Tag: Los Angeles CA

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Twin Temple Shares Soulful and Yearning “Haunt Me”

Acclaimed Los Angeles-based duo Twin Temple — married couple Alexandra and Zachary James — released their Shooter Jennings-produced third album Doomed Lovers through their own Pentagrammation Records back in October.

Recorded at Hollywood-based Sunset Sound‘s iconic Studio 3, Doomed Lovers marks the duo’s boldest chapter to date. Born from one of the darkest periods of their personal lives, Doomed Lovers is reportedly their most intimate and emotionally revealing work to date. Expanding upon the cinematic scope of the sound that has won them acclaim while remaining rooted in the timeless sound and traditions of early rock ‘n’ roll, the album is their most ambitious and fully realized artistic statement so far. The album continues the band’s commitment to analog recording while expanding upon their sound with lush orchestral arrangements performed by a 37-member orchestra. Yes, 37!

“We poured everything into this new record that we made with Shooter,” says the acclaimed and controversial duo. “We wanted to push ourselves creatively and expand the production further than we have before, drawing inspiration from the lush orchestral productions of Roy Orbison, The Ronettes, and The Shangri-Las, and added in some Countrypolitan flair. We brought in some incredible musicians like Matt Chamberlain and Jay Bellerose, and a 37-piece orchestra. We wanted to make something as beautiful as we possibly could – of course with our dark spin on things.”

The truth is, this album was made during one of the darkest periods of our lives. We had been struggling with grief, health issues, addiction, and depression. But day by day, going into Sunset Sound, making music with incredible people who believed in us, and being surrounded by that creativity slowly brought us back to life. We started smiling and laughing again. I was becoming alive again. It connected us to why we fell in love with music in the first place and became our most personal album yet.”

The album includes the breathtaking gorgeous, album title track “Doomed Lovers,” “Nothing Matters” and “Haunt Me.” “Haunt Me” is a decidedly twangy, Wall of Sound-meets-Sun Records-like tune with a subtle node to gospel that should remind the listener that country’s iconic period is heavily indebted to gospel, the blues and a early rock ‘n’ roll. That’s right, think of some of those early Elvis Presley, Johnny Cash, Jerry Lee Lewis, Little Richard and Chuck Berry albums — but rooted in a confusing, paradoxical mix of dread, jealousy, fear and longing that feels lived-in and deeply experienced. 

“‘Haunt Me’ is a gothic love song about fear, obsession, dread and jealousy with nods to classic American gospel, 1960s rock n roll and the blues,” the duo explain. “It romanticizes the terrifying nightmares your lover brings, and the paradox of never wanting them to stop haunting you.”

Featuring live footage of the band performing on hand-developed Super 8 film while the band was on tour back in September, the accompanying video for “Haunt Me” was shot, edited and directed by Dante Capone.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Always You Share Glistening and Breezy “Shadow Play”

Los Angeles-based duo Always You — twin brothers Christoph and Anton Hochheim –will be releasing their third album, the Jack Tatum-produced Against The World is slated for a Friday release through Hit The North Records.

With Jack Tatum at helm guiding production and mixing, he tirelessly broke down and then reconstructed all the elements of the material with the twins, pushing the album’s overall sonics to the absolute breaking point while still retaining their signature sophtisipop sheen. Throughout the album’s run time, heavy guitars and bending sheets of white noise clash over frenzied hi-hats and The Prodigy-like sub bass. Abrupt starts and stops seemingly crash down with the weight of the world. Drum ‘n’ bass and house beats thump over soaring melodies and chopped up vocal samples. The ballads seemingly sparkle with more heart and tension than anything in their previously released work.

Thematically speaking, Against The World is a statement for and against the times: a manic manifesto drawing a line in the sand, pointing out that love is the only resistance against the forces manufacturing distance and endless dissent between us. It’s a rallying cry pushing for something better, a staunch refusal of the status quo, fueled by the belief that we all deserve much better. The album’s material is rooted in the deep sense of longing for something, hell, anything else than this — a different reality, an alternate timeline, anything. Increasingly divorced from the world around us, the false promises of a new lover, a new leader, a quick and seemingly effortless salutation or a new savior become impossible to resist. That fantasy leads us further and further underground, leaving miles of rubble in its wake and keeping us all just out of reach.

Against The World will include”1994,” “Eye to Eye,” and the album’s final pre-release single “Shadow Play.” “Shadow Play” is the album’s most sophistipop-leaning tracks of the released singles. Featuring glistening synths, thumping electro pop-like beats, “Shadow Play” is a breezy tune that’s rooted in inquisitive themes.

“‘Shadow Play’ is about living for an imagined audience,” the duo explain. “We all do this to some extent in life and in love. Relationships are a type of performance, with specific roles that get cast and stories that get etched out and retold with time. It’s about love as a projection, as something very personal to a person rather than something created by two, and the dangers of copy and pasting that onto others.”
 

The accompanying video for “Shadow Play” follows a woman and one-half of the duo performing — in their own way– for an audience with concert strobe lights to emphasize the performative nature at the core of the song.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: JOVM Mainstays GIFT Returns with Introspective and Woozy “Every Step”

Brooklyn-based JOVM mainstays GIFT — TJ Freda (vocals, guitar, production), Jessica Gurewitz (synths, vocals, guitar), Kallan Campbell (bass), Justin Hrabovsky (synths, guitar) and Gabe Camarano (drums) — will be releasing their third album, the TJ Freda and Teddy Mars co-produced Frenzy For The Thill on January 15, 2027 through Captured Tracks.

The JOVM mainstays began in earnest during the pandemic with the band’s Freda holed up in Brooklyn building the lush layers of what would become the band’s 2022 full-length debut, Momentary Presence. Both Momentary Presence and it’s follow-up, 2024’s Illuminator saw the band blending various strains of psychedelic music — krautrock, New Wave, electronic music and shoegaze — while cataloging Freda’s ongoing battles with panic attacks, frequently seeking to counter anxiety with transcendence. However, before the creation of GIFT’s third album, TJ Freda found that particular metaphorical drug wasn’t working.

