Wendy Rae Fowler - Reb Fountain - Gustaf - Daisy Chute

Wendy Rae Fowler - Golden Brown.

Wendy Rae Fowler has shared a brand new single - her own unique rendition of the Stranglers’ classic, ‘Golden Brown’. Whilst maintaining all the twinkling emotion of the original, Wendy makes the cover completely her own; adding a distinctive whimsical allure, a truly spellbinding rendition, exuding its own haunting grace. You may not think you know Wendy Rae Fowler, but you do.

Wendy Rae Fowler penned and performed the theme music to one of your favorite dark-noir thrillers, The Killing (AMC), and her music has been featured on Orange is The New Black (Netflix). Her work has been variously described as “Brutal and Beautiful” by The Sunday Times and “Eerie and unforgettable” by The Guardian.

She was a founding member of We Fell To Earth and has collaborated with numerous bands and artists, including vocals on Queens Of The Stone Age’s ‘Feel Good Hit of The Summer’, Mark Lanegan (Bubblegum, Field Songs, Here Comes That Weird Chill), Eagles Of Death Metal (Death By Sexy) and Maya Jane Coles. Her music has also featured on the critically acclaimed film Jeune et Jolie and the BBC Documentary A Year in an English Garden: Flicker + Pulse. The single ‘This Is Not A Love Song’ off her new album has been recently featured on CW’s The Republic Of Sarah and she has just composed the original score for the documentary film Clay + Bone, featuring Will Self.

==========================================================================

Reb Fountain - Iris.

The day hath arrived. Iris, Reb Fountain's newest album, is officially out now! Yay! We have spent the week busily picking packing boxing and wrapping all of your records and CDs in anticipation for this day of days. Rest assured, if you haven't received yours yet, the couriers are busy! IRIS is coming like the Summer down under not too far away.

Reb also has today released the visual counterpart to this week's lead single, and title-track 'Iris'; the video directed and filmed by none other than Lola Fountain-Best.

The namesake of her new album, Reb says on the single, “'Iris' is a love letter to my sisters and my many selves, an embrace that holds all the stories we never shared, a rainbow connection, a feminist arsenal, a space to rest, a prism for the heart. What’s in your heart that you dare not speak? If love be our currency, what stories we would tell?"

==========================================================================

Gustaf - Cruel.

Brooklyn art punks Gustaf have released their highly anticipated debut album, Audio Drag For Ego Slobs via Royal Mountain Records. Following love from the likes of NPR, DIY, NME, Paste, BrooklynVegan and more for their past singles "Best Behavior", "Book" and "The Motions", the band are sharing a final video for album standout "Cruel" ahead of their supporting run with IDLES throughout the US.

With further dates planned with new Royal Mountain label-mates Pillow Queens, as well as California legends Osees, Audio Drag For Ego Slobs sees Gustaf staking their claim as New York’s “hardest working…and most reliably fun bands” 

Vocalist Lydia Gammill expands on "Cruel", "When I started working out the lyrics for cruel, I liked the idea of someone getting mad at the sunlight for shining through their window. I wanted to play with the idea of someone victimizing themselves over a blessing. Ultimately "Cruel" became a ‘love’ song — or as it goes with a lot of Gustaf songs, an anti-love song."

She continues, "The protagonist in "Cruel" is unfairly upset at someone who gave them a glimpse of a good thing and then took it away. Now they’re left obsessing over the thrill of what could have been. They were content with what they already had, but once they knew something more was possible they became indignant over losing it. Selfishly musing that if they knew it would be like this, they would’ve rather not had the thing at all."

==========================================================================

Daisy Chute - Let Me Be Your Home.

Daisy Chute is a folk/Americana singer-songwriter, multi-instrumentalist and regular on the London music scene. Daisy's new single ‘Let Me Be Your Home’ is taken from her forthcoming new EP ‘Songs of Solace’.

’Let Me Be Your Home’ is the second in a concept EP entitled ‘Songs of Solace’ that follows the beginning, middle and end of a relationship and explores themes of mental health and depression. The EP features acoustic heartfelt songs with female vocal,   guitar, cello, violin & piano. 

