Category: New Video

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Slumbering Sun Shares Trippy 120 Minutes MTV-era VIsual for “Liminal Bridges”

Austin-based doom metal outfit Slumbering Sun — Monte Luna’s James Clarke (vocals), Destroyer of Light’s Keegan Kjeldsen (guitar), Temptress‘ Kelsey Wilson (guitar), Monte Luna‘s and Scorpion Child‘s Garth Condit (bass) and Destroyer of Light’s Penny Turner (drums) — is an All-Star band featuring acclaimed members of Texas’ underground metal scene. 

After the breakup of their previous band, James Clarke and Keegan Kjeldsen resolved to forget the bitter pain of an album that would never be released, by creating something new. They decided to start a new band with an album that Kjeldsen wrote between work on other projects. The pair continued the creative process at their rehearsal space with a few songs strummed on a clean, electric guitar: Clarke began to write melodies with the pair finishing lyrics. 

Clarke and Kjeldsen recruited Temptress’ Kelsey Wilson, who made the commute from Dallas for the writing and recording process. Scorpion Child’s Garth Condit and Destroyer of Light’s Penny Turner, who played in other bands with Clarke and Kjeldsen respectively were recruited to be the band’s rhythm section — and from that point on, Slumbering Sun was a full-fledged band. 

Released last Friday digitally and on cassette and CD, the Austin-based doom metal outfit’s full-length debut The Ever Living Fire was recorded in a week-long recording session this past summer. Sonically, their full-length debut sees the band exploring broader melodies than their previous work while drawing from Celtic folk, doom metal act Warning, as well as 90s grunge rockers Soundgarden and Alice In Chains. 

In the lead-up to the album’s release, I wrote about three singles:

  • “Liminal Bridges,” an expansive song featuring an atmospheric introduction with swirling, shoegazer-like textures, followed by stormy, power chord-driven riffage and thunderous drumming paired with Clarke’s melodic crooning and enormous, arena rock-like hooks. The track sonically brought — to my ears, at least —  The Sword  to mind — ok but with a prog rock-leaning sensibility.

  • “Dream Snake,” an equally expansive track that opens with Black Sabbath and Soundgarden-like intro with fuzzy, power chord-driven riffage, thunderous drumming and a soulful solo paired with Clarke’s Ozzy Osbourne-like delivery until roughly around the five-minute mark. At that point, the song morphs into a sludgy doom metal dirge for the next two minutes or so before a gorgeous string arrangement carries the song into a gentle fadeout. Lyrically rooted in longing and heartbreak, “Dream Snake” sees the members of Slumbering Sun drawing from different eras one metal and doom metal and crafting something both familiar and new.

  • Album title track “The Ever Living Fire.” Continuing a remarkable run of expansive, mind-bending material, the song begins with a gorgeous 35 second, acoustic guitar-driven introduction before quickly exploding into an expressive and soulful doom metal dirge, built around sludgy power chord-driven riffage, thunderous drumming and Clarke’s crooning. And around the five minute mark, the band introduces a melodic hook that shifts the song in a trippy display of densely layered guitars. The song ends with a roughly minute-long, gorgeous acoustic gutter driven coda making it one of the more prog-leaning songs of the album’s released singles.

Building upon the attention the album’s first three singles have received, Slumbering Sun recently shared an accompanying video for “Liminal Bridges.” Fittingly set in a creepy forest, the video is split between the band performing the song at night — at points shot through a hazy filter. The other half of the video features two women performing a series of weird rituals seemingly meant to get them to a different realm of consciousness. If you grew up watching 120 Minutes, this one definitely will bring back some fond memories.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Los Bitchos Share Mischievous and Boozy Cover of “Tequila”

London-based instrumental outfit Los Bitchos — Australian-born, Serra Petale (guitar); Uruguayan-born Agustina Ruiz (keytar); Swedish-born, Josefine Jonsson (bass) and London-born and-based Nic Crawshaw (drums) — can trace their origins to meeting at various late-night parties and through mutual friends. Inspired by their individual members’ different upbringings and backgrounds, Los Bitchos have developed a unique, genre-blurring and retro-futuristic sound blends elements of Peruvian chicha, Argentine cumbia, Turkish psych, surf rock, and the music each individual member grew up with: 

  • The Uruguayan-born Ruiz had a Latin-American music collection that the members of the band fell in love with. 

  • The Swedish-born Jonsson “brings a touch of out of control pop,” her bandmates often joke. 

  • Aussie-born Serra Petale is deeply inspired by her mother’s 70s Anatolian rock records. 

  • And the London-born Crawshaw played in a number of local punk bands before joining Los Bitchos.

“Coming from all these different places,” Los Bitchos’ Serra Petale says, “it means we’re not stuck in one genre and we can rip up the rulebook a bit when it comes to our influences.”

Los Bitchos’ Alex Kapranos-produced full-length debut, last year’s Let The Festivities Begin! was recorded at Gallery Studios, and saw the band further cementing heir reputation for crafting maximalist, trippy, Technicolor instrumental party starting jobs — with a cinematic quality.

