Category: experimental pop

New Video: The Surreal and Psychedelic Visuals for HOTT MT’s “Tranceforming”

Earlier this year, I wrote about the Los Angeles, CA-based experimental pop Hour Of The Time Majesty Twelve (HOTT MT) — and you may recall that the duo, which is currently comprised of Spooki Tavi (guitar, vocals) and Ashi Dala (bass, vocals) have a developed a reputation for their former collaborative warehouse-based art space Non Plus Ultra, for crafting shimmering, psychedelic-leaning experimental pop, and for ambitious collaborations with The Flaming Lips, Ariel Pink, Erykah Badu and Ke$ha. Adding to a growing profile. the duo have opened for The Flaming Lips, Bat for Lashes, and Galaxie 500.
The duo’s sophomore full-length effort AU (Alternate Universe) is slated for a May 2017 release through the duo’s Mutation Records, and the album’s previous single “A Night in China Town” was a moody and dreamy song featuring shimmering synths, tinny and distorted Casio-like beats and angular guitar chords paired with a soaring hook while Spooki Tavi’s ethereal vocals floated over the mix. And while drawing from 60s psych pop and bubblegum pop and classic shoegazer rock, the song manages to also be reminiscent of Washington D.C.’s The Galaxy Electric but with a chillier air. AU (Alternate Universe)’s latest single “Tranceforming,” continues on a similar vein as its preceding single as you’ll hear a song that clearly draws from 60s psych pop and bubblegum pop — thanks in part to the use of what sounds like vintage, analog synths; but unlike the previous single, “Tranceforming” possesses a plaintive and visceral yearning, proving to be a subtle shading on a particular series of emotions.

Directed by the band’s Spooki Tavi, the recently released music video for “Tranceforming” builds upon a picture within a picture motif, as part of the video consists of its protagonist shoving a videocassette into the VCR — and the video is full of appropriately sugary and psychedelic imagery that at points features our very three dimensional protagonist in a 2 dimensional world. Pulling back to it’s viewer, the same protagonist is in a mind-altering trance.

 

Formed in 2015 and comprised of Whitaker “Whit” Finberg (guitar, vocals) and Evan Veasey (guitar, vocals), the Ann Arbor, MI-based experimental pop/math rock duo Fallow Land can trace their origins back to a particularly trying period in Whit Fineberg’s life. After relocating to Chicago, the death of a dear friend, the breakup of a previous band and the end of a relationship, Fineberg found himself proverbially speaking on fallow land — and while he may have felt directionless, he also felt more inspired than he had in years. Fineberg spent his free time recording song ideas in his apartment and making frequent visits back home in Ann Arbor to visit family and jam with friends. And as the story goes, Fineberg crossed paths with Evan Veasey, a local musician, who he had heard of and had been familiar with by reputation; but who he hadn’t played with. When they met, Fineberg was impressed by Veasay’s guitar playing — and their unique simpatico as they began to write material pairing off-kilter meter and polyrhythm with conventional song structures to create a sound and songs that are experimental and prog rock-leaning while being accessible.

Caelin Amin (bass, vocals) and Armand Terrell (drums, vocals) join the duo of Fineberg and Veasey for live shows and the band has in a relatively short period of time built up a regional reputation, playing shows in Detroit, Chicago, Cleveland and Toronto and sharing bills with The Bronzed Chorus, Shipley Hollow, All is Well, Amateur Eyes, We Love You and Growing Fins among others. And with the June 30, 2017 release of the duo’s forthcoming Chris Bathgate-produced EP Pinscher, Fineberg and Veasay hope to expand their profile. Interestingly enough, Bathgate, who once shared a bill with a previous band Fineberg had been in, was chosen to helm the controls of the EP because of his keen understanding of songwriting and attention to craft; in fact, as the duo mentions in press notes, after listening to their material, Bathgate helped push the duo and their material to new directions, simply by asking them “What does this song mean to the world?” and “What’s the most important part of the song?”

