JOVM’s William Ruben Helms celebrates Yeah Yeah Yeahs’ Nick Zinner’s 49th birthday.
Tag: indie rock
New Audio: JOVM Mainstay MAGON Shares Shimmering and Introspective “I Don’t Take You For Granted”
Over the past handful of years, I’ve managed to spill copious amounts of virtual ink covering the remarkably prolific Israeli-born singer/songwriter, musician and JOVM mainstay MAGON. Now, if you’ve been frequenting this site during that particular period, you might recall that shortly after the release of his fifth album, A Night in Bethlehem, the Israeli-born artist, along with his partner and young daughter relocated to Costa Rica, where he continued an ongoing period of remarkable prolificacy with his sixth album, Did You Hear the Kids?
Did You Hear The Kids? featured what may arguably have been the broadest and most expansive sonic palette of any of his previously released work — and a collaboration with Paris-based indie duo SOS Citizen.
The Isreali-born and now-Costa Rican-based artist’s seventh album, the recently released Chasing Dreams sees him collaborating with local indie rock outfit Las Robertas, who acted as his backing band for the recording sessions. Chasing Dreams sees the JOVM mainstay continuing a slow-burn expansion of his sound with the incorporation of string arrangements, which add a lushly cinematic and dreamy quality to the material.
In the lead-up to the album’s release, I wrote about two of the album’s previously released singles:
- Album title track “Chasing Dreams,” a song built around strummed acoustic guitar, shimmering pedal steel and gentle drumming paired with Magon’s dreamily laconic delivery. “Chasing Dreams” seems indebted to Exile on Main Street-era Rolling Stones and Harvest-era Neil Young with some subtle nods to country and folk. Much like the material on his last two albums, “Chasing Dreams” is rooted in the sort of deep, heartfelt introspection informed by living a full, messy and well-lived life and getting older — with the song touching upon themes of maturation, love and enjoying cherished family and personal bonds while you have them.
- “Under the Sea,” a child-like lullaby that sounds a bit like Yellow Submarine and “Octopus Garden”– perhaps as a result of a lush, 60s psych rock-inspired arrangement performed by the JOVM mainstay and his new collaborators Las Robertas, and an unfussy production. But at its core, the song is rooted in the pure and whimsical sense of exploration and curiosity of childhood.
“I Don’t Take You For Granted,” Chasing Dreams‘ third and latest single is a lush and introspective bit of psych rock/psych folk built around glistening, finger-plucked guitar, shimmering and cinematic strings and gently padded drumming paired with the JOVM mainstay’s laconic delivery. Much like its predecessors, “I Don’t Take You For Granted” is rooted in the same introspective, deeply lived-in lyrics that reflect a hard-earner, harder-won maturity and a contented sigh of recognition that adult love is so very difficult to find and harder to keep.
Throwback: Happy 59th Birthday, Mark Lanegan!
JOVM’s William Ruben Helms celebrates the 59th anniversary of Mark Lanegan’s birth.
Lyric Video: Mama Zu (Those Darlins’ Jessi Zazu and Linwood Regensburg) Share Anthemic and Sarcastic Kiss-Off
Nashville music scene darlings Those Darlings — Jessi Zazu, Nikki Kvarnes and Kelley Anderson — could trace their origins back to 2006, when they all met at the Southern Girls Rock & Roll Camp. The trio quickly gained an underground following for a raucous take on alt-country that was equally indebted to the likes of The Carter Family as it was the Ramones.
2009’s self-titled debut was released to critical praise from the likes of AllMusic, Consequence and a list of others. Their longtime drummer Linwood Regensburg, who has contributed to Low Cut Connie’s Art Dealers and Tristen’s Sneaker Waves joined the band as a full-time member for the writing and recording of their sophomore album 2011’s critically applauded Screws Get Loose.
The Nashville-based outfit’s third album 2013’s Blur the Line continued a run of critically applauded material with eh album receiving praise from Rolling Stone, Paste and others.
By 2016, the band spent a decade touring and recording together, and each of its members felt it was time for something new. During the middle of New York’s biggest blizzards con record, Those Darlins found themselves stranded in Brooklyn, trying in vain to finish their farewell tour.
