LA
New Track/Video: Old friends/nu-jazz- Sam Wilkes and Jacob Mann announce collab album ‘Compositions’ with synth funk bubbler ‘Dr T’
What is genre? Is it a help or a hindrance to the maker and listener? LA’s pioneering label Leaving Records have an answer, flying with the strapline pun ‘Genre All’ and nuturing a catalogue that swerves definition, wide ranging in tone but unified by the drive to experiment whatever the starting points. Now comes news …
News: “Heartbreak you can dance to”: Tove Lo drops new single for ‘No one Dies From Love’ – Performing at Listen Out 2022 – Launches Pretty Swede Records with mtheory
Grammy nominated, multi-platinum selling Tove Lo returns with a brand-new track No One Dies From Love via her own, new label Pretty Swede Records/mtheory. The Swedish, LA-based artist has also announced a return to Australia in September and October for Listen Out Festival. Co-written with longtime collaborator Ludvig Söderberg, the uplifting disco of ‘No One …
Track: Alisa Xayalith (from New Zealand’s The Naked and Famous) unveils anthemic and powerful debut solo single ‘High Fidelity’.
One of New Zealand’s most fabulous exports, The Naked and Famous, exploded on to the international scene with some stunning indie pop singles and albums and some blistering live shows (see video for ‘Young Blood’ here). While the band is currently in hiatus, singer Alisa Xayalith (now based in Los Angeles) has just released a …
Track: Clarke and the Himselfs release the fuzzy low-fi buzz of ‘Weighted Down’
Like some glorious love child of Velvet Underground and The Jesus and Mary Chain, and best buddies with Courtney Barnett, Clarke and the Himself‘s debut single ‘Weighted Down’ has a fuzzy deceptively simple sweet drone attack: sibilant cymbals, grunge guitars and the sweetest repeated melody backed by a plonking piano. All the remarkable for the …
Track: Colleen Green unveils the cool and witty track ‘I Wanna Be A Dog’ and announces the release of the fittingly titled album ‘Cool’ for September
With an innate cool guitar driven bop, the new single by Colleen Green is an absolute joy. A simple three chord buzzing guitar rhythm, driving drums and a rousing chorus deliver a low-fi gem. Think of the vibe of a sixties jam and an nineties sensibility – The Ronettes meets The Breeders and The Raveonettes. …
Track: Vintage Fiction – ‘Alright, Okay’: a little nugget of sundazed LA psych-pop bliss
YOU CAN so hear it their sound, if you ask me: the sun. The West Coast gleams through those burnished guitars, those dusky vocals, fair glows from the song as a whole in the way the first Avi Buffalo album does; early House of Love does. Languor, sleepy eyes, coastal bliss. Formerly trading as DIAZ, …
Track: The enigmatic Douglas Von Irvin’s Carnival’s ‘Vampire Lovers’ is shimmering, haunting garage pop
Douglas Von Irvin’s Carnival (DVIC) (a Toronto/LA based collective) has released a shimmering and haunting new track – ‘Vampire Lovers’ – a melodic ballad infused with a melancholic delivery and a hint of gothic horror. ‘Vampire Lovers’ has elements that reflect fellow US artists like The National, Grandaddy and Band of Horses: impassioned intelligent lyrics …
See: Tashaki Miyaki – ‘Castaway’: yearning, leftfield LA guitar pop
THE LA dreampop trio Tashaki Miyaki have dropped a a single and accompanying video of the title song from their forthcoming second album, Castaway, which will be released on July 2nd; and you can watch that below. Singer, drummer and producer Paige Stark says the song “… is about the challenges of romantic love and how …
Track: Man’s Body’s low-fi burner The Natural Host is a melodic delight
Greg Franco is a busy man. He is a central pillar in Rough Church – a band whose album ‘Emergency Breakthrough’ we enthusiastically reviewed recently, and is aso a key figure in LA/Chicago indie pop band Man’s Body. The new single from Man’s Body, ‘Natural Host’, is a gentle, kind and warmly themed delight that …
PREMIERE: Free Country – ‘The Life Of Riley’: wistful, essential lofi from his hometown basement
FREE COUNTRY is the indie pop project of LA’s Jason Ribadeneyra, a man with an ear for a wistful, low-key melody delivered with weary truth in his voice. Tomorrow he releases his latest six-tracker, the introverted, pretty-as, guitar and piano indie pop stylings of The Life of Riley; but tomorrow, as Annie sings so famously, …