07-09-2021 alter:MiX # 33 alter tracks in PRSNT_PRFCT_MiX [2019-2021] # Joan of Arc, Upset, The Heliocentrics, Ani DiFranco, Motorists, Public Memory, Michael Nau, Sharon Van Etten, Field Music, Oceanator, Southern Avenue
if you want excitement PRESS SHUFFLE!
Indie rock stalwarts led by Tim Kinsella, with a sustained focus on exploring the boundaries of their art.
Destiny Revision 3:44
Land Surveyor 3:36
from Tim Melina Theo Bobby 2020
Sometime following the release of their gorgeous 2018 album 1984, long-running Chicago art rock experimentalists Joan of Arc decided to call it a day. The band formed in 1995 around the impassioned vocals, obtuse thinking, and creatively limitless songwriting of former Cap'n Jazz member Tim Kinsella, and for the next many years, Kinsella and a rotating cast of players stretched the conceptual boundaries of what Joan of Arc was on over a dozen albums. After making the decision to end the group, the most recently active lineup entered the studio, knowing that what they were recording would be the last statement from a band who had spent two-and-a-half decades creating a sound that was both wildly specific and somehow boundless. In true Joan of Arc fashion, final album Tim Melina Theo Bobby (the first names of the players who made the music) sees the group taking their sound in a new direction, even on the way out the door...
Former Vivian Girls and Best Coast drummer formed Upset with ex-Hole drummer Patty Schemel to play her own punk-pop songs. Sounding like a lost band from the grunge pop '90s, Upset were formed by the duo of Ali Koehler, ex-Vivian Girls and Best Coast drummer, and Patty Schemel, who famously drummed for Hole.
Holy Basil 3:10
Over My Head 3:22
from Upset 2019
Upset's take on '90s pop-punk and grunge is more refined and powerful on their second album, 2019's Upset. Since their promising 2013 debut album and follow-up EP in 2015, the band has solidified into a quartet while spreading out the songwriting and singing duties. Original singer/songwriter Ali Koehler shares the mike this time with guitarist Lauren Freeman, who provides an alternate vision that's a little rougher -- both sonically and emotionally -- around the edges. For the most part, Koehler comes at her songs from a poppier, more melodic angle, while Freeman has a more angular and punk-derived style. .. Adding Freeman to the mix was a great idea that made an already good band even better and Upset is a strong step forward from their debut and some of the best retro grunge-punk going in 2019.
This London quintet blends Krautrock, psychedelia, and shoegaze into hypnotic, pulsating music.
Sequence One 4:17
Energy 4:07
from Happy in the Hollow 2019
With Clear Shot, TOY transformed their music by bringing it into hi-def focus. On Happy in the Hollow, they continue to change their sound in several ways. For the first time, the band self-produced their music, though their sessions at Dan Carey's Studio B suggest they're still tight with the producer who helped shaped their sound early on. .. Happy in the Hollow doesn't change the feeling that the members of TOY have one foot in another dimension that they're waiting to transport their listeners to.
Eclectic U.K.-based ensemble blending influences such as hip-hop, jazz, soundtracks, Ethiopian funk, outré electronics, and more.
99% Revolution 5:03
Elephant Walk 4:36
Hanging by a Thread 4:48
from Infinity of Now 2020
It's been nearly three years since London's Heliocentrics issued 2017's mind-blowing one-two punch of A World of Masks and their soundtrack for The Sunshine Makers. Drummer Malcolm Catto and bassist Jake Ferguson, the band's producers, reached a new plateau with those releases. They forged an aesthetic that explored numerous Indo-Asian traditions, library music, fractured '70s funk, film scores, beat jazz, and more, and applied them as carefully woven sonic experiments. They realized long ago that the band's restlessness is their M.O. Here, they've managed to deliver a rainbow stew of hybridized genres, production techniques, subtle but effective sound effects, and massive grooves. The Infinity of Now is the Heliocentrics debut offering for Madlib's Madlib Invazion label. Vocalist Barbora Patkova returns to the fold as a full member. ..The Heliocentrics' multivalently textured sound is by now a trademark signature. Infinity of Now is more adventurous, disciplined, and focused than any of their previous outings. Its dark and murky sonic vision is at once completely out of step with everything else, as well as miles ahead of it.
