Tag: Foo Fighters

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

New Audio: London’s White Lies Releases a Moody and Epic New Single from Forthcoming Album

Slated for a February 1, 2019 release through [PIAS] Recordings, the acclaimed London-based indie trio White Lies, comprised of Harry McVeigh (lead vocals, guitar), Charles Cave (bass, backing vocals) and Jack Lawrence-Brown (drums) will be marking their tenth anniversary as a band — and interestingly, the album reportedly finds the band pushing their sound and aesthetic in new directions with the addition of personal, and at times deeply intimate lyrics written by the band’s Charles Cave. Unlike the preceding albums, the writing and recording process was a Transatlantic one that included a trip to Los Angeles, where they worked on new material with Ed Bueller, who produced the band’s chart-topping debut To Lose My Life and their third album Big TV. Throughout the process, the band enlisted past associates and collaborators to assist on the proceedings including engineer James Brown, who has worked with Arctic Monkeys and Foo Fighters; the renowned producer Flood, who contributes synths and keys on a couple of tracks; and Grammy Award-winning Alan Moulder, who has worked with Smashing Pumpkins, Nine Inch Nails and The Killers to mix the album. 

Clocking in at a little over 7 and a half minutes, the album’s latest single “Time to Give” may arguably be among the most ambitious songs the band has released, as the track is centered around a lush yet moody arrangement of shimmering synths, a sinuous bass line that’s part of a propulsive, motorik groove and soaring, arena rock-friendly hooks paired with McVeigh’s sonorous baritone. And while nodding a bit at Snow Patrol and others, the song seems to focus on a dysfunctional and abusive relationship from a real an lived-in place; in fact, it’s so real that as a result, the song bristles with bitterness, confusion and hurt. 

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Scotland’s The Rah’s Return with a Boisterous and Swaggering Brit Pop-Inspired Single

Last month, I wrote about the up-and-coming  Prestonpans, East Lothian, Scotland-based quintet The Rah’s, and as you may recall, the band which is comprised of founding members Jack McLeod, Jordan McIntyre, Neale Gray and Andrew McLeod, along with newest member Lee Brown have developed a regional reputation for an energetic live show but over the past few years, they’ve been experimenting with their sound and songwriting approach; in fact, “Survival,” was a massive, power-chord based bit of arena rock that sounded as though it were inspired by Kasabian, The Hives, and Foo Fighters. Unsurprisingly, their latest single “Take It All In” follows in a similar vein as its predecessor, thanks to the band’s use of enormous, arena rock power chords and rousing hooks, it also reveals a young band finding a renewed swagger while growing into a unique take of a familiar and beloved sound.

The recently released video continues the band’s ongoing collaboration with Carousel Films finds the band, their friend and associates sneaking into an empty mansion for a live party — in which the band plays — and then quickly sneaking out into the night, presumably before the police show up.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Introducing the Swaggering Arena Rock Friendly Sounds of Scotland’s The Rah’s

The Rah’s are an up-and-coming Prestonpans, East Lothian, Scotland-based quintet, comprised of founding members Jack McLeod, Jordan McIntyre, Neale Gray and Andrew McLeod, along with newest member Lee Brown, who have cited Jimi Hendrix, Arctic Monkeys, The Beatles and The Rolling Stones — and while regionally, they’ve developed a reputation for an energetic live show, over the past few years they’ve been experimenting with their sound and songwriting approach with the result being their anthemic, 90s Brit Pop “Survival,” a massive power chord-based single that sounds inspired by the likes of Kasabian, The Hives, and Foo Fighters.

Filmed and edited by Carousel Films, the recently released video for “Survival” features the band performing over superimposed stock footage of political and social unrest, war, climate change and destruction — all of which echo our current world in an uncanny fashion.

