Category: New Video

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Canadian/American Duo Ritual Wave Share Sultry “My Sin”

This week is an extraordinarily busy week as I’ve been covering this year’s New Colossus Festival. So I haven’t been posting with the same regularity as I’d normally would. But I’m seeing live music and doing that valuable in-person networking one has to do to get by. And I’m having a ton of fun doing so. But as always, let’s get to the business at hand . . .

Ritual Wave is an emerging post-punk/dark wave duo featuring Toronto-based Judy Karacs and San Diego-based John Goodman. The Canadian/American duo bonded over a mutual love and appreciation for similar styles of music, which led to their collaboration together. Although they’ve been working on material since 2018, the duo’s work sonically sees them combining elements of old school post-punk with melodic dark wave undertones.

“My Sin” their second official single together as Ritual Wave features Karacs’ sultry cooing over glistening and icy synth arpeggios, a propulsive, angular bass line and subtle industrial clang and clatter. Sonically, “My Sin” — to my ears at least — recalls Cocteau Twins, Depeche Mode and the like, but fueled by a desperate, obsessive desire.

“My Sin” as the Canadian/American duo explain uses religious themes as a metaphor to express the psychological torment and destruction of a person willing to sacrifice everything in order to be loved. And as a result, the song explores the darkest sides of obsession, control and desire as is relates to romantic affairs.

“This track was really a labour of love for us. We actually wrote ‘My Sin’ very quickly, in 2018, but ended up re-working, re-recording and re-editing it ’till we finally decided it was ready,” Ritual Wave’s Judy Karacs explains in press notes. “With the lyrics and melody I really wanted to explore the subject of obsession and how that impacts the human psyche. I likened these feelings to a strong religious devotional experience. It was the idea of having such a profound faith in someone that you were willing to sacrifice everything just to hold onto what they made you believe was love. Obviously, this belief was based more on unhealthy fixation and desire instead of genuine love.”

Edited by Ritual Wave’s Judy Karacs, the accompanying visual is shot in a gorgeous and sultry black and white, and evokes the song’s central themes: lust and obsession through religious metaphors.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Liz Lamere Shares Sultry, Boxing-Themed Visual for Thumping “Lights Out”

I’m grateful for New Colossus Festival’s triumphant return this week. But as you can imagine, it means that this week I’ll be very busy running around Manhattan’s Lower East Side to cover shows; chatting and bullshitting with friends and colleagues; and of course, doing that valuable in-person networking that has been hampered by the pandemic. I’ll be posting when I can; it’ll just be kind of sporadic.

But let’s get to the business at hand . . .

Liz Lamere is a New York-based singer/songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, who has had a lengthy career playing drums in several local punk bands — and perhaps more famously for collaborating with her late partner, the legendary Alan Vega on his solo work for the better part of three decades.

Lamere finally steps out into the spotlight as a solo artist with her solo debut Keep It Alive. Written and performed entirely by Lamere, Keep It Alive was recorded in her Lower Manhattan apartment during pandemic-related lockdowns in the same space where the Suicide frontman constructed his light sculptures. Keeping it a family affair, the album was engineered by Vega and Lamere’s son, Dante Vega Lamere — and then co-produced by Lamere and The Vacant Lots‘ Jared Artaud.

“There’s something very magical about creating music in the same environment where Alan created his visual art,” Liz Lamere says in press notes. “His energy is pervasive and is inevitably infused in the recordings.” She continues “ We were living through unprecedented times and Keep It Alive took adversity and uncertainty and turned it into a message of resilience and empowerment.”

The album’s material reportedly courses with the bold and defiant energy that motivated a young Lamere through her early double life as a Wall Street lawyer by day and a downtown New York musician, before she met and fell i love with Vega. Her relationship with Vega led to her becoming his manager, creative foil and keyboardist on his solo work including albums like Deuce Avenue, Power On To Zero Hour, New Raceion, Dugong Prang, 2007, Station and IT, as well as the posthumously released, lost album Mutator, which lead to the Vega Vault, which she curates with Jared Artaud.

After Vega’s death in July 2016, Lamere found it cathartic to write down thoughts and observations in notebooks. Simultaneously, she and Artaud had started working together on overseeing the mastering of IT and the production and mixing of Mutator. Interestingly, during this very busy period, the pair discussed working together on her own solo material.

Keep It Alive‘s first single, “Lights Out” is a swaggering banger, featuring tweeter and woofer rattling 808s, glistening and melodic synth washes paired with Lamere’s coolly delivered boxing and fighting metaphors. While centered around a gritty and familiar, in-your-face, New York aggression, “Lights Out” is an upbeat, life-affirming song that will give you the energy to keep on fighting the necessary and good fight.

Interestingly, “Keep It Alive” is a homage to a song on her late husband’s New Raceion that has a deep and significant meaning for her. It was one of the key lines she would chant on stage, becoming a staple of their live performances together. The main theme and vision of the album is preserving your own inner fire. “Alan always encouraged me to make my own music, and I’ve waited until the time was right as I’ve been dedicated to preserving Alan’s vision and building his legacy,” Lamere says.

Lamere is an avid boxer, who has been involved in the boxing world for over fifteen years. And the Jenni Hensler-directed video for “Lights out” was fittingly filmed on 8mm film at New York-based Trinity Boxing Club. The sultry video features Lamere and a collection of men and women of various ages and backgrounds at the punching bag and sparring to strobe lights, while others dance along.

“’Lights Out’ was the very first track I wrote,” Lamere says in press notes. “You write about what you know. It’s boxing themed. When you step in the ring your life is literally on the line. ‘Let your hands go’ is a boxing term and my mantra for going full tilt in whatever I’ve set out to do.” 

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Montreal’s Tess Roby Shares an Intimate Visual for Dreamy and Meditative “Up 2 Me”

This week will be very busy: I’ll be attending and covering this year’s New Colossus Festival. So while they’ll be posts, I probably won’t be posting with the same regularity this week — but it’ll be worth it. But in the meantime, let’s get back to business around here:

Montreal-based singer/songwriter and producer Tess Roby is a classically trained vocalist and self-taught synth player, who has developed and honed an exploratory sound and approach that blur the lines between pop, ambient electronica and alternative folk with an emphasis on voice as an instrument. 

Roby’s sophomore album Ideas of Space is slated for an April 22, 2022 release through the Montreal-based artist’s own label SSURROUNDSS. The album reportedly sees Roby moving towards full artistic independence with the Montreal-based artist acting as songwriter, producer, musician, video director and art director. 

Ideas of Space features guest spots from BRAIDS‘ Austin Tufts, Joseph Shabason and Ouri, who contribute drums, woodwinds and cello respectively, adding intricate textures to material centered around fuller-bodied production and expansive song structures. The album’s songs shift effortlessly from jubilant highs to contemplative lows, evoking the concepts of duality, which run throughout the album’s material. 