The London-based JOVM mainstays capped off a momentous year with with two singles “Los Chrismos,” their first Christmas-themed composition and “Tip Tapp, which were co-produced by the band’s Serra Petale and Javier Weyler and recorded at 5db was released digitally and physically on a flexi-disc, bundled with a red vinyl re-press of their debut. “Los Chrismos” is a celebratory party-starting romp built around a psych rock-inspired, dexterous, looping guitar line, atmospheric synths cheers and shouts paired with cumbia rhythms. The end result is a much-needed joy and hope bomb that’s just pure unadulterated joy.

Los Bitchos’ forthcoming two-track EP PAH! is slated for a digital and 7″ release in mid-March through their label home City Stand — and the EP coincides with their upcoming UK and European tour opening for JOVM mainstays King Gizzard and The Lizard Wizard. PAH! features a mischievously rowdy and boozy cover of The Champs‘ “Tequila,” a song that has become a fan favorite during the band’s live shows. The EP also features a reworking of the Gizz’s “Trapdoor.”

Filmed by Los Bitchos and Lea Emmery, the accompanying video for “Tequila” follows the members of the JOVM mainstay act stopping at a liquor store to buy a bottle of tequila, which they bring with them through a night of partying with friends new an old. And much like the cover, it’s a mischievous, rowdy night through London.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Willy Hobal Shares Infectious Banger “Willy from the block”

Willy Hobal is a Dominican-born, Swiss-based singer/songwriter, actor and multi-disciplinary artist, who like countless artists and creatives have supported himself with a full-time job as a luxury hotel marketing specialist.

As a musician and recording artist, Hobal specializes in high energy, entertaining music featuring Caribbean rhythms meant to get people moving. Last year, Hobal exploded out of the gate with two singles, the Raniero Palm-produced “No Pares” and “Nadie me conoce,” which led to performances at the Somos Latinoamerica Festival in Lausanne, Switzerland and the Miss Universe Switzerland pageant.

Last summer, Hobal announced that he was working on his debut EP, VIRGO, which is slated for a summer 2023 release. The six-song effort explores the qualities of those born under the zodiac sign of Virgo, and to two zodiac signs that share similar qualities with Virgo. The EP is specifically for open minded people — and as Hobal says “for the black sheep, the people, who seek the freedom to be themselves through dance and music.”

The EP’s first single “Willy From The Block” is a swaggering, dance floor friendly banger that features a slick mixture of Europop and Dominican dembow rhythms — and a sonic nod to Jennifer Lopez‘s “Jenny From the Block.” Thematically, the song also draws a bit from Lopez’s smash hit with teh song encouraging the listener to work hard to overcome any of the obstacles they may have to face.

Fittingly, the accompanying video is a colorful, high energy visual that stars the Dominican-Swiss artist at a ranging house party with some ridiculous hip-hop cliches, including large piles of cash and a collection of incredibly attractive Virgos — who have the Virgo zodiac symbol on their heads.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: METZ’s and Weird Nightmare’s Alex Edkins and Holy Fuck’s Graham Walsh Team Up on Propulsive “Casting No Light”

Noble Rot is a new collaborative studio project, featuring METZ‘s and Weird Nightmare’s Alex Edkins and Holy Fuck‘s Graham Walsh. The project can trace its origins back to 2011: Walsh was enlisted to produce METZ’s 2012 self-titled full-length debut. And since then, the pair have remained in a state of creative orbit.

Slated for a March 24, 2023 release through Joyful Noise, the duo’s full-length debut together, Heavenly Bodies, Repetition, Control reportedly shows Edkins and Walsh joyously stepping outside and beyond the lines drawn by their previously released work, with the album’s material being the culmination of a year’s worth of feverish studio experimentation influenced by film soundtracks, experimental noise, kosmiche muzik, ambient, psychedelia and more.

While their distance musical sensibilities remain intact, Noble Rot provides the duo with a new vehicle for pushing their boundaries of sonic exploration. The album’s material will reward the listener with a songs filled to the brim with unbridled curiosity and boundless excitement — with the hopes that it’ll surprise and thrill both longtime fans and periphery lurkers alike.

Heavenly Bodies, Repetition, Control‘s first single “Casting No Light” is a densely layered soundscape featuring glistening and wobbling synths, hypnotic bass lines, spiraling and looping guitar lines, and motorik rhythms are paired with chanted mantra-like vocals. While effortlessly and seamlessly meshing the long-held creative instincts of its individual creators, “Casting No Light” is underpinned by a mischievous, almost childlike sense of adventure and an irresistible groove. And adding to the collaborative nature of the project, Wire‘s and Immersion‘s Colin Newman and Minimal Compact‘s and Immersion’s Malka Spigel lend a hand, contributing bass and heavily modulated guitars to the song’s motorik pulse — before closing out with bongo drums and howling synths.

Heavenly Bodies, Reputation, Control is included in Joyful Noise’s The White Label Series. Currently in its sixth year, The White Label Series taps influential curators and creatives to shine a light on a previously unreleased album of their choice. This year’s list of curators is equally impressive as it includes Julian Baker, Sean Ono Lennon, Helado Negro, The Jesus Lizard‘s David Yow, Speedy Ortiz‘s Sadie Dupuis and No Joy‘s Jasmine White-Gluz, who chose Noble Rot’s debut for the series.