The tours to support Illuminator had left Freda ragged and burned out. When a friend offered to let him stay at their Los Angeles home for two months, it seemed — at the time — to be a perfect way to decompress, to take time and write songs for other artists, and to put GIFT to the side for a bit. However, Freda arrived in Los Angeles as firefighters put out the final fires of early last year, to a house full of ash and not much else than the instruments he brought him. Moved by the renewal and resilience he saw in Angelenos coming together in the wake of the wildfires, the GIFT frontman suddenly felt a creative outpouring.

New GIFT songs arrived much more angst-ridden than in the past, yet not within their own sense of release. For the GIFT frontman, the songs were vehicles to ask the big, existential questions: Now, in his 30s, had watched friends settle down, but he found he was not doing searching. “Making Frenzy For The Thrill was partially about exploring the balance of living as an artist without disappearing into it,” Freda explains. From despondence, Freda emerged with a revitalized sense of creative purpose and direction.

Freda found himself gravitation towards grittier, angstier inspirations including 90s alt-rock, grunge and brasher iterations of electronic music. Combined with the band having become a tight, deeply connected unit honed by rigorous touring. Freda wanted to create something more visceral and collaborative. And as a result, Frenzy For The Thrill may arguably be the most-band orientated album of their catalog to date, anchored around the sound of five musicians diving into the madness together with an “one-for-all, all-for-one” sort of approach.

While adopting much of the ethos and structure of dance music, the album reportedly harnesses the energy the immediate energy the band cultivated onstage, while also incorporating more of their individual personalities and instincts in the overall arrangements and songwriting, Frenzy For The Thrill is anchored in far-seeing melodies and synth textures the band has become known for, while paired with what may be the most muscular performances to date.

Lessons are learned by the end of the album, including a soft of hard-won self-acceptance on the other side of the album’s violence, a healthier, more balanced life after staring into the void. “We’re always looking for resolutions, but life isn’t like that,” Freda concludes. “Frenzy For The Thrill is about still being in love with the chase knowing we might not find answers on the other side. This is the sound of us crashing headlong into the unknown.” 

Frenzy For The Thrill will include the previously released “Hand To The Flame” and the album’s second and latest single, “Every Step.” Arguably one of the most meditative and introspective songs the JOVM mainstays have released to date, “Every Step” is anchored around a grunge song structure featuring quiet, acoustic guitar-driven verses, woozy feedback and power chord-driven choruses and hooks beneath TJ Freda’s breathy crooning. Evening out the album’s feverish state, the song sonically — and thematically — offers flickers of clarity and perspective poking out of the haze of a scattered, frazzled mind.

“Everything comes down to perspective. There’s so much happening in the world that matters more than the small things we let upset us,” Freda says. “But when those small things feel just as big, guilt comes along with them, and it’s easy to feel disillusioned with yourself for not feeling the way you think you should. Perspective follows every step, whether you lean toward hope or toward heaviness. Beauty lives in the broken places, and something broken lives in every beautiful thing.”

Directed by TJ Freda and Crista Simiriglia, the accompanying video for “Every Step” brings Memento and Groundhog’s Day to mind as it follows Freda with an impressive shiner as he wanders around Chinatown, the West Village and Brooklyn with his actions and that of the world surrounding him going forward and backward — seemingly at will.

Video by William Ruben Helms

Live Footage: Dragonflies Perform “Heart Or Head” at Hollywood Forever Cemetery

Dragonflies are a new musical project between Nigel Godrich and Dhani Harrison. Godrich and Harrison had already know each other for years — running in the same circles, hanging out in nature and admiring each other’s work from afar. During the pandemic, Harrison reached out to Godrich for advice and insight on what would become his 2023 solo effort Innerstanding. Historically,. Harrison helmed all of his own projects and was generally averse to working with outside producers. At the same time, Godrich had reached the point where he was less interested in producing for strangers, and was much more eager to only work with friends.

Eventually a conversation around Innerstanding led to a different conversation: “Why don’t we try to work on something?”

Godrich’s first impulse was to invite Harrison to his Brixton-based studio, to draw him out of his comfort zone. There, Godrich brought Harrison into his current working method, which involves creating tape loops as the basis for songs. Though, they had known each other for years, the pair were entering completely unknown territory. But they had a shared musical language and multi-faceted decades-long careers between them, with each uniquely adept at production and an array of instruments. And at Godrich’s studio, they embarked on a series of writing and recording sessions in which songs quickly bursting out of them. “It’s like one person throwing something in the air and the other person catching it,” Godrich describes.

During their writing and recording sessions, Harrison was impressed by Godrich’s ability to edit on the fly. “He’s a machine,” Harrison says, then adds with a laugh: “He has strong opinions about what he wants to hear, and for me it’s very humbling — that’s why it’s such a new experience for me.” And yet for Harrison. a student of the alternative and electronic albums of late 90s Britain, working with his friend was a dream come true, and an experience in which each was able to shift roles. Harrison, who was long used to being control behind the computer, went to different places by operating primarily as a vocalist and guitarist. For his part, Godrich credits Harrison’s openness and compassion with allowing the writing process to be one of happy accidents, and began coming in with lyrics and melodies. 