Back in 2016, in the middle of New York’s biggest blizzards on record, the members of Those Darlings found themselves stranded in Brooklyn, trying in vain to finish their farewell tour. As the snow blanketed New York and the rest of the East Coast, Zazu and Regensburg thought about their own blank slate ahead of them. They devised a plan: Take a month off. Get some much-needed rest after a grueling run of gigs. Then they would get back to work on a new album.
With Zazu, the blank page never stayed blank for very long; she was always relentlessly doing, bursting with ideas, whether she was painting or writing, mentoring young musicians in her community or leading grassroots activism initiatives. For Zazu, there were always more songs to be writing and sung, more notes to be played, more issues to shine a light on and advocate for. Sadly, just as Zazu and Regensburg were set to begin working on their next project together, Zazu was diagnosed with cervical cancer, and things understandably were put on hold.
Work on their album started in early 2017 and was done in fits and spurts. “I don’t know if she felt the same way or not,” Regensburg says, “but watching this situation play out in my head, it was like I was equating it to some kind of hero journey. This person, who I believe to be invincible, overcomes a dire circumstance and the writing and recording of the music is all just part of the legendary comeback story. But that’s not what ended up happening, unfortunately.” Tragically, though, they weren’t able to finish the album: Zazu died at the all too young age of 28.
Understandably, the unfinished album was put on the shelf. . “After she died, I didn’t want to touch it,” Regensburg says. “I didn’t want to play the songs or listen to the songs, let alone finish them. It just seemed like such a daunting task with a lot of layers—there was a lot of work left to do, but then there was also this exhausting underlying emotional component that pops in and hangs around the moment I’d open a session.”
Years passed and distance grew. By 2020, Regensburg felt ready to finish what they had started, he says “both for her sake, and for my own sanity level. I was the only person left with this project. Working on those songs again was therapeutic, even if doing so brought on a new set of challenges as he polished nearly-finished tracks and rebuilt songs out of disparate parts, from the drum track on an older, alternate recording to a simple phone demo. “It was a way of spending time with her, and kind of the only capacity in which I could,” he said. “But then, I was also left with a lot of creative choices without her. Even though I had played most of the instruments, it had still been a totally collaborative thing; if there was a part I played that she didn’t like, she was clear about that. If someone’s gone, you can still talk to them, but you can only assume what their feedback might be. So I was stuck with a lot of musical choices that I’d be working under the context of, I hope you like what I did here.”
But on February 23, 2024, the world will hear the duo’s last project together Mama Zu — and what they had been working on with the 11-song Quilt Floor. The album sees the duo stitching a sonic tapestry of punchy songs that defiantly resist categorizing or pigeonholing in any specific genre. The material deftly flits from shimmering shoegaze to hooky power pop, riot grrl-tinged punk to 60s psych rock. Working without parakeets and without outside expectations led the duo to create an album that lives up to its mixtape moniker: 11 distinct tracks that are their own entire, separate universes while never feeling disjointed. The songs seamlessly form a robust whole, a representation of someone, who has a wildly eclectic, seemingly limitless record collection.
Ultimately, Mama Zu is simultaneously a continuation of the groundwork that Zazu and Regensburg laid with Those Darlings — and sadly, a final chapter. Importantly, it’s a snapshot of an artist in her prime, who was taken too soon, but while being stubbornly upbeat, defiant and fearless.
Regensburg shares Quilt Floor‘s first single “Lip.” Built around fuzzy guitars, a relentless and propulsive backbeat paired with Zaza’s sneering delivery, “Lip” is a kiss-off with a sarcastic smirk. The song’s subject is one that should be pitied — and perhaps laughed at — than scored. “The beauty of a ‘fuck you’ song (of which there might happen to be several on this album) is that you could simultaneously find yourself singing along while also being the oblivious target,” Linwood says. “Granted I never asked Jessi what this song was actually about and it’s also quite possible I might be an unreliable narrator here. Nevertheless, in the meantime, whether you’re in the mood to raise a middle finger or perhaps deserved of one, this song’s for you.”
A portion of the proceeds will benefit Jessi Zazu, Inc., a nonprofit dedicated to continuing Jessi’s work in the arts & humanities, social justice, and women’s health.
