We’re pretty partial to most things musical coming out of Denmark these days, and Yung is no exception. It’s essentially the project of Mikkel Holm Silkjær, a Danish DIY dude who’s been behind a drum kit since age four, thanks to his musically inclined father. And while any punk band can throw down some barre chords and do their best Paul Westerberg impersonation, Yung stands out for the moments of sweetness amidst the hard edges of distorted guitars.
Seratones are beasts of the Southern wild. The four-piece rock band, hailing from Shreveport, Louisiana, play rocking, swinging, soul-stirring tunes that are uniquely their own. Their debut single “Necromancer”/”Take It Easy” is set for release October 16th on Fat Possum Records. It is produced by Jimbo Mathus. Here’s a dose of the good stuff.
The band’s sound owes much to the commanding vocals of frontwoman AJ Haynes. At age six, Haynes began singing in Brownsville Baptist Church in Columbia, Louisiana, where she was taught to project her voice to hit the back wall. “Church was where I was introduced to the spirit, y’know?” AJ says with her sage laugh.
“Get Gone”, the debut album from Shreveport, LA band Seratones,
The Seratones, are four musicians highly skilled in the art of rocking your socks off, bringing the house down, and blowing your mind. Our goal is to make your musical experience replenish your faith in the power of Rock & Roll. Cheers to all our fans and friends for believing in the power of music! is now streaming on NPR Music in its entirety. Only one more week till this gem hits the stores. Available everywhere May 6th.
Ms. Haynes said that though Seratones is a new band, its members have known each over for at least a decade as they knocked around Shreveport, a city with a musical tradition that includes country’s Louisiana Hayride radio program; Lead Belly, who was born in nearby Mooringsport; and the avant-garde rock group, the Residents. In 2013, backed by Connor Davis and Jesse Gabriel, Ms. Haynes won the first Louisiana Music Prize, a competition held in Shreveport. She donated part of her winnings to a local arts-and-education center where she once taught. Bassist Adam Davis, Connor’s brother, joined the band in ’14.
“Yung’s music is a space of innocence and experience, beauty and pain, darkness and light. Frontman Mikkel Holm Silkjær embodies opposites, too: His music showcases both his maturity as a songwriter and his youth, as he relies on more than a decade of songwriting experience despite being only 21. Both of Silkjær’s parents are musical; they put him behind a drum set at the age of 4 and introduced him to the local punk scene as a teen. Since then, he has become something of a leader in the Danish DIY scene, playing in gritty hardcore and punk bands and running a record label for like-minded local bands in his hometown of Aarhus, Denmark. Yung, however, is a more personal project for Silkjær, in which he steps away from the heaviness of earlier bands but manages to keeps his sense of urgency and angst.”
‘Uncombed Hair’ is taken from A Youthful Dream, the debut album from Yung
– in stores June 10
‘Pills’ is taken from A Youthful Dream, the debut album Yung
One of the best newcomers in recent months, though, are an act from Shreveport, Louisiana called Seratones. They performed with great reaction at SXSW, when they’d just (literally, it was that week or something) signed to Fat Possum and come down on a whim. They were jaw-dropping live, with frontwoman AJ Haynes – a petite ex-schoolteacher with a big personality and even bigger fro – spending half their set walking up and down the bar, kicking people’s drinks over while mashing a tambourine into her hands as if Phil Spector was stood at the other end pointing a gun at her.
They also played NME’s CMJ show in October . There, it seemed like they’d grown massively as a band, but last month in Austin for SXSW 2016 was when it all really seemed to come together.
They’ve got a debut album called ‘Get Gone’ out on May 6th, and below is a brand new track from it called ‘Sun’. Here’s a quote from AJ about the track: “When Connor [Davis, guitar] came up with that sinister melodic line, we had no choice but to see how far we could run with it. At the time I was teaching ‘Young Goodman Brown’ and listening to ‘Beggars Banquet’ on repeat, so that lovely thematic thread seamlessly wove into sound we were going for.”