The EP’s latest single “Faux” will further cement the duo’s growing reputation for an unusual songwriting approach as the band pairs complex and shuffling polyrhythm, a propulsive bass line, shimmering and atmospheric-leaning guitar work and what sounds like either buzzing synths or buzzing feedback with a soaring and anthemic hook. And while possessing a heady intellectualism, the song captures the innermost world of its narrator with an uncanny attention to psychological detail, capturing the narrator’s desire to destroy his ego; but just under the surface is a twinge of heartache.

 

 

 

 

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New Video: The Gorgeously Expressive and Surreal Visuals for SOFTSPOT’s “Habits”

If you’ve been frequenting this site for the past few months you may recall that the Brooklyn-based indie rock act SOFTSPOT was initially founded in 2009 as a duo featuring its founding members Sarah Kinlaw and Bryan Keller, Jr. And other the past few years, the act has gradually evolved into a quartet featuring some of the NYC’s more accomplished and talented musicians, who have a history of collaborating with each other in a wild, almost unfettered creativity; in fact, as the story goes, Kinlaw and Keller, Jr. recruited long-time friends Blake Bateh, a member of JOVM mainstays Bambara (drums), who joined the band for the recording of MASS and Jonathan Campelo, a member of Pill (synths), who joined the band during the tour to support MASS.

Arrowhawk Records, the label home of Bambara, Cinemechanica and White Laces, released the band’s latest effort Clearing last week, and the album is the first recorded effort featuring the band’s current (and expanded) lineup — and interestingly, the album finds the band refining their sound and songwriting approach. Clearing’s first single “Abalone,” was a spectral yet tense single that featured a tightly syncopated rhythm section, shimmering guitar lines and twinkling synths and Kinlaw’s ethereal and expensive vocals. “Heat Seeker,” Clearing’s second single continues in a similar vein as it possesses an equally haunting and specetal quality while drawing from New Wave as the song features slashing guitar attack with propulsive metronomic-like drumming and Kinlaw’s vocals expressing the difficulties and frustrations in attaining true and lasting connections with others — while revealing a novelistic approach to its narrator psychological makeup. “Habits,” the album’s third and latest single is an atmospheric, slow-burning, and moody track that seems to draw from jazz, psych rock, indie rock, and pop while being roomy enough to allow Kinlaw’s expressive and ethereal vocals room to dance and roam through an equally gorgeous arrangement. And throughout, there’s a visceral ache as the song focuses on loss and memory — but with a dark, uneasy undercurrent.

Produced and filmed by New Media, Ltd, the gorgeously cinematic black and white video has Kinlaw, who interestingly enough is a choreographer, room to expressively dance in empty rooms and negative spaces. At points, her movements are edited like a stop-motion film, and it gives the video a surreal, dream-like logic before showing Kinlaw’s long and seemingly final descent into darkness.

With the release of their first two full-length albums 2012’s self-titled debut and 2014’s Adorn, the Canadian experimental pop/ambient electro pop/dream duo You’ll Never Get To Heaven — comprised of Alice Hansen, a classically trained pianist and violinist and Chuck Blazevic, a studio obsessed tone-sculptor and monome performer — quickly received attention nationally and internationally for a staunchly DIY/independent ethos and for lush, deeply textured compositions that are roomy enough for Hansen’s ethereal cooing.

And as a result of their growing profile, they caught the attention of Yellow K Records, the label home of Eskimeaux and Japanese Breakfast, who officially released the band’s third full-length effort Images today. And while the album’s fourth and latest single “White Light” will further their reputation for crafting lush and textured pop, it offers a subtle expansion into their sound as the slow-burning single features gently swirling electronics, twinkling synths and percussion, brief bursts of industrial clang and clatter to create a fever dream-like vibe — in which the narrator and the listener can’t quite discern if they’re completely asleep and or dreaming or awake and hallucinating.

Interestingly, while the Canadian dream pop duo have in the past been rather reclusive,  they’re currently planning their first European and north American gigs to support Images over the course of the Spring and Summer of this year, so be on the lookout; however, in the meantime, if you’re in Ontario over the next few weeks, you can catch them live. Check out dates below.

