Heartbreaking Bravery

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September 28, 2018

IDLES – Great (Music Video)

It’s been a while since anything went up on these pages and there are a lot of reasons behind yet another interim but, as ever, the work continues to be done behind the scenes. Five posts were scheduled to go up before that break and will be going live today. This is one of those posts.

IDLES are on the verge of releasing a legitimate Album of the Year candidate in Joy As An Act of Resistance, a profound protest record with a borderless message that’s resonating deeply in an especially volatile political climate in major countries across the world. Last year, the band released what this site would eventually name the 2017 Music Video of the Year in “Mother” (which remains one of the best clips of the decade) and have a genuine shot at repeating being granted the honor of that distinction this year with the feel-good reclamation of “Danny Nedelko“.

“Great” is the fourth music video to arrive from IDLES this year and continues an unparalleled run of brilliance in the format since the release of “Mother”. Directed by Theo Atkins, “Great” may be the most straightforward clip from the band’s present album cycle, consisting of alternating shots between moments of common, everyday life and live performance. Edited together, “Great” effectively underscores the declaration that comes at the end of the song: “because we’re all in this together.”

IDLES is a band of the people, for the people. They seethe, they rant, and they provoke, but they always get their point across. We’re all embroiled in fights that extend far beyond ourselves, making calls for unification, reminders of positive self-worth, and a willingness to demolish outdated ideals in the pursuit of progress monumentally important. “Great” is the kind of warning shot that sends an abundantly clear message of prioritizing empathy, inclusiveness, and community, which is a message that this site will stand proudly behind.

Listen to “Great” below and pre-order Joy As An Act of Resistance here.

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September 28, 2018

Lonely Parade – Olive Green (Stream)

It’s been a while since anything went up on these pages and there are a lot of reasons behind yet another interim but, as ever, the work continues to be done behind the scenes. Five posts were scheduled to go up before that break and will be going live today. This is one of those posts.

One of 2018’s more exhilarating breakout acts, Lonely Parade have crafted an immensely enticing lead-in to The Pits, thanks to the strength of the record’s advance singles. “Olive Green” is the latest piece of evidence suggesting that The Pits is primed to be one of the year’s best records. Once again, Lonely Parade deliver a work that surges off the energy that comes with their territory (the intersection of basement pop and post-punk), offering up an incredibly catchy run of razor-sharp guitar work, an aggressive rhythm section, and a pointed vocal delivery that oscillates between confidently sardonic and meaningfully unhinged. In short: it’s brilliant.

Listen to “Olive Green” below and pre-order The Pits from Buzz here.

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September 28, 2018

Pile – Cup (Stream)

It’s been a while since anything went up on these pages and there are a lot of reasons behind yet another interim but, as ever, the work continues to be done behind the scenes. Five posts were scheduled to go up before that break and will be going live today. This is one of those posts.

Few bands have earned the type of reverence among its listeners and contemporaries as Pile. Intricate, winding, dynamic compositions have brought them unending admiration and made their discography staggeringly dense, which is something that Odds and Ends addresses. A record that compiles the band’s 7″ releases, compilation contribution, and other assorted castoffs, Odds and Ends serves as something of a career summation and testament.

“Cup” is the record’s lone new, unreleased original track and it’s as unwieldy, tense, and breathtakingly go-for-broke as anything in the band’s towering catalog. After what many see as the best release of the band’s storied DIY-centric career, “Cup” is another bracing reminder that Pile are still on an ascending trajectory, suggesting that they may never truly hit a genuine peak. Raucous, intelligent, and deceptively subtle, “Cup” is the exact brand of brilliance we’ve come to except from what several have breathlessly hailed as the best band in the world.

Listen to “Cup” below and pre-order Odds and Ends from Exploding In Sound here.

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August 12, 2018

Mike Krol – An Ambulance b/w Never Know (7″ Review, Stream)

A few weeks ago site favorite Mike Krol returned with the typically explosive “An Ambulance“, the songwriter’s first release since Turkey (apart from a well-deserved deluxe reissue). “An Ambulance” more than proved Krol hasn’t lost a step in the interim, flaunting all of the characteristics that made his early work scintillating enough to snag the attention of Merge, who wisely added the basement pop auteur to their roster. An Ambulance b/w Never Know finds the label continuing to reap the benefits of that decision, which offers up two incredible tracks that are as infectious as they are aggressive.

With “An Ambulance” already given due credit (click the link above to go to the previous feature), “Never Know” gets the bulk of the attention here. It’s a song that finds Krol tapping further into the strain of pop music that defined the ’50s, which is an area that was effectively mined by contemporaries — and frequent collaborators — Sleeping in the Aviary. It’s a side Krol’s music doesn’t always feature but one that’s consistently worked to the material’s benefit, which is decidedly the case on “Never Know”, an outrageously fun track with a classic spin.

Together, “An Ambulance” and “Never Know” constitute one of the year’s best standalone 7″ releases and offer a tantalizing glimpse towards a more comprehensive project that Krol’s been hinting at in recent weeks. Strap in for the ride and use this as the soundtrack in the getaway car. Whenever the next stop arrives, this will be a stretch worth revisiting.

Listen to An Ambulance b/w Never Know below and pick up a copy from Merge here.

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August 12, 2018

Dilly Dally – Sober Motel (Stream)

When Dilly Dally‘s “I Feel Free” announced the band’s return, a lot was made about how the band’s initial touring schedule and international attention nearly killed them forever. Part of this was because of the stress levels that attention necessitated and the resulting struggles that existed within the band’s makeup. Alcoholism was a vice that hit especially hard and is a subject that gets pushed to the forefront of the band’s follow-up single to “I Feel Free”, pointedly entitled “Sober Motel”.