It was a unique way of working, both electronic and organic that involved laying down an idea, then chiseling the song into shape above mechanical sections of 24-track tape loops. Harrison conjured influences like Beth Gibbons, David Sylvain and Ryuchi Sakamoto in his vocals, while the duo refined their original recordings into layered grooves that channeled trip hop and electronic music — yet performed by hand. Then Godrich enlisted his Ultraísta and Atoms For Peace bandmate Joey Waronker (drums) to add more percussion. He also traveled to Los Angeles to work with composer and arranger David Campbell, with whom he worked on Beck‘s iconic Sea Change. Campbell draped the sputtering drums, rippling piano and frayed synths of several album tracks in gorgeous string arrangements. The result is a sort of earthbound space rock; music that’s transportive and far-reaching without ever sounding stereotypically psychedelic.

The destination was appropriately cosmic for a project that felt like liberation for both Godrich and Harrison. “Dragonflies are a symbol of spiritual enlightenment,” Harrison explains. “When Nigel suggested the name I was like, yeah, sold, done. Whenever I see a dragonfly it’s magical.” 

Interestingly, Dragonflies come from a period of both great change and stillness. After two decades being primarily based in Los Angeles leading bands like thenewno2 and scoring for television and films, Harrison returned to his native England, shocked at the sense of quiet remove back home. At the same time, Godrich had pulled back from touring and recording, and considered himself in semi-retirement. But it was from the newfound silence in both of their lives that Dragonflies became a vehicle in which they could chase unforeseen sound and horizons.

Dragonflies emerged from a period of both great change and stillness. After two decades primarily based in Los Angeles — leading bands like thenewno2 and scoring television and films — Harrison returned to his native England, shocked at the quiet remove back home. Compared to running himself ragged in LA, he felt free, and the next phase of his musical life blossomed. At the same time, Godrich had pulled back from touring and recording, and considered himself in semi-retirement. It was from the newfound silence in both of their lives that Dragonflies became a vehicle in which they could chase unforeseen sounds and horizons. 

Through the creation of the self-titled album, the duo discovered a new, brotherly depth to their friendship, and the fact that their bond allowed them to explore emotions and aesthetics neither could have done in another project — or by themselves. Built on trust, their experiments led to someplace unexpected for each, and opened the door for the future; They have a second album’s worth of material taht they’re putting the finishing touches on, and they plan on forming a touring band to take this new music on the road.

“I mean, it’s really fun,” Godrich explains simply. “Why would you not want to keep going?” 

“We could go even further,” Harrison concludes. “I’m still not sure what it is, where the band is going. But I want to go to that place more.” 

Their self-titled debut includes the album opening track “Slower,” which they performed on Jimmy Kimmel Live! and the album’s latest single “Heart Or Head.” Filmed at the band’s debut live shows at Los Angeles’ Hollywood Forever Cemetery, the live version of “Heart Or Head” features The Strokes‘ Nick Valensi and Harrison’s dueling psychedelic blues-tinged guitar paired with Godrich and Waronker’s driving, jazzy rhythm section and Talbot’s shimmering keys branch Harrison’s yearning falsetto, which reminds me quite a bit of his father.

The live footage perfectly captures their gauzy, psych rock meets trip house aesthetic.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Leon Bridges Shares Ebullient Video for “Watch You Dance”

Acclaimed Atlanta-born, Fort Worth, TX-raised singer/songwriter and musician Leon Bridges released his latest album, the J Lloyd-Watson and Lydia Kitto-produced, Happiness Anytime earlier this year Columbia Records. Happiness Anytime sees the acclaimed singer/songwriter and musician returning to the warmth of his 2015 debut but while seeing the members of Jungle and Bridges’ signature sensibilities blending to create something entirely new — an expansive, borderless sound and approach that pushes the Grammy Award-winning artist into a brand new territory. The album’s material echoes Fela Kuti, Paul Simon’s 1990 acclaimed effort The Rhythm of The Saints and Jorge Ben without feeling overly referential. At its core, the album is reportedly boundary pushing while remaining unmistakably Leon Bridges, rooted in his imitable vocal, effortless charisma and melodic sensibilities.

The album was written and recorded across three fast and furious sessions with Lloyd-Watson and Kitto, a collaboration that can trace its origins to the trio repeatedly crossing paths across the global festival circuit. The trio decided to attempt a low-pressure writing session at Los Angeles-based Chaplin Recording Studios. Four days later, they had come up with six songs — half of the completed album. Pino Palladino contributed bass during the sessions. The overall end result is a timeless body of work that feels unfussy and breezy — that they all hope will make the listener feel happiness anytime they play it.

“For me, happiness is not a feeling that you chase,” Bridges says,“I want this album to be something that lingers with people and lingers in people’s bones. There’s this feeling that we have to fix the problems of the world; you feel inadequate or it can be debilitating. My role is to be light. I hope that comes across with this album.” With Happiness Anytime, Bridges actively sets out with a desire to not only find joy but to find movement again.

Early in his career, Bridges was out in front dancing — and that was something that had begun to greatly miss. He wanted to get back to making music to dance to, music to excise the stresses and frustrations of modern life, and to feel grounded in the rhythms of the present. Over the summer, he had started introducing audiences to the new album with sets in Paris, Cannes, Los Angeles, Montreux Jazz Festival, London, Chicago and Outside Lands. And as he has being playing the new material live, he has unveiled “Leon Bridges Presents Happiness Anytime,” a reimagined stage production featuring a vinyl DJ, a horn section, three backing vocalists and Bridges out in front dancing and singing. Partly inspired by the communal spirt of Jamaican dancehall culture, the live set mirrors the album’s emphasis on movement — and on dancing your stresses and frustrations away for a bit. You can see what the live show will look like during his most recent appearance on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon, where he performed medley of tunes from the soon-to-be-released album — the strutting Afrobeat-meets-1970s Motown soul-like “Light The Way” and “Illusion” and jubilant, joyous ode to working things out “Talk It Over.”

