I’ve loved this song since it was introduced to me way when I first heard it back in 2017 as part of the first installment of his monthly Secret Lair project (it was then called “Floating Empire”, and it was good, . It was just Tyler and his acoustic guitar on that version, and this version adds only a few small, delicate, perfect touches and flourishes to what was already one of my favorite songs of his. We don’t know when his next full-length is coming, but it’s on the horizon and I, for one, can’t wait to hear it. This is a truly beautiful song and I wish I had something more poetic or profound to say about it. Fortunately, I don’t have to. Tyler’s carefully crafted lyrics speak for themselves.
“When you find that you can neither go backwards nor forward…when you are convinced that all the exits are blocked, either you take to believing in miracles or you stand still like the hummingbird. The miracle is that the honey is always there, right under your nose, only you were to busy searching elsewhere to realize it.” -Henry Miller
Another great song that highlights Tyler Lyle’s amazing talent as a singer, songwriter, lyricist. Apparently this is the acoustic version of the same song which will be on The Midnight’s next album.
Laura Stevenson’s last album, 2015’s Cocksure, found the singer beefing up her stripped-down sound with big guitars. A follow-up called The Big Freeze comes out at the end of March, and it heralds a return to Stevenson’s more finely detailed, wrenchingly intimate songwriting. The title refers to an eventual freezing of the universe which makes sense, given that she recorded it in the dead of winter — as well as to the ways relationships strain against emotional and physical distance. In first listen is the song “Living Room, NY,” she longs for a connection to the small details of everyday life with a long-distance partner, singing, “I want to see you stare at ceilings until you fall back to sleep.”
Recorded in her childhood home during the dead of winter, The Big Freeze represents a pivotal step for New York songwriter Laura Stevenson. Despite her pedigree in the punk and indie rock scenes, and the occasional inclusion of a backing band (like the sprightly, C86-inspired pop track “Dermatillomania”), for the first time on record Stevenson’s voice and guitar are in clear and highlighted focus. It is a natural aesthetic choice for the musician, who has often toured as a solo act and who pulls influence from the great American songbook, and a choice that plays to the core strength and organic beauty of her writing. And though it is easily the darkest and most emotionally-devastating album of Stevenson’s career, it is also without a doubt her most powerful.
Stevenson builds on her own private worlds with choruses of multi-tracked voices, swarms of cellos, French horns and violins; orchestration that blooms and swells throughout each intimate performance. Exploring thematic ideas of distance and misconnection; worlds pulling apart, aching loneliness, and attempts to drive out hibernating dormant demons.
In the opening track Stevenson’s voice insists the listener “lay back with arms out, all-in, unfeeling,” to allow themselves to sink into a flood of instrumental sound that thrums between dissonance and resolution. From waves crashing in an abandoned waterpark on the haunting “Value Inn”, to the last leaves trembling before winter sets in on “Rattle At Will”, a creeping sense of isolation and anxious beauty surrounds every song. And yet there is also warmth, and hope. The album’s third track “Living Room, NY” tells of an intercontinental love and longing which seems to have the strength to thrive despite even the most trying and impossible of circumstances. Across ten tracks, the listener will travel through the cold night, following after a small but powerful flame burning from the other side.
There’s a low, gritty, bluesy rumble to Angie McMahon’s dramatic, poppy rock and roll — at times, she sounds like a one-woman reincarnation of Fleetwood Mac, which is a pretty lofty goal to set for yourself. In “Keeping Time,”McMahon has fun with sweeping shifts in volume, seemingly fading out until she hits a rousing chorus and unleashes a whoop worthy of her classic pop-rock forebears. At that point, the windswept drama of it all seems to transport her to another era entirely.
The Melbourne-born singer-songwriter is touring the United States for a run of shows that includes a date with Pixies in Tennessee, backed by a new two-track EP, A Couple of Songs, out March 7th on Dualtone Records. Videos for both of those songs — the already-released “Keeping Time” and the brand new “Pasta” — are premiering they make for a perfect showcase of McMahon’s gifts as a songwriter and vocalist.
