Music Releases 02-16-24
TANGK is, at its core, a love album. Open to anyone who requires something to shout out loud in order to fend off any encroaching sense of the void, now or forever. TANGK is a bona fide pop record in a way we’ve never heard from IDLES before, that is, something for everyone to pass around and share, communal anthems intended for overcoming our grievances. The word - pronounced “tank” with a whiff of the “g” - began as an onomatopoeic reference in-studio for the sound of a guitar tone, but has grown into a sigil for living in love. Joe sings on TANGK in a way we’ve never heard before, completing his transformation from post-punk firebrand into soul singing evangelist. TANGK was co-produced by Nigel Godrich, Kenny Beats, and IDLES guitarist Mark Bowen.
You may think you know the story of Jennifer Lopez, one of the most written about women in the world, but This Is Me…Now shares the real story, a piece of her soul, and she is doing it in her own inimitable style. Jennifer Lopez’s long awaited musical experience THIS IS ME…NOW begins with the release on February 16th, 2024 of This Is Me…Now: The Album and This Is Me…Now: The Film inspired by the music. The album, written and produced by Jennifer Lopez and Rogét Chayed, along with Angel Lopez, Jeff "Gitty" Gitelman, HitBoy, Tay Keith and INK among others, effortlessly blends R&B, contemporary pop sounds and hip-hop beats. Her signature vocals, combined with intricately crafted lyrics delve into the highs and lows of life, love, and relationships with unflinching honesty and introspection, making this Jennifer Lopez’s most honest and personal album yet.
Hailed as "the reigning heavyweight champions of Southern rock" (No Depression), Atlanta-based quintet Blackberry Smoke is back with their 8th studio album, Be Right Here, produced by Dave Cobb. Be Right Here follows 2021's You Hear Georgia, which was the best-selling Country and Americana/Folk album in the country, entered at #7 on the Billboard Rock Albums chart and #4 on the Billboard Top Albums chart. Released to critical acclaim, No Depression praised the band for being “as much students of singer-songwriter-folk and outlaw country as they are of jam-based, chest-pumping rock,” ” while Guitar World declared "Many try to reproduce that holy grail, golden-era-of-classic-rock sound through their six-string escapades, yet only a handful ultimately succeed. One such band who succeeds in spades is Blackberry Smoke, whose most recent album You Hear Georgia serves up 10 tracks of pure rock ‘n’ roll bliss.”
In addition to Blackberry Smoke—Starr (vocals, guitar), Richard Turner (bass, vocals), Brit Turner (drums), Paul Jackson (guitar, vocals) and Brandon Still (keyboards)—the album also features background vocals from longtime collaborators The Black Bettys.
Lil Peep - Crybaby 1st Press 45rpm - n interviews that followed the release of Crybaby, and even afterwards during press runs for HELLBOY as well as Come Over When You're Sober Pt. 1, one of the most consistently asked (and answered) questions that would be thrown at Peep usually teetered around the lines somewhat of "aye Peep, love what you've been doing with your past couple of projects man, but what's the deal with that massive Crybaby tattoo you got on your forehead?" - To which, he would typically answer, "I got the Crybaby tat to keep me grateful, to remind myself that even if I'm going through a lot, there are kids across the world that don't even have clean water or know when their next meal will be, so I got it to remind myself that I need to be grateful for what little I have, and to keep pushing through for those who can't." - With this context now surrounding the whole ethos of this project, it seems fitting that the whole mixtape essentially focuses on Peep's hopes, dreams, and overcoming the emotions that ever so powerfully bled through nearly every song on here one way or another. Whether it's through the haunting coke lines on "Lil Jeep" and the Radiohead-sampled "Falling 4 Me", or through the ambitious glimpse into the future that initially got him signed in the first place with the Smokeasac-produced signature track "Nineteen", he flips blatant samples and turns them into his own songs. For example, there's a borderline "Wonderwall' cover (and hear me out on this one) in the shape of "Yesterday," where he paints a bleak picture of getting out of a toxic environment with the chorus "Change my name, shave my head // Tell my friends that I'm dead, run away from the pain // Yesterday is not today, it's not the same," that winds up adding to the source material more often than it taking away anything. - More notably though perhaps, is that he never conveys a sense of giving up when singing/rapping about any of these topics, and that only aids the sense of triumph found in moments all throughout the record. While it may seem like Peep is promoting all of the wrong things, what people don't seem to realize is that he never condones it; it's almost as if he's telling the listener to not make the same mistakes as he did, which eventually led to his untimely death just over a year later.