“Graham Walsh and Alex Edkin’s new musical partnership captures what I love most about their other musical endeavors (Holy Fuck, Metz); expansive production, musical moments of anxiety and calmness, unexpected earworms,” White-Gluz says of choice. “I love records like this that make me go ‘how did they make that sound?!’ and relisten to a song over and over.“

Directed by John Smith, the accompanying video for “Casting No Light” features an array of different colored shapes and lines squiggling and and moving along to the song’s motorik pulse. Smith, who’s a self-described “. . . long-standing admirer of synesthesia and its explorations by artists such as Kandinsky and experimental filmmakers such as Oskar Fischinger, Norman McLaren, and Walter Ruttman, I have been consistently inspired by the concept and its connection between sound and visual. For over two decades, I have been constantly exploring ways to express these connections, and upon first hearing the trance-like and multi-layered composition of “Casting No Light”, I saw a great opportunity to apply these concepts. With the assistance of Aaron Campbell, an interactive designer friend, we developed a system that translates every layer of sound into a corresponding visual component. Enjoying this experience with headphones will provide a much richer experience since you can better hear all of the nuances and textures in the song.”

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Los Angeles’ Gal Pal Shares Lush, Dream-like “Mirror”

Rising Los Angeles-based trio Gal Pal — Emelia Austin (she/her), Shayna Hahn (she/her) and Nico Romero (he/him) — can trace their origins back to a serendipitous meeting in college: The members of the band lived in the same dorm and on the same floor. Each member was drawn to to other by a sense of shared ambition and a desire to play music in a share that felt nonjudgmental and generative. Their initial collaborations were improvisatory, long-winded and playful — and featured recently purchased equipment, including a drum kit no one yet knew how to play. “We were learning our instruments together,” Gal Pal’s Nico Romero says. “The project started from wanting to learn how to play an write songs with other people.”

 The Los Angeles-based trio’s latest single “Mirror” altering their creative process — perhaps out of necessity: Austin, Hahn and Romero experimented with writing in isolation, crafting songs with lyrics on their own before bringing them to the group. Featuring production assistance from Danny Noguieras and Sami Perez, the new single is also a bold step forward sonically for the band: Centered around an intricate, looping guitar riff, skittering drum patterns paired with Austin’s plaintive wailing “Mirror” is a shoegazey take on post punk that evokes both the sensation of being hopelessly stuck in a repetitive, dysfunctional pattern — and the slow-burning sense of dread, because there’s the acknowledgement of being stuck, and not knowing how to get out of a hellish loop.

The bands Emelia Austin explains that the song “formed from Nico playing cynical guitar riffs over and over again. It helped me form the theme of being stuck in a pattern. I then wrote lyrics that were cut-off sentences, repeating again and again to express that feeling. For me, ‘Mirror’ is about the ways we allow our identities to be misshaped by people in our lives, how we are used as reflections for others, and the anxiety over being able to control it or not.” 

Directed by Will Rydall, the accompanying video follows the band performing in their sun-bathed practice space, in front of various mirrors — and bounding up and around the surrounding hills.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: RVG Shares Snarling “Nothing Really Changes”

Romy Vager is an Adelaide-born Melbourne-based singer/songwriter with a remarkable backstory: Vager was a teenaged goth kid runaway, who left Adelaide and headed east to Melbourne. Upon her arrival in Melbourne, she joined her first band Sooky La La, an act that specialized in material rooted in anger and discordance.

Unsurprisingly, Sooky La La was largely misunderstood, routinely cleared out rooms, and never found much of a following. Eventually, they split up. But it resulted in Vager committing herself to write songs that people would actually want to listen to, by attempting to do what countless aspiring singer/songwriters desperately hope — and then try — to do well: pair the universal feelings of alienation, loneliness, heartbreak, despair, feeling misunderstood, trying to find one’s place and even being in love with melody, introspection and rousingly anthemic hooks and refrains.

Vager wound up living at The Bank, a recording, rehearsal and performance space in an old bank building in Preston, Australia, a suburb about six miles from Melbourne. The Bank was a scene unto itself, as it housed a handful of bands that would later receive national attention, including Jalala, Gregor and Hearing, who at the time, all played, practiced and lived there. Living in such a space, surrounded by musicians, who were constantly working and honing their work was profoundly inspiring to Vager.

In 2015, the Adelaide-born, Melbourne-based singer/songwriter launched a tape of solo material that hadn’t actually been pressed yet. But that tape helped her land her first solo show at The Banks downstairs performance space. Vager recruited Drug Sweat’s and The Galaxy Folk’s Angus Bell (bass), her Bank neighbor, Gregor’s and Hearing’s Reuben Bloxham (guitar) and Rayon Moon‘s Marc Nolte (drums) to be a one-off backing band for that solo show. But as the story goes, once they all began playing together, they realized — without ever having to say it aloud — that they needed to continue as a band.

Shortly after that show, they settled on Romy Vager Group for their name. But they eventually shortened the name to RVG. Since then, the band has gone through a lineup change with Isabelle Wallace (bass) replacing Angus Bell.

Their full-length debut, 2017’s A Quality of Mercy was recorded live off the floor at Melbourne’s iconic rock ‘n’ roll pub, The Tote Hotel. Initially released to little fanfare, the album, much to their surprise received critical acclaim both nationally and internationally, landing on a number of end-of-year Best of Lists. The Aussie outfit also played alongside some of the world’s biggest bands.