“Watch You Dance,” Happiness Anytime‘s latest single is a strutting and sultry bit of neo-soul meets classic soul that feels like a funky, dance floor friendly synthesis of Black Pumas, Cody Chesnutt, Daptone Records and Marvin Gaye‘s “Got To Give It Up” but anchored in old-school craft, earnest, seemingly lived-in lyricism and a grown ass folks sensuality. The song’s narrator knows that seduction is a game that you have to play — and he knows how to play it well.

Directed by Rippy Austin, the accompanying video for “Watch You Dance” was shot on a beautiful, sunny afternoon in New Orleans and features Bridges and a collection of beautiful — and infectiously ebullient– Black dancers moving and grooving to the song. The video and the song are a much needed joy bomb for a desperate, uneasy time. And I’ll add this because it’s necessary: Black is beautiful y’all.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Always You Returns with Breezy Yet Tense “Eye to Eye”

Los Angeles-based duo Always You — twin brothers Christoph and Anton Hochheim — have managed to forge their own path while working alongside a hive mind-like collection of musician friends, including Beach Fossils, Wild Nothing, The Pains of Being Pure At Heart, MGMT, Jerry Paper, The Depreciation Guild and a lengthy list of others, which has helped shaped the siblings sonic identity along the way. Formerly known as Ablebody, the Hochheim Brothers have spent their careers exploring lo fi hypnagogic laptop pop, sophisticated synth pop informed by 80s UK and Japanese New Wave, as well as kitsch-en sink lounge ballads inspired by the great chansons.

The Los Angeles-based duo’s third album, the Jack Tatum-produced Against The World is slated for a November 13, 2026 release through Hit The North Records. With Jack Tatum at helm guiding production and mixing, he tirelessly broke down and then reconstructed all the elements of the material with the twins, pushing the album’s overall sonics to the absolute breaking point while still retaining their signature sophtisipop sheen. Throughout the album’s run time, heavy guitars and bending sheets of white noise clash over frenzied hi-hats and The Prodigy-like sub bass. Abrupt starts and stops seemingly crash down with the weight of the world. Drum ‘n’ bass and house beats thump over soaring melodies and chopped up vocal samples. The ballads seemingly sparkle with more heart and tension than anything in their previously released work.

Thematically speaking, Against The World is a statement for and against the times: a manic manifesto drawing a line in the sand, pointing out that love is the only resistance against the forces manufacturing distance and endless dissent between us. It’s a rallying cry pushing for something better, a staunch refusal of the status quo, fueled by the belief that we all deserve much better. The album’s material is rooted in the deep sense of longing for something, hell, anything else than this — a different reality, an alternate timeline, anything. Increasingly divorced from the world around us, the false promises of a new lover, a new leader, a quick and seemingly effortless salutation or a new savior become impossible to resist. That fantasy leads us further and further underground, leaving miles of rubble in its wake and keeping us all just out of reach.

Against The World will include the previously released “1994” and the album’s latest single “Eye to Eye.” “Eye to Eye” features glistening synths and uptempo, footwork-like breakbeats paired with a supple baseline beneath ethereal vocals. But beneath the breezy atmosphere, the song possess a simmering anger, as the song explores the feeling of resentment on the brink of rage.

“I usually try to avoid writing from an angry perspective but ‘Eye To Eye’ is explicitly that,” the duo explain. “I suppose it’s about being in a pressure cooker of simmering resentment, where belittling comments stack up until you feel like the walls are closing in on you and efforts to self-soothe and self-centre are all in vain. The only moment of harmony is in impending separation which becomes a fantasy one wouldn’t dare act on. It’s draped in a somber atmosphere but propelled with aggressive breakbeats to help punctuate that frenetic headspace.

“The video by Skellyot portrays Anton dressed as Death chasing me through an abandoned mall,” the duo says of the accompanying video. “We, in turn, were running from security the entire video shoot, sneaking through backdoors and hidden passageways to remain out of view while Skellyot followed closely behind in a pair of bright orange roller skates with light-up wheels they bought from the one store still open in the mall.”

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: St. Panther Shares Strutting, Old School-Inspired “OUT ON THE CORNER”

Los Angeles-based Mexican/Colombian producer, singer/songwriter, rapper and multi-instrumentalist Dani Bojorges-Giraldo (they/them) is the creative mastermind behind the critically applauded recording project St. Panther. Bojorges-Giraldo’s previously released work was the soundtrack to the early part of this decade for many folks, but following their departure from the major label network, the Los Angeles-based artist took time to be among their peers, friends and loved ones. 

Last year’s McClenney and Bojorges-Giraldo co-produced EP Strange World featured a defiant, genre-transforming collection of soulful, modern pop songs that narrate and confront the wider climate of uncertainty and oblivion. Thematically, Strange World was as much about Bojorges-Giraldo’ and their world — their village, their people, themselves — but also, the very strange world we inhabit right now. Drawing from soul, R&B, jazz, hip-hop and alt-pop the EP’s material sets out to urge for a sense of purpose, security and love admits seemingly universal apathy and chaos. 

The EP featured the EP title track “Strange World,” the old-school Quiet Storm-meets D’Angelo-like “The Deal” and “American Dreams.”

Bojorges-Giraldo’s highly anticipated McClenney co-produced St. Panther full-length debut, East Side Love Story is slated for a November 20, 2026 release through Los Angeles-based label drink sum wtr. East Side Love Story is reportedly an effervescent, soulful set of love songs dedicated to both their hometown and their neighborhood. Work began subconsciously when the rising and acclaimed Los Angeles-based artist started Shazamming songs that their neighbors were playing every day, populating a playlist that they playfully titled “East Side Love Story,” a nod to their cat’s bustling social life. “She’s a stray, literally got her from my neighborhood outside. She has a roster of boyfriends who come to visit her at the door and window. Pretty soon, my life started mirroring hers,” explains Bojorges-Giraldo. East Side Love Story traces seasons of relationships, from the ecstasy of newness to the pitfalls of monogamy, the distance between one another on respective paths, and an evolving understanding of love in its totality.