New Video: JOVM Mainstay Chopper Shares Atmospheric and Brooding “Moongirl”
JOVM mainstay outfit Chopper is the solo recording project of Copenhagen-based singer/songwriter and musician Jonatan K. Magnussen, who is best known in Denmark for being the frontman of the goth band The Love Coffin. With Chopper, Mangussen specializes in what he has dubbed “shock pop,” a crowd-pleasing sound that draws from Eurodance, glam rock, industrial, disco and B horror films.
Pink Cotton Candy Records released the mini-album Shock Pop Vol. 1 earlier this year. Shock Pop Vol. 1 saw the Danish artist continuing to explore the inherent dualities of the human condition while touching upon love, sexuality and carefree joy. Sonically, the material was influenced by Pet Shop Boys, Skinny Puppy and Underworld — but while attempting to place those influences within a modern context.
Shock Pop Vol. 2 is a stark contrast to the exuberant, dance-floor friendly material on its immediate predecessor with the forthcoming effort seeing the Danish artist crafting an atmospheric and cinematic sound that’s seemingly indebted to Rebel Yell-era Billy Idol, The Sisters of Mercy, Bauhaus, Scary Monsters-era Bowie and others.
“Moongirl,” Shock Pop Vol. 2‘s first single is a slow-burning and remarkably cinematic track featuring atmospheric synths, a hypnotic and propulsive bass line, thunderous boom bap-like drum machines, twinkling keys, buzzing bursts of guitar paired with Magnussen’s dramatic delivery — and his penchant for crafting enormous, rousingly anthemic hooks.
The song reveals an artist, who is able to recreate that big 80s arena rock-like ballad with an uncanny specificity paired with introspective, melancholy lyrics and a subtly modern take.
Shot by Amalie Maj and Thomas Skjølstru and edited by Magnussen, the accompanying video for “Moongirl” features some fittingly brooding footage of lightning strikes, graveyards, Magnussen looking like a young Robert Smith with a lit candle in that graveyard, childhood and family photos of a dear one, who may no longer be with us, and lastly Magnussen walking along the shore. For those of you, who like me, were alive and conscious during early 80s MTV’s heyday, this one will bring back some fond memories.
New Audio: JOVM Mainstay MAGON Shares Dreamy and Whimsical “Under The Sea”
Over the past couple of years, I’ve managed to spill quite a bit of ink on the remarkably prolific, Israeli-born, singer/songwriter, musician and JOVM mainstay MAGON.
Shortly after the release of his fifth album, A Night in Bethlehem, the Israeli-born artist, along with his partner and young daughter relocated to Costa Rica, where he continued an ongoing period of remarkable prolificacy with his sixth album, Did You Hear the Kids?
Did You Hear The Kids? featured what may arguably have been the broadest and most expansive sonic palette of any of his previously released work — and a collaboration with Paris-based indie duo SOS Citizen.
The Israeli-born, Costa Rican-based artist recently found creative and musical simpatico with local indie rock outfit Las Robertas, which led to his seventh album Chasing Dreams, which is slated for a December 7, 2023 release.
Chasing Dreams reportedly sees the JOVM mainstay continuing a slow-burn expansion of his sound with the addition of string arrangements, which helps add a lush quality to the material.
Last month, I wrote about the album’s first single, album title track “Chasing Dreams,” a song built around strummed acoustic guitar, shimmering pedal steel and gentle drumming paired with Magon’s dreamily laconic delivery. Continuing a run of material that seems indebted to Exile on Main Street-era Rolling Stones and Harvest-era Neil Young, “Chasing Dreams” features some subtle nods to country and folk. And much like the material on his last two albums, the single is rooted in the sort of deep, heartfelt introspection informed by living a well-lived life and getting older, with the song touching upon themes of maturation, love and enjoying cherished family bonds while you have them.
Chasing Dreams‘ second and latest single “Under the Sea” is a child-like lullaby that sounds a bit like Yellow Submarine and “Octopus Garden”– perhaps as a result of a lush, 60s psych rock-inspired arrangement performed by the JOVM mainstay and his new collaborators Las Robertas, and an unfussy production. But at its core, the song is rooted in the pure and whimsical sense of exploration and curiosity of childhood.