Their sophomore album, 2020’s Victor Van Vugt-produced Feral was released by Fire Records globally, excluding Australia and New Zealand, where it was released by Our Golden Friend. If you were following this site during that rather tumultuous year, you might recall that I wrote about three of the album’s singles:

  • “I Used to Love You,”a devastatingly heartbreaking ballad, rooted in a deeply universal tale of suffering in the aftermath of an embittering breakup — with the song’s proud and defiant narrator reclaiming herself and her life

  • “Christian Neurosurgeon,” a rousingly anthemic song about cognitive dissonance that sonically seemed to nod at Heaven Up Here-era Echo and the Bunnymen,

  • “Perfect Day,” a cathartic guitar pop single that expresses the frustration, despair, uncertainty and turmoil of the time that does what great songs should always do: speak to the listener in a manner that feels as though the band was in the listener’s head, putting words to the thoughts and feelings they’ve always known but couldn’t express or put words to — with the song being “about trying to give someone the facade of it been a nice day, even though things around them aren’t good,” as the band’s Romy Vager explained in press notes.

The album received some breathless praise both nationally and internationally with Rolling Stone Australia calling the album “the record of a lifetime.”

RVG’s third album, Brain Worms is slated for a June 2, 2023 release through Fire Records and Our Golden Friend. Between the band’s four members, Brain Worms is the most confident they’ve ever felt in RVG. The album reportedly sees them moving past their influences, trying new things and pushing themselves towards what they believe is their best album to date.

“Hype is scary. After two years of COVID it felt like the hype had gone down so we were able to just do stuff,” RVG’s Romy Vager says. “This time around we were like, this is what we’re doing, we’re taking control, we’re taking risks, and we’re going to make an album that sounds big so that when we hear it on the radio we want to hear it again. If we could only make one more album, it would be this one.”

Deriving its title from the hyper-recognizable experience of each day bearing witness to a world of private obsession being aired out in the infinite, Brain Worms may not be wholly new territory for the acclaimed Melbourne post-punk outfit and its frontperson, but there is reportedly a newfound radical acceptance.

Recorded in London’s Snap Studios with James Trevacus, the ten-song album surges with lush sounds and clear intentions — and the magic of an acoustic guitar, once owned by Kate Bush, given to her by Tears for Fears, who legend has it, wrote “Everybody Wants to Rule the World” on it.

“Nothing Really Changes,” Brain Worms‘ first single is am angular, 80s New Wave-inspired track rooted in big, arena rock-like riff, the band’s penchant for anthemic hooks paired with Vager’s earnest, lived-in lyricism: In this case, the song features a narrator desperately missing someone and confronting the lingering ghosts of their relationship — with frustration, anger, despair and a bit of begrudging acceptance. As the bands Vager explains, the song “started off as a songwriting experiment to write something catchy with an obnoxious riff, a cross between Divinyls and ‘Smoke on the Water.‘ It’s a song about missing someone but protecting yourself from being hurt.”

Directed by Hayden Somerville and show at the Rippon Lea Estate, the accompanying video stars the band’s Vager with a lifeless body acting as a listener to her frustration and despair — and in a playful scene that mirrors “Mary Jane’s Last Dance,” an unwilling dance partner.
“The words and music painted this haunted manor world in my head,” says Somerville. “A lifeless body represents a past relationship so nicely, while also acting as a fantastic listener for Romy. I think it’s all very therapeutic.” Vager adds, “This new record has been about taking risks so I really put myself outside of my comfort zone to make it work. I’m really proud of what we’ve made, the video compliments the melodrama and playfulness of the track perfectly.”
 

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Singapore’s Aisyah Aziz Shares Gorgeous Ballad “janji kita bertemu lagi”

https://youtu.be/szoIpBWhRRE

Aisyah Aziz is a Singaporean singer/songwriter, musician, model and actor with a soulful vocal that effortlessly spans a range of genres — and an ethereal presence on both the theater and concert stage. Aziz quickly established herself as a household name through notable performances both in Singapore and beyond, including Singapore’s National Day Parade, where she performed an original song co-written with longtime friend RHUAN.

The Singaporean artist also expresses herself through fashion, a passion of hers — and more recently through acting: She made her theater debuting a work by Teater Ekmatara commissioned for the Singapore International Festival of Arts.

Back in 2020, Aziz released her first English-language EP, Sugar: The Live Extended Play, which was performed and recorded as a live session. She followed that up with with 2021’s Ying Tan-produced, full-length Pearls. Her earliest work saw the Malaysian-Singaporean artist performing songs that were written for her, and she long thought herself to be a vessel for the music. But that changed when she found a creative community, who inspired her to break out of her shell and come into her own as a collaborator and independent singer/songwriter and producer.

Since then she has collaborated with Charlie Lim, Rizky Febian, YAø and a growing list of others. Adding to a growing profile. she was invited to perform with Malaysian music icon Dato’ Jamal Abdillah during his most recent Aku Jamal . . . My Musical Journey show in Singapore.

Armed with a newfound confidence, the rising Singaporean artist is ready to share what she’s been creating with the world, and is looking forward to releasing new material through various creative projects throughout the year with the hopes to bring her work further into the regional and international market. Aziz’s latest single “janji kita bertemu lagi” is the Malaysian-Singaporean artist’s first English-Malay bilingual song of her growing catalog — and the first single from her forthcoming EP, til death do us part, which is slated for an April 2023 release.