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

Comprised of core and founding members Charlie Hickey (guitar) and Andrew McCarty (drums), the New York-based alt rock act The Soft Underground formed back in 2010, and unsurprisingly the act’s core members quickly began to write, perform and record their own original music. Their creative process typically would have the duo writing and perfecting the instrumentation and arrangements, and then they would cast a guest vocalist, who would work perfectly for each song. Some of their collaborators have included Star & Micey’s Nick Redmond, The StoneCoats‘ Brannon Barnett, Lucero‘s, The Afghan Whigs‘ and Hank Williams, Jr.‘s Rick Steff, and the result was a highly accessible yet unique debut album Lost in Translation, which was released in 2015 to praise from The Big Takeover, Music Street Journal and airplay from Alt Nation.

Slated for a July 27, 2018 release, the duo’s sophomore effort Morning World reportedly finds the duo writing what may arguably be their most personal album to date while continuing their penchant for eclectic variation. As the story goes, the duo spent the past two years laboriously working on the album, doing everything they could to ensure that they expanded their sound and songwriting in new directions; in fact, Morning World‘s latest single “Rachel,” is centered around scuzzy power chords, a propulsive rhythm section and a mosh pit friendly hook that will remind some listeners of mid 90s alt rock — in particular, Deftones, Stone Temple Pilots, Foo Fighters, and In Utero-era Nirvana but with a clean, hyper modern production sheen.

 

 

 

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Introducing the 90’s Alt Rock-Inspired Sound of Dopamine

Consisting of Olly Dean (vocals, guitar), Jonny Wright (bass) and Chris Kidd (drums), the British rock trio Dopamine formed back in early 2015 and since their formation they’ve developed a reputation for a boozy, power chord-based, arena rock friendly sound heavily influenced by the likes of Royal Blood, Kings of Leon, Foo Fighters, Band of Skulls, Silversun Pickups and Nirvana — but while incorporating elements of the blues and country. And as the trio mentioned by email, they’ve just finished their debut EP, which features the anthemic, Ten and Vs. era Pearl Jam and early Soundgarden-like bruiser “Remedy,” a track that the band says is about a familiar situation to some at least — the end of a toxic relationship that in some small and nagging way feels as though it was kind of good.

Video by William Ruben Helms

Live Footage: Introducing the Arena Rock-Friendly Sounds of Up-and-Coming Los Angeles-based duo Migrant Motel

Initially formed back in 2013 in Boston, the Los Angeles-based rock duo Migrant Motel, comprised of Peruvian-born David Stewart, Jr. (vocals, bass, guitar) and Mexican-born Chava (drums and live loops) have developed a reputation for a power chord-based arena rock friendly sound, largely influenced by the likes of Royal Blood, MUSE, The Struts, Grandson, Foals and Foo Fighters. So far, 2018 has been a breakthrough year for the band, as “New Religion,” off their Peder Etholm Idsoe-produced full-length debut Album One has received over 350,000 Spotify streams — and building upon the growing buzz, the band released the album’s second single “Blue,” a swaggering and self-assured track that that will further cement the duo’s growing reputation for crafting an enormous, arena rock sound centered around the blues, rock and metal. 

The recently released video for “Blue” is comprised of live footage shot while the band was relentlessly touring the country — and it gives you a sense of the up-and-coming band’s live set. 

Video by William Ruben Helms

Lyric Video: Portland’s Hemmit Captures Youthful Passion in “Friends”

Keith Fleming is a Portland, OR-based multi-instrumentalist, producer and singer/songwriter, who as a drummer, has had stints touring and recording with The Jonny Cohen Love Machine, John Stabb’s Weatherhead and and others, and for being one-half of highly acclaimed indie rock duo Hemmit, with his longtime collaborator, producer, engineer, songwriter and highly sought-after guitarist Adam Rohosy. Interestingly, Hemmit has had their music featured on MTV, Surfline, Bike TV and have received radio airplay from a number of radio stations across the world; in fact, their fifth album Straight Outta Nowhere saw heavy college radio airplay and attention from critics and fans. 

