Category: Shoegaze

Video by William Ruben Helms

Live Footage: The Telescopes Perform “You Can’t Reach What You Hunger” and “Something In My Brain” at Tapetown Studios

Currently comprised of founding member Stephen Lawrie and featuring members of One Unique Signal as the live performing band, the Burton upon Trent, Staffordshire, UK-based psych rock/noise rock band The Telescopes originally formed back in 1987 and while inspired by the likes of Suicide, The Velvet Underground and 13th Floor Elevators — and over the course of a number of singles and nine full-length albums, including 1989’s Taste, 1992’s self-tiled album, 2002’s Third Wave, 2005’s #4, 2006’s Hungry Audio Tapes, 2008’s Infinite Suns, 2013’s HARM, 2015’s Hidden Fields and this year’s As Light Returns, the British band has developed a reputation for being arguably one of the more influential noise rock/psych rock bands of their era, seemingly influencing the work of the likes of A Place to Bury Strangers with whom they released a split 7 inch released through Fuzz Club Records, Chain of Flowers, Bambara and others. 

Now, if you’ve been frequenting this site over the past few months, you’d recall that the Aarhus, Denmark-based recording studio  Tapetown Studios  along with Sound of Aarhus have developed a live video series in which they invite national, regional and internationally recognized touring bands to come into their studio during their free time to record a live session. Over the past year, Tapetown Studios and Sound of Aarhus have invited British indie rockers Ulrika Spacek, Gothenburg, Sweden-based trio Pale Honey, and the Bay Area-based JOVM mainstay Tim Cohen and his primary project The Fresh & Onlys. Stephen Lawrie and the members of the touring band were invited to Tapetown to record a session that featured the slow-burning, murky, feedback driven dirge “You Can’t Reach What You Hunger” a song that builds upon a tightly restrained tension until its scorching conclusion; and the forceful and stormy “Something In My Brain.” 

Video by William Ruben Helms

Live Footage: Wolf Alice Performs “Sadboy” on “Late Night with Stephen Colbert”

Currently comprised of founding members Ellie Roswell (vocals, guitar) and Jeff Oddie (guitar, vocals), with Theo Ellis (bass) and Joel Amey (drums, vocals), the London-based indie rock quartet Wolf Alice can trace they origins to when its founding members began the act back in 2010 as an acoustic act. After a period of time, the band’s founding duo decided to add more electric elements to their sound, and they recruited Roswell’s childhood friend Sadie Cleary (bass) and Oddie’s friend George Barlett (drums) to join the band. With the original lineup, the quartet released their self-titled EP, which featured singles “Every Cloud,” “Wednesday,” and “Destroy Me,” and they released a video for “Wednesday.”

2012 saw massive lineup changes for the band — Barlett broke his wrist in 2012 with Joel Amey initially joining as temporary member, who later became a permanent member. Also that year, Cleary left the band to focus on her studies, and the band recruited Theo Ellis to replace her. Despite the lineup changes, the band released “Leaving You,” which wound becoming a viral hit, as it received airplay on BBC Radio 1 and was featured in NME‘s Radar section. Building upon the buzz they received nationally, the quartet toured with Peace, and they began the following year with a session for Huw Stephens’ BBC Radio 1 show.
Since then the quartet have released two EP’s 2013’s Blush and 2014’s Creature Song and two full-length albums — 2015’s critically applauded and commercially successful My Love Is Cool, which featured the Grammy Nominated-single “Moaning Lisa Smile,” a track that peaked at #9 on Billboard‘s Alternative Songs Chart, and their sophomore effort Visions of a Life, which was released earlier this year, and as you may recall I wrote about album single “Heavenward,” a lush, shoegazer single that reminded me of A Storm in Heaven-era The Verve.

The British indie rock quartet are about to embark on a short North American tour, which will feature a December 4, 2017 date at Brooklyn Steel, but before that they made an appearance on Late Night with Stephen Colbert, where they performed the jangling and anthemic album single “Sadboy,” with a swaggering self-assuredness while finding the band gently expanding upon the sound that has won them international attention — the song still nods at A Storm in Heaven-era The Verve; however, to my ears, there’s a subtle hint at Siouxsie and the Banshees and others. 

Video by William Ruben Helms

Live Footage: The Brian Jonestown Massacre’s Anton Newcombe Leads Pure Ensemble 6 at Space Fest 2016

Created by Nasiono Association, Space Fest is annual Gdansk, Poland-based festival of shoegaze, space-rock and alternative rock that features the prerequisite live music, but much like CMJ, Mondo.NYC, Northside Festival and others also features meet-and-greets with legendary and renowned artists, workshops for Polish and other internationally-based musicians, a battle of the bands-like competition for young, up-and-coming bands and more. As an annual celebration of all things psych rock and space rock-inspired, Space Fest in his almost seven year history has gradually become a scrappy yet internationally recognized festival with an increasingly diverse lineup of bands from across the European Union, Poland, the US, Canada and elsewhere. 