Last month, I wrote about the mesmerizing album title track, the Kate Bush and Flourish//Perish era BRAIDS-like “Ideas of Space,” which featured glistening and looping synth arpeggios, dramatic drumming and Roby’s achingly plaintive vocals. “‘Ideas of Space’ signals the beginning of a new chapter. This song is hypnotic and sinuous, and sonically possesses a certain power and urgency,” Roby says in press notes. “When I listen to it I imagine vast landscapes, a climb, a journey. Two distinct voices speak to each other; one lost, questioning, and the other guiding the way. I wanted to visually represent those voices and the journey I was on while making this album; one of self-discovery, hardship, adventure and in the end, confidence and strength.” 

Ideas of Space‘s second and latest single “Up 2 Me” continues a run of mesmerizing and dreamy material, centered around glistening synth arpeggios, propulsive and skittering beats programmed by BRAIDS’ Austin Tufts paired with Roby’s plaintive vocals.

The accompanying visual for “Up 2 Me” was shot on grainy VHS and is an interview look into Roby’s creative process (to some degree) as we see a black-clad Roby in the studio playing the song, thinking and dancing along to music, as well as the Canadian artist in a snow covered field gently swaying.

“The making of this song was very meditative. It was the first song I wrote following a situation that had taken a toll on my mental health, and had kept me out of the studio for a long time,” Roby explains in press notes. “The first iteration came in the summer of 2020, and it rested as an instrumental demo for a while. When I was close to finishing the album, I searched through all my recordings to find a final track – this one stood out to me. I wrote the vocal melody and arranged the song, then brought the instrumental to Austin Tufts along with a beat and asked him to program and expand on the idea. At this point we had been working together for a while and he was totally immersed in my sonic universe and knew the mood I was after. When I first heard the track with the drums, it was early Spring in April 2021. Montreal had this ridiculous 8pm curfew– it was 7:30pm or so and I left my apartment so I could listen outside. The sun was setting, the streets were empty, and I listened to the track on repeat until I had to run home.” 

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Ed Schrader’s Music Beat Shares a Cinematic and Eerie Visual for Brooding “European Moons”

Baltimore-based post-punk duo  Ed Schrader’s Music Beat — Devlin Rice and Ed Schrader — will be releasing their fourth album, Nightclub Daydreaming is slated for a March 25, 2022 release through Carpark Records.

The album and its material can be traced back to 2019 when Schrader and Rice began initially writing song with the idea of making a fun, danceable album. Along with touring drummer Kevin O’Meara, the members of Ed Schrader’s Music Beat road-tested the material while on tour with Dan Deacon in February 2020. 

As we all know, the COVID-19 pandemic brought most aspects of our lives to a screeching halt. But as it turns out, sadly, that Dan Deacon tour was one of the last experiences that Schrader and Rice had with O’Mera, who died in October 2020. O’Meara’s death weighed heavily on their minds as they finished working on the album. Understandably, it was an unshakeable moodiness and heartache. As Schrader puts it, “The cave followed us into the discotheque.”

They then went to record and mix Nightclub Daydreaming over a breakneck two-week period with Craig Bowen at Baltimore’s Tempo House. The end result wasn’t the album of “sunny disco bangers” that Rice says the band originally set out for, but something that turned out far deeper and darker. Their long-held reputation for whiplash-inducing stylistic shifts between aggressive and noisy rock and operatic, gloom pop have given way to a single aesthetic that seamlessly fuses those different impulses within propulsive, stark arrangements. 

“The fun thing about this record is that it’s all at once informed by our more recent lush productions with Dan Deacon, yet spartan and boiled-down, exuding a coldness wrapped in ecstasy, following our time honored trend of never giving people what they expect, but hopefully what they want,” says Schrader.

The Charm City-based duo started off this year on an explosive and attention-grabbing note: Back in January, they released two singles off the album and announced the dates for an extensive Spring 2022 tour that includes an April 23, 2022 stop at Union Pool.

Last month the pair released Nightclub Daydreaming‘s third single.

As for the singles:

  • “This Thirst” is a sleek post-punk ripper centered around angular guitar attack, a forceful motorik groove, a rousingly anthemic synth-led chorus and Schrader’s cool yet urgent delivery. The song’s narrator finds his irresistible urges leading him through a surrealistic, chemical-fueled fever dream of desperate back-alley bartering and scheming, uncertainty and existential threats. 
  • “Berliner,” is a dark and brooding bit of post-punk centered around rumbling and distorted bass, scorching angular attack and unrelenting four-on-the-floor paired with Schrader’s coolly delivered baritone. Much like its immediate predecessor, “Berliner” evokes flop sweat and bleary-eyed late nights fueled by booze and drugs, lingering ghosts, and fever dreams. 
  • “Echo Base,” a song that’s one part lingering ghosts, self-flagellation, bitter regret and simmering frustration centered around an icy facade. 

Nightclub Daydreaming‘s fourth and latest single “European Moons” is a slow-burning, brooding meditation centered around Schrader’s achingly plaintive and exhausted baritone, shimmering guitars, and dramatic drum rolls. Much like its immediate predecessor, there’s regret and simmering frustration — but it hides a sense of repression and uncertainty.

Directed by Jay Buim, the accompanying visual for “European Moons” features a stylish title card by Susan Juvet and follows a blonde bobbed haired woman entirely clad in black, also played by Juvet, who walks through an abandoned underground bunker facility with abandoned 60s and 70s office equipment. Superficially, she seems bored and disinterested but throughout the video her behavior seems unnatural and forced, as though she’s attempting to repress and then bury something deep within herself.

Right before the members of Ed Schrader’s Music Beat are about to embark on their tour to support the album, Schrader issued a personal statement about their gender identity, which I’ve included in full, below:

“In the past few weeks, I’ve made a big decision. I’ve decided to give you the full me. I’ve decided to speak openly about something that I had never spoken to anyone about. The me that I’ve been repressing in hopes of not making other people feel uncomfortable. But that’s not a life—that’s an inhumane purgatory that I am done subjecting myself to. 

That said, I have always felt like a woman and my pronouns are they/them.

“The stage and the studio have always been a safe space for me, where I can share my deepest struggles, joys and laughs. In your art, you can’t lie. That’s why I have always chosen riddles and cryptic lyrics in my art. I could never lie, but I could disguise the truth.

With Nightclub Daydreaming I continued this precedent, essentially telling my autobiography through fictional characters and surreal landscapes. But these are the stories of my fear, my neuroses, my ecstasy and my journey. 

The first single off of the record, ‘This Thirst,’ is about the thirst for my true self, and features the first time I ever referred to myself as a woman: “Who will rock you to the fire / Who’s the priestess to ordain?” 

On ‘Black Pearl,’ I sing of two lovers disconnected by an ocean, representing the personal dichotamy [sic] between my true self and who I was presenting to the world. In retrospect, you can hear the yearning as I sing “I want to see you really…a foreigner, even home now / I shut in vaults to heal you.” I was the foreigner whom no one had ever met, besides my bathroom mirror. When home alone, I would wear women’s clothing, put on makeup, blast M.I.A. and Yelle, and somehow this felt like a crime that no one would ever accept.