Coloring their craft with their surrounding neighborhood and culture, the acclaimed Los Angeles-based artist’s full length debut captures a chapter in their life defined by freedom and love. Continuing their ongoing collaboration with McClenney, Bojorges-Giraldo sees the album as a culmination: “I’ve been able to apply my influences and build a world around what my signature is, pulling the best of my performances and musicality, figuring out the place that I want it all to sit.” 

East Side Love Story’s latest single “OUT ON THE CORNER” is a strutting blend of Chicano and Motown-era soul featuring twinkling keys, old-school soul drum fills, a supple bass line and soul/funk guitar stabs beneath Bojorges-Giraldo’s soulful, lullaby-like croon . While showcasing their uncanny knack for pairing catchy hooks with earnest, lived-in lyricism, “OUT ON THE CORNER” details the often complicated and fleeting nature of modern romance with a sweet, old school-inspired charm. Lemme tell y’all, sometimes a sweet love song is what you need when the world is on fire and everything is seemingly full of hopelessness and doom. I say that because life, dear friends, is often about the small moments — especially the seemingly endless process of falling in love, falling out of love, heartbreak and repeat.

“I was pacing around my apartment singing the ‘oo’s’ and quickly picked up my Cordoba to try and sound out the chords,” Bojorges-Giraldo says of OUT ON THE CORNER’S creative process. “That demo was like an ear worm, it lent all the space for a Motown approach but we still needed a modern touch. After reworking it with Chris (McClenney) I called in Brian Gazo to track some “oo’s” on top of mine. There’s these isolated moments that crack a whole album open, hearing Brian’s first takes was exactly that. By the end of that session his vocals were on four songs on the album.” 

They continued: “What was important to me was capturing this particular moment in time on a record. I think we’ll look back on records like this and be able to appreciate that from Boyle Heights to Long Beach we were a movement of brown artists, the next generation of the music we grew up loving. To be able to have him across the album felt just right, like a family photo that will be passed down for generations.”

Directed by St. Panther and Khari Cousins, the accompanying video for “OUT ON THE CORNER” follows the acclaimed Los Angeles-based artist through their neighborhood and hometown, lovingly capturing its soul and character, as well as the warmth and kindness of its people.

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

New Audio: Los Angeles’ Charm School Shares A Thumping Club Banger for Our Dystopian Hellscape

Los Angeles-based electronic music act Charm School features Louisville, KY-born, Los Angeles-based multi-hyphenate artist and frontman Andrew Sellers and his longtime collaborators Matt Filip and Dave English. Sellers grew up immersed in Louisville’s underground scene, soaking up the work of local acts like Slint, Crain and Rodan, as well as the catalogs of beloved Chicago indie labels Touch & Go and Drag City. Later, Sellers got into PIL, Swell Maps, The Fall and Fugazi and The Nation of Ulysses. All of that informs Charm School’s sound and approach.

Their debut EP, 2023’s Finite Jest introduced listeners to a philosophically-minded, crushingly loud critique of modern life’s increasingly maddening realities. Last year’s full-length debut, Debt Forever introduced a broader range of influences and a much more acerbic viewpoint with lyrics drenched in salty, satirical humor.

Released earlier this year, Schadenfreude Ploy EP picks up where Debt Forever left off, musing on humanity’s tortured psyche and the confounding implications of living in a technocratic, dystopian hellscape in which tech billionaires, AI and modern life’s various manipulative traps are ubiquitous and seemingly inescapable.

Continuing a remarkably prolific period, the Los Angeles trio’s latest single, the Matia Simovich-produced “Desolation” is a hook-driven, EBM/darkwave/goth banger featuring 80s synthclavier stabs, thumping 808s paired with Sellers dryly sardonic yet simultaneously sincere delivery. Sonically bringing the likes of early Ministry, Depeche Mode, as well as contemporaries like Public Circuit to mind, the song is a club anthem for our dystopian hellscape. The world’s on fire and everything seems hopelessly fucked, so have a little fun, dance and sweat it out with some other humans.

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

New Audio: Twin Temple Shares Breathtakingly Gorgeous “Nothing Matters”

Formed back in 2017, Twin Temple — married couple Alexandra and Zachary James — are an acclaimed Los Angeles-based duo, who specialize in a new sub-genre and style that they’ve dubbed “Satanic Doo Wop,” which blends their practice of Satanism with a sound that’s influenced by The Platters, Roy Orbison, Buddy Holly and the like. 

The Los Angeles-based duo have developed for being one of the contemporary scene’s most talked about crossover acts, earning widespread coverage from media outlets like Rolling Stone, NME, Billboard, American Songwriter, Stereogum, Consequence, Revolver, Kerrang!, Metal Hammer, Loudwire, San Francisco Chronicle, Los Angeles Times and a long list of others, and for being one of the most provocative acts out there right now. Their uncompromising artistic vision routinely sparks much larger and more serious conversations about artistic freedom, religious freedom, freedom of expression, censorship, the role of controversy in art, and on a broader sense, the wider role of art within the cultural landscape.

Now, some of y’all heard of the acclaimed Los Angeles-based duo after Charley Crockett abruptly dropped the band from his tour earlier this year — specifically because of their usage of Satanic imagery. That led to Jack White publicly inviting the band to open for his Los Angeles show back in September. And serendipitously, the duo’s highly-anticipated third album Doomed Lovers will come right on the heels of their latest, and arguably biggest controversy to date. 

Slated for an October 9, 2026 release through their own Pentagrammation Records, the Shooter Jennings-produced Doomed Lovers was recorded at Hollywood-based Sunset Sound‘s iconic Studio 3 and marks the acclaimed duo’s boldest chapter to date. 