The music of Atlanta trio Omni has always swung fast and hit hard. And Souvenir, their fourth album and second for Sub Pop, packs their biggest punch yet. Inactive during the majority of the pandemic–the longest downtime in their history–they approached this recording with lots of pent-up energy. Guitarist Frankie Broyles, singer/bassist Philip Frobos, and drummer Chris Yonker converted their creative fuel into sharp, driving songs that land immediately, sporting chopping riffs, staccato beats, and wiry melodies.
Why does Souvenir sound so sharp? Because each track is a compact unit that stands on its own, reflecting the time and place in which it was created. That’s why Omni called the album Souvenir: it’s a collection of audio objects, a stash of musical miniatures. Think of it as a family photo album, a binder of rare playing cards, a shoebox holding precious gems.
Take “Plastic Pyramid,” the first song Omni wrote after coming out of lockdown. Filled with twists and turns, it’s a journey unto itself, charged by clanging chords, spinning rhythm, and Frobos trading lines with Izzy Glaudini of Automatic, with whom Omni toured with last fall. (Glaudini sings on two other Souvenir tracks, the first guest vocalist the band has collaborated with). Or take opener “Exacto,” a slicing web of intertwined guitar and bass. Its razor-fine notes and syncopated beats perfectly match pointillist Frobos lyrics such as “Exacto, de facto, concise, quite right”–a line that could well be an Omni mantra.
The precision and clarity of Souvenir comes from some new Omni developments. For one, this is their first album with Yonker as their full-time drummer, and his forceful playing adds exclamation points to every pointed moment on Souvenir. In addition, the trio worked with Atlanta-based engineer Kristofer Sampson for the first time. Sampson pushed the band to a higher degree of power, with Frobos’s vocals more upfront in his pulsing mix and the rest of the music leaping out of the speakers.
You might notice that Frobos’ singing is a bit more emotional and even nostalgic this time around. In crafting his vocals, he was inspired by the early college radio rock of formative favorites like REM, the Cure, and Big Audio Dynamite–the kind of bands whose melodies could have been top 40 hits in an alternative universe. The lyrics on Souvenir are also by turns funny, absurd, and even cryptic. A wry humor has always coursed through Omni’s songs, and this time, it comes in shades of both dark and light. In “Granite Kiss,” an “astronomical” love story concludes with the hope that “we can decay together,” while in “PG,” a romantic walk in the park includes a rose-colored mugging.
Immediacy rushes throughout every moment of Souvenir, making it the band's most powerful album to date. Omni has truly crafted a musical keepsake–a set of songs that you’ll want to keep close, an aural memento you'll cherish for the rest of time.
"On RAT WARS, HEALTH, are not only making the heaviest, most genre-obliterating music of their career, they’re documenting just how insane it feels to be alive right now. It’s The Downward Spiral for people with at least two monitors and a vitamin D deficiency. “RAT WARS” is a definitive statement on the insanity and the insipidness of contemporary life. "
The Mess We Seem To Make is the eagerly anticipated debut album from Crawlers. Digging deeper into what fans already know and love about their eclectic alt-rock sound, it builds on the relationship of trust they have with producer Pete Robinson and engineer Tom Roach at Liverpool’s Coastal Studios and takes on a whole range of challenging topics; trauma, sexual politics, mental health, the general goings on in a young person’s life.
Blue Splatter LP features alternate cover art.