You can hear both my euphoria and trepidation on songs like ‘Berliner.’ Deep down, I was beginning to feel my real self emerging in an undeniable way, and I was horrified by it. It felt as if others held the key to my own self worth through their acceptance, or lack thereof. 

On ‘European Moons,’ which we release today, I depict myself as a marionette, at the whims of a puppet master forcing me to present a distorted and untrue version of myself. “My posture’s at your strings / too much of coded sighs / I’d like to see you in the night.” It was my true self that I could only see at night. 

I have always felt like a woman and, moving forward, I will begin following that path one day at a time. Only the future knows where exactly that path will lead me, but I’m doing it my way. I will no longer only see my true self at night.

Video by William Ruben Helms

Lyric Video: Hamilton’s Ellevator Share Swooning and Anthemic “Sacred Heart”

Hamilton, Ontario, Canada-based indie rock outfit Ellevator — currently Nabi Sue Bersche (vocals), Tyler Bersche (guitar) and Elliott Gwynne (bass, synths) — have received attention in their native Canada and elsewhere for a developing and honing a sound and approach that draws from late-aughts guitar music, post-rock, U2, Peter Gabriel, Kate Bush, Feist, Spoon and Death Cab for Cutie paired with lean, razor sharp hooks, sweeping crescendos and Bersche’s sultry, pop star vocals singing increasingly earnest lyrics, which thematically touch upon power, love and loss from deeply lived-in, personal reflections and experiences.

Ellevator’s 2018 self-titled EP amassed over a million streams across the digital streaming platforms. Adding to a growing profile. the band toured across North America with the likes of Our Lady Peace, Matthew Good, BANNERS, Cold War Kids, JOVM mainstay Rich Aucoin, Dear Rouge, Bishop Briggs, Arkells and Amber Run. 

The Hamilton-based outfit’s long-awaited, full-length debut, the Chris Walla-produced The Words You Spoke Still Move Me is slated for a May 6, 2022 release through  Arts & Crafts. The 12-song album reportedly see the band documenting universal experiences like existential longing, romantic power struggles, the never-ending work of true self-discovery and the personal and highly specific – in particular, Nabi Sub Bersche’s experiences entering into and escaping a religious cult.

Late last year, I wrote about The Words You Spoke Still Move Me‘s first single, “Easy,” a song that revealed a band that not only making a bold decided step forward in their sound and approach, but a band embracing that they’re a rock band with the band balancing deliberate craftsmanship, earnest and lived-in lyrics, enormous hooks and raw and passionate performances with a slick studio polish in a way that reminded me of 80s pop and Deep Sea Diver‘s impressive Impossible Weight. 

“Easy” draws directly from Nabi Sue Bershe’s life: For a period of her life, the Ellevator frontwoman was a member of a religious cult, and the song is a rumination on the good and evil things we are raised to believe without question. “I was raised in the world of charismatic Christianity – an offshoot of Pentecostalism,” Ellevator’s Nabi Sue Bersche explained. “God was magic and prophetic ecstasies happened every Sunday. As a child, I spoke in tongues and prayed until my body swayed with a gentle force like wind knocking me backward. A deep and abiding love of the natural world took hold of me. I witnessed firsthand the wild power of music – how it could uplift, ensnare, console, inspire.

“When I was 17 I moved to the other side of the world and joined what would most accurately be described as a cult. I prayed for strangers I met in parking lots. I shut my eyes and read the dappled light between my lashes like tea leaves that could divine the future. Vulnerability was a badge in that community so I learned to overshare. Teachings were given in the language of freedom while the stiff hand of purity reduced my body to a shameful temptation. Growing up like that gave me a love of music, a nose for bullshit, and a lot to unravel. This song is about the good and evil things we are raised to believe. I was held captive by an ideology that severely limited my life and my perspective of the world around me. It’s a process I’m still in the middle of, this work of extraction.”

The album’s second and latest single “Sacred Heart” continues a run of slickly produced yet dramatic, radio rock with enormous, arena rock-like hooks, earnest and lived-in lyrics that to my ears brings John Mellencamp, Rod Stewart’s “Young Turks” and Stevie Nicks to mind, thanks in part to an expansive arrangement featuring slashing power chords, twinkling keys, and Nabi Sue Bersche’s yearning and plaintive vocals. At its core, the song details a swooning, young love in its guilelessness, passion, fearlessness and uncertainty. (From experience love — particularly young love — is all of that and then some.)

“This one’s a love song about how intimacy and deep knowing can make it feel like there’s nothing left to discover, and choosing to push on anyway in search of new depths, “Ellevator’s Nabi Sue Bersche explains. “Ty [Tyler Bersche] (guitar) and I got married on a cold spring morning when I was 22 and he was 19. There wasn’t much chance to sell each other on our own myths, to be the mysterious stranger from outta town: we wrote our origin story together. Learning to love each other better has been a strange journey and the great gift of my life.”

Directed and shot by Cam Veitch, the accompanying lyric video for “Sacred Heart” features intimately shot footage of the band playing the song live. “We shot, edited, and delivered the whole thing in less than 24 hrs,” Nabi Sue Bersche adds. “We’ve made a bunch of videos that I’m proud of but this one touches something special: we wanted to show what it feels like to play live as Ellevator, in all its sublime chaos, and I think we captured the lightning.”

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Tanika Charles Teams Up with DijahSB on a Strutting and Triumphant Bop

Two-time Juno Award-nominated and Polaris Prize listed, Toronto-born and-based Trinidadian-Canadian singer/songwriter Tanika Charles spent a formative part of her life in Edmonton, when energy sector opportunities brought her family there. But whether they were in Toronto or Edmonton, music was a constant presence in the Charles household: Her father would return from two weeks on site with the latest jazz records for Tanika and her brothers to play and jam out along.

Several years later, Tanika’s eldest brother would be the first to coach her on how to sing and how to record a song. As a young adult., Charles relocated to Vancouver, where she picked up gigs as a backing vocalist and got a taste of tour life. When she returned to her birthplace, the Trinidadian-Canadian artist’s long-held dreams of becoming a professional artist began to come to fruition: She assembled her first backing band, and with that band recorded her debut EP What? What! What?! With the release of her debut EP, Charles quickly became a local scene fixture.

Back in  2016, Charles independently released her full-length debut Soul Run within her native Canada. The album was sensation nationally, with the album receiving a Polaris Music Prize nomination and a Juno Award nomination for Best R&B/Soul Recording of the Year. The following year, Italian purveyors of funk and soul Record Kicks released Soul Run internationally to critical applause from the likes of Exclaim!, Music Republic Magazine and others. Album singles like “Endless Chain,” “Love Fool,” and album title track “Soul Run” received regular radio rotation on stations across Canada, the US, the UK and France.