Tour Dates
03/31/17 – London, ON – First Spiritualist Church
04/07/17 – Toronto, ON – The Baby G
04/16/17 – Ottawa, ON – Le Temporaire
04/18/17 – Sarnia, ON – Refined Fool Brewing
04/19/17 – Hamilton, ON – The Casbah

New Audio: The Trippy and Psychedelic Sounds and Visuals of The Seshen’s “Colors Collide”

Throughout the end of last year, I wrote quite a bit about San Francisco Bay Area-based electro pop/electro R&B/electro soul act The Seshen. Interestingly, the act comprised of founding members Lalin St. Juste (vocals) and Akiyoshi Ehara (bass, production) with Kasha Rockland (vocals), Mizra Kopelman (percussion) and Kumar Butler (sampler) have recede attention both across the Bay Area and elsewhere for a sound and aesthetic that draws from a diverse and eclectic array of influences including Erykah Badu, Jai Paul, James Blake, Radiohead, Broadcast, hip-hop, indie rock, electronica — with the result being a sound that managed to be simultaneously contemporary and retro-futuristic.

Now you may recall that I had written about the first two singles off the act’s sophomore full-length effort Flames and Figures — “Distant Heart,” a slickly produced, sleek and sensual, synth-based single that sounded as though it were influenced by 80s synth-based R&B and pop and “Already Gone,” a sultry and sensual track that subtly nodded at Giorgio Moroder’s legendary and incredibly sexy productions. However, the album’s third and latest single “Colors Collide” finds the Bay Area-based act pairing St. Juste’s nostalgic, stream-of-consciousness lyrics and sultry vocals with hazy mellotron, layered rhythms, a distorted and chopped up vocal sample, swirling electronics and shimmering synths to craft a sound that nods at trippy, 60s-inspired psych pop, experimental pop and prog rock thanks to a song structure that consists of several shifting and morphing sections held together by the song’s hazy vibe and a deep longing for more.

Interestingly, as the band’s St. Juste explains in press notes, “Colors Collide is about the illusory spaces that are created for us, and how we wrestle with the identities and experiences that grow out of those creations. It reflects the journey of leaving this current space for another. Perhaps in this next place, I can be free. It’s not a physical space, but rather, the place within myself that I hope to reach.”

Directed by Jesse Cafiero, the recently released music video for “Colors Collide” employs the use of classic, stop-motion animation to create a detailed yet surreal world that adds and emphasizes the song’s psychedelia-tinged take on pop

New Video: The Nostalgic Visuals and 60s Psych Pop-Leaning Sounds of Hour Of The Time Majesty Twelve

Comprised of primary songwriter duo Spooki Tavi (guitar, vocals) and Ashi Dala (bass, vocals), the Los Angeles, CA-based experimental pop Hour Of The Time Majesty Twelve (HOTT MT) have built a profile for their collaborative warehouse, art space Non Plus Ultra, for crafting shimmering, psychedelic-leaning pop, and for ambitious collaborations with The Flaming Lips, Ariel Pink, Erykah Badu and Ke$ha. And adding to a growing profile, the Los Angeles-based experimental pop duo have opened for the aforementioned The Flaming Lips, Bat for Lashes, and Galaxie 500.

The duo’s sophomore full-length effort AU (Alternate Universe) is slated for a May 2017 release through the duo’s Mutation Records. “At Night in China Town” features the duo pairing shimmering synths, tinny and distorted Casio-like beats, angular guitar chords with Spooki Tavi’s ethereal vocals and a soaring hook in a moody yet mischievously anachronistic song that sounds as though it simultaneously draws from 60s psych pop and bubble gum pop, shoegazer rock — and in a similar fashion to Washington D.C.’s The Galaxy Electric but with a chillier air.

The recently released music video for “At Night in China Town” features footage shot at their warehouse art space Non Plus Ultra, which was recently shut down. And much like losing a favorite bar or a favorite music venue, there’s a palpable sense of friendships being made and possibly lost, of uncertainty as to what’s next and what everyone will do now that their place is gone; but along with that a hope that there may be someplace new that will leave some indelible memory on you. As the members of HOTT MT say of their recent loss ” “All of us at Non Plus Ultra have been together for years. Our ideals brought us together, and we built a space and a business on them. Non Plus Ultra showed us that we aren’t alone in our desires. There are so many people in this town who share our values. We’ve made and lost spaces before, but this time we’ve got an incredible support system.”