One of the festival’s standout highlights over the course of its history is the Pure Phase Ensemble, a collaborative collective that features one permanent member, Karol Schwarz (KSAS), who also manages Nasiono Records, and every year Schwartz is joined by a rotating cast of local musicians and at least one internationally recognized musician, who acts as a guest musical director, mentor and collaborator through a series of workshops and joint songwriting that culminates with the group performing their new material during the final night of the festival. 

Now, if you’ve been frequenting JOVM over the past couple of years, you may recall that during the course of the Festival’s history, they’ve invited the likes of  Spiritualized’s Ray Dickaty, Stereolab’s Laetitia Sadier, Placebo’s Steve Hewitt, Marion’s Jamie Harding, Six by Seven’s Chris Olley, The Bad Seeds and The True Spirit’s Hugo Race and RIDE’s Mark Gardener. Last year, The Brian Jonestown Massacre’s legendary frontman and founding member Anton Newcombe led Pure Phase Ensemble 6 with Serena Maneesh’s Emil Nikolaisen, and the collective managed to impress festivalgoers with a live set that included “God Drugs” a menacing, droning, and murky dirge, consisting of layers fuzzy and distorted power chords, thundering drumming and an almost mosh pit-friendly hook over which Newcombe laconically delivers his lyrics. While forceful, the song manages a lysergic haze. 

Also, every year the organizers create a documentary of the festival and the documentary features brief interviews and live footage with festival organizers, Anton Newcombe, who says that his appearance at last year’s Space Fest was a way to convince and entice establish artists that it’s a serious and growing festival; the UK’s MDME SPKR, Italy’s Be Forest, Germany’s Camera, the Icelandic-German act The Third Sound, Poland’s Wild Books, Lonker See, The Fruitcakes, Rosa Vertov and The Czech Republic’s DIV I DED. Additionally, the video features impromptu interviews with thrilled festivalgoers and more. The documentary offers a glimpse of a rarely seen Gdansk, a city with a burgeoning music, arts and nightlife scene, full of hungry, young creatives  — a marked departure from the city’s long-held reputation as a grim Soviet satellite city. 

Interestingly, the videos serve as a teaser for this year’s Space Fest, which take place the weekend of December 1 – December 2 and will feature Maciej Cieslak of renowned Polish shoegazers Scianka, leading Pure Phase Ensemble 7, Italy’s New Candys, Portugal’s 10,000 Russos, Mugstar, Switzerland’s Blind Butcher, Germany’s Odd Couple, Mexico’s Tajak, the UK’s Dead Rabbits and up-and-coming local acts 30 kilo slonca, and Wilcze Jagondy. 

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: The Eerie Visuals and 4AD Records-like Sounds of Sicilian Shoegazers Clustersun

With the 2016 release of their debut album Out of Your Ego, the Catania, Sicily, Italy-based shoegazers Clustersun, comprised of Marco Chisari (vocals, bass), Mario Lo Faro (guitar) and Andrea Conti (drums), the members of the Sicilian based band quickly established themselves as one of their country’s most buzzed about and promising acts within the contemporary shoegazer scene — and as result of the growing buzz around them, the band was awarded the GLOBUS prize for Sicilian artistic excellence. As the band’s Andrea Conti says of the increasing recognition for their work, “Being cited alongside bands that we love and admire is great motivation to constantly push forward our limits.”

The Sicilian shoegazers’ sophomore effort, Surfacing to Breathe was co-produced by the band and La Casa Al Mare’s Alessio Pindinelli, and the album reportedly finds the band retaining to enormous wall of sound that first caught them attention across Italy and elsewhere, but while gently incorporating elements of psych rock, post-punk and dream pop  paired with lyrics that explore and express melancholy and emotional vulnerability and fragility.  “The sophomore album is a very tough step for every band, especially if it comes after a strong debut, as our Out of Your Ego was,” says Marco Chisari. “We are so much happy and proud of how Surfacing to Breathe came out, mainly because we’ve managed to capture how the band sounds live.” The band’s Mario Lo Faro adds “This album is way fuzzier, more powerful, dynamic, edgy than the debut. Sounds were layered to build a dense, but articulated, sonic wall. Also we recorded the songs from ‘Surfacing to Breathe’ while we were touring so they retain that “live” vibe and power, while Out of Your Ego had more ethereal and ‘light’ tracks.”