Charles’ sophomore album, 2019’s The Gumption was released through Record Kicks. The 12-song album picked up where Soul Run left off, further establishing the Canadian artist’s sound and approach in which classic soul is mixed with modern production. Thematically, the album saw Charles tackling moments of vindication, uncertain love, forbidden fruit and the state of the world. “It’s a little more mature,” Tanika said at the time. ““It’s not feeling guilty about being up front, not being afraid to address situations that aren’t comfortable for me. I’m comfortable in my skin now in a way I never was before.” The Gumption was long-listed for the 2019 Polaris Music Prize and nominated for the 2020 Juno Awards R&B/Soul Recording of the Year.

Along with her latest backing band, The Wonderfuls, Charles has toured across Canada and eight other counties to support Soul Run and The Gumption. Those tours have prominently featured stops across the local, national and global festival circuits, including Rennes Trans Musicales, NXNE, Lärz Fusion, Pop Montreal, Canarias Jazz Festival, CBC Music Festival, TD Toronto Jazz Fest, Birmingham’s Mostly Funk, Soul and Jazz Festival, the Pan Am Games and a list of others.

The Canadian artist’s music has appeared on HBO’s Less Than Kind, ABC’s Rookie Blue, The CW’s Seed, CTV’s Saving Hope, CBC’s Kim Convenience and Workin’ Moms and a nationally broadcast KFC ad campaign. She also has appeared as a reoccurring guest on CBC Kids and as a lounge singer on Global TV’s Bomb Girls. Between a busy schedule as a touring musician, Charles appeared in the touring production of Freedom Singer in 2017. She returned to that role in February 2019’s Now We Recognize. 

Charles’ third album Papillon de Nuit: The Night Butterfly is slated for an April 8, 2022 release through Record Kicks. The album, which features guest spots from Toronto-based emcee DijahSB and multi-disciplinary artist Khari McClelland was written and recorded during and after pandemic related lockdowns and restrictions. Much like its immediate predecessor, the forthcoming album is reportedly anchored in growth and maturity. 

The album’s title is derived from an unlikely source, a creature that soars after the sun has set, but often goes unnoticed until light is shone on it. Referred to as “papillon de nuit” by some, the animal is more commonly known as a moth, possibly revealing a linguistic bias. “I always thought it was a strange insect,” the acclaimed Canadian artist says in press notes. “Once while in Paris, a friend swatted at one and I asked: ‘Was that a moth?’. I was told: ‘No, that’s a papillon de nuit.’ I thought that was the most beautiful description for this otherwise overlooked creature. When I later learned of the symbolism associated with it, I felt that really spoke to both my own situation and also what we’ve all been going through.”

Last month, I wrote about the funky, old-school soul-inspired bop “Rent Free,” a fiery tell-off to the energy sucking vampires, deadbeats, naysayers, haters, time wasters and other shitty people of life, centered around Charles’ effortless, Motown era-like delivery. We’ve all had those sorts in our lives, and this song is the sort of song that tells you that it’s okay to push those toxic people out of your life for you to feel better — or to succeed.

The album’s latest single “Different Morning” is a collaboration that features Toronto-based emcee DijahSB, whose album Head Above the Waters was featured in Exclaim Magazine‘s Top 50 Albums of the year and landed a Juno Award nomination — and a performance slot at the award show. Sonically speaking, “Different Morning” is a slick and strutting synthesis of Larry Levan-like house and neo-soul centered around twinkling Rhodes, a sinuous bass line, swinging J. Dilla-like beats, and ebullient horn blasts. And over that celebratory two-step inducing production, Charles contributes soulful vocals that gradually build up confidence with a celebratory and triumphant verse from DijahSB.

“So much of our days are spent dwelling on the same mistakes, the same misfortunes. That thing we wish didn’t happen, or what we wish we hadn’t done,” Tanika Charles explains in press notes. “‘Different Morning’ is about starting a new day without that baggage, about finding a way to correct course and move past it. What starts as a pitiful interior monologue evolves into a celebration of getting over that hump by being your biggest cheerleader. DijahSB is someone who was able to carry that triumphant spirit that the second half of the song needed. ‘I’m alive today’ is enough of a blessing, enough of an accomplishment, and enough to be thankful for.”

Directed by Cazhhmere, the accompanying video for “Different Morning” features the Canadian artists in a lush, Alice in Wonderland-like maze at night dancing and rocking out to the song. Shit, I wish I could join them because they’re having fun, and just enjoying the moment.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Plumes Shares a Gorgeous Visual and Single

Veronica Charnley is an acclaimed Montreal-born Paris-based singer/songwriter and guitarist, who is best known as the creative mastermind behind Plumes, a solo recording project that draws from contemporary pop and classical music techniques through critically applauded albums, including her most recent effort, 2019’s Oh Orwell.

Charnley’s latest Plumes single, the breathtakingly beautiful and mournful “When I Walk In” features Charnley’s achingly plaintive and yearning vocals accompanied by an expressive, classical-leaning arrangement inspired by French composer Erik Satie that features equally gorgeous piano by Parisian pianist Manuel Peskine and expressive viola by Canadian violist Jennifer Thiessen.

Directed by Canadian filmmaker Pixie Cram, the equally mournful and cinematic visual for “When I Walk In” features some gorgeous images of the Grand Canyon and its environs split with footage of Charnley on the phone. The visual has a nostalgic weight to it, as it captures fleeting moments of profound beauty and loneliness.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: BADBADNOTGOOD Shares Cinematic and Trippy Visual for Meditative “Open Channels”

Acclaimed Toronto-based jazz outfit BADBADNOTGOOD — currently founding members Chester Hansen (bass), and Alexander Sowinski (drums) with Leland Whitty (sax) — have received attention internationally for jazz-based interpretations of hip-hop tracks, which have allowed them to collaborate with  Kendrick Lamar, Tyler The Creator, Earl Sweatshirt, Denzel Curry, Danny Brown, Mick Jenkins, Ghostface Killah and others — and for a sound and compositional approach that draws from hip-hop, electronica, jazz, acid jazz and prog rock.

Founded by Hansen, Sowinski and Matt Taveres, BADBADNOTGOOD can trace some of its origins to its founders’ mutual love of MF Doom and Odd Future: The band wrote and played a composition based on Odd Future’s music for a panel of their jazz performance instructions, who unsurprisingly didn’t believe the composition had much musical value. Instead of listening to their instructions, the Canadian outfit released the composition as “The Odd Future Sessions, Part 1.”

“The Odd Future Sessions, Part 1” eventually caught the attention of Tyler the Creator, who helped the video go viral. Building upon rapidly growing buzz, the members of BADBADNOTGOOD followed up with their full-length debut, 2011’s BBNG, which featured interpretations of A Tribe Called Quest, Waka Flocka Flame and of course, Odd Future. The band also recorded a live jam session with Tyler The Creator in Sowinski’s basement, with videos from the sessions amassing more than a million views each.

Their sophomore album, 2012’s BBNG2 was recorded over a course of a ten-hour studio session. Featuring guest spots from Leland Witty (saxophone) and Luan Phung (electric guitar), the album was a mix of their own original material, as well as renditions of songs by Kanye West, My Bloody Valentine, James Blake, Earl Sweatshirt and Feist. That year, the band was the official Coachella Festival house band, backing Frank Ocean and Odd Future over the course of its two weekends.