With the six-song EP One Ultra, the long-awaited follow up to their buzz worthy fifth, full-length album, Hemmit has become a solo recording project featuring Keith Fleming, and the EP reportedly consists of indie rock and guitar pop that blends elements of lo-fi garage rock, power pop and 80s synth rock, largely influenced by Ty Segall, Best Coast, Guided by Voices and Sloan; however, the EP’s first single “Friends” sounds as though Fleming was drawing from 90s alt rock — in particular My Vitriol, Blur, Foo Fighters and others, as the song is centered around enormous power chords, a guitar pyrotechnic-fueled solo, thunderous drumming and a rousingly anthemic, arena rock friendly hook. And while swaggering and self-assured, the song is a breakneck, swooning, “you-were-there”-like recollection of youth and youthful passions 

The recently released lyric video for “Friends” is essentially a time capsule, featuring found footage of young people over the course of the past 30 years or so, being young and seemingly carefree. 

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

If you’ve been frequenting this site throughout the course of this year, you’ve come across a couple of posts featuring the Los Angeles, CA-based indie rock/dream pop duo Alyeska, and as you may recall the duo, which is comprised of Montana-born, Los Angeles-based frontwoman Alaska Reid and Ben Spear derive their name from an archaic spelling of the state of Alaska — and of course, Reid’s first name.

With the release of “Tilt A Whirl,” the first single off their John Agnello-produced debut EP, Crush, the duo began to receive attention across the blogosphere — as well as this site — for a sound that draws equally from 80s post-punk and New Wave, as it did from contemporary indie rock. The EP’s second single “Motel State of Mind,” as a moody and dramatic song that while meant to be a “rip off “rip off The Replacements” as Reid explained in an interview with Billboard, managed to remind me quite a bit of Concrete Blonde‘s “Joey,” complete with a swooning heartache at its core. “Sister Buckskin,” the EP’s third single continued in the 80s post-punk/New Wave/college radio vein, as it managed to remind me of The Pretenders; but underneath the shimmering guitar work and anthemic hooks was a bitter sense of nostalgia over what could have have been — and just didn’t happen.

Since the release of Crush, the duo have gone on to open for the likes of Middle Kids, Frankie Cosmos and Blitzen Trapper but interestingly, the band recently released the EP’s latest single “Stones,” the last bit of music recorded at The Magic Shop, where David Bowie, Arcade Fire, Sonic Youth, Norah Jones, Coldplay and the Foo Fighters once recorded albums. And while further cementing their reputation for crafting hook-laden, anthemic 80s-inspired rock, the “Stones” manages to make a subtle nod to Fever to Tell-era Yeah Yeah Yeahs, as the song features some of the most impressive guitar work on the EP while bristling with a feral sensuality.

 

 

 

 

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

Since their formation in 2015, the Nashville, TN-based (by way of Florida) trio The Delta Troubadours, comprised of Gytis Garsys (lead vocals, guitar, keys), Jon Franklin (bass, vocals), and Ian Heausler (lead guitar, vocals), have developed a reputation across much of the Southeast for a gritty, Southern fried rock meets blues rock sound and for an energetic live set. 

“Stone Thrasher,” the first single off the Nashville-based band’s forthcoming sophomore EP will further cement their reputation for crafting songs with a familiar gritty Southern fried rock meets blues rock sound — but within a decidedly ambitious song structure featuring some incredibly psychedelic-tinged guitar licks, enormous, Foo Fighters-like, arena rock-friendly hooks, and a subtly sinister vibe, reminiscent of Queens of the Stone Age’s Songs for the Deaf. Or in other words, the band kicks ass and takes names  — what else can you want?

 

 

 

 

 

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

 

Featuring members of Swans, Dead Heavens, twelve am flowers and Valley Lodge, Twiggy Branches specializes in swaggering, sleazy and anthemic power chord-based glam rock that sounds indebted to T. Rex, Foo Fighters and others, as you’ll hear on the EPs first two tracks “Never Gonna Be Told” and “Miss Available” off their  latest EP Waste Not, Want More. As the band told me by email, the EP was tracked live in studio, recorded by Paul Kostabi, who has worked with White Zombie, mixed by Violens‘ and Ariel Pink‘s Jorge Elbrecht and mastered by Alan Douches — and as a result, both singles possess a forceful “you-were-there” sort of immediacy that’s rare for contemporary rock.

