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Introducing your next obsession, LINES – a brand new Stockholm-based four-piece who are coming out swinging.
LINES debut song, “Weekends,” is the first taste of their beautifully twisted music, comprised of chaotic synths placed perfectly over pounding bass lines and melodies that rise but never seem to set. To kick things off, they’ve released the ultimate weekend anthem that channels an intensity that will bring dance parties to its knees.
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Filed under Check 'em Out!, dance, listen
Argonaut & Wasp is an indie dance band from Brooklyn, NY. Inspired by the sounds of the kick drum, the electric guitar, the bass, and the synthesizer, the group creates fashionable music for fashionable crowds.
Check out “Paradise” and fall in love like I did.
“Trey and I were attending lots of DJ sets at the time (which is one of our favorite evening activities). Anyways, we would show up at all of these hip Brooklyn venues and everyone would be glued to the walls, everyone just standing there – lost in a state of confusion. We decided to capitalize on this feeling, this need for a rhythm and the need for a beat. We rushed home one of these evenings – grabbed a cowbell, picked up the guitar, and got to work.” — Argonaut & Wasp
Filed under Awesome, dance, listen, Newest Love
credit: Maeghan Donohue
“can go toe to toe with some of the classic early punk of the 70’s” – Impose
“a collection of icy post-punk dissonance… agitates and alarms while clinging to the inscrutable beauty of the genre. ” – Buzzbands LA
“Their moody, glimmering sound is evident on their new single… an exciting song that showcases their vast talents” – PureVolume
“Recover, the debut single and lead-off track from Second Still‘s upcoming self-titled LP, leaps straight for the throat and doesn’t let go for nearly five minutes.” – Post-Punk.com
“Second Still offers the menacing sound of bands like Wire or early Cure, modernized through a guitar tone that occasionally borrows from shoegaze, and sweetened by Suki’s Siouxie-esque airy vocals.” – The Deli NYC
Second Still is a three piece band from Los Angeles. Though strongly influenced by No Wave and French Cold Wave, their electronic drum sounds, unconventional bass and guitar lines, and strange vocal melodies still set them apart from any traditional categorization.
Bassist Alex Hughes and guitarist Ryan Walker met in 2007 and spent years combing through 80s underground records, the most memorable being Xmal Deutschland, Asylum Party, Garlands-era Cocteau Twin, and Opera De Nuit. It wasn’t until after moving to New York and meeting Suki San, (a classically trained violinist and former shoegaze vocalist), in late 2014 that they finally became a band.
Early Forms, the band’s debut EP, was released in March 2016 as a limited edition cassette. They recorded those four songs while snowed in, in a barn in upstate New York over three days in the dead of winter. Before re-locating to Los Angeles in January 2016, Second Still hunkered down in the studio and recorded their entire self-titled debut album in just two days.
The album is out now on Paris-based label Manic Depression Records, and in support of the release, the band is hitting the road for their first US tour.
04.16 – Part Time Punks @ The Echo – Los Angeles
05.14 – The Chapel – San Francisco, CA
Filed under Check 'em Out!, new albums
Photo credit: Mayumi Hirata
Filed under Highly Anticipated, listen, new albums, video
After spending three years as a lead vocalist in a funk-rock band, Julie Elody is excited to find her sound as a solo artist, working with several renowned producers. Check out her first solo track, “Sirens”. The indie-electro track is accompanied by Julie’s captivating voice and a subtle yet soothing sound of sirens in the background.
“I don’t like to write about frivolous things, and ‘Sirens’ is no exception,” Julie explains of her new track. “It is about the all-too-often times that we ignore problems in our lives instead of dealing with them head-on, and all of the ways that this affects us.”
With soulful vocals and meaningful lyrics, Julie promises to use her voice to make a statement. She has been the featured vocalist on a few electro-pop tracks, all which gained high success on both Soundcloud and Spotify. She embodies the style of popular music without singing about meaningless partying and how much she wants to be your baby. Conversely, Julie writes songs about issues that are important to her. In her song, “Mountain Lion”, she talks about her struggle with anxiety. “Pennies” is about how the over-commodified society we live in can be detrimental.