Lyric Video: Deap Vally Tackles a Classic Stones Tune with Swaggering Aplomb
Acclaimed Los Angeles-based rock duo Deap Vally — Julie Edwards (drums, vocals) and Lindsey Troy (guitar, vocals) — can trace their origins to the duo’s chance meeting in a knitting class over a decade ago. The Los Angeles-based duo’s debut single, 2012’s “Gonna Make My Own Money,” was released through tiny British indie label Ark Recordings.
Since then, Edwards and Troy went on to release three albums of roaring, idiosyncratic maximalist minimalist rock — 2013’s SISTRONIX, 2016’s Nick Zinner-produced FEMEJISM and 2021’s MARRIAGE. They’ve shared stages with Blondie, Garbage, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Queens of the Stone Age and a lengthy list of renowned acts. Along with that, they participated in a series of groundbreaking collaborations with an eclectic array of artists including Peaches, KT Tunstall, Jamie Hince, Soko, and The Flaming Lips, with whom they recorded a joint album, 2020’s DEAP LIPS.
Although the band has been received critical applause and won fans across the globe, maneuvering the contemporary music industry has become increasingly difficult. And if you add the challenges of the pandemic and raising families, the duo increasingly found themselves struggling to fit into the recording, promotion and touring cycle. “That model isn’t compatible with our current lives,” Lindsey Troy says. “We found we just can’t function as a traditional band anymore,” Julie Edwards adds. “It’s time for both of us to explore motherhood and other avenues of our lives properly, rather than squeezing them into our artist’s hustle.”
“I’m so proud of all our records, and Julie and I have an uncanny creative relationship,” Troy says. “It’s hard to ever picture having that with someone else. After all that, ya never know what could happen! We need to find the balance where we can focus on the fun stuff, but have the freedom to make the music we love. We just felt it would be fitting to go out with a bang, not a whimper. I felt marking this occasion should be a cathartic process: healing deep wounds, reconnecting with old friends and collaborators – and falling in love with Deap Vally all over again.”
So while Deap Vally is calling an end to their decade-plus long run together, they’ve decided to go out with a bang — and not with a whimper. They’re releasing a re-recorded version of their full-length debut, SISTRONIX 2.0, which is slated for a February 1, 2024 release through their own Deap Vally Records. The double LP will also include demos, previously unreleased covers, re-recordings of limited release B-sides and rarities, and much more. Pre-order vinyl, exclusive bundles and the digital LP here.
They’ll be supporting SISTRONIX 2.0 with a final tour, which will see them celebrating SISTRONIX‘s 10th anniversary by playing SISTRONIX in its entirety. The tour begins with West Coast dates during November. And a Midwest and East Coast run in early 2024. The east coast run includes a February 17, 2024 stop at Le Poisson Rouge.
More information on the tour can be found here. L.A. Witch, JOVM mainstays Death Valley Girls, Sloppy Jane, and Spoon Benders will be opening for the band in select markets. A handful of new tour dates have been added and from what I understand there may be more added, so be on the lookout.
Earlier this year, I wrote about album single “Baby I Call Hell (Deap Vally’s Version),” a swaggering and towering ripper built around buzzing power chords, thunderous drumming and soulful vocals that capture the quintessential Deap Vally sound and energy but with a completely different, new context: The duo is a bit older and wiser. Kids are around — and that forces you to rethink everything about your life and career. But they do so lovingly and wistfully with a sense of admiration and awe as though the pair is saying to each other: “Holy shit! We did actually did THAT!”
“SISTRIONIX is just classic Deap Vally. It’s so pure and raw,” Troy continues. “It really encapsulates an era — an era of dank, yeasty backstage rooms across the UK, of the endorphin rush of that first wave of success, of youthful drunken, wild nights, of the worldly adventures and the newness of it all.”
“We’re just going to go to play as many places as we can and say farewell to everyone,” Julie Edwards says. “Though the band is playing live for the last time, the door is open to us to collaborate. Now we’re all about re-establishing a workflow and connection around our friendship, after all we’ve shared together along the way.”
