Emily Moore is a Los Angeles-based singer/songwriter and multi-instrumentalist, who may be best known as a touring musician, who has shared stages with Grammy Award-winning act fun., Børns, Ella Vos, X Ambassadors and a lengthy list of others. Moore is also the creative mastermind behind the indie pop, solo recording project Total Brutal. And withTotal Brutal, Moore’s goal is to spread positivity and self-empowerment, based on an ethos of standing up for yourself in order to be heard and seen, facing fears head on –and most importantly, being comfortable in your own skin.
Inspired by a series of strong female artists, Moore is determined to help other young women make their worth known and their voices heard. “It took me a really long time to understand that I am allowed to speak up, have opinions and speak directly,” Moore explains. “I’m starting to realize that I can be myself and be liked and professional all the same. I want to help foster that adventurous spirit and confidence in young women!”
Moore’s latest Total Brutal single “Egypt” is a slickly produced, dance floor friendly, pop confection centered around a sinuous bass line, shimmering synth arpeggios, Nile Rodgers-like guitar, an infectious hook and Moore’s self-assured yet coquettish vocals. Seemingly indebted to 80s New Wave and synth pop, the track finds its narrator desperately trying to connect with the feeling of childhood excitement over what the future could hold. Of course, the past year has had us feeling fearful and uncertain — but the infectious track manages to remind the listener that there’s hope for something better, as long as you’re still here.
Moore confides, “I constantly need to remind myself to play more and lighten up. It’s easy to get lost in the seriousness of life but I want to go through life having fun and viewing everything with curiosity.”
Born Mariama Siga Goudiaby, the rising singer/songwriter Mariaa Siga hails from the Casamance region of Southern Senegal. In 2009,. Goudiaby won a talent show and caught the attention of Senegalese act Joan of Arc; the act’s frontperson mentored the young Goudiaby, helping her refine her style and further develop her musical skills. By the following year, the emerging Senegalese artist earned a role in Mon Réve, a film which aired on RDV.
As a musical artist, Goudiaby was long accustomed to the traditional rhythms of her native Casamance but her curiosity led her to discover and experiment with more Western styles, including the blues and jazz, which she meshes into her own work. In 2016, she was one of the winners of the Festival des Vielles Pirogues’ Tremplin competition.
Goudiaby released two singles “Ya sama none” and “Asekaw,” in 2017. And building upon a growing profile, the Senegalese artist performed in her native Casamance for the first time with a set at 2018’s Kayissen Festival. Also that year, Yoro Ndiyae featured Goudiaby on his Sunu Folk compilation before capping it off with a French tour that November.
Building upon a growing profile, Goudaiby released her full-length debut, last year’s Asekaw (which translates as “woman” in her native Diola). She also won Baco Records’ One Riddim Contest, which led to sets at Morocco’s Festival MarcoFoiles, France’s Midem Festival and to an invite to play Quebec’s Festival Mondial des Femmes d’Ici et d’Ailleurs.
The rising Senegalese artist’s latest single “Lagne Boote,” which in her native Diola translates to “back to basics” was recorded at Vagh and Weinmann Studio in Salernes, France — with the support of the African Culture Fund. Centered around shimmering and looping acoustic guitar, shuffling African polyrhythm and Goudiaby’s gorgeous vocals, “La Lagne Boote” is a breezy and infectious song that subtly hints at soca and other Caribbean sounds while gently reminding the listener to never forget their roots. “When you get lost and don’t know where you’re going, go back to your sources,” Goudiaby explains.
Throughout the past year, I’ve spilled copious amounts of virtual ink covering French electronic music artist and producer LutchamaK. The French JOVM mainstay’s work is deeply influenced by — and generally draws rom — techno but while reflecting a lifelong devotion to and love of eclecticism, with his work often possessing elements of deep house and EDM among other electronic music genres, styles and subgenres.
During that same period, LutchamaK has been frenetically prolific, releasing new material through an increasing number of EPs, standalone singles and albums, including his latest EP, the six track effort Omen. Omen EP finds the French producer and JOVM mainstay crafting material that’s decidedly deep house. Centered around stuttering hi-hats and wobbling synth arpeggios, “Hope/Peace” is mesmerizing yet meant to be soothing — all while bringing Octo Octa’s Between Two Selves to mind.