Legendary indie-rock band Grandaddy has announced a brand new studio album Blu Wav set for release February 16, 2024 via Dangerbird Records. A prolific storyteller, Jason Lytle is inspired by the overwhelming beauty of nature to the mundane moments that spark life’s strongest memories. Introducing pedal steel into the band’s repertoire for the first time, buoyant lead single “Watercooler” comments on the dichotomy of both. It was inspired by having his own outdoorsy rock guy (in both senses of the word) lifestyle while his partner had an office job. Lytle shares, “Most of my relationships have involved girls who worked in office settings. This song is about the end of one, or perhaps a few, of those relationships. Listeners will also notice the pedal steel on this track and eventually on many others from the forthcoming new album. It’s a first for Grandaddy, and I couldn't be more thrilled about this fact.” With the album title Blu Wav meant to be a literal mash-up of “bluegrass” and “new wave”, the new collection has a distinct feel, a uniform vibe, and a somewhat unexpected sound. It was conceived as Grandaddy maestro Jason Lytle was driving through the Nevada desert, and Patti Page’s "Tennessee Waltz" came across the classic country station on the radio. He was immediately intrigued by the possibilities of what it might sound like to keep the slow sway and sweet, simple lyrics of the bluegrass waltz while adding layers of dense synthesizers and the electronics of new wave. It incorporates the lo-fi lushness and sometimes-psychedelic orchestration Grandaddy is known for with Lytle’s first foray into true country. Seven of its 13 songs are waltzes, and as Lytle notes, “there’s an inordinate amount of pedal steel.” Grandaddy recently celebrated their legacy with a series of 20th anniversary reissues including the acclaimed Sumday Twunny box set which earned a Pitchfork ‘Best New Reissue”. Lytle also contributed vocals to a posthumous Sparklehorse album by request of his friend and fellow psychedelic pop auteur Mark Linkous’ family. Grandaddy has released five official LPs, most recently 2017’s Last Place. Grandaddy members include Jason Lytle, Aaron Burtch, Jim Fairchild, Tim Dryden, and the late Kevin Garcia, who passed away in 2017.
Written in the topsy-turvy days following two different breakups, San Fermin’s poignant new album, Arms, is a testament to the band’s ability to transform pain and isolation into catharsis and healing. The songs are more minimalist than ever before, stripping away much of the sonic ornamentation the Brooklyn eight-piece has come to be known for in favor of a more raw, direct sound reflective of the album’s candid, plainspoken lyrics. The result is a deeply moving, compassionate collection, one that moves from anger and disappointment to clarity and acceptance as it balances devastation and hope in equal measure. Founded in 2013, San Fermin rose to early acclaim on the strength of their self-titled debut, which bandleader Ellis Ludwig-Leone had initially envisioned as a one-off featuring more than 20 collaborators. NPR hailed the album as “one of the year's most surprising, ambitious, evocative and moving records,” while Pitchfork called breakout single “Sonsick” “deliriously infectious.” Buoyed by the record’s success, Ludwig-Leone put together a full-time band and hit the road, performing everywhere from the Tiny Desk to Lollapalooza and sharing bills with the likes of alt-J, Courtney Barnett, the National, and St. Vincent. In the years to come, the group would go on to release three similarly lauded albums, prompting The New Yorker to celebrate their “knack for simultaneously expressing beauty and crisis.”
Produced by award winning producer and composer Martin Wave and co-written with JKash, Andrew Wells, Ellie King and Charlie Puth. It has ALL the makings of a new era of Paloma. It’s confident. It’s cinematic. It’s empowering. It’s compelling from beginning to end, all powered by the kind of anthems that transformed her into an icon. The single is about finding the confidence of walking away from a relationship and being empowered with your own happiness, its limitless expression of pop allows it to sit comfortably next to Paloma’s many chart successors and then some.”
