New Iron & Wine, Oh Wonder, Ruen Bros & more

The sixth Iron & Wine album, Beast Epic, is set for release in August. So far we have one track, and it's a beauty. "Call It Dreaming" is a gentle rumination on the passing of time and the importance of loving each other while we're here. Sam Beam says the album was recorded and mixed in about two weeks, and the result is a loose, natural sound. "By employing the old discipline of recording everything live and doing minimal overdubbing, I feel like it wears both its achievements and its imperfections on its sleeve."

We dip again into Justin Townes Earle's latest collection, Kids In The Street, to feature "There Go A Fool." The first-verse story of romantic frustration reminds us a bit of Joe Jackson's "Is She Really Going Out With Him?" but with a heavier dose of melancholy. AllMusic.com writes of this album that Earle "sounds as good as ever ... carefully shaping these tales with smart, subtle phrasing. ... This is among his very best work to date." (The reviewer also shares our love for "Champagne Corolla," which we've been playing for weeks.)

Earle's roots are in Nashville, and from that city's busy music scene comes The Daybreaks. Singer/songwriters Kaleb Jones and Heather Bond and producer and multi-instrumentalist Bobby Holland had separate projects before coming together in 2015 and deciding they should be a band. Their debut album, Find Me At The End Of The World, is due later this month. The opening track, "The Machine," was actually released as a single about a year ago, but it qualifies for our New Music bin under the "hey, it's new to us" rule. Hat tip to NoiseTrade.com for bringing it to our attention.

The London alt-pop duo of Josephine Vander Gucht and Anthony West are about to release their second album as Oh Wonder. The title track, "Ultralife," has an upbeat sound and unabashedly happy lyric in the now-that-I've-found-you vein: "Ever since you came, I'm living ultralife."

Rounding out our New Music picks this week is a new single from the Ruen Brothers. Siblings Henry and Rupert Stansall, who hail from Scunthorpe, England, caught our attention last year with their retro-60s sound on "Aces." They're back with a jumping little number called "Genevieve, Come Out Tonight" that we just couldn't resist - only partly because we love that name!

New Iron & Wine, Oh Wonder, Ruen Bros & more

The sixth Iron & Wine album, Beast Epic, is set for release in August. So far we have one track, and it's a beauty. "Call It Dreaming" is a gentle rumination on the passing of time and the importance of loving each other while we're here. Sam Beam says the album was recorded and mixed in about two weeks, and the result is a loose, natural sound. "By employing the old discipline of recording everything live and doing minimal overdubbing, I feel like it wears both its achievements and its imperfections on its sleeve."

We dip again into Justin Townes Earle's latest collection, Kids In The Street, to feature "There Go A Fool." The first-verse story of romantic frustration reminds us a bit of Joe Jackson's "Is She Really Going Out With Him?" but with a heavier dose of melancholy. AllMusic.com writes of this album that Earle "sounds as good as ever ... carefully shaping these tales with smart, subtle phrasing. ... This is among his very best work to date." (The reviewer also shares our love for "Champagne Corolla," which we've been playing for weeks.)

Earle's roots are in Nashville, and from that city's busy music scene comes The Daybreaks. Singer/songwriters Kaleb Jones and Heather Bond and producer and multi-instrumentalist Bobby Holland had separate projects before coming together in 2015 and deciding they should be a band. Their debut album, Find Me At The End Of The World, is due later this month. The opening track, "The Machine," was actually released as a single about a year ago, but it qualifies for our New Music bin under the "hey, it's new to us" rule. Hat tip to NoiseTrade.com for bringing it to our attention.

The London alt-pop duo of Josephine Vander Gucht and Anthony West are about to release their second album as Oh Wonder. The title track, "Ultralife," has an upbeat sound and unabashedly happy lyric in the now-that-I've-found-you vein: "Ever since you came, I'm living ultralife."