Their third album, 2013’s III featured “Hedron,” which was featured on the compilation Late Night Tales: Bonobo. That year, they also assisted with the composition and production of The Man with the Iron Fists soundtrack. 

The Canadian outfit’s fourth album, 2015’s Sour Soul saw them collaborate on Ghostface Killah on an effort that has been described as a hip-hop album that nodded heavily at jazz. They ended the year with covers of a handful of holiday standards, including “Christmas Time Is Here” with Choir! Choir! Choir!

Leland Whitty joined the band as a full-time member in early 2016, and the band quickly went to work producing “Hoarse” off Earl Sweatshirt’s full-length debut Doris and “GUV’NOR,” a remix, which appeared on JJ DOOM’s Keys to the Kuffs (Butter Edition). Capping off a busy year, they released their fifth album, the somewhat ironically titled IV, which featured Future Islands’ Sam Herring, Colin Stetson, Kaytranada, Mick Jenkins and JOVM mainstay Charlotte Day Wilson. The album was released to critical acclaim and was named BBC Radio 6’s #1 album of the year.

BADBADNOTGOOD’s Talk Memory was released late last year through XL Recordings. Composed in conjunction with legendary Brazilian composer Arthur Verocai, the album features guest spots from Karriem Riggins, Laraaji, Terrace Martin, and a list of others. More so than on their previously released material, Talk Memory sees the acclaim act capturing the focus, energy and improvisation at the heart of their live show on wax.

For the acclaimed Canadian band, a song is a living, breathing entity that naturally changes and evolves as it’s played in different settings. The album’s material plays with that thinking. After years of relentless touring, the band took a pause and looked back at their collective history and experiences before they started out on Talk Memory‘s creative process. At the heart of their new creative approach is a sense of reflection and renewed communication. That, interestingly enough, led to the album’s title.

While much of their earliest released material often took place quickly, the members of BADBADNOTGOOD took on a more deliberate, intentional approach: The album was written over a two year period, with the Toronto-based act expanding upon the album’s material in the studio, rather than on the road.

Last year, I wrote about album single “Beside April,” an expansive and breathtakingly gorgeous composition with a mind-bending and expressive guitar solo in a song that’s one-part jazz fusion, one part Boogarins-like psych rock with a widescreen, cinematic film score. Previously, only available on physical copies of Talk Memory, album single “Open Channels” was recently made available on streaming services with an accompanying visual directed by Sylvain Chaussée.

“Open Channels” is a meditative and expansive, Giant Steps meets Live at the Village Vanguard era Coltrane composition centered around twinkling Rhodes, Whitty’s expressive and mournful sax lines, Sowinski’s delicate drumming. Play this one, close your eyes and reflect on beauty in an ugly and mad world.

As for the video, the mostly black and white visual that begins with the band carrying their instruments through a snow-covered forest before switching to the band performing the song in a bare studio and some trippy footage of the individual members standing in front of psychedelic projections.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: JOVM Mainstays Pastel Coast Share a Playful Visual for Breezy “Helios”

Pastel Coast, led by  Boulogne-sur-Mer, France-based creative mastermind Quentin Isidore (vocals, guitar) and featuring Benjamin Fiorini (drums), Ingrid Letourneau (keys), Marion Plouviez (guitar, vocals) and Renaud Retaux (bass) have received attention both nationally and internationally for breezy yet melancholic sound that’s indebted to the early 90s Manchester scene and to acclaimed French indie act Phoenix. 

2019 was a break through year for the rising French act: their full-length debut Hovercraft landed on Dream Pop Magazine‘s Top 100. Continuing upon that momentum, Pastel Coast released their sophomore album, last year’s Sun, which featured five critically applauded singles:

  • The attention grabbing “Rendezvous”
  • “Dial” a breezy synthesis of New Order and Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix-era Phoenix that evoked the swooning euphoria of new love. 
  • “Sunset,” a glistening and breezy number that’s saw the band meshing New Zealand jangle pop and French pop focused on lovelorn folks racing against time to try to find love before sunset. 
  • “Distance,” a synth-driven numbers featuring angular guitar bursts and a euphoria-inducing hook
  • “Funeral,” an achingly nostalgic song that wistfully yearned for simpler times and the “one that got away.”

“Helios,” is the first bit of new material from the French JOVM mainstays since the release of Sun. Centered around glistening synth arpeggios, Isidore’s plaintive vocals, a four-on-the-floor-led motorik groove, angular guitar bursts, “Helios” sonically — to my ears, at least — recalls fellow JOVM mainstays Yumi Zouma: a winning breezy melancholy that longs for bright sunny, Spring and Summer days, Spring and Summer crushes and flings and the like.

Directed by Robin Larroque and Quentin Sarda, the accompanying visual is a slick and stylish visual that features the members of the JOVM mainstay act performing the song in a studio in front of white walls. Each member of the band has a distinct shade of blue on, which explodes in front of the white background. The band also does some record cover art posing,. And at one point we see plastic balls dumped on top of individual band members. It’s a surreal and playful fever dream that eventually pulls out to see a behind-the-scenes view of the video.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Acclaimed Punk Outfit Grim Streaker Share a Frenetic Visual for “Mind”

Currently split between Vancouver and Brooklyn, acclaimed art-punk act outfit Grim Streaker — Amelia Bushell (vocals), Dan Peskin (guitar, electronics, synths), Bill Dvorak (bass) and Piyal Badu (drums) — initially made a name for themselves playing DIY spaces and venues across North America, sharing stages with METZ, IDLES, Surfbort, A Place To Bury Strangers and a lengthy list of others.

The quartet quickly became known for a precise and frenetic pace, which frequently lays the foundation for Bushell’s explosive stage performances. And along with that, they released two critically applauded efforts — 2017’s Minority Girl EP and 2019’s No Vision, which The FADER called “razor-sharp modern punk that harkens back to the icons of the genre.”

Bushell stepped out into the spotlight as a solo artist with her singer/songwriter side project Extra Special — and in light of the pandemic, she relocated to Vancouver. Interestingly, Bushell’s move to Canada helped channel a new creative process for the band, which included a decided change in sonic direction: Bushell’s performances became more vulnerable, playful yet unsettling. Peskin built a genre-bending band of art punk while Dvorak and Basu locked tightly into pulsating, danceable frameworks.

Recorded at Greenpoint-based Diamond City Studios by Johnny Schenke, Grim Streaker’s latest EP MIND was officially released today through Montreal-based purveyor of all things psych Mothland. The four-song EP is a surreal, subversive effort that reflects on the current state of mental health, laughable social constructs and the inescapable, seemingly infinite working grind centered around a sound that meshes careening disco punk and R&B among other things.

“There has been a constant question of the why/how we create music as we’ve grown together over time,” the member of Grim Streaker say in press notes. “Influences from the punk, no wave and post-punk eras have always created a playground for us to build upon. Much of our latest  songwriting draws from more diverse musical influences delving into the realms of dance, hip hop, funk and industrial. With MIND, each song exists in its own world, pulling sonically from new places with a punk point of view.