Translated from Malay “janji kita bertemu lagi” means “promise we’ll meet again.” Featuring a sparse arrangement of strummed acoustic guitar paired with Aziz’s breathtakingly gorgeous vocal “janji kita bertemu lagi,” is an achingly bittersweet ballad that captures the heartache and uncertainty, as well as the begrudging acceptance and hope (both real and sometimes delusional) of a breakup.

Directed by Aziz’s best friend Paul Lin, the video was shot from the perspective of a guitar — presumably her guitar. “Having fallen back in love with singing on the guitar, it witnesses everything that happens in my life without judgement. It is simple and it takes everything in as it is. Alhamdullilah I’m beyond stoked to be able to work with Paul, my best buddy, on this video. You don’t need a big team to create something magical.”

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Audio: Kay Young Shares Coquettish and Funky “The Way You Look At Me”

Kay Young is a rising London-based singer/songwriter, emcee, and producer. Back in 2019, Young caught the attention of Jay Electronica on Instagram. Jay Electronica passed some of her short beat videos to friend and collaborator Jay-Z. Before she knew it, she’d been flown out to Los Angeles and signed to Jay-Z’s management company Roc Nation. She has complete creative control of her work from songwriting to production while effortlessly moving between spitting fiery bars and soulful vocals. And throughout, her work is thoughtful, uplifting and playful while drawing from and exploring dance, jazz and soul.

Young’s debut EP, 2021’s This Here Feels Good was written during pandemic-related lockdown and features material that thematically explores familial legacy and cultural relations. The EP was released to critical applause and was supported with opening slots for Jay Electronica, Masgeo and Corrine Bailey Rae, as well as festival sets at The Great Escape and We Out Here. The rising London-based artist was featured on Blue Note’s compilation album Re:Imagined II, breathing new life into Marlena Shaw‘s “Feel Like Making Love.”

In her native UK, she has received airplay from BBC 6 Music personalities Chris Hawkins and BBC Radio 1‘s Huw Stephens, as well as BBC 1Xtra’s Jamz Supernova, recording a live session at Maida Vale. She also performed a star-studded performance of “White Teeth on BBC 4’s Other Voices 20th Anniversary show.

The rising London-based artist starts off the year with “The Way You Look At Me,” the first bit of new material since the release of This Here Feels Good. Rooted in a Motown-era soul-inspired groove with a big brass section paired with Young’s coquettish and self-assured delivery (which sees her alternate between crooning and spitting bars) and an infectious hook, “The Way You Look At Me” tells a classic tale of falling in love with that pretty young thing on the dance floor — but with a modern twist. The song is just a fun, carefree and coquettish bop that captures exactly what young love feels like — new, exciting, hopeful and a little crazy.

Directed by Dylan Hayes, the accompanying video features the rising London-based artist and her backing band performing the song in late 60s-early 70s-styled garb and in front of psychedelic-tinged backgrounds. They all look like they’re about to perform on Soul Train back in about 1972 or so.

Young’s forthcoming, sophomore EP is slated for release later this year. Be on the lookout for more news.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Pattern Primitive Shares Eerie “I Know Your Thoughts”

French duo Pattern Primitive — Andrew Richards and Severin Stancler — create a hypnotic and meditative soundscape, comprised of lo-fi noise particles, melancholic memories floating in the air and gentle melodic breaths caressing the back of the listener’s neck.

“Know Your Thoughts,” the French duo’s eerie and hypnotic, latest single is rooted around swirling and wobbling synth textures, layers of skittering beats and glitchy electronics paired with processed ethereal vocals. The song manages to feel like an uneasy fever dream, fueled by a creeping malevolence, just out of reach.

The accompanying video begins with colored oils being dripped into water and following the patterns they create, followed by trippier footage of a robe wearing, candy skull-looking character in the woods and more.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Chiara Foschiani Shares Sultry “Sabotage”

Rising Paris-born-and-based singer/songwriter and pianist, Chiara Foschiani can trace the origins of her music career to when she started piano lessons at eight. The Parisian singer/songwriter and musician started singing when she was 13. She joined a number of local bands, performing on small stages and local music festivals before she started writing her own songs.

Back in 2021, Foschiani released her debut single Trouble Maker featured:

  • “Queen of Disaster”

  • “My Glass of Wine,” a remarkably Portishead-like track

  • “God Damn,” a sickly produced, straightforward pop confection rooted in earnest and lived-in lyricism that belies her relative youth

The young Parisian artist’s sophomore EP is slated for a May release. The EP’s first single “Sabotage” is a bold step forward for Foschiani. Featuring wobbling low end, skittering beats, glistening synth arpeggios and enormous, shout-along worthy hooks paired with the young Parisian artist’s self-assured and sultry delivery, “Sabotage” may the most dance floor friendly song she has released to date. But under the slick production is a deeply personal, lived-in story of a narrator who, much like the song’s creator, experienced terrible harassment, survived — and has been trying to regain their confidence and power.

