ALTER.NATION #64
Upset, TOY, Twin Peaks, Juliana Hatfield, Modest Mouse, Tindersticks, FKA Twigs, The Young Sinclairs, Loma Prieta, Blood Incantation, Caspian, Incognito
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ALTER.NATION #64 on DEEZER
Former Vivian Girls and Best Coast drummer formed Upset with ex-Hole drummer Patty Schemel to play her own punk-pop songs.
Upset -
Lucky Strikes Out
It’s an invigorating three-minute story song that fits in the disappointment of a hookup flaming out and the subsequent decision to dig yourself deeper into despair by lighting up a cigarette, before twisting around into a rom-com-style happy ending. That’s all delivered with the infectious chorus: “I lit a Strike and struck a match, my Lucky Strikes and a heart attack/ With any luck, I’ve met my match.”
This London quintet blends Krautrock, psychedelia, and shoegaze into hypnotic, pulsating music.
TOY -
Down on the Street from Songs of Consumption
Talking about the album, TOY said: Songs of Consumption sonically is a continuation and development of the themes conceived on Happy In The Hollow and it will show people where we are going towards musically. The DIY approach was explored further utilising more of the electronic elements that we touched upon before. Drum machines, stripped down arrangements and rudimentary production give a primitive sound that we thought suited the choice of songs. Some of the songs have very big sounding production, so we wanted to experiment with them by going in a different direction...
Chicago garage punkers who channel '60s and '70s influences with giddiness and irreverence.
Twin Peaks -
Spiders (Kidsmoke) (
Wilco Cover)
The Wilco tribute album Wilco Covered was released on CD with the November issue of Uncut, and only one of its songs was released digitally... That would be Twin Peaks’ take on “Spiders (Kidsmoke),” which, like “Company In My Back,” originates from Wilco’s masterful 2004 release A Ghost Is Born. It’s a roots-rock/krautrock hybrid that sets Wilco’s drowsy pop harmonies and rangy, agitated lead guitar work to a motorik pulse, punctuated by occasional widescreen bar-band explosions. Twin Peaks, Wilco’s Chicago rock descendants, have delivered a faithful reading of “Spiders (Kidsmoke),” one that reminds me how cool it would be to see the track back in Wilco’s setlist sometime soon...
Formerly of Blake Babies, the eclectic singer/songwriter graced MTV while retaining her D.I.Y. ethos with spry, girlish story-songs.
Juliana Hatfield -
Hungry for You (J’aurais Toujours Faim De Toi) from
Juliana Hatfield Sings the Police
Arriving swiftly after 2018's Juliana Hatfield Sings Olivia Newton-John, 2019's Juliana Hatfield Sings the Police amounts to the second chapter in a musical autobiography for the rocker. If Olivia Newton-John amounted to Hatfield's first musical love,
the Police are the pivotal band of her teens, a group that accelerated her interest in rock & roll. Appropriately, Juliana Hatfield Sings the Police isn't as sweet or dreamy as Juliana Hatfield Sings Olivia Newton-John. Hatfield emphasizes the group's connection to punk and New Wave, both through song selection and arrangement... In Hatfield's hands, the songs of Sting and the Police don't necessarily sound like hits -- nor are they performed with the technical proficiency of Andy Summers and Stewart Copeland -- but they sound fresh and alive, once again feeling like punk-inspired pop.
Pacific Northwest indie rockers who became unlikely chart-toppers with a volatile mix of punk-inspired rawness and simmering atmosphere.
Modest Mouse -
Ice Cream Party
Modest Mouse returned this past Record Store Day with a 7″ featuring their first new songs since 2015’s Strangers To Ourselves... The new track is called “Ice Cream Party.” It features Isaac Brock creepily murmuring the lyrics, “There’s an ice cream party at my house, please come over.” And it’s accompanied by the release of an official Modest Mouse ice cream. Earlier this week, Modest Mouse posted a location to Reddit. The map linked to Portland ice cream shop Ruby Jewel, makers of the special Modest Mouse flavor.
Acclaimed English sextet whose melancholy, obtuse songwriting and the baritone vocals of Stuart Staples made them indie darlings during the '90s.
Tindersticks -
The Amputees from
No Treasure But Hope
There are few if any working bands who craft their music as meticulously as Tindersticks; their music is like a suspension bridge built out of nuance, a wealth of small details coming together into something tremendously powerful even when it's whisper quiet (which is often). So it's surprising to learn that the group's 2019 album No Treasure But Hope was recorded in less than a week... But if anyone was expecting No Treasure But Hope to sound rougher or less precise given the way it was recorded, they'd be wrong. The craft these performers bring to this music is as stunning as ever, and the interplay between the musicians is wondrous, made all the more remarkable by the deeply affecting murmur of Stuart Staples' vocals...
Evoking trip-hop as well as the xx's spare electronic pop, FKA twigs' songs are haunting and vulnerable.