 

 

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

Initially forming under the name Apteka, the Chicago, IL-based psych rock quartet Pink Frost, currently comprised of founding members Adam Lukas (vocals, guitar) and Paige Sandilin (guitar) and newest members Alex Shumard (bass) and Jesse Hozeny (drums), have released 2011’s debut Gargoyle Days  and 2014’s Sundowning to critical praise both locally and nationally from  Pitchfork, SPIN Magazine, Noisey, Magnet Magazine, and Chicago Reader for a sound that had been compared favorably to RIDE, Smashing Pumpkins, Dinosaur, Jr. and Deerhunter. And adding to a growing national profile, the band had material from Sundowning placed in the major motion picture, The Lookalike and TV series such as The Vampire Diaries and CSI: Miami.

If you had been frequenting this site over the past 2 years or so, you may recall that the Chicago-based band released a painstakingly remixed and re-mastered edition of their debut effort, from the original analog masters to better reflect their live sound at the time — and with artwork reflecting the band’s name change, as a both a metaphorical and literal rebirth. And at the time, I wrote about Gargoyle Days’ second single, the seemingly  The Posies’ “Ontario,” Foo Fighters‘ “This Is A Call” and The Black Angels’ “Telephone“-inspired “Where Days Go.” However, four years have passed since a full-length album of original material from the Chicago-based psych rockers and in that time, they’ve gone through a series of changes that have influenced the band’s songwriting approach, their overall sound and the material’s thematic concerns. Now, as I hinted at earlier, the band went through a massive lineup change — and as the band’s Adam Lukas explains in press notes, Gargoyle Days addresses a collective sense of abrupt changes. “There is a sentimentality or a sense of loss that permeates most of the songs,” Lukas says. “Whether it’s the loss of truth, the ones you love, your place in the universe, or general sense of meaning in changing landscapes.”

The recently released New Minds, reportedly finds the band’s material at points becoming much more introspective — and while the more straight ahead rock-leaning material manages to be heavier and darker, their more spacey, shoegazer-like material manages to be much more introspective and with more delicate melodies. “Bare Roots,” New Minds’ first single was a power chord-based barn-burner that sounds as though it draws from Black Sabbath and Led Zeppelin. And while continuing in a similar, power chord-based, arena rock vein,  the album’s latest single “Seek and Recover” manages to nod at 90s alt rock — in particular Foo Fighters, as the song manages to pair a polished studio sound, a radio-friendly accessibility and an arena rock swagger, completed with rousing hooks.

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

As I’ve mentioned a number of times on this site, I frequently multitask while writing about the various songs, videos and other materials I post — and while at lunch, I was eating, writing about a particular band and once I was finished I stared to tweet about something or another when I came across “Here Comes The Light,” from the Birmingham, UK-based rock duo Glass Cut Kings. Comprised of Paul Cross (vocals, guitar) and Greg McMurray (drums, vocals), the Birmingham-based duo specialize in arena rock-friendly, power-chord based rock that sounds indebted to Silversun Pickups, The Black Keys, Foo Fighters and others, complete with rousingly anthemic hooks. Naturally, what caught my attention was the fact that for a duo, they create an enormous and forceful sound — and those guitar riffs remind me of 70s glam rock.

 

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

Initially forming under the name Apteka, the Chicago, IL-based psych rock quartet Pink Frost, currently comprised of founding members Adam Lukas (vocals, guitar) and Paige Sandilin (guitar) and newest members Alex Shumard (bass) and Jesse Hozeny (drums), have released 2011’s debut Gargoyle Days (under the name Apteka) and 2014’s Sundowning to critical praise both locally and nationally from  Pitchfork, SPIN Magazine, Noisey, Magnet Magazine, and Chicago Reader for a sound that had been compared favorably to RIDE, Smashing Pumpkins, Dinosaur, Jr. and Deerhunter. And adding to a growing national profile, the band had material from Sundowning placed in the major motion picture, The Lookalike and TV series such as The Vampire Diaries and CSI: Miami.