Directed by Mephisto, the accompanying video further emphasizes the song’s central themes: We see Foschiani getting molested and oppressed by dark, murky characters and forces beyond her understanding. But much like the Phoenix, she goes through a fiery rebirth.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: JOVM Mainstay Taleen Kali Shares “120 Minutes”-Era MTV-like “Crusher”

Over the past couple of years, I’ve spilled quite a bit of virtual ink covering Los Angeles-born and-based singer/songwriter, guitarist, poet, essayist, visual artist, Dum Dum Records founder, and JOVM mainstay Taleen Kali. Kail (she/they) has made a carer out of writing romantic punk songs that are simultaneously cosmic, dreamy and defiant, and informed by her Armenian heritage and her parents’ birthplaces of Lebanon and Ethiopia. But the material is underpinned by Kali’s desire to seamlessly fuse her cultural heritage and identity with the sounds of the modern countercultures she grew up embracing and exploring as a musician and singer/songwriter. 

Kali’s music career started with a stint in Los Angeles-based band TÜLIPS. After TÜLIPS closed up shop in 2016, she stepped out into the limelight as a solo artist, eventually touring across the US with Ex Hex, Alice Bag and Seth Bogart. 

The Los Angeles-based JOVM mainstay’s solo debut, 2018’s Kristin Kontrol-produced Soul Songs EP was recorded at Hollywood-based Sunset Sound Studios. The EP, which found Kali’s long-held riot grrl ethos maturing into a multifaceted punk sound and approach with elements of noise pop and New Wave was released to praise from BUST Magazine and Stereogum, who likened her sound to a contemporary Blondie. Soul Songs was also included in Pitchfork‘s Guide to Summer Albums and LA Weekly‘s Best Indie Punk Albums. 

Kali along with her backing band followed up with an unplugged version of Soul Songsand covers of The Supremes‘ “Baby Love” and Garbage‘s “#1 Crush.” She also recorded a two-song pandemic project called Changing with her TÜLIPS-era producer Greg Katz.

Taleen Kali’s Jeff Schroeder and Josiah Mazzaschi-co-produced full-length debut Flower of Life is slated for a March 3, 2023 release through Kali’s Dum Dum Records. Sonically, the album reportedly sees the rising Los Angeles further cementing her fuzzy and noisy take on psych punk paired with vocals that run the range of femme punk and shoegaze siren. 

Over the past year or so, I’ve written about the following album singles: 

  • Album title track “Flower of Life,” a grungy psych punk ripper centered around fuzzy power chords, thunderous drumming, soaring organ chords and Kali’s sneering delivery paired with mosh pit friendly hooks and choruses that sonically was a bit of a synthesis of My Bloody Valentine and riot grrl punk. “‘Flower of Life’ was a spiritual concept I held onto for a long time before writing this song,” Kali explains in press notes. “The flower is a fractal, a cycle, ever blooming, ever decaying. 

  • “Trash Talk“, a jangling Brit Pop-inspired anthem centered around a chugging motorik-like groove, fuzzy power chords, Kali’s unerring knack for rousingly anthemic hooks and a sneering “fuck off” attitude towards haters, trolls and toxic bullshit that almost anyone can relate to. 

  • “Fine Line,” a Too True-era Dum Dum Girls-like confection centered around shimmering and reverb-drenched guitars, a forceful and driving rhythm section paired with Kali’s plaintive delivery and her unerring knack for well, placed, rousingly anthemic hooks. 

  • “Tomorrow Girl,” a shimmering Too True-era Dum Dum Girls-meets shoegaze-like pop confection featuring shimmering and reverb-drenched guitars, Kali’s gorgeous and achingly plaintive delivery paired with a driving rhythm section and enormous hooks. Much like its predecessors, “Tomorrow Girl” is rooted in personal, lived-in experience and hard-won wisdom. 

Flower of Life‘s latest single “Crusher” is a swooning, 120 Minutes alt rock-like shoegazer them featuring swirling guitar textures, relentless four-on-the-floor and Kali’s unerring knack for enormous hooks paired with heart-proudly-worn on-sleeve earnestness and a blazing solo from Smashing Pumpkins’ Jeff Shroeder. “Crusher” manages to evoke the sweet ache of having a desperate crush. “Crusher’ is our ultimate shoegaze love song. You ever crush so hard you’ve been brought to your knees? This song is about all those impossible feelings, taking inspiration from some of the greats: Chapterhouse, Lush, Ride, and Curve,” Kali explains. “This song has always been our band favorite and it features a guitar solo from Jeff Schroeder of Smashing Pumpkins so we’ve been saving the best for last…”

Fittingly, the accompanying video for “Crusher” draws from 120 Minutes-era MTV and features romantic imagery — guitars played with roses, roses bursting into flames, shot through kaleidoscopic filters.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Silver Moth Shares Slow-Burning and Cinematic “Mother Tongue”

Silver Moth is new collective featuring a celebrated cast of musicians and artists, including Mogwai’s Stuart Braithwaite singer/songwriter and electro pop artist Elisabeth Elektra, singer/songwriter and multi-instrumentalist Evi Vine, Abrasive Trees‘ Matthew Rochford, Burning House‘s Ash Babb, Steven Hill and Prosthetic Head’s Ben Roberts, who has also worked with Abrasive Trees and Evi Vine. The collective can trace its origins back to a Twitter exchange between Matthew Rochford and Elisabeth Elektra about the Isle of Lewis. A couple of Zoom meetings would subsequently lead to Rochford, Elektra, Vine, Braithwaite, Hill, Babb and Roberts visiting Black Bay Studios on the Isle of Lewis in the Outer Hebrides, a dramatic location, where they recorded the collective’s full-length debut, Black Bay.

