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Saturday, May 27, 2023

New Foo Fighters + The Empty Pockets + Ålesund + Vanishing Shores + introducing Jacob Weil


Foo Fighters: Show Me How


The latest single from the upcoming album But Here We Are is a surprisingly subdued number featuring a father-daughter vocal duet. Stereogum writes that the track "sounds like a Foo Fighters take on early-’90s shoegaze, and Dave and Violet Grohl’s vocals mesh with the queasy rush of melodic guitars."

The Empty Pockets: Make It Through


A new single from the Chicago band that made a big splash last year with its Outside Spectrum album. "This song is for the person who helps you through the darkest hours."

Ålesund: Rode Off Into The Sun


This is the title single of an upcoming EP from the band fronted by British-Norwegian singer-songwriter Alba Torriset. She says the song "was written with a lot of joy. I tried to capture that feeling of new excitement bubbling, of turning over a new chapter and feeling really good about it all."

Vanishing Shores: I Wouldn't Change a Thing




With the latest single from this Cleveland-based band comes word that a new LP, Possible Light, is in the works. Frontman Kevin Bianchi says he wrote this song "in response to the question, Does the length of a relationship determine how ‘real’ it is? – and I wanted it to express that love, all love, is real and powerful in the moment, regardless of how long or short the relationship may be.”

Jacob Weil: Beginnings


After half a decade touring with various Canadian roots and alternative bands, this multi-instrumentalist from Vancouver, B.C., traveled to the Sonic Ranch Studios in Tornillo, Texas, where he and his quartet laid down live-off-the-floor tracks that will become his debut album. We're catching up with the first single.

Saturday, May 20, 2023

New from Red Matter, Spoon, Deer Tick, Nanna, KIDSØ & Natascha Polké


Red Matter: Light of the Moon


This "genre-blending jam band," formerly known as Terrapin, is relaunching itself with a new name and a new album, Northbound Train. The seven-piece group hails from Greenwich, Connecticut, a short northbound train ride from New York City. The LP delivers on the promise of mixing genres, including rock, blues, Americana and occasional Latin rhythms, with both male and female vocals. The group cites influences such as Grateful Dead, Tedeschi Trucks Band, Santana and another Connecticut band, Goose.

Spoon: Sugar Babies


After last year's release of Lucifer on the Sofa, the band went back to the studio to revisit some unfinished tracks. The result is a EP due next month called Memory Dust, consisting of this and two other songs.

Deer Tick: Once in a Lifetime


Photo by CJ Harvey
From the upcoming album Emotional Contracts comes this mid-tempo rocker with a live-while-you-can theme. The Rhode Island-based quartet, fronted by singer-guitarist John McCauley, is joined here by a chorus of five backing vocalists: Courtney Marie Andrews, Vanessa Carlton, Angela Miller, Sheree Smith and Kam Franklin.

Nanna: Crybaby


Of Monsters and Men's Nanna Bryndís Hilmarsdóttir has released a solo album, How to Start a Garden, featuring this single. Atwood Magazine calls the LP a "fragile indie folk record of fracture and friction," and describes this track as "sonically and emotionally charged ... a churning fever dream soaked in heavy feelings and tastefully overdriven guitars."

KIDSØ & Natascha Polké: Bloom in the Cold


This dose of European electronica comes from Munich-based synthesizer/percussion duo KIDSØ and Swiss producer/singer-songwriter Natascha Polké. They teamed up to release an EP called What If I earlier this year, and now this track has worked its way into our New Music bin. 

Saturday, May 13, 2023

Danielle Ponder + Yukon Blonde + Local Natives + The Chelsea Curve + Thirty Seconds to Mars


Danielle Ponder: Roll the Credits


Photo by Robert Gentler
Following up her debut LP, last year's Some Of Us Are Brave, the singer-songwriter from Rochester, N.Y., has just released this song, which she says speaks of "our ability to find God in all things if we are paying attention.” The New Sounds website says the track "has an unexpected trip-hop vibe, with a floating keyboard and cycling bass line. There are also wordless vocal effects and what sound like swooping sine wave tones. But Ponder is a powerful soul singer, and the combination of vocals and production yields something earthy yet also unearthly."

Yukon Blonde: Up 2 U


Photo by Raunie Mae Baker
The Vancouver-based band seems to be a four-piece again, as the publicity for this new single makes no reference to keyboardist and vocalist Rebecca Gray, who was on their last two albums. The original quartet of Jeffrey Innes, Brandon Scott, Graham Jones and James Younger is said to have a new album coming later this year. CanadianBeats says of this track: "Classic synths and rocksteady cowbells anchor the shimmering guitar licks and vocal harmonies, which all come together to deliver an irresistibly fun and catchy tune."

