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Photo: Kayla Thornton
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This Chicago indie-folk-rock band has just released its first full-length album,
Undertones, produced in Nashville by Wilco's Pat Sansone. We're featuring the opening track, which leans farther toward alt-rock than most of the collection, starting off with a bass-drum punch and fuzzy electric guitar. "You're an unsolved mystery / Constantly challenging me," sings frontman Matt Smith. "You're outlandish / and perfectly cool." Smith is backed by Jeff Sullivan on guitar, David Thrift on bass and drummer Jake Bicknase, described by Smith as the band's "musical director - I get the broad ideas and then he goes into the theory." We'll sprinkle some of the album's more folk-ish songs into our mix as well.
The Albuquerque, New Mexico-based duo of Anne Luna and Evan Woodward have just released their self-titled debut EP. They take turns on lead vocals and harmonies on its five tracks, which feature Luna on upright bass and cello, Woodward on guitars and John Bartlit on percussion. Luna is also part of The Hard Road Trio, and wrote this track with another member of that band, Steve Smith. The lyric laments a friend's self-imposed alienation: "Alone in her room every night / Drinkin' the gloom when it's quiet / Welcome the dark as a key to your art / Grudges to guard your soft heart." A
review at Tinnitist.com quotes Luna saying that in writing the song, "I thought of times I have felt so stuck in life, wondering how I got there, and of times I’ve witnessed others creating their own cages."
We're pleased to feature another debut indie release this week, by this pop-rock band from Glagow, Scotland. The four-track EP is called
Cutting Teeth, from the expression for just beginning to learn a skill. The title sells them short: Lyricist-vocalist Clara Robb, composer-guitarist Tony Millar, bassist Scott Anstruther and drummer Robbie Houston already have the sound of an accomplished band, with solid musicianship and inventive songwriting. They describe "Lifeguard" as "a song for the people who use those closest to them as a lifebuoy without realising, or maybe even caring, that they're pulling the other person underwater with them."
The upcoming EP
The Fireside Sessions is credited to "Snow Patrol and the Saturday Songwriters." While in pandemic lockdown, frontman Gary Lightbody conducted a series of Instagram livestreams and invited fans to collaborate with him. "They would suggest chords and lyrics and I would put them all together and add in a few of my own where appropriate - but my unwritten rule was that there would be lyrics from a Saturday Songwriter in each line of the song.” In this track, the resulting lyrics are cryptic yet expressive of a longing to return to personal connection: "Know the last time that I saw you / Is not the last page of the book."
After a few releases on Nettwerk, this California band is going indie again with an album coming this fall. This first single is a collaboration with members of L.A. trio Sir Sly. A band statement says: "Songwriting sessions between bands can become complicated tinder dates with simultaneous multiple partners, but we're happy that everyone swiped right and turned a pretty lie into one of our most creative and fun songs."
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