Born from one of the darkest periods of their personal lives, Doomed Lovers is reportedly their most intimate and emotionally revealing work to date. Expanding upon the cinematic scope of the sound that has won them acclaim while remaining rooted in the timeless sound and traditions of early rock ‘n’ roll, the album is their most ambitious and fully realized artistic statement so far. The album continues the band’s commitment to analog recording while expanding upon their sound with lush orchestral arrangements performed by a 37-member orchestra. Yes, 37!

“We poured everything into this new record that we made with Shooter,” says the acclaimed and controversial duo. “We wanted to push ourselves creatively and expand the production further than we have before, drawing inspiration from the lush orchestral productions of Roy Orbison, The Ronettes, and The Shangri-Las, and added in some Countrypolitan flair. We brought in some incredible musicians like Matt Chamberlain and Jay Bellerose, and a 37-piece orchestra. We wanted to make something as beautiful as we possibly could – of course with our dark spin on things.”

The truth is, this album was made during one of the darkest periods of our lives. We had been struggling with grief, health issues, addiction, and depression. But day by day, going into Sunset Sound, making music with incredible people who believed in us, and being surrounded by that creativity slowly brought us back to life. We started smiling and laughing again. I was becoming alive again. It connected us to why we fell in love with music in the first place and became our most personal album yet.”

The album will include the previously released, “Doomed Lovers,” and “Haunt Me,” as well as the album’s last pre-release single “Nothing Matters.” “Nothing Matters” continues a remarkable run of breathtakingly gorgeous and cinematic material that to my ears at least, sounds a bit like a blend of Patsy Cline with Roy Orbison, anchored by a similar aching sense of loss and grief.

“‘Nothing Matters’ was born out of the bleakest, lowest point of depression and apathy following a devastating loss, functioning as a modern day Gothic lament for a love that refuses to die,” Twin Temple’s Alexandra and Zachary James say. “Channeling a kind of Nihilistic and Byronic romanticism, the song tackles the abject feelings of hopelessness, disorientation, and loss of self that profound grief evokes. We wanted to make something beautiful out of that experience, pairing the tragic narrative weight with the lush, cinematic sweep of a 37-piece orchestra.”

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Always You Share Woozy, Bittersweet “1994”

Los Angeles-based duo Always You — twin brothers Christoph and Anton Hochheim — have managed to forge their own path while working alongside a hive mind-like collection of musician friends, including Beach Fossils, Wild Nothing, The Pains of Being Pure At Heart, MGMT, Jerry Paper, The Depreciation Guild and a lengthy list of others, which has helped shaped the siblings sonic identity along the way. Formerly known as Ablebody, the Hochheim Brothers have spent their careers exploring lo fi hypnagogic laptop pop, sophisticated synth pop informed by 80s UK and Japanese New Wave, as well as kitsch-en sink lounge ballads inspired by the great chansons.

The Los Angeles-based duo’s third album, the Jack Tatum-produced Against The World is slated for a November 13, 2026 release through Hit The North Records. With Jack Tatum at helm guiding production and mixing, he tirelessly broke down and then reconstructed all the elements of the material with the twins, pushing the album’s overall sonics to the absolute breaking point while still retaining their signature sophtisipop sheen. Throughout the album’s run time, heavy guitars and bending sheets of white noise clash over frenzied hi-hats and The Prodigy-like sub bass. Abrupt starts and stops seemingly crash down with the weight of the world. Drum ‘n’ bass and house beats thump over soaring melodies and chopped up vocal samples. The ballads seemingly sparkle with more heart and tension than anything in their previously released work.

Thematically speaking, Against The World is a statement for and against the times: a manic manifesto drawing a line in the sand, pointing out that love is the only resistance against the forces manufacturing distance and endless dissent between us. It’s a rallying cry pushing for something better, a staunch refusal of the status quo, fueled by the belief that we all deserve much better. The album’s material is rooted in the deep sense of longing for something, hell, anything else than this — a different reality, an alternate timeline, anything. Increasingly divorced from the world around us, the false promises of a new lover, a new leader, a quick and seemingly effortless salutation or a new savior become impossible to resist. That fantasy leads us further and further underground, leaving miles of rubble in its wake and keeping us all just out of reach.

Against The World’s second and latest single “1994” is a bittersweet meditation on time’s inexorable march forward, aging, lost youth and lost opportunities and the rose-tinted glasses of nostalgia pushing us to dream of a simpler world that never really existed. But when the world is seemingly running down, there’s a strange comfort in looking backwards isn’t there? Sonically and thematically, “1994” seemingly channels Smashing Pumpkins’ “1979” sounding as though it could have been released in — well, 1994 while underpinned by some old school craftsmanship.

“‘1994’ is a song about clinging to specific times and seeking refuge in them, often to moments that never really existed,” the Los Angeles-based sibling duo explain. “We live in a world that deals nostalgia as currency, where the past is constantly viewed through rose tinted lenses, with our youth put on a pedestal and the continual quest to return to that version of ourselves always just out of reach. We long to return to the simpler times before life pulled us from each other and ourselves, before our hardships and tragedies calloused us to the world, back to a time that only ever existed in our minds.”

Directed by Otium, the accompanying video for “1994” is a woozy and panoramic visual that touches on the song’s overall themes of rose-tinted nostalgia for at time before everything seemingly went bonkers — even if it was kind of bullshit to begin with.

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

New Audio: E Lundquist Teams Up with Michael Damani on Breezy “Chasing”

Los Angeles-based producer, composer and multi-instrumentalist Eric Borders is the creative mastermind behind E. Lundquist, a project that derives its name from a loving nod to his family lineage, bringing the focus back to his own story. With E. Lundquist, Borders specializes in a warmly cinematic sound rooted in Rhodes-driven soul jazz, funk, R&B, library records and live band groove and analog synth textures, reflecting a shift to an intimate, reflective and composer-led approach. 