“The main theme for MIND is mental health. Finding happiness and mental stability in a world full of socially constructed expectations. Being different and having one’s own unique views and preferences on society and its dwellers. Work and money, being a part of a machine. 

“Most of the EP was written in the pandemic on the internet or right before in NYC. It was recorded alongside Johnny Schenke from the band P.E. at Diamond City Studios in Greenpoint, Brooklyn. It was printed live off the floor wearing masks, with minimal overdubs. We got weird with instrumentation too, using a number of synths, drum machines and even household objects to build up the layers of each song.”

MIND‘s frenetic and uneasy title track “Mind,” features wobbling atmospheric synths, angular and percussive blasts of guitar, a driving motorik-like groove, relentless, metronomic-like four-on-the-four, paired with Bushell’s sultry delivered lyrics on the tenuous hold on reality in the unending grind that sonically brings Gang of Four to mind.

Directed by Stephen Mondics and Devan Davies-Wood, the frenetic and turbulently edited, accompanying video for “Mind” follows a man’s tenuous hold on reality while being a cog in a relentless, profit-making machine.

“‘Mind’ is a uniquely dynamic song,” the video’s directors say in press notes. “We knew the video had to match the song’s frenetic energy in the visuals and pacing, and we wanted to incorporate a narrative based on the themes presented. The visual textures felt right for the song, as they both breathe and feel organic in ways that complement each other so well. The edit matches the pacing of the song perfectly, reinforcing its turbulent nature.”

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: JOVM Mainstays Otoboke beaver Share Anime and Manga Inspired Visual for Breakneck Ripper “I Am Not Maternal”

 Kyoto, Japan-based garage punk act Otoboke Beaver(おとぼけビ～バ～ in Japanese) — Accorinrin (vocals, guitar), Yoyoyoshie (guitar, vocals), Hirochan (bass, vocals) and Kahokiss (drums, vocals) — can trace their origins back to when the band member while being in Kyoto University‘s music club.

The Kyoto-based punk outfit quickly built a profile locally and nationally for pairing incredibly dexterous musicianship with Accorinrin’s confrontational stage presence. But when Damnably Records released the Okoshiyasu!! Otoboke Beaver compilation, Otoboke Beaver began to amass international airplay from BBC Radio 6′s Gideon Coe and Tom Ravenscroft, XFM’s John Kennedy, as well as praise from the likes of Pitchfork, NPR, i-D and The Fader.

Building upon a rapidly growing profile, the band made critically applauded, attention-grabbing appearances across the international festival circuit with stops at SXSW and FujiRock Festival. Their extensive global touring included a sold-out show at London‘s 100 Club. 2018 included an extensive UK tour and a stop at that year’s Coachella Festival.

2019 saw the release of ITEKOMA HITS, an effort that featured “Anata Watashi Daita Ato Yome No Meshi” and “Don’t light my fire,” two feral rippers that possessed elements of noise punk, no wave, prog rock and riot grrl punk, as well as the straightforward yet breakneck “I’m tired of your repeating story.”

At the beginning of 2020, the members of Otoboke Beaver quit their office days jobs in order to embark on a world tour. They completed a two week European tour and were about to embark on their first Stateside tour when the COVID-19 pandemic forced global quarantines and lockdowns. With touring out of the question, the band worked on new material, which they recorded between lockdowns at Osaka-based LM Studio.

The acclaimed, Japanese punk outfit’s newest album Super Champon is slated for a May 6, 2022 release through their longtime label home Damnably. The album’s title is derived from champon, a Japanese word that means a mixture or jumble of things of different types. “It’s a mixture of songs from love to food, life and JASRAC (Japanese Society for Rights of Authors, Composers and Publishers),” the band explains. “Our music is genre-less and has various elements. We hope that it will be our masterpiece of chaos music. It also sounds like champion.” 

Super Champon will feature two singles the band released back in 2020, “I am not maternal” and “Dirty old fart is waiting for my reaction.” “I am not maternal” continues a run of defiantly feminist, breakneck, mosh pit friendly ripper: big power chords, thunderous drumming and shouted lyrics. Play this one as loud as humanly possible.

The accompanying animated visual was created and animated by the band’s Yoyoyoshie and fittingly it’s an explosive array of bright colors, manga and anime-like characters getting fed up over traditional gender roles.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Blake Morgan’s Cinematic Love Letter to New York

Blake Morgan is a New York-born and-based singer/songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, producer and the founder and President of ECR Music Group. In his role as President of ECR Music Group, Morgan’s ideas, opinions and editorials on music and the music business have been regularly published by a number of major media outlets including The New York Times, Billboard Magazine, CNN, Newsweek, Variety, The Hill, NME, The Huffington Post, and The Guardian. He also lectures frequently at The Georgetown University Law Center, California State University, Syracuse University,NYU’s Clive Davis Institute of Recorded Music, American University and his alma mater, Berklee College of Music. His music advocacy has taken him to Capitol Hill numerous times where, as the founder of the #IRespectMusic movement, he continues to fight for musicians rights in the digital age. As a producer, Morgan has collaborated with a who’s who of contemporary music from Lenny Kravitz to Lesley Gore. 

Since the release of 2013’s Diamonds in the Dark, Morgan has been extremely busy: he has a remarkably six-year run of sold-out shows at Rockwood Music Hall that often feature guest spots from a number of Grammy and Tony Award-winning artists, who join him for unique, on-stage collaborations; 150,000 miles of touring and sold-out shows on both sides of the Atlantic; and production work on over 20 albums by some serious A-list artists. 

Late last year, the New York-born and-based singer/songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, producer and music biz exec released “Down Below Or Up Above” to praise from the likes of The Aquarian, Post-Punk.com, Culture Catch and my dear friends at Glamglare. “Down Below Or Up Above” will appear on Morgan’s long-awaited fifth album Violent Delights, which is slated for a May 20, 2022 release through ECR Music Group.

“My Love Is Waiting” is the rousingly anthemic, second single off Morgan’s forthcoming album. Centered around twinkling keys, atmospheric synths, an enormous arena rock friendly hook and Morgan’s plaintive vocals, “My Love Is Waiting” is a defiant and brazenly hopeful love song that’s specifically meant to get people up from their seats to dance and shout along with it. But it’s also the sort of upbeat love song, which views love as the most important force of our lives and that is very rare. Sonically, the song nods at The Police‘s “Every Little Thing She Does Is Magic,” as well as Joe Jackson and JOVM mainstays Palace Winter. And that’s a result of old-fashioned craftsmanship paired with an uncanny knack for a well-placed razor sharp hook. 

“If I had only three minutes to play anyone anything from this new record, I’d pick these three minutes,” Morgan says in press notes. “It’s a brazen love song that dares you not to get out of your chair.” He goes on to add that the song was inspired by more than just the power pop and post-punk influences that he’s best known for. “This track has specific Easter-eggs in it connected to The Police’s ‘Every Little Thing She Does Is Magic,’ a track I’ve been mesmerized by since I was a kid. I hadn’t intended an indirect homage when we recorded it, but there’s some juicy stuff in there if you hunt for it.”