Brooklyn-based psych pop/dance pop act Psymon Spine — Noah Prebish, Sabine Holler, Brother Michael Rudinski, and Peter Spears — can trace its origins back to when its founding duo of Noah Prebish and Peter Spears met while attending college. Bonding over mutual influences and common artistic aims, Psymon Spine’s founding duo toured the European Union with Prebish’s electronic project Karate. And as the story goes, while in Paris, Spears and Prebish wrote their first song together. By the time, they arrived in London, they were offered a record deal.
When the band’s founding duo returned to the States, Spears recruited Micheal “Brother Micheal” Rudinski and their Karate bandmates Devon Kilbern, Nathaniel Coffey to join their newest project. And with that lineup, they fished out the demos, which wold eventually comprise their full-length debut, 2017’s You Are Coming to My Birthday. The band went out to support the effort with immersive art and dance parties like their Secret Friend party series across Brooklyn and through relentless touring.
Prebish was also splitting his creative time with rising Brooklyn-based dram pop act Barrie and around the same time, his work with the rising dream pop act began to receive attention across the blogosphere and elsewhere through the release of a handful of buzz worthy singles, followed by their full-length debut, last year’s Happy to Be Here. Interestingly while with Barrie, Prebish met his further Psymon Spine bandmate, vocalist and multi-instrumentalist Sabine Holler.
Without live shows and touring, the members of Psymon Spine have been busy releasing new material this year, which included two singles:
“Modmed,” an Andrew VanWyngarden-produced and cowritten, strutting disco-tinged track that’s actually deceptively upbeat, as it captures the ambivalent and confusing mixture of frustration, doubt and relief of a relationship that had long petered out and finally wound down to its inevitable conclusion. Interestingly, the song is inspired and informed by personal experience: Prebish and Holler’s difficult decision to leave Barrie to focus on Pysmon Spine full-time.
Psymon Spine’s third single of this year, is the hazy and lysergic banger “Confusion.” Centered around shimmering synth arpeggios, a wobbling bass line, blown out beats and Prebish’s plaintive vocals, a trippy spoken word-delivered break and a looping guitar solo, Psymon Spine’s latest single brings Tame Impala‘s Currents to mind. Much like its immediate predecessors, “Confusion” continues a run of carefully crafted and breezy, hook driven pop.
Interestingly, the release of the single manages to simultaneously coincide with the announcement of the Brooklyn-based act’s third album Charismatic Megafauna while encapsulating the album’s overall theme and vibe — the complicated feelings involved in the dissolution of human relationships. In particular “Confusion” finds the band channeling the confusing and contradictory feelings following the sort of breakup that has lead to a major rift in the larger social circle — but while also possibly hinting to the end of a friendship or working relationship. And as a result, the song seems to evoke the desire to dance away the hurt, for a little while at least.
Charismatic Megafauna is slated for a February 21, 2021 release through Northern Spy.
Building upon a rapidly growing national profile, the act landed at #30 on Brisbane community radio 4ZZZ’s 2019 countdown and received praise from British journalist and post-punk musician Vivien Goldman during her BIGSOUND Keynote address, which led to further industry buzz.
Much like countless other acts across the globe, the members of the rising Aussie punk act have been attempting to maneuver a difficult and challenging year — but they’ve managed to continue some of the momentum of last year with the June release of “Better Than This,” which has received ration of commercial and local radio, as well as COVID-19 safe shows. (Shows, y’all. Shows. Holy shit!) BLUSSH’s second single of 2020 is the mosh pit friendly ripper “Incoming.”
Centered around fuzzy power chords, thunderous drumming, enormous hooks the song is full of the betrayal, confusion, accusation and heartache of a bitter breakup with an unvarnished piss and bile-fueled delivery.“It’s tempered, bruised and challenged as it explores themes of being on the other side of love” the members of BLUSSH explain.