“‘Baby I Call Hell’ is quintessential Deap Vally,” Lindsey Troy says. “It was the first song we ever wrote as a band, so it’s very meaningful to our story. Re-recording that song was a lot of fun, but also a lot of pressure because we wanted to make sure the recording captured the magic of the song again.”
SISTRONIX 2.0‘s latest single is a previously unreleased swampy and sultry cover of The Rolling Stones‘ “Ventilator Blues” that captures the vibe and feel of the original while being defiantly feminist.
“Covering ‘Ventilator Blues’ was a special privilege to pay homage to one of the greatest and most seminal bands in the history of rock’n’roll,” Deap Vally’s Lindsey Troy says. “We recorded this song in 2014 and it has been in the vaults ever since, so I’m really glad it’s finally seeing the light of day!”
“‘Ventilator Blues,’ one of our favorite Rolling Stones songs, is a song about the inevitable end we are all hurtling towards, and we felt it was a perfect way to soundtrack the final chapter of Deap Vally,” the band’s Julie Edwards adds.”To assemble this video, I sifted through archival footage from twelve years of heavy riffs, sweat, and dream-fulfillment. This was a very cathartic exercise and I recommend it for anyone confronting the end of a project that meant everything to them. This video would not have been possible without the tireless efforts of videographer and director Anthony Ferrara, who filmed some of our earliest shows, and has continued to bear digital witness to us up until the present day.”
Throwback: Happy 60th Birthday, Johnny Marr!
JOVM’s William Ruben Helms celebrates Johnny Marr’s 60th birthday.
Led by songwriter and producer Aaro Seppänen, emerging Helsinki-based indie outfit Favourite Colours has quickly developed a unique sound featuring reverb-drenched guitars, lush synths, catchy melodies that draws from ’80s and ’90s dream pop and shoegaze, as well as punk and hip-hop while being rooted in strong emotions, ranging from bittersweet melancholy to heavenly euphoria.
Favourite Colours’ full-length debut, Summer ’13 was released last Friday. The hazy and nostalgia-including album features three previously released singles “Better,” “Through the Night” and “Remember That Day.” The album’s fourth and latest single “Play It Loud” is a brooding yet gorgeous song built around atmospheric and twinkling synths, reverb-drenched shoegazer guitar textures, enormous and rousingly anthemic hooks paired with a plaintive and yearning vocal. Sonically, the song seems to nod at A Storm in Heaven-era Verve, Love Is Here-era Starsailor — with clear nods to Brit Pop.
Through the release of their full-length debut, 2021’s In This Town and last year’s Zoo Avenue EP, the Southeast Ohio-based indie outfit The Laughing Chimes, founded by siblings Evan and Quinn Seurkamp, firmly cemented a timeless sound that draws from American and British jangle pop from the 80s and 90s that could have easily originated in Athens, GA, Dunedin, New Zealand — or Southeastern Ohio.
The Southeastern Ohio-based band share two new, gloomy singles — just in time for the Halloween season. The A-side “A Promise To Keep” is an original that sees the band expanding upon the jangle pop sound that they’ve developed with hints of early R.E.M. and late 70s post punk, with angular yet lyrical bass lines from the band’s newest member Avery Bookman and glistening bursts of synth paired with Evan Seukamp singing lyrics describing abandoned Appalachian towns with cavernous reverb. The result is a haunting anthem of a decaying, slowly dying America that should feel familiar to those who have grown up in small, one-industry towns across the country.
The B-side is a loving and fairly straightforward cover of The Ocean Blue‘s “Ballerina Out of Control,” off 1991’s Cerulean. While retaining the essential elements of the original — in particular, the jangling guitar melody and twinkling keys — The Laughing Chimes version manages to be possess a bittersweet ache that compliments the A-side single, while evoking the chill and gloom of autumn.
New Audio: Kilo Bravo Shares Arena Rock Friendly “Lucinda”
Long Beach, CA-based indie outfit Kilo Bravo will be releasing their sophomore album in early 2024. Their latest single “Lucinda” is an arena rock friendly ripper built around Queens of the Stone Age and Foo Fighters-like power chords and thunderous drumming paired with rousingly anthemic hooks and choruses.
“Lucinda” sees the band known for sentimental tunes exploring new sonic horizons while revealing a band that can play swaggering, fuzzy rippers with the best of them.