Surfacing to Breathe’s latest single “Lonely Moon”  possesses an enormous and enveloping sound featuring layers upon layers of pedal effected guitar chords, a driving groove, ethereal vocals and a soaring hook, and interestingly enough to my ears, their sound is reminiscent of 4AD Records legendary heyday — but underneath the shimmering surface is a melancholy song focusing on its narrators deepest torments and regrets.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Introducing the Dream-like Visuals and Sounds of Montreal Shoegazers Penny Diving

Currently comprised of twin sisters Chatntal Ambridge (vocals, guitar) and Kathleen Ambrdige (bass), both whom were members of The Muscadettes; along with Ambridge’s partner Thomas Augustin (guitar, keys) and Jonathan LaFrance (drums), the Montreal-based indie rock quartet Penny Diving is reportedly a sonic and thematic departure The Muscadettes, with the Ambridge Sisters and company moving a bit from the sunny, surf rock-tinged, garage rock influenced by the Ambridge Sisters’ childhood in California and towards a moodier shoegaze with anthemic hooks as you’ll hear on their debut single “Stella.”

As Chantal Ambridge, the band’s primary songwriter says in press notes of the song and the Philippe Beauséjour aka Phil Console-produced video for the song, “The writing process is intuitive and telepathic almost, and by being this close to one another, it can only enhance the creative output. With “Stella” the pieces quickly fell together, out of the sky, and into my lap. We wanted the video to portray dreamlike visions, because I think a lot of processing happens in dreams, in your subconscious, and if you can somehow tap into that, you can tap into the bigger picture. Bridging the gap between the tangible and intangible.”

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Austin, TX Shoegazers Blushing Returns with Psychedelic Visuals for Shimmering New Single “Weak”

Comprised of two husband and wife couples, Christina Carmona (vocals, bass) and Noe Carmona (guitar, keys)  and Michelle Soto (guitar, vocals) and Jake Soto (drums), the Austin, TX-based dream pop/shoegaze quartet Blushing can trace its origins to the summer of 2015 when its founding member Michelle Soto recruited her classically trained friend Christina Carmona to join her new project, after several years of writing material on guitar.  Soto and Carmona then recruited their spouses to complete the band’s lineup and after about a year of writing and revising their material, the newly formed quartet went into Bad Wolf Recordings to record their debut EP Tether, which was mixed and mastered by Philip Odom and released earlier this year. Now, if you’ve been frequenting this site throughout the course of this year, you may recall that I wrote about the EP’s title track “Tether,” an immersive single that found the band pairing Christina Carmona’s and Michelle Soto’s ethereal harmonizing with shimmering guitar chords and a soaring hook that personally reminded me quite a bit of A Storm in Heaven-era The Verve and Lightfoils’ Hierarchy.  

Energized by the positive reception of their debut EP and a growing fan base, the Austin, TX-based shoegazers armed with a batch of new songs went into the studio to record what would eventually comprise their forthcoming sophomore EP, Weak, which is slated for a January 26, 2018 release through Austin Town Hall Records. And while EP title track and first single “Weak” will further cement the band’s growing reputation for crafting material deeply indebted to Lush, Cocteau Twins, The Sundays and others, complete with some gorgeously lush guitar work, the slow-burning single finds the band at their most direct and anthemic, revealing a gentle refinement of the overall sound that first caught attention. 

Directed, filmed and edited by Blushing’s Jake Soto with additional filming by Eddie Chavez, the recently released video for “Weak” was shot entirely on an iPhone in an Austin, TX-based studio, the video features the members of the band performing the song amidst swirling colors, shadows and lights — and occasionally in trippy slow motion, emphasizing the song’s psychedelic nature. 

Video by William Ruben Helms

Live Footage: Up-and-Coming Swedish Band Pale Honey Perform “Heaviest of Storms” at Tapetown Studios

Now, if you’ve been frequenting this site over the past few months, you may know that the Aarhus, Denmark-based recording studio  Tapetown Studios  and  Sound of Aarhus have a long-running series in which they invite both touring bands to come into the studio for a live session; but along with that the band during their limited downtime would get a unique taste of Aarhus beyond the touring routine of load-ins, sound checks, shows, tear downs, pack ups and van rides to the next gig. Recently, Tapetown Studios and Sound of Aarhus invited Gothenburg, Sweden-based trio Pale Honey for a session — and the trio, comprised of Tuva Lodmark, Nelly Daltrey, and Anders Lagerfors performed “Heaviest of Storms (Devotion, Part 1)” a shimmering and moody track that reminded me quite a bit of early PJ Harvey. 

