Premiere: Ted Barnes feat. Kristin McClement – ‘Metal Man (Red Snapper Rework)’: a noir jazz reversion full of double bass goodness
WE SWOONED for “Metal Man”, a dusky tale of yearning from former Clayhill quiet songwriting genius Ted Barnes featuring the vocal talents of Brighton folkie Kristin McClement a month back now when we premiered it; and now Ted’s lovely album 17 Postcards is out in the world, he’s offered that track up for a remix …
See: The lyric video for the flute-punk rush of TEKE::TEKE’s ‘Barbara’
WE LOVE them, you know; TEKE::TEKE, the Montrealais-Japanese septet who formed initially for a one-off tribute show to Japanese king of the surf guitar Takeshi Terauchi, and who have since delighted us en route to their debut album for Kill Rock Stars with the cinematic panache of “Kala Kala”, the heavy chaos and psych propulsion of …
See: The video for the swirling freakbeat of Michael Robert Murphy’s ‘Puzzles’: Liverpool psych excellence sings us into spring
IT’S SO undeniably the Mersey sound; the new single from Michael Robert Murphy, erstwhile singer with Liverpool’s ace acid/folk-rock chemists The Wicked Whispers, comes swirling into spring with his new single, “Puzzles”, keeping his head held high in the city that in recent decades has brought us Micheal Head in all his beautiful incarnations, The …
See: The video for the raw punk blues grooves of Ghost Woman’s ‘Demons’
EVAN USCHENKO grew up in the small town of Three Hills, Alberta (pop: 3,212), and cut his teeth as a multi-instrumentalist in Michael Rault’s band, playing out an expansive, fuzzy, proggy psych-pop with the likes of King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard; and cashing his cheques for playing the guitar at gas stations after the …
See: The monochrome video for Trevor Sensor’s ‘Chiron, Galactus’: an instant classic of mourning, cathartic Americana
ILLINOIS singer-songwriter Trevor Sensor, who beguiled hearts and minds with a clutch of EPs and his debut album, Andy Warhol’s Dream, on Jagjaguwar back around 2017-18, has been away, grown his hair into a leonine mane, and is back with a new album on High Black Desert Records come mid-June. He’s collected together a clutch …
Track: Roy – ‘I’m Not Afraid’: a proper garage-punk pebble preludes Toronto voyager’s second album
ROY is how Toronto psych scenester Patrick Lefler likes to get dressed for a night on the town, all paisley finery, hookahs and a knack with a lazily excellent dream of Pepperland. He plies his excellent trade for Idée Fixe, a label which noted its first encounter with ROY’s aesthetic while ploughing through the demo …
Track: Louien – ‘Deep Within’: Nordicana that gently, effortlessly steals your heart away
KNOW this: Miranda Solberg, the Norwegian alt.folk singer who steps out into the music world as Louien, and who is about to release an EP, No Tomorrow, for Oslo’s Jansen Records, can grasp your heart in a second with voice and her melodicism. The evidence, m’lud: it’s all there in her latest single, “Deep Within”, …
Premiere: Wes Tirey – ‘Bang The Drum Slowly’: haunting, beautiful Americana with plains dust under its nails
WES TIREY comes to us from the arty city of Asheville, North Carolina, out in the Blue Ridge Mountains, where he’s been plying a trade in well-crafted Americana for nearly a decade with a whole clutch of releases under his belt in that time for labels such as Scissor Tail, Full Spectrum, and Noumenal Loom. …
News: Birds of Maya breathe new fire into the stoner vibe with an album for Drag City in late June – see the video for ‘BFIOU’
PHILADELPHIA is a city that knows how to properly rock, dirt under its nails, filthy fuckin’ fuzz in its heart. With the news that Philly headz Bardo Pond are getting a silver jubilee expanded repress for their ’96 psychotropic masterpiece Amanita, comes news from more of the city’s favourite prodigally noisy sons, Birds of Maya; …
See: King Ropes – ‘Magical Floating Eye’: outta their Montana eyrie with playful alt-rock
BASED in the small city of Bozeman, Montana, in the foothills of the Rockies, King Ropes have quietly going about their particular brand of whimsical, alt.psych rock since their 2017 debut, Dirt. There’s a little of Kurt Wagner’s husky, declamatory warmth and observation to their thang; a touch of the Malkmus absurds, a little Mr …