If you’ve been frequenting JOVM over the past couple of years, you’ve likely come across several posts on Umea, Sweden-born and based, singer/songwriter and cellist  Cajsa Siik. And with the release of her debut single “Was I Supposed To,” which was then promptly followed by her full-length debut Contra and a batch of attention grabbing singles through 2015, Siik received attention both nationally and internationally while cementing herself as one of her country’s standout artists, drawing comparisons to contemporary, Scandinavian pop artists Lyyke Li and Robyn.

Siik’s third full-length effort DOMINO is slated for a June 2, 2017 release through Birds Will Sing For You Records, and the effort, which was produced by Rolf Plinth will feature guest spots from Phoenix‘s and Deportees‘ Thomas Hedlund and Tiger Lou’s Rasmus Kellerman, both of whom contributed to the jangling and shuffling  album single “Talk To Trees.” And what made that single particularly interesting to me was the fact that it reveled a new direction for the internationally renowned singer/songwriter and multi-instrumentalist, with its sound being simultaneously intimate and bold, yet swooningly anthemic and spacious enough for Siik’s effortlessly gorgeous and tender vocals. While the song may be one of Siik’s shorter songs — it clocks in at 2:40 — the song and its narrator seem haunted by a messy yet fully-lived in past; but while suggesting that life is about closing your eyes and taking a chance — even if it may backfire.

DOMINO‘s latest single “White Noise” is a dramatic track that features four-on-the-floor drumming, blasts of shimmering guitar, and atmospheric synths which give the song an art pop sheen while Siik’s vocals and uncanny ability to write an infectious and soaring hook gives the song a pop-leaning accessibility.  In press notes, Siik explained that, “DOMINO can be described in two different ways. First I wanted it to represent the fact that we’re all connected to each other and that we have a responsibility towards each other and this world. To shoulder that responsibility is easier said than done, but we must try. Be aware. Not only mind our own business. I’ve given that a lot of thought lately. Secondly, every song on this album depends and relies on the other. Together they create a unit and the unit is supposed to be diverse. I aimed for creating a dynamic album.” Interestingly, when you hear the newest single in relation to its preceding single “Talk To Trees” there’s a sense of Siik and her collaborators creating a deeply unified mood and vision while speaking of experiences and feelings — in particular about love and longing with a hard-fought deeply adult wisdom and confidence.

New Video: Miles Francis Releases Infectious Darkly, Ironic Experimental Pop Single

Miles Francis’ solo debut single “You’re a Star” employs mischievously complex and propulsive polyrhythm, bursts of jerky and motwinkling 8 bit Nintendo-like synths, a breezy and infectious hook wrapped around hushed and whispered vocals. And while clearly drawing from Afropop and Afrobeat, the song also seems to draw from Fear of Music and Remain in Light-era Talking Heads, as well as contemporaries like Rubblebucket and others, “You’re a Star” sound like a bit of departure from Arntzen’s previously recorded work as the material possesses a darker and more ironic tone, as the song’s narrator is desperate for the greater validation that he may never actually see. In some way, it pokes fun at the musician’s life, darkly suggesting that maybe part of the endeavor is pointless and ridiculous.

Directed by Charles Billot, and featuring the Star Dancers, comprised of Magdalen Segale, Colin Fuller, Ashton Muniz, Matilda Nakamoto and Taner Van Kuren, as well as the Miles Francis backing band, comprised of Katherine Lieberson and Lizzie Lieberson, the recently released music video has the pop artist in a white, linen suit as he goes through a series of surreal, dream-like situations — including sitting in sparsely furnished apartment and on a beach with brightly costumed dancers moving to the song’s jerky instrumentation. And it ends with Miles Francis in the ocean, being overtaken by the waves. While being gorgeous, it’s surreal and is rife with several levels of symbolism left for the viewer to interpret in any way they felt fit.