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

Comprised of Odd Martin Skålnes, best known for his solo project O. Martin and as a member of Aurora’s backing band; Birgitta Alida Hole, a member of Lumkilde; Fredrik Vosberg, a member of The Megaphonic Thrift and Casiokids; and Even Kjelby, a member of Great News, the Norwegian shoegazer act Strange Hellos was started as a studio-based side project back in 2015. And interestingly enough since their formation, the band has received attention from the likes of NME, The Line of Best Fit and others for an anthemic, power pop take on shoegaze that will immediately bring to mind 4AD Records and 120 Minutes-era MTV, complete with enormous, rousing hooks, distortion-filled, jangling guitars and ethereal vocals; in fact, “Gold For The Golden,” the latest single off the Norwegian band’s recently released full-length debut, Chromatic will further cement their growing reputation for crafting anthemic and swooning shoegaze.

 

 

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: JOVM Mainstay Shana Falana Releases Vivid and Surreal Visuals for “Cool Kids” That Focus on Acceptance and Inclusion

Now, if you’ve been frequenting this site for the better part of the past year or so, you’d be familiar with JOVM mainstay Shana Falana, and as you may recall, Falana is a California-born, Upstate New York-based singer/songwriter and guitarist, who can trace the origins of her musical career to  San Francisco‘s D.I.Y. scene, as well as a stint in a local, Bulgarian women’s choir. By 2006, Falana had been in New York for some time and was struggling through drug addiction and financial woes, when she lost part of an index finger in a work-related accident. And under most normal circumstances, the accident for most people would be considered either extremely unlucky and perhaps even tragic; however, the settlement money she received provided a much-needed period of financial stability and a desperately-needed period in which she could get sober and find a new focus in her life and music. You’ll also recall that, her sophomore effort, Here Comes the Wave, which was one of my favorite albums released last year, was conceptualized and written during two different parts of Falana’s life — while she was struggling with drug addiction and trying to get sober, and in the subsequent years that have followed in sobriety. Naturally, the material at points was rewritten, revised and refined with the growing sense of perspective and awareness that comes when you’ve gotten older and hopefully much wiser than what you were. As a result, the material winds up being centered around a universal duality — in this case, how its creator once thought, felt and once was and how its creator now thinks, feels and is. But along with that, the material focuses on transformation as a result of emotional turmoil, the inner strength and resolve to overcome difficulties, the acceptance of time-passing, aging and one’s own impending mortality., as well as the death of her father. 

Falana’s sophomore effort found her continuing her collaborating with producer D. James Goodwin, best known for his work with Bob Weir, Whitney and Kevin Morby and with her long-time partner, collaborator and drummer Mike Amari, with Goodwin and Amari playing much larger roles on the album, as the trio of collaborators boldly went for much more audacious sounds, more heightened moments and an emotional vulnerability — while remaining relentlessly and infectiously upbeat and positive. And in a subtle fashion, the material suggests as TV on the Radio’s Tunde Adebimpe said during last month’s Meadows Festival, “Everything turns out okay in the end. If it isn’t okay now, well clearly, it isn’t the end yet.” 

Waves’ latest single “Cool Kids” while being decidedly among the album’s most shoegazer-inspired tracks manages to be simultaneously meditative and anthemic, as it possesses some enormous and rousing hooks, propulsive drumming and a shit ton of distortion with looped vocals and unsurprisingly, the song has an overwhelming positive message. As Falana explains in press notes, “The song, which I wrote last year, is about embracing yourself and letting go of judgements against others.” As she adds, “Like most of my work, it meditates on one tone, one note, attempting to create a space where people can relax, and dream.”

Interestingly, the recently released Bon Jane-produced video is a mischievous mix of 70s hair product commercials and workout video, as it features a diverse array of people blow-drying their hair in slow motion while on stationary bikes. There’s also a lot of rainbow flag waiving — and of course, Falana herself is seen sporting felt hearts, the same ones that she’s been sewing onto people’s clothing and passing out at her shows. “I’ve been sewing felt hearts onto people’s clothing and asking them to make a pledge to be more vulnerable, empathetic, and to actively take care of others in their communities,” Falana says in press notes. (Of course, the video makes me wish I still had hair; but that’s another issue.) 

In terms of the video, Falana says “This is about as political as I get. This year has forced so many of us to re-proclaim the basics of human rights and decency. It’s been heartbreaking to see so many friends in my local community, who have been under attack and marginalized further, and so how could that not be on my mind when making a video for ‘Cool Kids’?

“When Bon Jane, who brilliantly shot and directed this, and I got together, we both loved the idea of presenting that dreamy, meditative state through people blow drying their hair in slow motion. This video is about re-affirming my belief in the future. During the shoot, we kept calling the group o people on bikes an ‘Army of Love,’ because that’s what we’re doing. Going to war for love.”