Slated for an April 21, 2023 release through Bella Union, Black Bay reportedly is a testament to connectivity and receptivity and captures a union of disparate minds committing to something to something greater than the sum of its individual parts. Capturing the sound of seven storied musicians yielding to shared goals, the album ranges between hushed incantations and molten guitars, 15-minute noise rock epics and healing psalms.

“Mother Tongue,” Black Bay‘s first single is a slow-burning and sprawling song centered around swirling shoegazer-like guitar textures, twinkling reverb-drenched keys, ethereal and plaintive vocals paired with jazz-like drumming. While sounding like a synthesis of A Storm in Heaven and Dark Side of the Moon, the band explains that  “Mother Tongue is a song about women and other marginalized people rising up in the face of oppression.”

Directed by Maddie Burton, the accompanying video features the gorgeous scenery of the Isle of Lewis superimposed with footage of women and other marginalized groups protesting and standing up in the face of oppression and cruelty across both time and space. “We were really excited as a band to work with video director Maddie Burton for the accompanying visuals.Maddie’s work is so beautiful, textural and evocative, all the members of Silver Moth felt her art harmonized with our music perfectly, ” the band says of the accompanying video. “Evi Vine had the idea for Maddie to include archival footage from feminist marches around the world in the video, and Maddie then overlaid the march footage with archival footage of the island of Lewis where we recorded the album. Maddie also wove in other images of nature, which felt like it added an extra layer of meaning considering the climate emergency we are all currently navigating”

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Dream Wife Shares Tongue-in-Cheek Ripper “Hot (Don’t Date a Musician)”

Deriving their name from a pointed criticism of society’s objectification of women, the acclaimed London-based JOVM mainstays Dream Wife — Rakel Mjöll (vocals) (she/her), Alice Go (guitar, vocals) (she/her) and Bella Podapec (bass, vocals) (they/them) — can trace their origins back to 2015 when the trio started the band as a art project, rooted in a unique concept: a band born out of one girl’s memories of growing up in Canada in the 1990s.

The London-based outfit’s 2018 self-titled debut was released to widespread critical acclaim, and led to the the trio opening for Garbage, The Kills and Sleigh Bells, as well as playing that year’s SXSW. Building upon a growing international profile, the members of Dream Wife also went on a series of headlining tours across the European Union and the States, which included a Rough Trade stop with New York-based genre-defying artist Sabri. 

Dream Wife’s 2020 Marta Salogni-produced So When You Gonna . . . saw the JOVM mainstays writing and recording their most urgent and direct material to date. Thematically touching upon abortion, miscarriage and gender equality, the album’s material is fueled by a “it’s-now-or-never” immediacy. The album’s material seemed to be a call to action to the listener, to get up off their ass and do what they can to get things right. The album was a critical and commercial success, especially in the UK: The album landed at #18 on the UK Albums Chart, making it the only album in the Top 20 to be produced by an all womxn/non-male production and engineering team — and the only non-major label release to chart that high. 

Dream Wife’s highly-anticipated third album, Social Lubrication is slated for a June 9, 2023 release through Lucky Number. Throughout their career, the band has managed to be remarkably adept at merging the political and the playful, and the forthcoming album continues upon that reputation. Forcefully vital statements are hidden within hot and heavy dance floor anthems about making out, having fun, staying curious. In the band’s words, the album is: “Hyper lusty rock and roll with a political punch, exploring the alchemy of attraction, the lust for life, embracing community and calling out the patriarchy. With a healthy dose of playfulness and fun thrown in.”

That sense of fun and openness about everything is central to the albums material. “There is a sense of fun and openness that is central to Social Lubrication, as well. “There’s a lot of lust in this album and taking the piss out of yourself and everyone you know,” Dream Wife’s Rakel Mjöll says. “It’s almost quite juvenile in that way.”

Interestingly, more than ever before, the live show is at the core of the album. “The live show is the truth of the band,” Alice Go says. “That’s at the heart of what we do and of the statements we’re making.” That energetic, pedal-to-the-metal sound explodes through the album’s material — and you can hear it through the loud, dirty riffs and choruses specifically built for dancing and shaking asses together in shared spaces. For the band’s Go, who produced the album, it was important to bottle this joyful, frenetic feeling within each other. “We wanted to get that rawness and energy across in a way that hadn’t been done before,” she says.

The live show is where the band and fans come together in shared moment of community. And to that end, the album is a celebration of community and a big ol’ middle finger to the societal barriers enforced to sever connection, playfulness, curiosity and even sexual empowerment. “Music is one of the only forms of people experiencing an emotion together in a visceral, physical, real way,” says Go. “It’s cathartic to the systemic issues that are being called out across the board in the record. Music isn’t the cure, but it’s the remedy. That’s what Social Lubrication is: the positive glue that can create solidarity and community.” 

“The album is speaking to systemic problems that cannot be glossed over by lube,” the band’S Bella Podpadec says. “The things named in the songs are symptoms of f-ed up structures. And you can’t fix that. You need to pull it apart.”

