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Sunwatchers
New Dad Blues 6:16
Psychic Driving 4:59
from Illegal Moves 2019
New York quartet Sunwatchers make instrumental music that exists where the spiritual reach of free jazz and the screaming chaos of psychedelia intersect. Bandleader Jim McHugh was a founding member of the late-2000s freaked sounds collective Dark Meat, and he carried on their deep-fried blend of structure and skronk when he uprooted from Athens, Georgia, to New York City in 2010 and began working towards what would become Sunwatchers. Wildly prolific, the band quickly established their untethered sound over the course of multiple releases captured both in the studio and in live performances. Illegal Moves is their third studio album, and its seven selections capture the group at their tightest and most electric state of sonic and psychic connectivity yet...
The Heliocentrics
Human Zoo 4:49
A World of Masks 7:45
from A World of Masks 2017
After 2016's From the Deep, an excellent summation of all their previous musical directions, the Heliocentrics go -- as the banner on Ken Kesey's Merry Pranksters bus proclaimed -- "Further." While the Malcolm Catto-led outfit has been digging through many varieties of jazz, psych-funk, hip-hop, library grooves, and international sounds (having worked with Mulatu Astatke and Lloyd Miller) for over a decade, A World of Masks presents an intergalactic take on many of the above.
Added to the band's personnel on this date is Slovakian vocalist Barbora Patkova, who has been working with the outfit live since 2013. Like her fellow Heliocentrics, she is an explorer. While June Tyson is a reference point, Patkova is so versatile that other comparisons are equally apt: Urzula Dudziak, Julie Tippetts, Jeanne Lee, and Patty Waters also come to mind...
Wire
Be Like Them 3:52
Primed and Ready 2:43
from Mind Hive 2020
One of the great joys of Wire's music in the 2010s and beyond is how brilliantly they reinvent their enduring strengths in equally timeless and timely ways. On Mind Hive, the band's legendary skill at writing concise songs filled with layers of meaning comes to the fore. Even its title is compact yet complex, flipping a statement of shared knowledge -- and perhaps conformity -- into one of restless intelligence. Wire don't waste any of the album's terse 35 minutes; instead of the ruminative approach they took on Silver/Lead, they immediately spring into action... The issues Wire grapple with are evergreen, and as they persevere in the face of stupidity and apathy, Mind Hive's unflinching, poetic songs prove maturity is a weapon they wield just as deftly as outrage.
Down the Hill 4:43
When It Burns 3:20
from Juillet 2020
En Attendant Ana are a Parisian indie quintet whose tightly focused melodies and energetic attack are fused with a curious blend of harmonic sophistication and wild abandon. They first appeared in 2016 with a rather rugged lo-fi EP, followed two years later by the more refined full-length Lost and Found, an exciting debut that revealed a young band with heaps of potential. Jump ahead to 2020, when their excellent sophomore LP, Juillet, makes good on that promise. Fronted by singer and chief songwriter Margaux Bouchaudon, En Attendant Ana are primarily a guitar band, though they make good use of multi-instrumentalist Camille Fréchou, whose lofty trumpet lines add a distinctive finesse to the group's energetic post-punk meets indie pop arrangements...
Shadow Show
Charades 3:45
Green Stone 3:47
Shadow Box 4:10
from Silhouettes 2020
After a few seconds of mysterious noise that sounds like distant waves crashing, Silhouettes, the debut album from Detroit trio Shadow Show, begins with a bassline a few notes removed from "Taxman" and a kaleidoscopic explosion of tremolo guitars and mod pop vocal harmonies. It's a strong start to an album that channels several different generations of both British pop and Detroit rock without ever directly mimicking any specific influences. Vocalist/guitarists Ava East's haunted guitar tones on songs like "The Machine" find the middle ground between pensive, late-night loner jams from Fred Smith's Sonic's Rendezvous Band and the sinister energy of Primal Scream...
Leslie Mendelson
Lay It All on Me 3:11
All Come Together 4:42
from If You Can't Say Anything Nice 2020
For her fourth long-player, If You Can't Say Anything Nice, singer/songwriter Leslie Mendelson worked again with longtime co-writer Steve McEwan, who also produced alongside bassist/engineer Lorenzo Wolff. As the reunion may suggest, the album remains in Mendelson's wheelhouse, evoking classic '70s songwriter influences in the vein of Carole King and Carly Simon. (In the period between albums, she released a duet with Jackson Browne for the documentary film 5B.) However, the subject matter here is of its own time, with topics ranging from tragic prescription-drug addiction to media overexposure and anxiety in general, quite in tune with the day's economic and political climate...
Jim Noir
Hexagons 3:55
Tol Circle 4:19
A.M Jazz 6:22
from A.M Jazz 2019
After making a record that eschewed his usual junkshop electronics-meets-the Beatles sound in favor of something guitar-oriented and very Beatlesque on 2014's Finnish Line, Jim Noir returned to a more familiar sound on 2019's AM Jazz. Working with an array of old synths and whatever instruments were lying about his studio, he's crafted a melancholy take on his trademark sound that folds in very pillowy synths, soft rock vocal harmonies, and loads of atmosphere...