“Pasta” is the standout though, an undulating rock song that McMahon says is “about feeling really tired, trying anyway, and wanting to rock out like Springsteen.”
That video has McMahon playing a show to (and sort of with) a pack of dogs. “When I needed to make merch for my first tour, I spent so long freaking out about it, worrying that it wouldn’t look cool and I wouldn’t be able to design something that felt genuine,” McMahon. has said “The day before it was due, I quickly scribbled this picture of some dogs lining up to go to a concert (dream come true). I got to the tipping point where I let go of the pressure and just did whatever felt good. This music video is a kind of adaptation of that. The gold star reminds me of being a kid and having encouragement, getting a tick of approval or whatever, but the adult version that I’m learning is that you just have to encourage yourself and not wait for other people to do it. And if you can’t make yourself feel awesome, dogs might make you feel awesome. It’s a reminder to go outside.”
Both of these songs will be on Salt, her debut full length, due out later this year.
Chapter Music welcomes Sweet Whirl, aka Melbourne artist Esther Edquist, to their roster with this six song EP , Love Songs & Poetry introduces Edquist as a master of smoky self-analysis, casting a sharp eye over blurry situations and dissecting hazy mornings-after with wry resignation. Using her bass guitar as a singularly expressive lead instrument, Esther imbues bleak moments with space, mystery and romance. The Sweet Whirl band includes drummer James Vin- ciguerra from Total Control, and Liam Barton of Laura Jean and Gregor’s live band, who also recorded the EP.
Esther’s previous band Superstar released two albums of delay-drenched pop on the Bedroom Suck label. She also released a tape of no-fi solo bass and vocal recordings on experimental label Nice Music in 2016.
With Love Songs & Poetry, Sweet Whirl emerges into a world of fully fledged songcraft. The EP’s six songs illuminate questionable life choices, revealing the beauty and glamour lurking within.
“With music this soft on your skin, small acts of rebellion feel big.” – The Guardian
“Beautifully melancholic and ethereal” – Lost At E Minor
“This might not be music for fucking but it could be music for thinking about making love” – Who the Hell
Jen Cloher is a highly respected recording and performing artist and co-founder of Milk!Records.
From the artwork of the album down to the songs themselves everything about this album is soaked in drama, What makes “Dead Wood Falls” so fantastic is its simplicity. It combines honesty and minimal folk styling’s to explode a wonderful collection of songs that showcase a very disciplined artist. Every song is carefully crafted and placed on this album to give a continuity that is vital to helping you the listener connect to all of the stories being expressed.
..it’s hard to believe this album was released back in 2006, but then again a classic album is by definition timeless. There’s a certain simplicity to this album – despite all the bluesy, country and rock touches, it is Jen Cloher’s sombre and poignant vocals that pierces the blackness that hold the listener enthralled…”
The albums seventh track “Rain” is a highlight and an example of the Jen Cloher magic. The song itself flirts with that storytelling tradition but the song doesn’t slip into the cliché’s that often come along with that creative template. There is still a healthy dose of fiction acting as the safe place for the real hurt of this piece of communication to be buried so that you get the perfect mix of personal pain and metaphors. Regardless of all this scientific dissection the fact remains that the song “Rain” has a powerful dialogue capable of cutting you deep and hitting you directly. When you hear those lyrics you know that Jen lived every inch of them and like all of the classic songwriters of our time it connects to your story and helps give light to both the confusion and conclusion needed to discover that brand new start.
Autonomy can be damn frightening. The realization that arrivies after a breakup, before a solo move, following a graduation, etc.—that you’re actually in this thing alone and it’s only you in the driver’s seat can leave you feeling scared silly. Or it can leave you feeling high on independence and excitement. Julia Jacklin’s “Crushing” is a striking search for self, a call to upend that which tethers you down. But it’s also rooted, deeply, in a sense of calm.