Filed under Awesome, Check 'em Out!, listen
“channeling gothy ‘80s rock…has the ‘80s influence coming in loud and clear” — BrooklynVegan
“There’s darkness in INVSN that is seemingly spawned by the barren Scandinavian landscapes of their rural base.” – Clash Music
“… the bursts of noise and bits of electronica provided by the band give INVSN a punchy edge that keeps us from becoming too comfortable.” – Pop Matters
INVSN releases the newest track for “I Dreamt Music,” a post-punk gem for the band’s forthcoming LP, The Beautiful Stories.
The song’s cadenced groove and dark tones are the perfect balance to the underlying message concerning consumerism and politics. Frontman Dennis Lyxzén is no stranger to incorporating political themes into his work, from his days fronting Refused to (international) Noise Conspiracy to INVSN.
Lyxzén shares his thoughts on how music is being exploited these days. “ Music always meant more to me then just entertainment. It has had a profound impact on everything that I am as a person and I see music as art and art as life. We live in a world devoid of meaning where we serve the lowest common denominator at all times. Where politics as an idea has failed us and where art is being reduced to consumerism and clickbait.”
I wanted to write about the longing for resistance to the cultural/political/musical landscape that holds us imprisoned. I wanted to write about the naive, romantic and pretentious notion that music and art should be about ideas that can change and transform and maybe even be the beacon of hope in these dismal times.”
“I Dreamt Music” serves as the fifth track for the band’s sophomore album The Beautiful Stories, set to be released June 9th via Dine Alone Records.
Of The Beautiful Stories, Dennis Lyxzén says,
“Music is in many ways a young person’s game. That first debut record. The youthful exuberance and violence. But there are other things that might matter as much. Experience and hard work. Putting in the miles. The collective effort of this band is beyond anything I’ve witnessed before.
I can’t even begin to fathom the hours we spent record music, playing live and just living this life. Somehow it feels like it lead to this; this glorious piece of music that I have to say is one of the most exciting and experimental and genuine works of art I ever been a part of.
The process of writing and creating is often harder than we would like to admit and it doesn’t really get easier with age. But when the end result comes out as thrilling as this all those hours spent rehearsing and playing, all those hours on the road and all those records that came before, are totally worth it!”
Filed under Check 'em Out!, new albums
photo credit: Daniel Cavazos
Filed under Highly Anticipated, new albums, video
The Cranberries are set to release Something Else, a new album featuring re-worked renditions of their major hits, as well as brand new material. The album is due out April 28 via BMG on digital and CD formats, and includes seminal Cranberries songs like “Linger,” “Zombie,” “Dreams,” and “Ode To My Family”… re-recorded in orchestral and acoustic arrangements.
Something Else celebrates the 25th anniversary of the band. Their first major U.S. hit “Linger” has been re-done acoustically, and just premiered on Rolling Stone! On the album concept and choice of “Linger” as the first single, The Cranberries’ singer-songwriter Dolores O’Riordan explains,
“‘Linger’ was the first song The Cranberries ever wrote together. I was 17, and the youngest member of the band was 15 at the time. We never imagined it’d be such a big hit, but soon us teenagers found ourselves on our first flight to the United States to shoot the video in Downtown LA. That video would introduce us to American households, in the good old days of MTV! The bittersweet love song still holds all that sentimentality for us personally, which is why we had to include it on this project. Universally, I think its message remains timeless and relevant, never going out of fashion, yet never quite in fashion. It’s amazing to have a song hold up 25 years later, and I hope this acoustic version allows our fans to hear a Cranberries classic in a new way.”
“Linger ” is available now for download and streaming. The full album is available for pre-order on digital and CD formats.