Borders’ forthcoming album Chasing My Reflections will touch upon themes of identity, resilience and self-reflection while featuring collaborations with Michael Damani, India Blue, Michael Edwards and JOVM mainstay Kendra Morris.

Chasing My Reflections will include “Wishing” feat. Kendra Morris and the album’s latest single “Chasing” feat. Michael Damani. “Chasing” is an upbeat and breezy tune, anchored around a Motown/Daptone/Big Crown/Colemine Records-like arrangement featuring reverb-soaked Rhodes or Wurlitzer, melodic rhythmic guitars and a steady backbeat beneath Damani’s yearning, equally old-school-like falsetto. Lyrically, the song touches upon themes of optimism, self-discovery and acceptance — all while feeling like a warm summer day.

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: STACEY Shares Lush, Kaleidoscopic “Upside Down Merry Go Round”

STACEY is a Toronto-born, Los Angeles-based singer/songwriter and musician, whose retro-tinged psych pop draws from the sounds and pop culture of the 1960s and 1970s has received critical praise from SPIN, LadyGunn, American Songwriter, Clash Magazine, Wonderland, Refinery29 and a lengthy list of others while receiving airplay from Apple Music’s Matt Wilkinson, KCRW’s and School Night’s Chris Douridas, CBC’s Errol Nazareth, BBC 6 Music’s Lauren Laverne and more.

The Canadian-born artist’s 2021 full-length debut, Saturn Return is part of a catalog that has amassed over eight million streams on Spotify, along with this year’s “These Days,” 2023’s “Christmas in California,” as well as 2013’s STACEY EP, 2015’s STACEY (Reconstruction) EP and 2017’s First Move EP.

Her compositions have been part of the soundtracks for more than 15 TV series and films including Netflix’s Spinning Out, Disney+’s Hollywood Stargirl, Lucifer, Pretty Little Liars Original Sin, Orphan Black and Degrassi. She has also shared stages with Charlotte Day Wilson, Tamino, Vinyl Williams and Tame Impala’s Cameron Avery. And adding to a growing profile, she has appeared on CTV‘s Your Morning and Global News’ The Morning Show and the Royal Ontario Museum‘s 75th Anniversary of Christian Dior Exhibit.

The STACEY and Dillon Casey co-produced, STACEY and Suzanne May a.k.a. Fonteyn co-written “Upside Down Merry Go Round” is STACEY’s first original release in five years and features Loren Humphrey (drums) and Tim McNalley (bass). Built around shimmering Wurlitzer, “Upside Down Merry Go Round” is lush, dreamy and subtly uneasy tune that sounds a bit like a seamless blend of Carole King‘s Tapestry, Dark Side of the Moon and Wish You Were Here-era Pink Floyd paired with a modern songwriting and lyrical approach. Thematically, the song captures the anxieties and emotional whiplash of existing in a modern, dystopian timeline: You’re trying to pay bills, join Zoom calls, chase dreams and carry on with your life, while the world unravels around you.

“I wanted to encapsulate the disorienting juxtaposition of day-to-day existence against the backdrop of worldly chaos, not only through the lyrics but also through the songwriting and production,” explains STACEY. “The drop to half-time in the choruses mirrors the relentless highs and lows of doom-scrolling. The song also has this feel-good quality that sits in contrast with the lyrics — ‘like a rainbow-coloured panic attack.’”

Directed by STACEY, the accompanying video for “Upside Down Merry Go Round” was filmed on 16mm film by Gus Bendinelli and is set a meticulously handmade surrealist dreamscape straight out of 1975 or so with psychedelic imagery and a miniature merry go round. To create the edible horses, which appear in the video. the Canadian born artist 3D-scanned the merry-go-round — a Facebook Marketplace find — and 3D-printed a miniature replicate of one of its horses. Longtime collaborator and makeup artist Christina Spina then created a mold, which the Los Angeles-based artist used to pour and then hand-painted the colored chocolate horses. “Aesthetically, I was loosely going for a 1970s Jodorowsky meets The Love Witch vibe with a sprinkle of Cher, but always myself — mostly letting my Facebook Marketplace prop finds and fashion choices guide the way,” STACEY says.

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

New Audio: Niia Shares Two Previously Unreleased Tracks off “V (Goth Jazz Edition)”

Born Niia Bertino, Niia is a Needham, MA-born, Los Angeles-based classically trained composer, pianist and vocalist. Deeply rooted in jazz, her work blends elegance, edge and a timeless voice with razor-sharp, seemingly lived-in songwriting. Her fifth album, last year’s Spencer Zahn co-produced V was the culmination of years spent experimenting at the intersection of tradition and reinvention.

Existing in the tension between control and collapse, V saw the acclaimed Los Angeles-based artist seamlessly blending the electronic textures of contemporary, experimental pop with the interplay of live, jazz-rooted instrumentation and musicianship. The album’s arrangements stretch — sometimes restrained, sometimes theatrical– but always with intention. As a classically trained musician, who grew up watching Italian cinema, Bertino explains, “I pulled from the harmonic language of jazz pianists like Bill Evans and from the psychological atmosphere of film scores.” 

Arguably, one of Bertino’s most personal albums to date, V thematically explores the full spectrum of the self — self-harm, self-delusion, self-awareness and in rare moments, self-love. “Not in a moralizing way, but in a very human one,” she adds. “The good and bad live side by side, often in the same verse. One minute I’m performing heartbreak like it’s a role I’ve rehearsed, the next I’m quietly admitting I caused the whole thing. That contradiction is the truth.”

The album featured “Pianos and Great Danes,” which I wrote about on this site.