Featuring Superhuman Happiness‘ founding members Stuart Bogie, Eric Biondo, along with Andrea Diaz (a.k.a. Dia Luna); producer and multi-instrumentalist Ian Hersey, a former member of Rubblebucket; and Brain Bisordi (percussion), the Brooklyn-based experimental pop act TOUCH/FEEL can trace its origins to when Superhuman Happiness’ primary trio, had convened to write material for what they thought would be the band’s third full-length effort. And as the trio explains in press notes, while they had already begun to be known for crafting a sound based around bright and mischievous harmonies and driving, funky polyrhythms, the newer material turned out to be the complete inverse, as the material took on much darker melodies and harmonies with slower, heavier rhythms. The lyrics they began writing with that new sound focused on death, destruction and transformation as being a necessary part of the cycle of existence, drawing some thematic influence from the Egyptian Book of the Dead, the Tarot, re-runs of Unsolved Mysteries and the renewed sense of urgency that countless folks across the country felt after this past Presidential election. The project’s founding trio of Bogie, Biondo and Diaz then enlisted Ian Hersey and Byran Bisordi to join their new project, as the founding trio felt that both Hersey and Bisordi helped bring a rough edge to the proceedings that makes the music feel raw and alive, “and more like chamber music in the sense that we are playing to each other, and striving to engage each other like a string quartet would — without backing tracks or whatever to regulate the music to a clock.”

The project draws from a wild variety of influences including early Peter Gabriel, Sade, the Kronos Quartet, Fela Kuti and Kraftwerk, sonically as you’ll hear on the project’s debut single “ASHES/GOLD,” Diaz’s husky crooning ethereally floats over a slick production featuring processed drums, analog synths, filtered bass guitar, saxophone, flute and trumpet — and while still bearing a resemblance to the sound that won them attention with Superhuman Happiness, the track is a mid tempo track, full of  plaintive, unresolved longing and ambiguous and murky emotions.

From what I understand live, the material is meant to take the audience through 9 specific movements, much like a chamber music group balancing composition and improvisation and incorporating dancers and a degree of performance art. TOUCH/FEEL’s first live set is on March 4, 2017 at National Sawdust — and based on what the band describes, it sound be a spectacle.

 

 

New Video: The Dark and Surreal Visuals for Vaarwell’s “You”

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bOl-f7-BhDA%5D

Comprised of Margarida Falcão, Ricardo Nagy and Luís Monteiro, the Lisbon, Portugal-based indie pop trio Vaarwell, derives their name from the Dutch word vaarwel, which translates into English as farewell — and since their formation back in 2014, when the members of the band met at a music production class, the up-and-coming trio have received attention in their native Portugal and internationally with the release of their debut EP Love and Forgiveness, which revealed a sound that paired ethereal and delicate melodies with minimalist instrumentation and production. Adding to a growing profile, the trio had been included in 2015’s FNAC Best New Talent Compilation, named Tradiio’s “Artist of the Week,” played at the renowned Portuguese music festival NOS em D’Bandada and more recently commissioned by French designer Philippe Starck to write and record a track for his exhibition at the Groninger Museum during this year’s Eurosonic Nooderslag Festival.

“You,” the achingly melancholy and gorgeous, first single off the Portuguese trio’s forthcoming full-length debut Homebound 456 will further cement their reputation for pairing Falçao’s tender and ethereal melodies with a minimalist production featuring warm and soulful keys with subtle industrial clatter, fluttering electronics and shimmering guitar. And while sonically speaking, the song reminds me of Flourish//Perish-era BRAIDS, the song has a narrator who spends a significant portion of the song self-flagellating herself for getting herself fooled by someone she shouldn’t have, who has hurt her in an egregious fashion — and as a result, the song possesses a visceral sense of confusion, bitter heartbreak and desperate searching.

Featuring production work from the Playground Production Company, the accompanying video further emphasizes the brooding contemplative feel of the song, as the video has the trio sitting in a deserted, late night parking lot while a human-sized teddy bear stalks and stomps around nearby. And as the band’s frontwoman is seemingly focusing on some past event or situation and caught within her own revelry, the teddy bear stomps around — without anyone treating it as out of the ordinary; in fact, even the bandmembers quickly treat it as a feverish figment of the imagination.