Weathering all of those storms and fighting through life’s difficulties seems to have made Dilly Dally a stronger band, with “Sober Motel” and “I Feel Free” standing  as pillars of proof. The band can still go scorched-earth with the best of them and they’re leaning even harder into the rest-and-explode dynamic that helped them make their name. “Sober Motel” showcases this especially well, with Katie Monks unleashing one anguished howl after another (Monks’ voice remains one of the best instruments any band today has to offer) as the band provides some complementary grit. It’s a characteristically breathtaking track from an original voice that found a way to survive. We should all be grateful.

Listen to “Sober Motel” below and pre-order Heaven here.

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August 12, 2018

Marbled Eye – Laughing Sound (Stream)

Taking less than a second to establish that there’s a threat of detonation is always a bold way to start a track and that brand of weaponization is fearlessly deployed in Marbled Eye‘s “Laughing Sound”, one of the best post-punk tracks of the year thus far. The quartet rides that foreboding intro into a jittery tempo that never truly explodes, the band reeling in with the kind of measured restraint that defines the genre. Yet, that lingering threat remains throughout the track’s entirety, never dissipating enough to provide a level of safety or comfort.

Constantly teetering back and forth between total annihilation and crumbling to pieces, “Laughing Sound” should serve as a remarkably perfect lead-off track for Marbled Eye’s forthcoming Leisure. A behemoth of a song as it currently stands, it’ll be fascinating to hear in the context of the record. For now, we should be more than content to just loop this one until every twist and turn’s been committed to memory.

Listen to “Laughing Sound” below and pre-order Leisure from the band here.

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August 12, 2018

Tomberlin – Self-Help (Music Video)

Just before releasing one of the most devastating albums of the year in the achingly gorgeous At Weddings, Tomberlin offered up one last peek towards that incredible record with the Laura-Lynn Petrick-directed clip for “Self-Help”, which lays bare the kind of arresting nakedness that gets put under the knife throughout the course of the album. Centered around the artist and a trip to the aquarium, the clip for “Self-Help” drives home the pervasive tendency to feel small outlined against the wonders of life that gets considered and dissected in At Weddings.

No answers are offered, no questions are explicitly asked, but “Self-Help” punches home existential wonderment with an unapologetic precision. Viewers might get lost in “Self-Help” but it’s difficult to predict to what extent, as there’s enough at stake here to level someone particularly vulnerable. Bravely articulated and fearless in its vulnerability, “Self-Help” is art at its most honest, which can go a long way towards a greater survival.

Watch “Self-Help” below and pick up a copy of At Weddings from Saddle Creek here.

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August 12, 2018

Alien Boy – If We Don’t Speak (Stream)

Consistently engaging and constantly intriguing, Alien Boy have been a name to watch for a while now and, if “If We Don’t Speak” is any indication, are preparing for bigger things. Not just in terms of audience but scope. Everything from the production to the arrangement style has been tweaked and “If We Don’t Speak” is comparatively towering over Alien Boy’s past releases (which remain worthy of investment). Here, the project bridges subversive pop-punk with shoegaze to an effect that’s genuinely startling.

A lot of bands in the past few years have been attempting to bridge those two genres but most haven’t come halfway close to the seamless overlapping that “If We Don’t Speak” contains. Washed-out reverb, punishing guitars, an aching melody, a bruised narrative, and a tenacious determination collide to elevate the sound to stratospheric heights that conjure a genuine feeling of awe. It’s a behemoth of a track that’s not content to just reach skyward, it’s one that successfully seizes the universe.

Listen to “If We Don’t Speak” below and pre-order Sleeping Lessons from Tiny Engines here.

 

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August 12, 2018

Sonny Falls – Flies (Stream)

Over almost four minutes, Sonny Falls showcase their confidence, identity, and ability with a shape-shifting, tempo-switching rock n’ roll ripper that presents the project as one of today’s more tantalizing acts. Invoking the open-road sensibilities of forebears like Petty and Springsteen, “Flies” also sees Sonny Falls injecting that ceaselessly sprawling sweep with the hard-won wisdom that accompanies being a DIY-level band that makes a commitment to the road.

An intersection of so many celebrated rock n’ roll staples, “Flies” still manages to sound like a singular work. There’s a strain of strangeness coursing  through “Flies” at every turn, even in its most time-honored moments (no one’s likely to hear a more well-timed saxophone solo in a punk-leaning song this year), suffusing a fresh sensibility into a comforting and familiar pattern. A song worth every last second, “Flies” suggest Sonny Falls have more stories to tell. Songs like this one is what’ll keep people listening.

Listen to “Flies” below and pre-order Some Kind of Spectre from Sooper Records here.

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August 12, 2018

The Beths – You Wouldn’t Like Me (Music Video)

On Friday, The Beths released one of 2018’s best albums so far in the astonishing Future Me Hates Me, a record overflowing with sugar-coated basement pop that comes with just enough bite to truly stand out. One of the strongest moments of that record — which, again, is uniformly great — comes by way of “You Wouldn’t Like Me”, which was recently given an Ezra Simons-helmed music video that stands as the band’s best clip to date.

Ceaselessly charming, gifted with a vibrant palette, and full of clever, tongue-in-cheek moments, the clip acts as a perfect summation of the band’s appeal. There’s something familiar about the surface but there’s a competing intricacy that suggests the individualized vision at The Beth’s core. Warm, welcoming, and ridiculously winsome, “You Wouldn’t Like Me” offers up a worst-case argument for its title, clearly outlining just how much about this band, this record, and this clip, is not only worth liking but outright loving.

Watch “You Wouldn’t Like Me” below and pick up a copy of Future Me Hates Me from Carpark here.

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