FKA twigs -
sad day
...Now, in “sad day,” the fourth teaser track before MAGDALENE drops Friday, twigs beckons for her lover as he steals further away. She begins with a bohemian gentleness that may just turn his head: “Taste the fruit of me/Make love to all you see,” she coaxes in her lovely falsetto, a woodland sprite urging the wanderer back into the forest. But even she must admit that shadows loom; soon enough, with a heavier and almost wry intonation, twigs allows that he’d act “foolishly” to still love her, that she’s “made him sad before.” Crackling digital effects suggest insistent rain, and a sly, scratchy bass drop pierces the optimistic haze. twigs’ co-producers on the track—Nicolas Jaar, Skrillex, Noah Goldstein, Benny Blanco—flex their thumbs in these heavy synth instrumentals. The wistful, future-shock distortion of her vocals alludes to her own defiance and anger, before she slips effortlessly back into airy entreaties. twigs’ eyes are open and her heart is tired.
Prolfic and authentic folk rock revivalists from Virginia with psychedelic and garage influences.
The Young Sinclairs -
Leviathan from Out of the Box
After spending a decade establishing themselves as a top-tier '60s revival band, forging a sound that lived in the sweet spot where jangling folk-rock, melancholy guitar pop, and fuzzy psychedelia meet, the Young Sinclairs dropped out of sight for a few years beginning in 2015. When they returned in 2019 with their third album, Out of the Box, things had changed. The band weren't just mining that fertile, if a little narrow, plot of ground anymore; this time they cast a wider net and rope in all kinds of new sonic influences... reverb-heavy modern chillwave ("Leviathan"), and most surprisingly, a strong dose of early-'90s-style baggy psychedelia...
Bay Area hardcore band that specializes in uncomfortable sonic discord, subtle harmony, and "emo violence." (named after the 1989 earthquake that devastated Northern California)
Loma Prieta .
Continuum
Back in 2015, the raw and jagged long-running Bay Area hardcore band Loma Prieta released their truly impressive Self-Portrait album. And then: Nothing. Today, Loma Prieta end that silence... With “Continuum,” the band has built on the moody hardcore sonics of their old records, but they’ve done something very different with it. There’s a lot of mud and noise in the sound of “Continuum,” but the song is, at heart, a melodic and extravagantly bummed-out rock songs. It’s not even that fast! There’s a bit of shoegaze in the way the ultra-distorted guitars and bass build their own kind of drone and in the way that they overwhelm the vocals. It’s aggressive music, but it’s pretty, too.
Blood Incantation is an American death metal band from Denver, Colorado, formed in 2011. The band consists of vocalist and guitarist Paul Riedl, guitarist Morris Kolontyrsky, drummer Isaac Faulk and bassist Jeff Barrett.
Blood Incantation -
Inner Paths (to Outer Space)
“Inner Paths (to Outer Space)” is what happens when one of the best new American metal bands invites us along for a vision quest. “We improvised this track on psychedelics over a period of several months, allowing it to grow and evolve as it chose,” Blood Incantation said of the first taste from their long-awaited second album, Hidden History of the Human Race. From the Colorado quartet known for giving pulverizing, cosmic soundtracks to ancient alien conspiracy theories, “Inner Paths” spends most of its runtime patiently building toward the quicksand-deep death metal they perfected on 2016’s Starspawn... As with all their best work, Blood Incantation scoured the past and found a portal to a world that feels nightmarish, new, and breathtakingly alive.
Massachusetts-based post-rock unit in the vein of Explosions in the Sky and Mono. Made up of members Philip Jamieson (guitars, keyboards, samples), Calvin Joss (guitar, glockenspiel), Chris Friedrich (bass), Joe Vickers (drums) and -- since 2007 -- Erin Burke-Morgan
Caspian -
Flowers Of Light
New England instrumentalists Caspian have been off our radar for a good long while, but they’ll return in January with their first album since 2015’s Dust And Disquiet. It’s called On Circles, it was produced by Will Yip... In a press release, guitar and keyboard player Philip Jamieson has some fascinating thoughts on the new album, and about the way bands often talk about their new albums:
"I’ve grown weary of reading about bands discuss the renewing, rehabilitative properties their most recent [album] has had on them. They incur corrosion, come close to running out of gas, descend into the dark abyss, and finally emerge on the other side with a record that has given them crystal clear perspective and a confident path forward. On Circles is not that record." Maybe not, but “Flowers Of Light” is still the kind of cleansing fire I want out of a post-rock song.
Led by Jean-Paul "Bluey" Maunick, they're the most enduring and successful band affiliated with the acid jazz movement.
Incognito -
Saturday Sirens (Instrumental) from Tomorrow's New Dream
Forty years since their inception, Jean-Paul "Bluey" Maunick's Incognito continue to forge ahead with Tomorrow's New Dream, closing out a third straight decade in which they have released at least five studio albums of feel-good soul, jazz, and funk. Longtime fans knowledgeable about the group's roots might long for another cover -- the album LP is nothing but originals -- but connections are made with some greats...
Upset, TOY, Twin Peaks, Juliana Hatfield, Modest Mouse, Tindersticks, FKA Twigs, The Young Sinclairs, Loma Prieta, Blood Incantation, Caspian, Incognito