If Talk Show’s exhilarating full-length debut, Effigy, feels more like a film than an album, that’s no coincidence. The band crafted the collection to soundtrack to a fictional nightclub. “One of the biggest influences on this record was the intro to the movie Blade, where this character’s being dragged through a meatpacking plant and into the vampire rave,” says frontman Harrison Swann. “There’s so much tension and anticipation and intimidation in that scene. We wanted to create the kind of music we’d play if we were performing in that club, to put ourselves into that scene and see how far we could push it.” With Effigy, Talk Show do more than just push their sound; they completely reinvent it. Produced by Remi Kabaka Jr., of Gorillaz, the record offers up a bold and exhilarating showcase for the band’s dramatic evolution, drawing on everything from The Chemical Brothers and The Prodigy to Nine Inch Nails and The KLF as it taps into a raw, primal sound at the intersection of techno, electronic, industrial, and rock music. The songs are dark and gritty, fueled by blistering guitars and explosive drums, and Swann’s vocals are nothing short of hypnotic, leaning on repetition and restraint to reach for transcendence in the midst of swirling sonic chaos. The result is an immersive, multi-sensory experience, one that conjures up a dark, sweaty warehouse packed with moving bodies all radiating heat and desire, anxiety and release, ecstasy and desperation. “When people talk about dance music, they often talk about escapism or freedom or drugs, but to me, that’s a really reductive view,” says Swann, a Manchester native. “I’ve been in some sketchy clubs where I’ve been scared shitless. We wanted this music to embody all of it.” Hailed as one of the UK’s most exciting new bands, Talk Show first came together in 2017, when Swann met bassist George Sullivan, drummer Chloe MacGregor, and guitarist Tom Holmes at Goldsmiths, University of London. A series of critically acclaimed singles and raucous live shows led to the band’s internationally lauded debut EP, These People, which arrived in March of 2020, just as the entire world shut down. By the time the pandemic had subsided enough for Talk Show to properly tour the collection, though, the group had already begun to move on creatively, trading in the brash post-punk of their early work for a ferocious, guitar-driven vision of dance music that would help earn them festival slots everywhere from Pitchfork Avant-Garde to Sonic Wave in addition to a four-star review from the NME for their 2022 follow-up EP, Touch The Ground. “The shift in sound wasn’t so much about changing who we were as it was about finding ourselves as a band,” Swann reflects. “It just felt like the most natural thing in the world to us, and we’re never going back.” The transition led the group’s writing process became inherently more collaborative, and when it came time to begin work on Effigy, MacGregor and Sullivan often found themselves laying the groundwork for songs, generating high-energy grooves for Swann and Holmes to build layers and textures over. The band created an imaginary club to help guide the sessions, too, naming it Effigy (something to be worshipped and despised at the same time) and visualizing every detail from the ground up. What would it look like? Where would it be located? How would it feel to wait in line? To walk through the doors? Once recording was complete, Talk Show teamed up with director Ashley Rommelrath to bring their visuals to life, designing gatefold artwork depicting the club as a physical place and shooting a series of videos set inside. “I’m reluctant to call it a concept album because these aren’t narrative songs,” Swann reflects. “I’ve never been the kind of writer to spell everything out. I’d always rather build a world and set an atmosphere and let you lose yourself inside of it.” Press play on Effigy and it won’t take long. Pulsating opener “Gold” sets the scene, with relentless drums and bruising, distorted guitars pumping like adrenaline through your veins as Swann implores you to “just feel it / just feel it” with escalating fervor. Like much of the album, it’s a song rooted in ambivalence and delivered with a snarl; there’s a sense of menace in Swann’s delivery, an uneasy feeling that things could turn dark at any moment. The taut “Oh! You’re! All! Mine!” flirts with disaster, while the breakneck “Red/White” spirals into oblivion, and addictive lead single “Closer” edges towards an ecstasy that seems perpetually out of reach. “We get closer and closer / closer and closer /closer and closer / over again,” Swann sings, repeating the passage a half dozen times with an increasingly manic intensity. “Utilizing that kind of repetition allows me to build a rhythm and raise the stakes and put new meaning into the line each time,” he explains. “Working with Remi really helped me harness how much nuance I could put into my phrasing, how much more powerful it could be to whisper than to shout.” Such nuance is ultimately at the core of Effigy, which rewards repeated listens with subtle shading hewn into its imposing walls of sound. Listen closely and you’ll hear hints of trip-hop, flashes of heavy metal, even touches of new wave and funk. The incendiary “Got Sold” tips its cap to the Beastie Boys; the entrancing “OIL” nods to Tricky. It’s album closer “Catalonia,” though, that takes the biggest chances, playing out like a pulse-pounding journey from room to room through the Effigy club as Swann delivers a mix of muted vocals and heavy breathing. “We wanted to take you from standing outside in the freezing cold straight into the heart of the sweatbox,” Swann explains, “straight into the warm glow of the club.” In typical Talk Show fashion, the ending is an ambiguous one. “Maybe we’re alone,” Swann sings on a loop, his voice disappearing into the ether as the beat forges inexorably on. Perhaps we’ve lost him in the crush of the crowd; perhaps his voice was in our head all along. Either way, there’s no going back.