Alternative folk icon, feminist, activist, and paragon of the D.I.Y. ethos who has charted in the U.S. since the '90s.
Revolutionary Love 7:09
Shrinking Violet 6:17
Confluence 4:52
from Revolutionary Love 2021
For more than three decades, Ani DiFranco has made the personal political and vice versa. Whether playing solo, working the road with her trio, or in a studio with a raucous band, she has consistently shown unflinching honesty in critiquing the myriad ways in which power informs relationships across racial, social, gender, economic, environmental, and romantic lines in an astonishing variety of musical contexts. DiFranco has also called New Orleans home for some time; many of its musical traditions have burrowed their way into her artistic DNA. While on the road in 2019, seeing America tear itself apart under Trump, DiFranco wrote songs and read Sikh activist and civil right lawyer Valarie Kaur's See No Stranger, a memoir/manifesto for accountable, compassionate living in catastrophic times. DiFranco returned home as COVID-19 became a global pandemic. She felt she needed to "get people inspired to vote...believing in democracy, believing in each other and in themselves." In February, just before lockdown, she traveled to co-producer Brad Cook's North Carolina studio and cut this 11-song set in two days with her trio and local luminaries including Hiss Golden Messenger, Mountain Goats, Mipso, etc. With them she illustrated these songs at the blurred edges where soul, folk, and jazz-pop intersect...
Made up of childhood friends and longtime collaborators, Motorists bring rough-edged punk excitability and the wistful jangle of '80s college rock to their melodic and infectiously energetic sound.
Surrounded 2:15
Latent Space 4:07
Blood from the Stone 2:45
from Surrounded 2021
On their debut full-length, Surrounded, Toronto-bred trio Motorists hit a sweet spot that intersects the wistful jangle and chorus-drenched guitar work of classic '80s college rock bands with healthy amounts of post-punk-leaning frustration and energy. Made up of longtime friends and collaborators Craig Fahner, Matt Learoyd, and Jesse Locke, the band writes songs that are both snappy and to the point while being layered with both musical intricacies and understated social critique. Surrounded's title track follows a perpetually dissatisfied narrator as they go from one environment to another, finding new problems living in the city, the country, and communal spaces, ultimately feeling crowded and overwhelmed by existence itself. It's a wildly neurotic lyrical journey that plays out over a relatively fun and upbeat instrumental...
The moody electronic project of Robert Toher, Public Memory explores loss, dreams, and illusions of nostalgia with dense collages of dub, Krautrock, and trip-hop.
Bad Orbit 5:12
Midsummer Shadow 3:46
Butcher 4:07
from Ripped Apparition 2020
With Ripped Apparition, Public Memory's Robert Toher continues to craft music that burrows deep into listeners' psyches. Though Toher used a host of new synthesizers that transformed his creative process, the project's third album is still very much on brand... Ripped Apparition also finds him connecting Public Memory's music to other shadowy styles and artists without borrowing too obviously from any of them... Ripped Apparition might be a little more linear than 2018's Demolition, but it's another testament to Toher's skill at soothing, seducing, and unsettling his audience at the same time.
Singer, songwriter, and multi-instrumentalist Michael Nau crafts reflective indie rock tinged with folk, psychedelic, and vintage pop influences. He's known for leading the like-minded projects Page France and Cotton Jones from the mid-2000s to the early 2010s before beginning to record under his own name in 2016.
Hoops 4:27
Grow My Wave 3:38
Look Into Dance 5:22
from Less Ready to Go 2019
Still a collaborative effort, and even more bustling than 2018's Michael Nau & the Mighty Thread in terms of arrangements, Less Ready to Go is Michael Nau's fourth album under his own name. Recorded at a studio in Joshua Tree, it was produced by Dr. Dog's Scott McMicken. As for its particularly colorful sound, Nau has explained that each song was recorded live with guests, who would then "switch instruments and do a live overdub on top." Alongside extra touches and sound effects, the results are often wonky and woozy on an album whose otherworldly quality extends to reaching back to the '60 and '70s for R&B, pop, and psychedelic influences. Rather than ever playing like a tribute, these elements seep into Nau's dreamy songs...
