Mamalarky - Emily Breeze - Declan O'Donovan - Kindsight - Hohnen Ford - The Company Stores
Mamalarky's highly-anticipated sophomore full-length, Pocket Fantasy, is due out September 30 via Fire Talk. The follow up to the band's critically-acclaimed 2020 self-titled debut LP, the album's early singles have generated a great deal of excitement, with the lead track "Mythical Bonds" earning praise from the New York Times, who said "Mamalarky make math rock sound like fun" and appearing on a new music playlist from Talking Heads frontman David Byrne, while second single "It Hurts" landed on multiple best of the week lists.
Now Mamalarky are back with a final single from their forthcoming LP, a track called "Shining Armor". Accompanied by a video animated by Alex Futtersak, who is known several striking visuals he has created for Cautious Clay and Crumb, the track is the kind only Mamalarky could have created, delivering a blend of tightly wound indie rock, wobbly, jazz-inflected wildness and moments of arresting beauty played against their most abrasive.
"This song goes out to conveniently anonymous YouTube haters," says singer Livvy Bennett. "Shining Armor is an invitation for anyone who has shit to say about how I play guitar to go ahead and reveal themselves and play a little song for us! When I wrote this I was getting a bunch of comments about my gender and appearance and how that corresponds with how I play guitar. The only response was to covert that anger into something that's genuinely so fun to play.
"Alex Futtersak (@chippy_zone) took this idea and crafted a whole world around it, where our music is essentially breaking a curse over these angry knights in armor. I actually sent him some DIY motion capture from my room so some of the moves are true to form."
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Bristol-based indie noir-pop artist Emily Breeze returns with a bitter sweet new single Ordinary Life, dripping with brit-goth nostalgia and sad-pop synth lines via Sugar Shack Records on September 23rd 2022.
Emily’s previous single ‘Confessions of an Aging Party Girl’, received airplay from Lauren Laverne, Don Letts and Tom Robinson alongside continued support from BBC Radio Bristol and BBC Introducing in the West. Ordinary Life continues in this vein, a reflection on a gloriously misspent youth and a celebration of the magic, misery, miracles and monotony that are sewn into the fabric of everyday existence where you are the hero of your own mythic quest.
Speaking of the inspiration for the song Emily says, “It’s a quest that involves biblical first loves and tragic one night stands, epic all nighters and the quiet desperation that follows as your dreams disperse like the fronds of a dandelion clock in the cold morning air. You blink, two decades have passed and you become the thing you always despised, a three dimensional, functional adult with reasonable expectations... Or perhaps it's the theme song to the end of a John Hughes movie set twenty years after Prom night, except it's not prom night, it's Butlins and Mike Leigh is directing but Simple Minds and Souxsie Sioux are still sparkling in the spotlight, and so are you.”
Ordinary life is the opening track to Emily’s third solo album Rapture which she describes as “A collection of coming-of (middle) age stories which celebrate flamboyant failure, excess and acceptance”, due for release January 2023.
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The musical vastness and ambivalence of Declan O’Donovan’s sound is reflected by the picturesque backdrop between his home of Whitehorse in Canada’s Yukon and the urban centres from Toronto to Montreal that he frequents.
For over a decade, the Canadian has succeeded in creating stylistically unique fusions of the most diverse of song writing approaches. Nothing is too strange, too big or too far: alternative folk, psychedelic rock, classical piano, you name it.
Albums with an eccentric richness of ideas like his self-titled debut (2012) or the larger-than-life “Broken Sky” (2017) have made O’Donovan one of the most sought-after musicians in Canada. Comparisons range from Tom Waits to Randy Newman or Harry Nilsson, but of course don’t really do the creative maverick and his unmistakably rough timbre any justice. His new release “Get Thee Behind the Wheel” once again shows that he’s riding a wave of his own, subject to his own transformations.