Rounding out our New Music picks this week is a new single from the Ruen Brothers. Siblings Henry and Rupert Stansall, who hail from Scunthorpe, England, caught our attention last year with their retro-60s sound on "Aces." They're back with a jumping little number called "Genevieve, Come Out Tonight" that we just couldn't resist - only partly because we love that name!

'Everything' and more added to our big mix

Photo credit: Guy Aroch

"Everything Now" is the title track from Arcade Fire's upcoming fifth album. The lyric addresses how our minds and our lives are stuffed with an overabundance of stimulation and ... stuff. "Every single room of my house / is filled with s--- I can't live without," Win Butler sings (causing us to cringe in self-recognition). Pitchfork notes that "the irony of a song lamenting our need for overstimulation and immediate gratification coming from one of the generation’s most grandiose rock bands is not lost on the musicians." But this track is actually more light and breezy than some of the Montreal band's previous work, with echos of 80s-pop and a break for a crowd-chant of nah-nah-nahs.

The War On Drugs also has a new album on the way, called A Deeper Understanding. The Philadelphia band just released a second single, "Holding On," with its signature dreaming-in-double-time sound. NPR's All Songs Considered calls it "a pulsing jam that sounds deeply inspired by '80s-era Bruce Springsteen, with glockenspiel chimes set against gritty guitars and synths."

Los Angeles trio Lo Moon released its first song (a 7-minute opus) last September, then retreated from sight for a while. They emerged earlier this year with an extensive tour and a Columbia Records deal. Their debut album is still under wraps, but they've just released a second track. "This Is It," starts out with an intimate vocal and expands to a festival-friendly swirl of sound. And indeed they just played the Governors Ball in New York and will be at Lollapalooza in August (presumably playing more than two songs).

From the small town of Nykoping on the Baltic coast of Sweden comes Pwned By Gravity, a young quartet influenced by the likes of Radiohead and Muse. They're making the rounds of clubs in Sweden and Denmark before venturing to the UK for a tour later this year. They've just released their first single in the UK, "All My Might," and it found its way to our ears and into our New Music bin. “All My Might is about desert sand, brackish water and lots and lots of guitar” says vocalist/guitarist and lyricist Alvin Blomberg. “But it's also about being manipulated and deceived by someone you adore and how that affects your relationship.” OK then.

Photo credit: Jennilee Marigomen

We turn back to Canada for a new release by Vancouver-based Louise Burns. A former member of early-2000s teen-pop band Lillix, Burns has established herself as a solo artist and is out with her second full album, Young Mopes. Far from moping, the single "Storms" has a jangly, upbeat sound behind enigmatic lyrics like "[If] all that you live for / Is a thunder in your heartstorm / Don't be what they ask for in the end." Hat tip to Seattle's KEXP for drawing our attention to this track by picking it as Song of the Day recently.

'Everything' and more added to our big mix

Photo credit: Guy Aroch

"Everything Now" is the title track from Arcade Fire's upcoming fifth album. The lyric addresses how our minds and our lives are stuffed with an overabundance of stimulation and ... stuff. "Every single room of my house / is filled with s--- I can't live without," Win Butler sings (causing us to cringe in self-recognition). Pitchfork notes that "the irony of a song lamenting our need for overstimulation and immediate gratification coming from one of the generation’s most grandiose rock bands is not lost on the musicians." But this track is actually more light and breezy than some of the Montreal band's previous work, with echos of 80s-pop and a break for a crowd-chant of nah-nah-nahs.

The War On Drugs also has a new album on the way, called A Deeper Understanding. The Philadelphia band just released a second single, "Holding On," with its signature dreaming-in-double-time sound. NPR's All Songs Considered calls it "a pulsing jam that sounds deeply inspired by '80s-era Bruce Springsteen, with glockenspiel chimes set against gritty guitars and synths."