The Aussie songwriter’s ability to process emotion is out-of-this-world sharp, and this album is her best, most piercing work to date. This album “Crushing” can change from melodic balladry to anthemic rock at the drop of a hat. And for its entirety, Jacklin, slowly gaining cred as one of the most underrated singer/songwriters working, basks in a newfound clarity. Crushing is the brave story of a woman, and an artist coming into her own. Securing that agency, however, was no walk in the park. Jacklin clearly had to sort through mountains of wreckage to arrive here, but the album’s autobiographical nature is what makes it so affecting. Jacklin has said, and in writing it, she realized “how not very special” she is (evident in “Body” as she sings, “It’s just my body / I guess it’s just my life”). But in recognizing the non-exclusivity of her experiences, she made something singular.
This video for “Pressure To Party” (directed by Julia and Nick Mckk) features Julia and her siblings, plus a guest appearance from Body Type.
Julia Jacklin performs “Don’t Know How to Keep Loving You” for a World Cafe Session with contributing host, Kallao. Recorded live at WXPN Studios in Philadelphia on 1/23/2019.
Hatchie is the world of Harriette Pilbeam. Step inside her mind; a dreamy landscape where cascading synths, jangling guitars, propulsive rhythms and white noise undulate beneath irresistible pop melodies. Rather than focusing on the external world of her life in Brisbane, Pilbeam turns her gaze inwards, making a soundtrack out of her daydreams, setting her emotional life to song.
‘Without A Blush’ is taken from Hatchie’s debut album ‘Keepsake’ out June 21 on Double Double Whammy, Heavenly Recordings
The first single ‘The Barrel’ has been launched today, with a delightfully off-kilter accompanying video that transmutes to film the intense and commanding energy seen in Harding’s live shows. Designer finds the New Zealander hitting her creative stride. After Party, Harding came off a 100-date tour last summer and went straight into the studio with a collection of songs written on the road. Reuniting with John Parish, producer of Party, Harding spent 15 days recording and 10 days mixing at Rockfield Studios, Monmouth and Bristol’s J&J Studio and Playpen. From the bold strokes of opening track ‘Fixture Picture’, there is an overriding sense of an enigmatic artist confident in their work, with contributions from Huw Evans (H. Hawkline), Stephen Black (Sweet Baboo), drummer Gwion Llewelyn and violinist Clare Mactaggart broadening and complimenting Harding’s rich and timeless songwriting.
‘The Barrel’, by Aldous Harding. New album ‘Designer’ will be released on 4AD/Flying Nun on 26th April 2019.
Julia Jacklin followed up her strong and promising 2016 debut, Don’t Let The Kids Winwith something decidedly different: A chill, laidback indie rock trio album with some buddies under the name Phantastic Ferniture. The album was unfairly overlooked by most folks, but had a shaggy, loose vibe that, when paired with Jacklin’s songwriting wit and floating voice, made it impossible to ignore once you heard it.Jacklin’s solo again with “Crushing” her sophomore LP as a solo act, and neither of her previous albums could have prepared anyone for this: Crushing is an organs-on-the-table dissection of a breakup, absolutely harrowing and wrenching in its lyrical specificity and its openness. Crushing’s 10 songs examine the tumultuous waves present in each breakup. Separating in a relationship is not linear; it comes in wave after crushing wave. The anger gives way to sadness gives way to regret gives way to trying to forget them gives way to grim acceptance. Jacklin captures it all in Crushing.
Crushing opens with “Body,” a song recounting an apparently real fight with her boyfriend over him getting kicked off a flight for smoking in the bathroom, culminating in her wondering if he’ll use the nude photos he took of her to hurt her in the future. “I’m gonna leave you / I’m not a good woman when you’re around” Jacklin sings solemnly over the trace drumbeat and a strummed guitar, capturing so much with so little, the hallmark of Jacklin’s songwriting.