Late last year, I wrote about “Leech,” an urgent, post-punk inspired ripper that saw the band’s Mjöll alternating between spoken-word-like delivery for the song’s verses and feral shouting for the song’s choruses. Mjöll’s vocal delivery is paired with an alternating song structure that features looping and wiry guitar bursts for the song’s verses and explosive, power chord-driven riffage for the song’s choruses. While the song is a tense, uneasy and forceful, mosh pit friendly anthem for our uncertain, fucked up time, “Leech” addresses the inherent double standards of power — while urgently calling for more empathy.”

“It’s an anthem for empathy. For solidarity,” the JOVM mainstays explain. “Musically tense and withheld, erupting to angry cathartic crescendos. The push and pull of the song lyrically and musically expands and contracts, stating and calling out the double standards of power. Nobody really wins in a patriarchal society. We all lose. We could all use more empathy. As our first song to be released in a while, we wanted to write something that feels like letting an animal out of a cage. It’s out. And it’s out for blood…”

The album’s second single “Hot (Don’t Date A Musician)” is a hilarious, Gang of Four-like, tongue-in-cheek ripper inspired by Mjöll’s grandmother’s sage advice — despite the fact that she herself, dated many musicians in her day — while wryly poking fun at musicians and the music adjacent, the band included. “Dating musicians is a nightmare,” Mjöll explains. “Evoking imagery of late night make-outs with fuckboy/girl/ambiguously-gendered musicians on their mattress after being seduced by song-writing chat. The roles being equally reversed. Having a laugh together and being able to poke fun at ourselves is very much at the heart of this band. This song encapsulates our shared sense of humour. Sonically it is the lovechild of CSS and Motorhead. It has our hard, live, rock edge combined with cheeky and playful vocals.”

Directed by Bethany Fitter and featuring a concept by Fitter and the members of Dream Wife, the accompanying video employs the use of the classic, follow the bouncing ball to sing along technique, split with someone swiping on profiles on a Tinder-like app. It’s a send up on dating app life that feels — well, familiar.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Montréal’s Grand Public Shares Shimmering “Lundi normal”

Montréal-based indie outfit Grand Public features a collection of accomplished local players: The band’s frontman and founder Gregory Paquet has played with The Stills, Alvvays‘ Molly Rankin and Peter Peter. The band’s other members, are three childhood friends, who have played together in several bands, including Reviews, an act that has played with JOVM mainstays Corridor, Omni, and others.

Grand Public took advantage of pandemic enforced downtime to refine their sound and write material, including their four-song Dominic Vanchesteing-produced mini album Idéal Tempo. Slated for a March 24, 2023 release, Idéal Tempo reportedly sees the Montréal-based outfit pairing angular guitar textures, ethereal melodies and hypnotic rhythms with explosive release of tension.

The mini EP’s second and latest single “Lundi normal” features reverb-drenched, angular guitar attack, ethereal vocals and rousingly anthemic hooks paired with a propulsive rhythm section. “Lundi normal” sonically recalls Junior-era Corridor but rooted in surrealistic, seemingly stream-of-consciousness lyrics.

Shot in Nouveau Système Beaubien, a famous, old-fashioned Montréal-based greasy spoon, the accompanying video captures the band’s members hanging out and bullshitting on a regular and seemingly cold Monday.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Nicholas Allbrook Shares Shimmering “Jackie”

Nicholas Allbrook is an acclaimed Western Australian-born and-based singer/songwriter, multi-instrumentalist. painter and producer. Since starting his artistic career, Allbrook has brought community and collaboration to the forefront of his artistic and creative method — both as a solo artist and with POND. Allbrook has also collaborated with Aussie and international acts alike. including King Krule, Cate Le Bon, Cuco and Holy Fuck among others.

Through his career, Allbrook has shown a deep understanding of the human experience and the importance of art in modern society. His fourth solo album, the Allbrook and Nathaniel Hoho (a.k.a. HOKO) co-produced Manganese is slated for a July 9, 2023 release through Spinning Top Music . The album reportedly is a psyche pop wonderland that captures the sound of a musician with a symphony in his back pocket, a thorough history of 80s Oz-rock in his rearview mirror and modern Australia in his sights.

“Jackie,” Manganese‘s latest single is a mid-tempo, swooning ballad centered around twinkling synths, strummed guitar, a sinuous bass line and a rousingly anthemic hook paired with Allbrook’s plaintive vocal. Seemingly indebted to 80s pop, “Jackie” is a bittersweet song that grapples with loss, grief and hope for peace in the afterlife — or whatever is beyond this.

“This song is about my friend (whose name isn’t Jackie) who died in 2021,” Allbrook explains. “She was fantastic and the news left me with familiar feelings of guilt and regret and ‘why didn’t I do more or know better?’ I don’t usually get hit with creative bolts while running, but by the canal once in London I was struck with the hopeful image of her rowing away from the earth that had been so hurtful and hard, on a black lake surrounded by stars, finally finding peace and silence. It felt nice to think about death like that, bathed in pale silver light rather than just cold. I got lots of instrumental help from Nathaniel Hoho, who bizarrely and brilliantly put in the nature documentary voice about the giant panda which should never work but somehow does.”

Directed by Alex Haygarth, the accompanying video for “Jackie” is split between Allbrook in full Thin White Duke mode, playing acoustic guitar while bathed in spotlight with flecks of starlight around him. We also see drag performance artist Ash Baroque expressively dancing and lip synching to the song, making the video seem as though it’s a duet between two dear friends — one just departed, one still here in the mortal coil.