Los Angeles trio Lo Moon released its first song (a 7-minute opus) last September, then retreated from sight for a while. They emerged earlier this year with an extensive tour and a Columbia Records deal. Their debut album is still under wraps, but they've just released a second track. "This Is It," starts out with an intimate vocal and expands to a festival-friendly swirl of sound. And indeed they just played the Governors Ball in New York and will be at Lollapalooza in August (presumably playing more than two songs).

From the small town of Nykoping on the Baltic coast of Sweden comes Pwned By Gravity, a young quartet influenced by the likes of Radiohead and Muse. They're making the rounds of clubs in Sweden and Denmark before venturing to the UK for a tour later this year. They've just released their first single in the UK, "All My Might," and it found its way to our ears and into our New Music bin. “All My Might is about desert sand, brackish water and lots and lots of guitar” says vocalist/guitarist and lyricist Alvin Blomberg. “But it's also about being manipulated and deceived by someone you adore and how that affects your relationship.” OK then.

Photo credit: Jennilee Marigomen

We turn back to Canada for a new release by Vancouver-based Louise Burns. A former member of early-2000s teen-pop band Lillix, Burns has established herself as a solo artist and is out with her second full album, Young Mopes. Far from moping, the single "Storms" has a jangly, upbeat sound behind enigmatic lyrics like "[If] all that you live for / Is a thunder in your heartstorm / Don't be what they ask for in the end." Hat tip to Seattle's KEXP for drawing our attention to this track by picking it as Song of the Day recently.

Another great crop of new music added to our mix

After a six-year break, Toronto's Sarah Slean has released a gorgeous new collection, Metaphysics. Our pick for the New Music bin this week is the opening track, "Perfect Sky." The song's message is that if you wait for the perfect time to do something, you'll never get it done. In her case, she said in an interview with CBC Music, the "something" was songwriting.

"It's like you're in the middle of chaos, and you always think to yourself, 'Oh, if I get to a better place, if I just find that house or if I work the right person, or if I have the right circumstances this will happen.' And, I think the realization for me was that there's never going to be a perfect set of circumstances. And, if you want it to get written, you just have to sit down and write it."

Birch Street Radio listeners are familiar with Willamena, an indie band from Michigan with a polished rock sound. In fact, they were one of the first indie bands that we began playing a couple of years ago as our format was evolving. Their latest EP, Strong Enough To Last, is coming out in a couple of weeks, and we're happy to add the single "When You Close Your Eyes" to our New Music rotation.

From the city of Hull in England -- designated as the U.K.'s City of Culture for 2017 -- comes a five-piece acoustic band called Pavey Ark. Formed just last year, the group has just released its debut EP Leaf By Leaf" featuring the single "Hidden Hills." Its tightly woven strands of folk guitar, violin, percussion and lilting vocals take you for a ride through the countryside and might evoke memories of past masters like Fairport Convention. The band's leader, singer-songwriter Neil Thomas, says the song is "about meeting the person you love, a chance encounter within [the] huge expanse of time - and how special that is.”

The Brooklyn indie-rock veterans known as Grizzly Bear have started to roll out their seventh release, Painted Ruins, due in August. Two tracks have spun out so far, and we're picking up "Mourning Sound" -- which, despite its title and sorrowful lyric ("Let love age / And watch it burn out and die"), does not sound morose, with a brisk rhythm and sprightly keyboard breaks between Ed Droste's verses and Dan Rossen's choruses.

Topping off the New Music bin this week is "Soulfire," the title track from a new release by Little Steven and the Disciples of Soul. It's the first solo project in 18 years from Bruce Springsteen's longtime comrade-in-guitars. Steven Van Zandt says simply, “This record is me doing me.” And indeed it fits comfortably into the sound that he helped create in Asbury Park, N.J., some four decades ago. In fact, the album includes versions of songs Van Zandt wrote for Southside Johnny and the Asbury Jukes. The opener, "Soulfire," is a new song (sort of; Van Zandt says actually he wrote it several years ago). With an opening disco riff, Motown-style background singers, an arena-worthy solo and wall-of-sound crescendos, this track has everything you'd expect from Steven doing Steven.