The album rolls like the cover of Unknown Pleasures through the feelings post-breakup, often accompanied by instrumentation that matches the ups and downs. “When the Family Flies In,” which ends with a pained ponderance over the music video she sent her ex the last time they talked, is all piano, and dulcet tones, while “Pressure to Party,” a song about wanting to force yourself out into society after the breakup, but taking the time before trying to love again soon, is upbeat, shredding and shouty. Crushing, as much as it is a breakup album, is also a showcase for how varied Jacklin’s songwriting has become in the last three years; she can do loosely tied indie rock and piano ballads and acoustic campfire songs and gruff tell offs effortlessly in a row here.
Crushing’s arc is one of reclamation; through these songs, Jacklin is able to regain some control over her body, how she wants to be loved, and her own headspace.
The album closes with a personal affirmation and a confirmation that she’s ready to let go. “I’ll be OK / I’ll be alright / I’ll get well soon / sleep through the night / don’t know how you’re doing, but that’s what I get / I can’t be the one to hold you, when I was the one who left,” she sings quietly over a Chemtrail guitar line. Crushing might be the story of Jacklin’s personal breakup, but it’s also her most universal record; it’s a salve for when you’re in the pit of a breakup and eventually you’ll get a hold of yourself, try the restaurant your ex always wanted to go to, say “fuck them,” and move on.
Produced by Burke Reid (Courtney Barnett, Liam Finn) and recorded at The Grove Studios, Crushing sets Jacklin’s understated defiance against a raw yet luminous sonic backdrop. New album ‘Crushing’ will be out February 22nd
A long-loved love child of the 4AD-Domino constellation, heart throbbing Californian songwriter Cass McCombs rocks up to Anti- (sister label to Epitaph), continuing his streaking succession of albums with “Tip Of The Sphere”. Providing a ninth solo LP in total, this latest record keeps up with guitarry-and-garrish themes of Mangy Love (2016), however richly purporting melodic songs that paint wheatgrass imagery of stretching plains, distant cross roads, and beachside trails to the rivermouth. With fingerpicking expertise to reflect both John Fahey (and Chris Isaak in parts) jangly pianos from a far western saloon making their way into “Absentee”, alongside a pinch of Neil Young’s soul (“Prayer For Another Day’) . With flashes of Alan Vega and Martin Rev to be heard in “American Canyon Sutra” too, to more hippy Buddha Bar vibes in “Real Life” thanks to them tablas,
Tip Of The Sphere follows 2016’s Mangy Love, which was named a “Best Rock Album Of The Year” by Pitchfork. While most of McCombs albums have been pieced together in different studios over an extended period, Tip Of The Sphere was recorded quickly and with a strong sense of purpose at Shahzad Ismaily’s Figure 8 Studios in Brooklyn. This new approach for McCombs brought his songs a raw immediacy and a special balance of compassion and experimentation with the intent of making a more consistent statement. The rock songs have more fervor, the ballads are more beautiful, the explorations more confident; the sounds of jazz and Latin music creep in through the back window. The thematic centerpiece, “Sleeping Volcanoes,” is a rousing, rock and roll number that uses a distinct lyrical approach to intensify the narrative. On the main refrain, a key phrase of the song is repeated continuously and taken through its possible meanings, almost like a jazz musician repeating a musical phrase through key and chord changes.
As described by McCombs, “Sleeping Volcanoes” is about “people passing each other on the sidewalk unaware of the emotional volatility they are brushing past, like a sleeping volcano that could erupt at any moment.” [Deluxe LP comes in an embossed cover and features three bonus tracks, a poster and a ‘Castillo de la Esfera’ created by fellow Northern California artist and contemporary Tahiti Pehrson as an homage to Brion Gysin’s dream machine. When the ‘Castillo de la Esfera’ is placed on top of the record player, and as the record is played (with or without a lightbulb cantilevered in the center), thoughts are encouraged to wander.
The Fat Angel Sings 