Grief Chapter is an album with songs rooted in mortality, grief, and living fearlessly. Tracks like “Nobody Escapes,” “To My Heart,” and “Head Shrink” are sure to ignite their devoted legion of fans, and undeniable alt-rock anthems “Explode!,” “Days,” “Normalize” and “The Matrix” will sound at home on festival stages and amphitheaters they’ll be headlining in the US next summer. The album was produced by Mother Mother frontman Ryan Guldemond, and mixed by the revered Rich Costey.
East Los Angeles quartet Levitation Room’s floaty, cosmic songs are always a trip. Since forming nearly a decade ago, they’ve self-produced dizzying, otherworldly music that’s connected with fellow travelers in the hallucinogenic world of outré rock music. Led by singer and guitarist Julian Porte along with founding members Gabriel Fernandez (lead guitar) and Johnathan Martin (percussion), the band has enchanted live audiences at Desert Daze and on tour with like-minded groups Post Animal and Psychedelic Porn Crumpets. The band’s vivid sound has found them placed on popular playlists like Modern Psychedelia and the legendary superproducer’s Danger Mouse Jukebox. Their 2015 debut, “Friends,” has surpassed 18 million streams. Joined by new member Kevin Perez (bass) in 2021, Levitation Room have continued to expand their colorful, unearthly sound, a process that has culminated with the vibrant new album Strange Weather. Collaborating with former Brian Jonestown Massacre keyboardist Rob Campanella, Jason Kick (Mild High Club), and Black Crowes’ Joel Robinow, Levitation Room take a new step in their story and vision with Strange Weather. The record’s lyrical narratives—about love in the park, life in the city, and the fact that “The world today is such an illusion”—are appropriately steeped in ’60s sonics and a dreamy, lo-fi atmosphere. It’s spacey, celestial guitar music for escaping into, and “it feels just like heaven.”
Earl Sweatshirt & The Alchemist
VOIR DIRE [Indie Exclusive Limited Edition Silver LP]
Vinyl: $24.98 Buy
Voir Dire, the momentous album by Earl Sweatshirt and Alchemist, undoubtedly represents the long-awaited convergence of two rap titans. Earl's personal and intricately woven wordcraft, along with Alchemist's treasure trove of obscure, captivating samples, combine to create an artistic chemistry that permeates "Voir Dire" (which translates from French to "Speak Your Truth"). Earl accomplishes just that as he delves into the analysis of specific phases of his life, particularly in the past where his reflections resonate with immense potency, meticulous detail, and profound insight. The album features notable Los Angeles wordsmith Vince Staples on two tracks and esteemed rap artist, MIKE. On Voir Dire, unmatched lyricism and remarkable maturity take center stage, while personal experiences such as new fatherhood emerge and evolve over stripped-down, spacious Alchemist production — culminating in what many consider to be the best rap album of the year.