Local Natives: NYE


The band released a few singles last year, and now comes word that its fifth album, Time Will Wait For No One, will be released in July. It will include this lively number, which guitarist Ray Hahn says came from the laid-back Los Angeles group's desire to try their hands at a "fast and wild song." Never mind that this isn't really the right time of year for a song about New Year's Eve.

The Chelsea Curve: How Can I (Resist You)


Billed as a "mod-pop" trio, bassist/vocalist Linda Pardee, guitarist/vocalist Tim Gillis and drummer Ron Belanger named their band after a zig-zag stretch of highway just north of their native Boston. They started dropping singles in 2021 and last year released their debut LP, All The Things. This 80s-flavored single is the first taste of an EP due in the fall.

Thirty Seconds to Mars: Stuck


This song of physical attraction is the lead single from It's the End of the World but It's a Beautiful Day, the sixth studio album from Jared and Shannon Leto's band, due in September. Loudwire notes that while 30STM started out as a rock band, it has moved toward electro-pop, and "apart from a dollop of guitar, [this track] is assuredly not a rock song."

Saturday, May 6, 2023

New Music: Autopilot, Bailen, Bethany Cosentino, Don't Believe in Ghosts, Silent Thieves


Autopilot: Say Something


This Saskatoon-based trio's latest single arrives ahead of an album expected this fall. Guitarist-vocalist Marlon Harder says it's "a song about the carefree nature of youth and the feeling of not wanting to be tied down by responsibilities or expectations. The lyrics speak of the desire to live in the moment and enjoy life without any worries or concerns. It celebrates the carefree nature of youth and encourages listeners to embrace this spirit and not take life too seriously."

Bailen: Nothing Left to Give


Julia, David, and Daniel Bailen just released their Tired Hearts LP, including the single "Call It Like It Is," which we featured previously. We're picking this lilting, cheerful-sounding song that Daniel tells Flood Magazine emerged from a dark place - a time of "feeling so overwhelmed that you no longer care if everything goes wrong. The song is a mantra to help me crawl out of a depression hole."

Bethany Cosentino: It's Fine


The release of this single comes with the news that Best Coast is now on "indefinite hiatus" and that Bethany Cosentino's first solo album, Natural Disaster, is due in late July. "I am excited about being just Bethany Cosentino for a while and figuring out who I am outside of the ‘Bethany from Best Coast’ box I’ve lived in for such a long time.” We hope "it's fine" for long-time bandmate Bobb Bruno, too.

Don't Believe in Ghosts: Makes No Difference


The latest single from this New York band "is about finding it harder to play along with the expectations and pressures of life," says lead singer Steven Nathan. The new LP Solutions comes out this week.

Silent Thieves: Burst


From Inverness, Scotland, comes the duo of Mark Allison on guitar and vocals and David McIntosh on drums. Veterans of other bands, they got together last year with producer Iain McLaughlin to start recording new songs, and this is their fourth single release.

Saturday, April 29, 2023

Latest picks: Josh Ritter, The Gaslight Anthem, Natalie Merchant, ferna, Matt Epp


Josh Ritter: For Your Soul


On his tenth album, Spectral Lines, Josh Ritter experiments with field recordings - this track opens with the sound of a playground swing - and gap-less transitions from song to song. He describes it as “some kind of trip down the river, just to be carried along by this thing.” Many of the songs are quiet, even hushed. Our pick for the New Music bin is one of the more upbeat tracks, featuring "a chorus that could have come straight from the Traveling Wilburys," as AmericanaUK puts it.

The Gaslight Anthem: Positive Charge


Photo by Casey McAllister
Brian Fallon put the band back together for a tour last year, and the New Jersey quartet has released its first single in nine years to launch another tour this summer. Fallon says the song "began as a message of joy to ourselves and to our audience. The central theme is about looking at the things you’ve come through and feeling like you want to go ahead with an open heart toward the future, believing that the best years are not behind any of us and the good we have is worth something.”

Natalie Merchant: Tower of Babel


From her new album, Keep Your Courage, comes this song that ties the Biblical myth about language barriers to modern miscommunication. “See this house is divided / see we’re broken in two / ... Everybody's so confused,” Merchant sings over piano, simple percussion and backing vocals - punctuated by dynamic horn breaks arranged by trombone player Steve Davis.

Ferna: Open Up


We previously featured the single "New City" from Belfast-based singer-songwriter Hannah McPhillimy, aka Ferna. Now she's released her debut LP, Understudy. She says the collection "is all about what’s going on beneath the surface. Who is not getting to speak? What nuances are we not picking up on? And what happens then, when we become spectators, rather than players, in our own lives?”

Matt Epp: Live Free


The 13th studio album from this Toronto singer-songwriter, Rolling Wave, was mostly self-recorded in a converted rural church on the shore of Lake Huron during the second winter of the pandemic. Music blogger Darryl Sterdan calls this song an "uplifting roots-pop gem ... a testament to following life’s calls to adventure, while shaking off the fear of getting hurt in the process”