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Danish four-piece Kindsight make music that draws from 80’s and 90’s alternative rock and combines it with the shimmering Scandinavian pop that the region has become so renowned for, resulting in a sound that is both fuzzy and melodic in equal measure. Releasing their first material in 2020, the up and coming Danish four-piece have been quick on the rise, picking up steam and their debut album, Swedish Punk, was released in March earlier this year and was followed by tour dates in Scandinavia, Germany and UK. Now they're back with atmospheric the new single Love You Baby All the Time, an indie pop gem recorded close after the album's release.
The band says: “For about 200.000 years, humanity has successfully postponed complete annihilation as each human takes part in a sort of symbiotic ritual with a person they would like to see several more of sometime in the future. “Love You Baby All the Time” seeks to present this occurrence loud and clear and with no further comments.”
Kindsight formed when front-woman Nina Hyldgaard Rasmussen and guitarist Søren Svensson bonded over a shared love of The Sugarcubes. They went on to recruit bass player Anders Prip and drummer Johannes Jacobsen and over the past few years have earned a reputation within Copenhagen’s thriving indie scene for their exciting live shows. The praised debut album Swedish Punk is finally available on vinyl, as a red limited edition.
On the album’s title, Rasmussen says “Swedish Punk’ was an off the cuff term our producer, Adam, came up with when we needed a working title for a new song we wrote during the recording sessions. Our bass player, Anders, then wrote some lyrics based on the working title and we ended up liking the whole ‘Swedish Punk’-thing so much it became the name of the album”.
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London-based singer-songwriter Hohnen Ford just announced a European tour in October supporting Matt Maltese and shares her new single "Close To Your Heart" - the latest track to be heard from upcoming debut EP 'Infinity', out 26th October via Young Poet. Debut EP 'Infinity' was written and produced by Hohnen Ford herself, features writing collaborations with Matt Maltese, and was mixed by Tom Carmichael (Porridge Radio, Wu-Lu).
A prodigious songwriting and vocal talent – Hohnen Ford has made an immediate impact. Very quickly given the seal of approval by jazz aficionado Jamie Cullum, she's gone on to receive notable support from Spotify (featured in their New Music Friday and Fresh Finds playlists), alongside coverage on esteemed publications including The Line Of Best Fit, CLASH Magazine and Whynow.
Hohnen Ford's achingly sincere, yet irresistibly entertaining and romantic prose, paired with her delicate piano arrangements position her as one of the most exciting songwriters to surface in recent times. Newly released single "Close To Your Heart" is further evidence of her gift, as she contemplates the emotional intricacies of relationships. Speaking more on the lyrical inspiration of new single, Hohnen Ford said:
"Close To Your Heart is about rekindling love for your person. Daring yourself to love like it's day one, and acknowledging bad habits. Taking responsibility for your own emotions and being able to laugh at yourself - step outside the emotion in that moment to stop yourself from bickering or causing a fight and remembering why you love that person. I wrote it to remind myself to make sure the hassle and stresses of day to day life don't get in the way of my relationships."
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The Company Stores independently releases The Family Album, their third full-length album, today September 23. The powerful and sultry voice of lead vocalist Ileana Ille captivates the audience with her ability to express raw emotion, while the band unites many influences to lay down bold grooves amidst dynamic crescendos.
“This album tells a story of everything being turned upside down; both personally and across the country,” says Matthew Marks, the primary lyricist for the band. “It is about family and understanding the triumphs, failures, tendencies, and choices of the people who came before, in order to understand how to successfully navigate where you are going.”
No Depression’s Amos Perrine writes, “The album had me from the opening track, ‘Savannah,’ which could have easily been on a Steely Dan record (notably the guitar parts), by way of the jazz group Return to Forever. The vocals by Ileana Ille glide over the instrumentation much like those of Return to Forever’s first vocalist, Flora Purim, did. Ille’s vocals are but one of the many textured layers that blend together in unexpected ways.”
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