Directed by genre-defying filmmaker Alice Teeple, the accompanying video for “My Love Is Waiting” is shot in a gorgeous, cinematic black and white, and follows a dapper, black suit clad Morgan in a swooning love letter to New York that begins in Coney Island and through the subway system. Inspired by William Friedkin’s classic The French Connection and Jules Dassin’s The Naked City, the video is “classic, old-school New York cinema mixed with rock and roll,” the New York-born and-based Morgan says in press notes. “There are only two characters in it– me, and New York.”

Directly contrasting the dark, 1940s noir aura of “Down Below or Up Above,” “My Love Is Waiting” was shot in daylight, as a way to reflect the hopefulness of the accompanying song. “We wanted motion, propulsion––just like the song itself has. A modern-day music video crossed with Walter Hill’s The Warriors, full of energy, and full of hope,” Morgan continues. “We also wanted to keep to the aesthetic of the whole record, as we did with the first video: one of classic cinema, where you’re not quite sure what decade this video was shot in. Alice and I both live and breathe that stuff. It’s why we have such a short-hand vocabulary when working together.”

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Lyon’s Ashinoa Shares Tribal and Hallucinogenic “Koalibi”

Lyon, France-based experimental synth act Ashinoa quickly exploded into the national and international scene with the release of their full-length debut, 2019’s Sinie Sinie, an effort that saw the French synth outfit establishing a minimalist krautrock sound and approach.

The Lyon-based synth act supported their full-length debut with tours across their native France opening for JOVM mainstays METZ and Flamingods, Warrmduscher, Bo Ningen, Kikagaku Moyo and others.

Ashinoa’s sophomore album L’Orée is slated for a March 25, 2022 release through Fuzz Club. The album reportedly sees the building upon the minimalist krautorck of their debut while taking the listener on a psychedelic journey through the wilderness through shape-shifting electronics.

Primarily centered around a largely synthesizer-driven soundscape, L’Orée‘s material sees the members of Ashinoa exploring a much more natural, organic sound than their previously released work, a sound that at times is percussive and dance floor friendly and other times hypnotic and expansive — and largely inspired by the environment it was written and recorded in. Recorded in a house, tucked away in the French countryside, which bordered on a surrounding forest, the band recalls that the album sessions were spent soaking up their immediate surroundings with a number of collaborators coming in and out to play on the record: 

“The house we recorded the album in was kind of in the middle of nowhere, surrounded by Douglas Pine trees. From this proximity to the forest, we wanted to take our soundscapes to a place we’ve never been before,” the members of the French-based experimental act explain. “Before we were surrounded by concrete, and then far from it. We were looking for a new listening place, to discover new intriguing sounds. We had laid down the basis of the album and then musician friends that would visit us at the time were invited to participate in the making of the album, each one of them bringing a touch of their own.”

So far i’ve written about two previously released singles:

  • Disguised by Orbit,” a L’eclair and Mildlife-like bop centered around cosmic grooves, old school boom bap and Brit Pop swagger
  • “Feu De Joie,” which features some scorching psych rock riffage, twinkling synths and an oscillating beat in a jazz fusion meets psych rock-like jam

L’Orée‘s third and latest single “Koalibi” is a percussive track centered around syncopated polyrhythm, oscillating electronics, a trippy motorik groove and jungle noises — specifically birds and animals calling to each other. Koalibi” is one-part tribal house, one-part acid house one-part psych pop — and entirely danceable.

“’Koalibi’ sounds like the jungle, with animals screaming and birds flying up in all directions. It’s a ritual movement. It’s dancing,” the band says of L’Orée‘s third single.

Animated by Morgane Botella, the accompanying visual for “Koalibi” fittingly features jungle-like imagery with various wild creatures flying, crawling, swimming and climbing through the jungle, as humanoid figures float by on boats. The humanoid figures travel to a mystical spot, where they trip out and dance throughout the night in their boats — as the wind blows through the reeds and grasses.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Belgian JOVM Mainstays Whispering Sons Share Gorgeous Visual for Brooding “Tilt”

Initially started in 2013 as a hobby for its then Leuven, Belgium-based founding members Kobe Linjen (guitar), Sander Hermans (synths), Lander Paesan (bass) and Sander Pelsmaekers (drums), the rising Brussels-based post punk act Whispering Sons have evolved a great deal. As the story goes, the band then-in search of a singer, recruited Fenne Kuppens, who at that point had been uploading covers of bands like Slowdive to Soundcloud.

Already fostering deep ambition, Kuppens rigorously prepared for the gig. “I’d always wanted to sing in a band, but I never had friends who made music, they weren’t in my surroundings,” Kuppens recalled in press notes. “They were talking about this post-punk thing that I’d never heard of before, so I had to read into it. I could see myself in it, I felt the music.”

Leuven is a quiet, European university town and its mainstream-leaning music scene didn’t connect with Kuppens. But after a year studying abroad in Prague, where she immersed herself in the city’s DIY scene, Kuppens was galvanized — and inspired. “I made friends there who did things with their lives! There was a guy who had a DIY record label and who made music, all from his bedroom. I thought, if they can do this, why can’t we at least try?” Kuppens recalls. As soon as she returned from Prague, she relocated to Brussels. The remaining members of the band — Linjin, Hermans, Pelsmaekers and Paesan — later joined her. And immediately, the band quickly began honing their live show and sound. 

Inspired by Xiu Xiu and Chinawoman, Kuppens’ distinctive, low register vocal style emerged early. “I started to feel more comfortable on stage, to express myself more rather than just singing a song,” she says. “I started feeling the music more, identifying more with the sounds and what I was doing.” Kuppens stage presence became known for being transfixing and trancelike, defined by compulsive movements. “People have said it looks like I’m fighting my demons onstage, I guess there’s some truth in that,” she says.

During the summer of 2015, the band went into the studio to record material. “Fenne was really pushing us saying ‘We have to go for it, not just make another demo,” Whispering Sons’ Kobe Linjen recalls in press notes. The result was their goth-inspired debut EP, 2015’s Endless Party EP. Just a few months after its initial release through  Wool-E-Tapes, the Brussels-based post-punk act won Humo’s Rock Rally, one of Belgium’s most prestigious music competitions.

With the increased attention and accolades came bigger shows, bigger tours across Europe and larger crowds. “People started to expect things from us. We had to adapt quickly,” Linjen adds. The demands of a growing profile and the attention brought onto the band, saw the band setting new, more ambitious targets for themselves. While writing new material for the increasingly longer sets their increased status required, they began to grow tired of the limits of post-punk and eagerly sought ways to push past them as much as possible. “We wanted to evolve, we wanted to attract larger audiences and not just play in one scene,” Kobe continues.

The Belgian post-punk quintet released two 7 inches, 2016’s “Performance”/”Strange Identities” and  2017’s “White Noise” — while going through a lineup change: the band’s friend Tuur Vanderborne replaced Paesan on bass. Their Micha Folders and Bert Vliegen co-produced 2018 full-length debut Image was released through  Cleopatra Records here in the States and Smile Records throughout the rest of the world.