With the release of 2018’s full-length debut Slices, the Stockholm-based psych act Phogg quickly established a buzz-worthy sound that critics across Scandinavia and elsewhere compared to Ariel Pink and Unknown Mortal Orchestra. Building upon a growing profile, last year’s sophomore album Mofeto: Mashine Adamkosh, an album about “robots that take over the world,” featured two attention grabbing singles:
“Three Shirts:” a motorik-groove driven single that to my ears brings TOY‘s Join the Dots and Primal Scream‘s Evil Heat to mind.
“Pearls:” an expansive and lysergic track that’s one part explosive psych rock freak out ripper and one part melodic and jangling guitar pop held together by a sinuous and propulsive groove.
Much like everyone else, 2020 has been a difficult year for the members of Phogg. Riding high from the critical reception of their sophomore album, the band began the ambitious challenge of working on two different albums simultaneously with the goal of working on each album in parallel — and then releasing them at the same time. But as the old saying goes: “The best laid plans of mice and men go awry.” Recording two different albums at the same time, wound up being a terrible decision with the band experiencing burn out and fatigue. And for a period of time, the band sort of floated around with no direction and no goal, waiting until their creative instincts returned.
During that the period, the band had deep-seated philosophical questions that tied into their own creative process. “What does it really mean to be a rock band these days? Does anything even matter? The legendary days of rock have faded into the ruthless fart of the pandemic era. It’s not fun to make songs about the end times when you are in the middle of it.”
Phogg’s forthcoming third album The Sharkness is informed by and influenced by the harrowing events and emotions of the pandemic, an existential crisis and a recent heartbreak. The Sharkness‘ latest single “Corme (Rental Palace)” is a brooding yet meditative instrumental jam centered around shimmering guitars, atmospheric and twinkling keys, a propulsive rhythm section before turning into a gallop towards the song’s last half. Some dexterous guitar work darts in and out of the song’s propulsive rhythm, giving the song a subtle surf rock air. Interestingly, the track may be among the most brooding yet heartfelt tracks of their growing catalog.
Eoin Murphy is a Philadelphia-based singer/songwriter, multi-instrumentalist and creative mastermind behind the emerging solo recording project brushstroke, which draws from neo-soul, psych pop and alternative R&B.
Murphy’s latest brushstroke single “Freeze” is a sultry, slow-burning, Quiet Storm-inspired track centered around a dusty, lo-fi-like production, shimmering guitars, twinkling keys, a sinuous bass line, the Philadelphia-based singer/songwriter and multi-instrumentalist’s plaintive yet soulful falsetto, blown-out beats and an infectious, radio friendly hook. Sonically, the song manages to bring JOVM mainstays Nick Hakim and Tame Impala to mind, complete with a similar deliberate attention to craft and mood.
Austin, TX-based singer/songwriter Alex Maas is known for being the frontman and founding member of acclaimed Austin-based psych rock act The Black Angels and psych rock supergroup MIEN. Maas’ life changed in 2018 with the birth of his first child, a healthy and happy baby boy, he and his partner named Luca, which means “bringer of light.”
With Luca’s brith, Maas experienced a flurry of emotions he hadn’t felt before.There was profound joy and awe over the creation of a new life — but there was to some lesser degree, there was a gnawing fear: What sort of world was his son going to grow up into, exactly? And how could Maas protect him from its dangers? “The world is definitely messed up,” Maas says in press notes. “But there’s a lot of good in it too, and that’s why the whole world isn’t on fire—parts of it are. I do believe that there’s more good than evil.”
Named for his first-born child, Maas’ Brett Orrison co-produced full-length debut Luca is slated for a December 4, 2020 please through Innovative Leisure. The album was a long time coming, with some of its material dating back almost a decade — and put together piece-by-piece over the past couple of years. Featuring songs that are a much gentler, meditative take on the psych rock sound we know him for, the album is a decided sonic departure, showcasing what Maas says is “a whole different part of my brain.”
Driven by the quiet, nature-filled expanses of his home state, Luca finds Maas contemplating his son’s future, the terrifying and uncertain world he was born in and how to navigate the perils and frustrations of our society. And as a result. Luca is arguably the most personal and direct material Maas has written in his nearly two decade recording career.
