lofi
Premiere: Alex Fasso drops ‘Northside’: watching Melbourne goings-on in lo-fi quietude
BASED these days in Melbourne, born and raised over in Hong Kong, Alex Fasso has been quietly migrating his seductive and blissful tunesmithery away from the brittle acoustic introspection of his earlier work – check the lockdown lovely “Happy 4 U”, for instance, committed to tape during that first, weird, weird period when we all …
TRACK: Felid – ‘Midnight Lover’: Bristol producer brings languid piano grace – his debut EP’s out now
AFTER initially making his mark as exactly half of cool electropop duo Mauwe, Bristol-based, South African-born Felid, aka Jay Rodger, struck out on his own during 2020 with a clutch of stripped back, sultry, citified tunesmithery, dropping a trio of tracks as a statement of alt.pop intent. Backseat Mafia covered his debut strikeout in his …
PREMIERE: Fixtures – ‘Five Ft One, Six Ft Ten’: proper scruffy, shredding alt.guitar pop like they used to make
BROOKLYN five-piece Fixtures know how to do a ridiculously fun guitar pop rush. Really, they do. They’ve just signed on the dotted with Spain’s Bobo Integral, and will be releasing their debut EP, Weak Automatic, for their new home in December. We’ve had a little listen, and another one, and another; and it really is …
TRACK: Milky Wimpshake’s tweepunk starburst ‘You Make A Nice Piece Of Art’ leads for October LP
IF YOU like your indiepop punky and proud, erudite and bearing a manifesto – yeah, like it used to – then Newcastle’s Milky Wimpshake should so be on your shopping list. The thrashy twee punk project of Pete Dale that has been releasing lofi sherbet grenades of purest bouncealong thrashpop for a quarter-century now – …
TRACK: Magic Bronson are back and ‘Surfin’
LA’s scuzzed-up alt.pop duo Magic Bronson are back and “Surfin on your brainwaves” with the second single to be released ahead of their forthcoming LP. It’s a slice of West Coast psych goodness, coming at you in a wall of delay and bells and tremulous guitar, all MGMT’s leather-jacketed little bro. “It’s our time, it’s …
EP REVIEW: Hanya – ‘Sea Shoes’
BRIGHTON’S small but perfectedly formed indie label Austerity Records, the brainchild of industry gentlemen and label co-owners Garry Saunders and Jamie Windless, has gone all chromium oxide on us with the launch of its C60 Club. A reel-to-reel move across from the singles club, Austerity launches its new venture thus: “A lot of us grew …
SEE: Otta’s ‘Sick Inside’ has a gorgeous, genre-busting fragility
SOUTH London-based, British-Finnish singer Otta is plotting an intriguing and sonically dazed course out on the creative fringes of singer-songwriter, lofi and soul. Her second EP, entitled Songbook, follows a critically tipped debut at the end of last year; and on the strength of lead track “Sick Inside” promises to be innovative, inventive, playful and …
TRACK: Home Counties’ ‘Dad Bod’ – fantastically Peel show awkward squad
IT WOULD seem the Bristol underground scene is in rude health. Last week we had a new download-only only round-up from Dorset boys moved uptown with a whole clutch of stoner psych goodness, Leeches. And now we have a second missive from Brizzle-based guitar shamblers Home Counties: and it’s a cracking, snotty-cuffed slice of John …
EP REVIEW: Trunky Juno – ‘Too Many Teeth’
TRUNKY JUNO has been called ‘lo-fi’ in an attempt to slot him nicely into an ever more complicated musical map. And while some of the trademarks of that sub- (micro- ?) genre are definitely there, I would – to groans, necessarily – propose herewith that actually our dear Mr. Juno be referred to as ‘wide-fi’. …
ALBUM REVIEW: The Gist – ‘Interior Windows’
CARDIFF’S Young Marble Giants subverted the revolution while the fires were still lit. In an age when guitars were razor-loud and lyrics were spat, the Welsh four-piece turned it right back down to a female-led fragility. One album was recorded for Rough Trade before fragmentation and the group’s main protagonists went firing off in different …