Over a period of two weeks last year in the University of Limerick, at the home of the Irish Chamber Orchestra, the band revisited old times; Dolores laid down vocals as small booths were created to record the instruments as if live. She was no longer a child, singing her mature songs from an inexperienced vantage point but a woman now, with the capacity to throw her life at the music, the benefit of hindsight. “I prefer them like this,” she says of the new recordings of old songs, “with a little bit more experience behind them, with a new lease of life. They sound fresh again.”
As the record began to take full shape, three new songs were added, to stop it from just being a rush of memories lost and found. The first was “The Glory”, which Dolores explains she wrote in The Irish Chamber Orchestra’s rehearsal rooms at the University of Limerick. She then brought out two songs she had been keeping in her personal stash, until she could place them in the right home: “Rupture” (“about depression, about being in that black hole and finding it hard to get out of it”) and the forthcoming single “Why?” (“written just after my father passed, the hardest time”).
It’s testament to Dolores and Noel’s song-writing prowess that the new additions to the Cranberries cannon sit seamlessly next to the old. When they began finalizing details for the record, they decided on Something Else, a nod to the first record’s Everybody Else…, a title neither riven with the promise of future endeavors or locked into the past.
Official Tracklisting
01. Linger **
02. The Glory
03. Dreams
04. When You’re Gone
05. Zombie
06. Ridiculous Thoughts
07. Rupture
08. Ode To My Family
09. Free To Decide
10. Just My Imagination
11. Animal Instinct
12. You & Me
13. Why
UK & Ireland Tour Dates
17 May Belfast, Waterfront
18 May Dublin, BordGais Theatre
20 May London, Palladium
22 May Bristol, Colston Hall
24 May Gateshead, The Sage
25 May Nottingham, Royal Concert Hall
27 May York, Barbican
28 May Manchester, Bridgewater Hall
Filed under Holy Freaking Crap!, new albums, Shows, Whoa!
Photo Cred: Danielle Ernst
Paloma have shared their new track “Touch.” “It’s about a diamond in the rough,” the band explains, “Somewhat of a tramp. A certain someone who didn’t quite know how to believe in them self. Until he meets this princess of sorts that did. When they both turn to real life, he’s banking on the idea that we’re only half way through the film. That the story isn’t finished yet.” It’s the first song released from their upcoming debut EP, Luna, out this April 28th.
Paloma was born of the struggle to navigate the harrowing societal construct typical of suburban Los Angeles. It is the answer for learning to balance the need to make ends meet while expressing the irrepressible creativity brooding inside. The band officially began in a small bedroom studio with several ideas being deconstructed over and over again as every artist can relate to. It wasn’t until Nick and Victor invited the masterful keyboardist and local legend Steven Doman to the studio that the band finally grasped the scope of their newly created sound. In a place where one’s inherent value is often picked apart according to attributes of wealth and beauty, Paloma is truly an escapist’s musical paradise.
Luna – TRACKLISTING
01. Fish
02. Touch
03. Isabel
04. Thick Of It All
05. Climbers
Luna is a (Tim Burton meets the Future of the Malibu) five track EP. The second release from Paloma is a Gothic blend consisting of psychedelic dance grooves with swampy, sad and warm melodies. It’s perfectly confused. The record was deeply influenced by various sounds born in Southern California as well as around the world. Paloma draws inspiration from artists such as: Beach House, Daft Punk, The Weeknd, Tame Impala, Pond, Gum, Dumbo Gets Mad, Fleetwood Mac, Michael Jackson, The Beatles & Earth Wind and Fire.
“We wanted the record to fully express the feeling of living in California,” the band says of the EP, “From the mountains of Malibu driving on Mulholland to the Tents surrounding 6 the street in Downtown LA. Hell, even all the people living in their vans on Lankershim Blvd in North Hollywood. We have love for them all. We (Paloma) produced Luna alongside Bob Curtin who engineered, mixed and mastered the record in Simi Valley, CA.”
Filed under Awesome, Check 'em Out!, listen, Newest Love
Musically Amusing 