Now, if you had been frequenting this site over the past 2 years or so, you may recall that the Chicago-based band released a painstakingly remixed and re-mastered edition of their debut effort, from the original analog masters to better reflect their live sound at the time — and with artwork reflecting the band’s name change, as a both a metaphorical and literal rebirth. And at the time, I wrote about Gargoyle Days‘s second single, the seemingly  The Posies’ “Ontario,” Foo Fighters‘ “This Is A Call” and The Black Angels’ “Telephone“-inspired “Where Days Go.” However, four years have passed since a full-length album of original material from the critically applauded, Chicago-based psych rockers and in that time, they’ve gone through a series of changes that have influenced the band’s songwriting approach, their overall sound and the material’s thematic concerns. As I mentioned earlier, the band went through a massive lineup change in which the band’s newest members Shumard and Hozeny take prominent roles — and as the band’s Adam Lukas explains in press notes, the album overall addresses a collective sense of abrupt changes. “There is a sentimentality or a sense of loss that permeates most of the songs,” Lukas says. “Whether it’s the loss of truth, the ones you love, your place in the universe, or general sense of meaning in changing landscapes.”

New Minds, the band’s latest album is slated for a June 16, 2017 release and the album reportedly finds the band’s material at points becoming much more introspective — and while the more straight ahead rock-leaning material manages to be heavier and darker, their more spacey, shoegazer-like material manages to be much more introspective and with more delicate melodies. “Bare Roots,” New Minds‘ first single is a power chord-based barn-burner that sounds as though it draws from Black Sabbath and Led Zeppelin, complete with an anthemic hook. And interestingly enough, the song may be the most urgent and forceful song they’ve released to date, echoing our most urgent and forceful time.

World Music by William Ruben Helms

Preview: Secret Solstice Festival 2017

With its inaugural run back in 2014, Reykjavik, Iceland’s Secret Solstice Festival has quickly become one of Iceland’s largest music festivals, featuring a diverse and eclectic array of established and internationally recognized artists, locally renowned acts and up-and-coming artists from all over the globe, performing in one of the most unique backdrops in the entire world – the roughly 72 hour period of near constant daylight Iceland experiences during the Summer Solstice, because of its proximity to the Arctic Circle. (After all, Reykjavik is the northernmost capital and administrative region of the northernmost country in the entire world.) Building upon its growing reputation as one of the world’s most unique music festivals, the fourth edition of the festival may arguably be one of the biggest and most diverse lineups to date as it includes Foo Fighters, Rick Ross, the UK electronic act The Prodigy, The Verve’s former frontman Richard Ashcroft, Pharoahe Monch, Chaka Khan, Foreign Beggars, Dubfire, Novelist, Rhye, Dusky and Chicago house music artist Kerri Chandler. Along with those artists, some of Iceland’s renowned acts, including Högni, Úlfur Úlfur, Amabadama, Emmsjé Gauti, GKR, Tiny, Aron Can, KSF, and Alvia Islandia will be performing. And adding to the 72 hour party vibe, the festival’s organizers have planned a series of electronic dance music takeovers and showcases featuring some of the world’s best party crews – including Ibiza’s Circoloco, Above & Beyond Records’ deep house imprint Ajunadeep Records’ dance floor collective Crew Love, ATG and Dubfire’s SCI+TEC among others.
Interestingly, for the second consecutive year, Secret Solstice is currently the only major music festival in the world to be certified CarbonNeutral®, as the festival sources almost all of their power needs from the use 100% renewable geothermal energy, hybrid vehicles provided by Toyota Iceland – and from offsetting any residual emissions through the purchase of high quality, verified carbon credits. Unlike any other festival I’ve attended or heard of, festivalgoers and artists alike can know that they’re being environmentally responsible while partying and catching some of the world’s most interesting artists. Of course, during a multi-day festival like Secret Solstice, it’s difficult and damn near impossible to catch everyone and everything, so consider me as a helpful guide – with some information on artists I’d love to catch while in Reykjavik.