Recorded over a ten day period at Waimes, Belgium’s GAM Studios, Image found the band crafting a dark, brooding blend of experimental and frenetic post-punk that expressed the alienation, loneliness and anxiety that each individual member felt when they relocated to Brussels, Belgium’s largest city. Image garnered praise from music press across the globe — and it amassed millions of streams across digital service providers.

Before pandemic-related quarantines, lockdowns and restrictions, the Brussels-based post punk quintet was establishing themselves for a ferocious, must-see live show while sharing stages with the likes of The Murder Capital, Patti Smith, The Soft Moon, Croatian Armor and Editors. “We were very happy with Image, and at that point it was the best thing we could have made,” Fenne Kuppens says. “But from the moment we finished it we started to look at it in a critical way. ‘This is something we should do again. This is something we don’t like.’ So very quickly we found the direction we wanted to go in for the next album.”

During the summer of 2020, the members of Whispering Sons retreated to the Ardennes to work on new material. And in those writing sessions, the band took what they believed were the strongest part of their earliest work and refined them even further, with a focus on their greatest strength — sheer, unpretentious intensity. “We tried to create an album that’s more direct and more dynamic. More in your face,” Kuppens says. 

Kuppens can trace the origins of the lyrics for the band’s sophomore album  Several Others from one sentence she’d scribbled in a notebook “Always be someone else instead of yourself.” “It’s terrible advice,” Kuppens says in press notes. “But it resonated with me and my personal ambitions.” She stared writing about her uncompromising perfectionism that was partially responsible for the band’s success and yet was becoming stifling and overwhelming. “I was at a stage where it was becoming unhealthy. You always think things have to be better, that you can always do more.”

The album, which featured “Satantango” and “Surgery,” went straight to #1 on the Belgian album charts and was released to critical acclaimed across Europe. Their dark and brooding blend of experimental and frenetic post punk paired with their ferocious live shows have helped to cement the Belgian post-punk band’s reputation as one of Europe’s most exciting new bands.

The Belgian act’s latest single “Tilt” was written during the Several Others sessions but was eventually cut from the album because the band felt it didn’t fit in with the rest of the tracks. “Tilt” is a slow-burning and brooding song centered around a sparse arrangement of metronomic-like drumming, twinkling bursts of keys, atmospheric synths, a propulsive and sinuous bass line paired with Kuppens distinctive, baritone-like vocals. With the freneticism dialed down, the introspection behind the lyrics come to the forefront.

“Tilt’ was really a group effort. We had all been working on the song for a long time, trying out different arrangements and different parts, before eventually settling on its final form,” Whispering Sons’ Kuppens says in press notes. “When we went to the studio to record our second album Several Others the track quickly became the odd one out. It became a more intimate and stripped-down version of what we initially intended. We felt that it didn’t fit with the rest of the album, but that it still deserved a release on its own.”

Video by William Ruben Helms

Lyric Video: JOVM Mainstays No Swoon Share Introspective New Single

Formed back in 2016, JOVM mainstays No Swoon — Tasha Abbott (vocals, guitar) and Zack Nestel-Patt (synths, baas) — have developed an established sound that sees the pair meshing elements of dream pop, shoegaze, post-punk and ethereal wave through two releases, 2018’s EP 1 and 2019’s ’s Jorge Elbrecht-produced, self-titled full-length debut. 

Much like countless others across the world, the COVID-19 pandemic, threw the the lives and plans of the JOVM mainstays into disarray” their planned tour to support their full-length debut had to be scrapped entirely. After spending the past five years in Brooklyn, the duo relocated to Los Angeles. And understandably, spending over a year in quarantine-imposed isolation forced the pair to step back and think about their lives in new ways — and to examine the intricacies of going through life as we know it.

The duo managed fro released a couple of singles during the pandemic, including the Siamese Dream era Smashing Pumpkins meets Slowdive like Again,” a single that marked massive, life-altering transitions for the duo: their aforementioned return back West paired with a reworked sound and approach.

As the JOVM mainstays explained in press notes, “This song is about when days begin and end with no real definition. About being stuck in the loop of our life and we can’t get out. It may come to no surprise that this song was written early on in the Pandemic. Before everything shut down, I (Tasha) was constantly moving: work, music, sleep, etc., and being at stand-still all of a sudden was definitely strange (on top of the already terror and stress of the pandemic).”

Interestingly, “Again” will appear on the band’s highly-anticipated sophomore album Take Your Time. Slated for an April 8, 2022 release, the lion share of Take Your Time was recorded by the band in Western Massachusetts, amidst the isolation of pandemic related quarantine — with the band’s Nestel-Patt taking up engineering duties during the initial recording sessions. The album features guest spots from longtime collaborator Jon Smith (drums), along with Furrows‘ and Olden Yolk’s Peter Wagner (guitar). Jake Aaron contributed some additional production and Chris Coady mixed the album, pushing the material into something otherworldly. 

Take Your Time‘s material was conceived and written during both personal and global transitions and turmoil — but while celebrating a joyful acceptance of the paths that have lead each of us to where we are right now. About the album’s themes, No Swoon’s Abbott contends, “We are so hard on ourselves for decisions we made years ago. I have plenty of regrets, but I also see it as a process, and it’s ok that I didn’t realize the hopes and dreams of 20-year old me. What did she know anyways?” 

Last month, I wrote about Take Your Time‘s first official single “Besides.” Centered around Abbott’s plaintive and breathy falsetto, a propulsive rhythm section and intertwined buzzing power chords and twinkling, reverb-drenched synths, “Besides” sonically nods at Beach House, but as the band’s Tasha Abbott explains, the song was inspired by a wild, enigmatic dream she once had in which, while exploring a mysterious cavern, she stumbled upon a secret apparently blissful cult with ambiguous intentions.

“I have some really weird dreams,” Abbott said in press notes. “They are often these wide-ranging sci-fi stories. This song is part 2 of the same dream that inspired a song on our first record ‘Don’t wake up, wake up‘. That dream had ended with meandering into a cave that turned out to be the home to a cult where everyone looked the same and seemed very ‘happy.’ Though, obviously they were not very happy because it was a cult. I eventually got out.”

“Wait to See,” Take Your Time‘s brooding third and latest single is centered around a maelstrom of synths, driving percussion, blown out bass with Abbott’s ethereal vocals floating over the mix, to create a mesmerizing song that’s simultaneously bruising and dreamily introspective.

“This song is about growing up,” No Swoon’s Abbott says in press notes. “
We’re talking to our younger selves who had very specific dreams and ideas of how our lives would pan out. But as we all know, the hopes and dreams we had at 15 are usually not our realities when we grow up.. We could look back and be upset that we didn’t become who we had hoped to be, or we could relish the new ideas and new dreams, and be ok with where we are. This song is about how looking back now, you can see the path that led to where we are now and how we wish we could tell our younger selves to be kind to who we will grow up to be.”