Live Footage: Pavo Pavo and Friends Pay Tribute to Manhattan Inn with a cover of George Harrison’s “Wah Wah”

Now, if you’ve been frequenting this site over the past year or so, you’ve come across a handful of posts featuring the Brooklyn-based experimental/psych pop act Pavo Pavo. Deriving their name from the name of the southern constellation Pavo — Latin for peacock —the members of the band Eliza Bagg (violin, synths, vocals), Oliver Hill (guitar, synths and vocals). Nolan Green (guitar, vocals), Austin Vaughn (drums) and Ian Romer (bass) can trace its origins to when the members of the quintet were studying while at Yale University, and since then individual members have collaborated with the likes of Here We Go Magic, John Zorn, Dave Longstreth, Porches, Olga Bell, Lucius, Roomful of Teeth and San Fermin among others. Adding to a growing profile, their “Ran Ran Run”/”Annie Hall” 7 inch was praised by a number of media outlets and blogs, including Stereogum as being “weightless pop music that sounds like it was beamed down from a glimmering utopian future.” And while nodding at 60s psych pop and 80s New Age, just underneath the glimmering surface there’s a hint at unease, anxiety, rot and dysfunction.

Released during the last few months of 2016, the band’s highly-anticipated full-length debut Young Narrator in the Breakers was released to critical praise across the blogosphere for material that thematically speaking — according to the members of the band — described both magic and panic of adult life. Conveying the understanding that much like getting caught in a vicious breaker, the swimmer has to stop swimming and fighting against the tide; that on a certain level, they have to go along and ride it out while sonically speaking album singles like “Ruby (Let’s Buy The Bike),” “Ran Ran Run” and “Annie Hall,” real a band that specializes in dreamy, minimalist and escapist synth-based pop that manages to be simultaneously retro-futuristic and utopian; but just under the surface, there’s a sense of anxiety and rot.

Interestingly, when the members of Pavo Pavo — which also includes members of the Swimmers art collective — heard that the renowned Greenpoint, Brooklyn venue Manhattan Inn was closing, they all decide that they should call up a bunch of musician friends and film a video at the last minute to commemorate and celebrate the space, as the space had a special connection for the band and for countless numbers of musicians across Brooklyn. As the band said to the folks at Brooklyn Vegan “Manhattan Inn was a rare place, a place where bands felt free to step out of their routine of Playing-The-Set-In-Rock-Clubs.” The members of the band went on to describe seeing some incredible, once in a lifetime/only in New York live music; but more important, that the venue was where they played their first New York area live show, where they met their manager, where they played an impromptu night of Bowie covers, upon learning of his death — and where they collaborated with a ton of musicians across Brooklyn. They go on to explain that All Things Must Pass is one of their favorite albums and that “Wah Wah” seems to suit the collective, experimental and joyous atmosphere of Manhattan Inn.

The end result was 24 musicians, including members of Lucius, Delicate Steve, San Fermin, Alpenglow, Uni Ika Ai, Wilder Maker, Antibalas, Underground System and others performing a straightforward yet gorgeous cover of George Harrison’s “Wah Wah,” off his critically and commercially successful All Things Must Pass.

Now, if you had been frequenting this site over the last part of 2016, you may recall coming across a post on the Oakland, CA-based soul pop quintet Bells Atlas. Comprised of Derek Barber (guitar) Geneva Harrison (drums, percussion, keys) Sandra Lawson-Ndu (vocals, percussion, keys) and Doug Stuart (bass, vocals, keys), the quintet specializes in a sound that’s kaleidoscopic, lushly layered and difficult to pigeonhole as it incorporates elements of indie rock, Afro pop jazz and electro pop. Their trippy, shimmering and atmospheric “Spec and Bubbles” revealed a song that structurally owed a debt to  Hiatus Kaiyote as the song consisted of several, twisting and morphing sections held together by stuttering drumming, a sinuous bass line and Lawson-Ndu’s sultry cooing.

The Bay Area quintet’s latest single “NCAT” will further cement their burgeoning reputation for crafting slow-burning, atmospheric and soulful pop as the song consists of shimmering and bubbling arpeggio synths, stuttering drumming and a rolling bass line paired with Lawson-Ndu’s sultry yet ethereal vocals. And by far, the song may arguably be the sexiest song they’ve released to date, as Lawson-Ndu’s vocals express a visceral, vulnerability and human need — and in some way, the song nods at Quiet Storm-era R&B, Snoop Dogg‘s “Sexual Eruption” and the aforementioned Hiatus Kaiyote.