Led by powerhouse frontwoman A.J. Haynes whose thunderous vocals recall the grit of Janis Joplin and gospel of Mavis Staples, Seratones will release their debut album Get Gone onMay 6th via Fat Possum. Recorded at Dial Back Sound studios in Mississippi, Get Gone is all live takes, a portrait of Seratones in their element.
An all-ages acid trip for fans of: Tame Impala, the Velvet Underground, Menace Beach
Why You Should Pay Attention: Brooklyn’s fuzzy, neo-psychedelic Sunflower Bean are hitting the pavement hard this year. The trio of Julia Cumming, Nick Kivlen and Jacob Faber formed the band two years ago and rapidly became teenage heroes of Brooklyn rock. They’ve been playing for primarily older crowds, but it hasn’t come with too many hurdles. “Sometimes there have been venues where we have to stand outside of the venue the whole time and can only go in to play,” says Cumming. They released their debut EP, the excellent Show Me Your Seven Secrets, last year and then dropped their seven-inch, “I Hear Voices” signed to Fat Possum. They’re currently hard at work on their debut full-length, titled Human Ceremony: due out early in stores February 5th on Fat Possum Records
They Say: When the band celebrated the release of their latest seven-inch at Rough Trade NYC we expected a party. Then the EP release show at [Brooklyn venue] Baby’s All Right was really fun and definitely felt really special to us,” Cumming recalls. “[The EP] was our first collection of music besides our singles that we put out, so we put streamers everywhere and served baked goods.”
Shreveport, Louisiana four-piece the Seratones has been performing together since early 2014, but since they signed to Mississippi-based Fat Possum Records earlier this year, they’ve been making waves well beyond their hometown thanks to the howling grit of frontwoman AJ Haynes. After a series of standout performances that included several raved-about sets at this year’s South by Southwest and CMJ, the band released “Necromancer,” a fitting first taste of the powerful vocals and ripping instrumentals that have made this band one to watch. Check out their groovy recent set at the Paste Studio in Manhattan
These Thoughts Are Like Mandatory Chores was the second EP released in 2015 by Yung, but the Danish band seems to have no shortage of ideas. Their first 2015 EP, Alter, showed that they’re great at building up a scuzzy hook — and they do that again here on “God” and “It Happened Again” — but I find myself gravitating toward the tracks where they spread out, particularly the back half of “Offshore.” The spiraling staircase on the artwork feels apt: It’s easy to fall down into these songs, and get completely lost in your own head.
Out on new label Fat Possum Records, the first new material Sunflower Bean have released since their jangling, pacey debut EP ‘Show Me Your Seven Secrets’, and self-recorded over a year ago. It’s a swirling, multi-paced rocker that begins slow and sludgy, a little like Led Zep playing the riff from ‘Children Of The Revolution’ by T-Rex, before cranking up so Kivlen – a could-be genius guitarist who in the past has been likened to everyone from Johnny Marr to Thurston Moore – can let rip at full pelt.
Sharing vocals one verse at a time, Kivlen and Cumming make a compelling front duo. There’s a definite yin-yang thing going on, with the pendulum here swinging heavily between psych wig outs and classic horror iconography Underneath it all is a sense of burgeoning songwriting prowess that suggests they know exactly how to marry compelling storytelling with giant-sized riffs
On the strength of this, it’s something Sunflower Bean should explore deeper.
Garden is the latest dreamy pop sound from Scottish multi-instrumentalist C-Duncan (the C stands for Christopher!). Drenched in 60’s style, with crisp guitars and swirling vocals it is another string to the performer’s already strong bow. After appearing at several major festivals this summer.
Since its release back in May, it has already enjoyed strong coverage across the blogosphere and music magazines as well as enjoying being play listed on BBC 6 music. The ethereal and psychedelic multi-layers of the track were all performed by C-Duncan, a trait that his debut record Architect carries.
Signed to Fat Cat Records, he produced the whole of his album in his home studio – even producing the artwork for the release himself. Having been surrounded by music his entire life (both his parents were classical musicians) he’s used that to create an incredible sounding album that mixes Lo-Fi, charming folk with contemporary dream pop. Architect was released on July 17th and is available for download now.
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