Last month, I wrote about “Been Struggling,” a dreamy and shuffling waltz that reminded me a bit of the melancholy psychedelia of Scott Walker and the classic Nashville sound — but while centered around meditation of memory, fate and loss from the perspective of a narrator, who has lived a messy and full life. “The City,” Luca’s latest single is a woozy and intimate campfire that reckons with the larger, historical cycle of human violence. The hauntingly sparse arrangement manages to evoke the horror, terror and senselessness of our behavior to one another. “The enemy is always just outside the door and the enemy could be anything,” Maas explains.
With the release of their debut EP I Used to Love You, Now I Don’t, the rising Brighton-based dream pop act Hanya — Heather Sheret (vocal, guitar), Benjamin Varnes (guitar), Dylan Fanger (bass) and Jack Watkins (drums) — received attention nationally and across the blogosphere for a sound that meshes elements dream pop and shoegaze.
Much like countless other bands across the globe, Hanya had plans to build upon a rapidly growing national and international profile: earlier this year,. they released their acclaimed sophomore EP Sea Shoes and they made their Stateside debut at New Colossus Festival back in March. Without having shows or tours, the Brighton-based JOVM mainstays have been busy writing new material, which has included “Texas,” a shimmering bit of dream pop that nods at 70s AM rock, and focuses on the longing and excitement of a new crush/new love/new situationship.
Hanya’s latest single, the hazy and meditative “Monochrome” is centered around Sheret’s gorgeous yet plaintive vocals, shimmering guitars, atmospheric synths and a soaring hook, the new song finds the Brighton-based act boldly crafting a sound and approach that sets them apart from a crowded field of challengers.
“With a break from live shows, each of us had a chance to reinvigorate our songwriting. It’s difficult when you’re always rehearsing for the next show to really mess around and make music with no real direction,” the band says in press notes. “‘Monochrome’ started off this way, a hazy-pop ballad written on a midi-keyboard. Now we’re all back together, we fleshed out the chaos together and developed the track’s full dream-pop potential. It’s a song about re-connection with what makes you happy, taking pleasure from the little things”.
Deriving their name from a pointed criticism of society’s objectification of women, the London-based punk rock trio and JOVM mainstays Dream Wife — Icelandic-born, London-based Rakel Mjöll (vocals), Alice Go (guitar, vocals) and Bella Podapec (bass, vocals) — can trace their origins to when the trio met and started the band back in 2015 as an art project centered around a unique concept: a ban d born out of one girl’s memories of growing up in Canada in the 1990s.
Dream Wife’s 2018 self-titled debut was released to widespread critical acclaim — and the London-based JOVM mainstays supported the album by opening for Garbage, The Kills and Sleigh Bells and playing that year’s SXSW. Building upon a growing international profile, the members of Dream Wife also went on a series of headlining tours across the European Union and the States, which included a Rough Trade stop with New York-based genre-defying artist Sabri.
Released earlier this year through Lucky Number Music, the London-based trio’s Marta Salogni-produced So When You Gonna . . . finds the JOVM mainstays crafting what may arguably be their most urgent and direct material to date. Thematically touching upon abortion, miscarriage and gender equality, the album’s material if fueled by a “it’s now or never” immediacy, in which the listener is told that they need to get off their ass and start doing something to make the world a better place for all — right this very second. In the UK, So When You Gonna . . . has been a critical and commercial success: the album landed at #18 on the UK Albums Chart, making it the only album in the Top 20 to be produced by an all womxn/non-male production and engineering team — and the only non-major label release to chart that high.
To celebrate such a momentous achievement in their careers, Dream Wife will be releasing a live album, IRL (Live in London 2020). Recorded at a Peckham Audio show back in January, the live album, captures the band’s ferocious and feral live sound, which has made them a must-see live act. But it also captures something much larger and much more important what so many of us miss: the transcendent ecstasy of a fan seeing their favorite artist play their favorite song live; the camaraderie with newfound friends over your mutual love of that artist — or of traveling to see that artist and on and on and on.
IRL (Live in London 2020)’s first single is a previously unreleased song “Cheap Thrills.” Centered around slashing guitars, a propulsive bass line, four-on-the-floor drumming and Mjöll’s brash and bratty delivery, “Cheap Thrills” sonically is one part Gang of Four, one part Yeah Yeah Yeahs and one part Garbage with a youthful and defiant urgency.