Adding to Chicago’s long lineage of forward-thinking indie rock, Friko transform each song into a moment of collective catharsis. On their full-length debut, vocalist/guitarist Niko Kapetan and drummer Bailey Minzenberger sustain the combustible energy of their break-out single Crimson To Chrome, merging elements of post-punk, chamber-pop and experimental rock, magnifying their music’s exhilarating power with a barrage of spirited ensemble vocals. Poetic, explosive, and sublimely raw in feeling.
Consider this your invitation to Café Molly, a lounge bar like they don’t make them anymore. The lights are low, the martinis are ice cold, the banquettes are velvet, and the stage is set for the electrifying talent of whistler Molly Lewis. After the exotica stylings of The Forgotten Edge EP and the tropicalia-indebted Mirage EP, Molly wanted to encapsulate the sound of Café Molly for her debut album On The Lips, a dreamy tribute to classic mood music, it conjures up misty visions of classic Hollywood jazz clubs, Italian cinema soundtracks and lingering embraces between lovers.
Recorded with producer Thomas Brenneck of the Menahan Street Band at his newly-built Diamond West Studios in Pasadena, and with something of an open door policy during the sessions, a stream of acclaimed musicians ended up across the album’s 10 tracks, including Nick Hakim, Latin Grammy-nominated Brazilian guitarist Rogê, Leland Whitty and Chester Hansen of Canadian instrumental group Badbadnotgood, Chicano soul group Thee Sacred Souls appear on the melancholy ‘Crushed Velvet’, experimental jazz pianist Marco Benevento and El Michels Affair’s Leon Michels.
With her intoxicating compositions, and wry brand of stagecraft (she might not be singing up there, but she can sure tell a joke) Molly Lewis looks set to join her heroes in the storied lore of the Los Angeles lounge scene and beyond. So pull up a chair, order your favorite drink, and prepare to fall for On The Lips.
Executive produced with hitmaker Ryan Tedder (Taylor Swift, Beyonce), THINK LATER and it's songsare steeped in pop appeal and infectious toplines. Showcasing Tate's boundless vocal talent and evolution as a songwriter, this new body of work explores the all-too-relatable feelings of falling in love and embracing the raw emotions that you experience as a result of leading with your intuition and heart.
Originally released in 2010, ‘4x4=12’ is the fifth studio album by Canadian electronic music producer & composer deadmau5. The Grammy-nominated album includes some of deadmau5’ biggest single hits, such as “Some Chords”, “Animal Rights” with Wolfgang Gartner, “Sofi Needs a Ladder” as well as “Raise Your Weapon” with Greta Svabo Bech.
This album charted in the Top 100 Dance Albums charts across the U.S., Canada, U.K., Australia, & more, reaching RIAA Gold certification in the U.K.
Sarah McLachlan’s platinum-selling third studio album, Fumbling Towards Ecstasy, debuted in 1993 to critical acclaim. Featuring the hit song “Possession,” the album showcases McLachlan's introspective lyrics and versatility, while reinforcing her status as one of the music industry’s foremost singer-songwriters.
She Reaches Out To She Reaches Out To She [Indie Exclusive Limited Edition Cobalt Blue LP]
Vinyl: $28.99 Buy
Bad Self Portraits: 10 Year Anniversary [Limited Edition Deluxe Cloudy-Effect Blue LP]
Vinyl: $31.98 Buy
Bryn Terfel’s new album 'Sea Songs' presents a rich and diverse repertory of traditional music with sea shanties, spirited sailor songs and maritime folk tunes in brand new arrangements. Featuring guest stars Sting, Sir Simon Keenlyside, Fisherman’s Friends and Calan.
Originally released on Sonic Youth co-founder Thurston Moore’s Ecstatic Peace! imprint in 1986 (and later reissued by SST Records), 1986: Keeps Me Wild remains an earth-scorching touchstone in the downtown NYC underground movement and a milestone recording in the annals of American indie rock. In addition to two never-before-heard demos, it features new contributions from Dez Cadena (Black Flag), Thalia Zedek (Come), Gary Lee Conner (Screaming Trees), and John Robinson (The Fluid).