “Restart”, pushing the boundaries of the Rock and Roll genre while layering dizzying harmonies over an instrumental track that Built to Spill would kick themselves for not thinking of first. Meanwhile, Eva Treadway provides a perfect foil with an effortlessly cool approach to laying her sometimes light-hearted (“Ortega”) and frequently heartbreaking (“Fallout”) lyrics over her more driving style of guitar playing, as indebted to Slanted and Enchanted era Pavement as it is to the best work of The Donnas, seamlessly working clanging guitar abrasion into pop gems. Dylan Lockey and Sinclair Riley fill out the rhythm section on drums and bass, respectively, with Lockey’s snap-tight precision guiding the mood and tempo of the record (i.e. highlights such as “3:45”), and Riley’s complex bass work constructing a rich and deeply melodic backbone for Helm and Treadway to build upon. Stranger to the Pain is the kind of record that reintroduces a band whose previous catalog stands assuredly on its own as a new and fresh face- and like a conversation with an old friend, once it’s over, you will want to restart.
San Francisco’s Pllush will release their debut album, Stranger to the Pain, on June 8th, 2018. Listen to the track “Ortega” which the band calls “an honest reflection on growing up.“Stranger to the Pain” will be available on Oxblood + Bone Half & Half (limited to 300) and Bone (limited to 300) vinyl. Both variants come with a full color, double-sided insert, download card, and exclusive postcard illustrated by artist, Faye Orlove.
You may now listen to “Perfume”, the latest single off our “Perfume EP”. Perhaps you’ve heard us play it live the last couple of tours and been like “what the heck iz that song?” well now you know!
Smells like 30 new minutes of new music via seven new electric hues, shocks of light that flagrantly provoke the dark, a posy’s clutch of purple, fuchsia, green and snowy white that curl against the stench of plague. With “Perfume”, Wand presents olfactory events that recall futures and pasts.
The Fat Angel Sings 