A singer of distinct, controlled passion, Sharon Van Etten carved out a loyal audience with her hushed, intense albums... A dedicated choir student during her childhood, Van Etten studied clarinet, violin, and piano before moving on to guitar. She began writing songs in high school and sang in a choir group, the Madrigals. She credits her choral experiences as indispensable in learning to musically notate, as well as to sing harmonies.
I Told You Everything 4:45
Memorial Day 4:27
No One's Easy to Love 4:38
from Remind Me Tomorrow 2019
For a decade, Sharon Van Etten specialized in understatement. From her 2009 debut Because I Was in Love through 2014's Are We There, she mined the tension generated by murmuring instrumentation clashing with her passionate delivery, a balance that proved quietly compelling. Van Etten maintains that sense of drama on Remind Me Tomorrow, her fifth full-length album, but she's radically shifted her presentation. Working with producer John Congleton, she's expanded her sonic palette, incorporating vintage synthesizers and drum loops while occasionally cranking up her amplifiers. Some of the sounds are conscious throwbacks, but they don't play like retro nostalgia, not in the context of Remind Me Tomorrow, which juxtaposes fearless aural adventure with keenly observed observations of easing into a satisfied life. ..
Hailing from Sunderland, England, indie/art rockers Field Music emerged in the middle part of the 2000s with a distinctive blend of smartly crafted pop hooks and an ambitious nature that pulled from a variety of rock subgenres. Helmed by brothers Peter and David Brewis, the group earned critical acclaim and a devout fan base...
Field Music
Coffee or Wine 3:03
A Shot To The Arm 2:32
Only In a Man's World 2:46
from Making a New World 2020
...Their distinctive brand of indie pop has been constantly refined over the years as they smartly thread between bits of clever guitar rock, synth pop, soul, disco, and chamber pop, this time adding in some light prog-rock sophistication and the sort of aerodynamic new wave that harkens back to Thomas Dolby's early work. Like each of their previous releases, Making a New World is an ambitious, original, and exquisitely crafted work, full of rich details and compelling songs that translate the past into modern new shapes.
The stage moniker of Brooklyn-based singer/songwriter and multi-instrumentalist Elise Okusami, Oceanator emerged in 2016 with a sound that combines heavy grunge, fuzzed-out indie rock, and deeply personal lyrics with synth pop-laced, incisive pop hooks.
Goodbye, Goodnight 4:03
Hide Away 6:11
Walk with You 4:20
from Things I Never Said 2021
The debut full-length effort from Brooklyn-based singer/songwriter and multi-instrumentalist Elise Okusami, who operates under the moniker Oceanator, Things I Never Said is a delightfully understated grunge-pop paean to the disillusionment of early adulthood. Okusami is a nimble pop architect who knows how to bait a hook, and her songs, which marry the riot grrrl ethos of Sleater-Kinney with the neatly wrapped emo-pop earworms of Jimmy Eat World, frequently take abrupt instrumental detours that lead the listener into new sonic headwaters...
Using vintage blues and soul as their musical foundation, Southern Avenue is a band that brews up a sound inspired by their home base of Memphis with ingredients from around the world. Lead singer Tierinii Jackson takes inspiration from soul divas of the '60s and '70s as well as contemporary R&B artists, and guitarist Ori Naftaly plays blues-influenced leads filtered through the swagger of rock & roll.
Be The Love You Want 3:16
Love You Nice And Slow 4:04
Push Now 3:10
from Be the Love You Want 2021
In 2017, Memphis' Southern Avenue issued a self-titled long-player that directly straddled rootsy Delta blues and stripped-down Southern soul and gospel. 2019's Grammy-nominated Keep On stuck closer to the big-city blues while providing a vehicle for the instrumental prowess of guitarist Ori Naftaly and keyboardist Jeremy Powell. Be the Love You Want stands in marked contrast to both. Co-produced by Naftaly and Los Lobos' Steve Berlin, this set adds big-beat R&B and funk to the mix without sacrificing any of their rootsy appeal...
Nincsenek megjegyzések:
Megjegyzés küldése