Last week, Bertino released V (Goth Jazz Edition), a deluxe edition of her acclaimed fifth album through Candid Records. V (Goth Jazz Edition) features three bonus tracks, a cover of Chet Baker‘s “I Get Along Without You Very Well (Except Sometimes) and two, previously unreleased tracks “Been A Long Night” and Show Me Love.” “There were a few directions on the album that I still wanted to explore a little deeper, and these new songs felt so connected to the world of V that they really wouldn’t have made sense anywhere else,” Niia says of the deluxe edition of V.

“Been A Long Night” features an intricate, jazz-driven arrangement of broodingly cinematic piano and a supple yet propulsive bass line with skittering drum ‘n bass-meets footwork-styled beats beneath the acclaimed Los Angeles-based artist’s yearning delivery. While being both club and lounge friendly, “Been A Long Night” is rooted in a late-night longing and desire that’s simultaneously fun and a little dangerous.

“Show Me Love” is a slow-burning, gorgeous, Quiet Storm-like tune that showcases Niia’s effortlessly soulful, pop star vocal confessing a desire to wholly accept and love while asking her lover to show some much-needed vulnerability. “Show Me Love” may arguably be the deluxe edition’s most straightforward yet earnest tune.

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

New Audio: Leon Bridges Returns with Sultry and Soulful “Watch You Dance”

Atlanta-born, Fort Worth, TX-raised singer/songwriter and musician Leon Bridges quickly established himself as one of America’s most exciting new artists with 2015’s platinum-certified, Grammy Award-nominated debut Coming Home, which featured breakout singles “Coming Home” and “River.” Bridges followed up with 2018’s critically applauded Good Thing, which saw him expanding upon his sonic panic while earning a Grammy Award-nomination for Best R&B Album and a Grammy Award for Best Traditional R&B Performance for “Bet Ain’t Worth the Hand.”

2021’s Gold-Diggers Sound was the acclaimed Atlanta-born, Fort Worth-based artist’s most adventurous album to date, and the album received critical applause while earning another Grammy Award-nomination for Best R&B Album. His most recent album, 2024’s Lean is an introspective effort inspired by his Texan roots and his artistic evolution.

Along with his solo work, Bridges has collaborated with the equally acclaimed act Khraungbin on two albums — 2020’s Texas Sun and 2022’s Texas Moon. In a relatively short time he has earned six Grammy Award-nomiations — three for Best R&B Album — and a Grammy Award-win, has also collaborated with an eclectic array of artists, including John Mayer, Kacey Musgraves, Robert Glasper, Terrace Martin, Gunna, The Avanlanches, Gary Clark, Jr. and Shaboozey, all of which showcase a remarkably versatile artist.

Adding to a rapidly growing profile, Bridges has a long-held reputation as a captivating live performer, who has made a run of the global concert and festival circuit, playing an increasing number of the world’s major festivals while making appearances on Saturday Night Live, NPR’s Tiny Desk Concert and Austin City Limits.

Bridges’ fourth album, the J Lloyd-Watson and Lydia Kitto-produced fifth album, Happiness Anytime is slated for a Friday release through Columbia Records. Happiness Anytime reportedly sees the acclaimed Atlanta-born, Fort Worth-based artist returning to the warmth of his 2015 debut but while seeing the members of Jungle and Bridges’ signature sensibilities blending to create something entirely new — an expansive, borderless sound and approach that pushes the Grammy Award-winning artist into brand new territory. The material reportedly echoes Fela Kuti, Paul Simon’s 1990 effort The Rhythm of The Saints and Jorge Ben without feeling overly referential. At its core, the album is reportedly boundary pushing while remaining unmistakably Leon Bridges, rooted in his imitable vocal, effortless charisma and melodic sensibilities.

The album was written and recorded across three fast and furious sessions with Lloyd-Watson and Kitto, a collaboration that can trace its origins to the trio repeatedly crossing paths across the global festival circuit. The trio decided to attempt a low-pressure writing session at Los Angeles-based Chaplin Recording Studios. Four days later, they had come up with six songs — half of the completed album. Pino Palladino contributed bass during the sessions. The overall end result is a timeless body of work that feels unfussy and breezy — that they all hope will make the listener feel happiness anytime they play it.

“For me, happiness is not a feeling that you chase,” Bridges says,“I want this album to be something that lingers with people and lingers in people’s bones. There’s this feeling that we have to fix the problems of the world; you feel inadequate or it can be debilitating. My role is to be light. I hope that comes across with this album.” With Happiness Anytime, Bridges actively sets out with a desire to not only find joy but to find movement again.

Early in his career, Bridges was out in front dancing — and that was something that has wanted recently. He wanted to get back to making music to dance to, music to excise the stresses and frustrations of modern life, and to feel grounded in the rhythms of the present. Interestingly, over the summer, he has been introducing audiences to the new album with sets in Paris, Cannes, Los Angeles, Montreux Jazz Festival, London, Chicago and Outside Lands. And as he has being playing the new material live, he has unveiled “Leon Bridges Presents Happiness Anytime,” a reimagined stage production featuring a vinyl DJ, a horn section, three backing vocalists and Bridges out in front dancing and singing. Partly inspired by the communal spirt of Jamaican dancehall culture, the live set mirrors the album’s emphasis on movement — and on dancing your stresses and frustrations away for a bit. You can see what the live show will look like during his most recent appearance on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon, where he performed medley of tunes from the soon-to-be-released album — the strutting Afrobeat-meets-1970s Motown soul-like “Light The Way” and “Illusion” and jubilant, joyous ode to working things out “Talk It Over.”

“Watch You Dance,” Happiness Anytime‘s latest single is a strutting and sultry bit of neo-soul meets classic soul that feels like a funky, dance floor friendly synthesis of Black Pumas, Cody Chesnutt, Daptone Records and Marvin Gaye‘s “Got To Give It Up” but anchored in old-school craft, earnest, seemingly lived-in lyricism and a grown ass folks sensuality. The song’s narrator knows that seduction is a game that you have to play — and he knows how to play it well.