HXXS
Seppuku 2:56
Vices 3:13
from Mkdrone 2018
HXXS are the duo of Jeannie Colleene and Gavin Neves. They got their start in a cramped San Jose warehouse, sharing a wall with a porn studio. Despite their vocal takes periodically interrupted by even louder and harsher vocal takes echoing in the halls, MKDRONE soon came together. HXXS live somewhere between the uncomfortable and the alluring. Their live show, which consists of any hardware they can get their hands on – drum machines, synthesizers, samplers – is built on loops, making the songs feverish and at times deliberately frenzied to a point of anxiety. However the duo anesthetize this angst with more subdued nods to electronic and post-punk acts of the 80’s, 90’s, 00’s and present.
Overlake
Unnamed November 3:58
You Don't Know Everything 6:52
Goodbye 5:44
from Fall 2017
Shoegaze is alive and well and living in Jersey City, New Jersey, where it has adopted the name Overlake. On the group's second full-length album, 2017's Fall, Overlake have taken the usual tropes of classic shoegaze -- the big, billowy guitar figures, the murmur-y vocals, the thick undertow of bass, and the languid but crashing rhythms -- and transformed them into something that sounds fresh, engaging, and honestly exciting. With a band like this, good tunes usually make all the difference, and Fall shows that Overlake has them to spare... Fall is big music with an intimate heart, and Overlake will give you the contemplative ride you've been looking for with this splendid album.
Ron Gallo
Young Lady, You're Scaring Me 3:40
Put the Kids to Bed 2:54
Why Do You Have Kids? 3:16
from Heavy Meta 2017
Ron Gallo spent close to a decade exploring the boundaries of his blues, country, and roots rock influences with his band Toy Soldiers, but when he jumped ship to go solo, he left all of that behind. At least that's the very strong impression given by Gallo's second solo album, 2017's Heavy Meta. Gallo's first solo effort, 2014's Ronny, was a step away from Toy Soldiers' sound into a brighter and poppier direction, but with Heavy Meta, he's done an about-face into raw, wiry, guitar-based rock & roll. Backed by bassist Joe Bisirri and drummer Dylan Sevey, Heavy Meta is a gritty, energetic exercise in punk-informed 21st century garage rock, with Gallo's buzzy, rough and ready guitar figures and high-attitude vocals front and center in the mix at all times...
Salad Boys
Psych Slasher 2:50
Scenic Route to Nowhere 3:37
Going Down Slow
from This Is Glue 2018
The Salad Boys' 2015 debut album Metalmania was a fine update on classic jangle pop, full of ringing guitars, hooky melodies, and a mix of uptempo and more relaxed tunes. They don't deviate much from their winning formula on This Is Glue, the 2018 follow-up. Unlike the previous album, which was a more collaborative effort, this time the band's songwriter Joe Sampson took control. With drummer James Sullivan in tow, he recorded the album in various locales around his hometown of Christchurch and gets a much less polished sound than on Metalmania. This approach fixed one of the main problems that album had, which was how sleek and shiny it was. Jangle pop can easily come off as too polite if there isn't some grit under the chiming guitars, and This Is Glue has just enough scruff and lo-fi appeal to avoid this pitfall...
Steve Mason
No Clue 3:10
About the Light 4:26
Walking Away from Love 3:40
from About the Light 2019
Following 2016's excellent Meet the Humans, former Beta Band mastermind Steve Mason takes a more organic and collaborative approach on his fourth solo album, About the Light. While his later catalog has increasingly revealed his acumen as a more straightforward pop songwriter, the Fife native's reputation as a wily studio maverick who builds glorious tracks out of odd bits and bobs has stuck with him since his early days. Having proven many times over that his signature approach yields fruit, Mason decided to take a leap into the unknown, employing his live band to write, rehearse, and record together as a team. Produced by Stephen Street (Morrissey, Blur, the Cranberries), About the Light combines the strong melodicism and thoughtful songwriting of its predecessor with the cumulative energy and spontaneity of group effort, making for a distinctive and deeply engaging entry in Mason's canon...
Of Montreal
Get God's Attention By Being An Atheist 3:50
Don't Let Me Die In America 3:35
Deliberate Self-harm Ha Ha 4:20
from Ur Fun 2020
... 2018's White Is Relic/Irrealis Mood took direct inspiration from the extended remixes of pop hits that were prevalent in the 1980s, and two years later, Ur Fun narrows in on catchier, singles-minded fare. A set that doesn't break for ballads, it was, as has become typical for Barnes, inspired by his personal life, which settled into a steady relationship following divorce... an album otherwise entirely performed and recorded by Barnes in his Athens, Georgia home studio. That doesn't mean that lyrics will be starry-eyed, however; the loquacious lyricist still draws on politics, society, and reflection as well as relationships for Ur Fun... Taken together, infectious rhythms, smart lyrics, and effervescent chorus hooks that deliver throughout Ur Fun make it more than a mere amusement.
Contents
Sunwatchers, The Heliocentrics, Wire, En Attendant Ana, Shadow Show, Leslie Mendelson, Jim Noir, HXXS, Overlake, Ron Gallo, Salad Boys, Steve Mason, Of Montreal
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