Daisy says “Let me Be Your Home represents the honeymoon phase of the relationship. It's simply about being someone's safe place, their home. It's cosy and comforting, with a tinge of sadness hinted at with lyrics like 'when you find that life's too much to bear’”

While her musical roots were born out of her Scottish/American heritage, Daisy has had forays and extensive training in both the jazz and classical genres.  Whilst still at school Daisy signed to Universal/Decca as one quarter and lead vocalist of multi platinum selling band All Angels.
A mix of Celtic, American, Classical and Jazz backgrounds has since seen her feature across Film, TV, Game soundtracks ranging from The Sims 4, Tomb Raider, Shaun The Sheep the movie, 47 Ronin and Yesterday, to David Attenborough documentaries (A Perfect Planet) and Radiohead albums (session musician on A Moon Shaped Pool).

==========================================================================

Gustaf - Alice Hubble - Alphanaut - stores - Family Time

Gustaf - The Motions.

Brooklyn art punks Gustaf are sharing the final single from their highly anticipated debut album Audio Drag For Ego Slobs. "The Motions" follows previous tracks "Best Behavior" and the NPR-approved "Book" and is the latest track from one of New York’s “hardest working…and most reliably fun bands” (BrooklynVegan) before their album comes out on October 1st via Royal Mountain Records.

Ahead of an extensive of touring schedule that sees them traversing the US, UK and Europe alongside IDLES, Pillow Queens, and Osees, vocalist Lydia Gammill explains, "I always envisioned "The Motions" as our ‘walking around New York City’ song. The cadence is great for trudging across a bridge or taking the subway.

The song is about snapping between the perspective of your chaotic inner narrative while following the precut path of the world around you. Like when you’re strutting down the sidewalk to a song and your headphones slip off for a second to reveal the natural soundscape you’d been ignoring, realizing the world you had been wrapped up in is not the one shared by everyone else. 

Then you see that everyone with headphones is jumping between their own personal world and the reality they’re actually living in. I’ve found that if you walk around New York City without headphones, the streets are surprisingly silent. It’s us that add the cacophony of our own personal soundtracks.

==========================================================================

Alice Hubble - Hexentanzplatz.

Hexentanzplatz the new album by Alice Hubble will is released today September 10th, 2021 via London-based electronic-pop label Happy Robots. Described as the work of ‘one lady at home with her enormous collection of synthesisers’, Alice Hubble mixes melancholic pop, layered vintage synths and elegant vocals, reminiscent of Ladytron, Jane Weaver and Dubstar. Her debut album Polarlichter was released in September 2019 to much critical acclaim.

The title track of the album, Hexentanzplatz is named after the German mountain steeped in magic and legend. It translates literally to mean 'Witches’ Dance Floor' in English. An apt title for an album that dances it’s way through themes of illusion, love, feminism and protest whilst maintaining glistening, 80’s synth-pop sensibilities. “Being an eternal optimist I felt the need to write something in 2020 that was full of hope and positivity,” she says. “‘Hexentanzplatz’ is in part about the mountain, but really it's an inclusive pop song about fighting the patriarchy,” she continues. “Oh what a beautiful mountain” she sings atop euphoric, glitchy electronics. ‘Hexentanzplatz’ is a celebration of the wonders of nature, inclusivity and acceptance.

Of the other tracks on the album, perhaps the most classically pop moment is ‘Projections’ an 80’s style love song for the confused. “1,2,3 and I fall in love with my projections of you / I just see what I want to see” the chorus goes, referencing the love you project onto an unobtainable person. Second single ‘My Dear Friend’ was inspired by the discovery of a collection of love letters written by Hubble’s mother to her father around the time that they first met. “My mother passed away when I was in my teens and these letters gave me a real insight into who she was as a person, her ‘newly in love’ giddiness jumping off the page,” she says.

In contrast, Hubble found herself channelling a lot of anger into ‘Power Play’. “The track is a comment on what happens in a post #metoo world, once the worst offenders have been ‘cancelled’ and the news stories are over. Has something changed?  Does society move on and go to the next issue?” she explains, “‘Power Play’ is the closest thing I’ve written to a protest song”. The album also showcases Hubble’s talent for creating immersive electronic soundscapes. Tracks like ‘Numb’ and album opener ‘West Reservoir’ are awash with twinkling synths, the latter of which invites the listener into Hubble’s carefully curated world. ‘Gleichfalls’, a blissed out five minute instrumental, close

==========================================================================

Alphanaut - Young, Wild And Beautiful.

We have a new single from Palm Springs music collective, Alphanaut! Coming in hot before the release of their album on October 15th, they are sharing “Young, Wild & Beautiful,” another smooth delivery from the band that showcases their flare for new wave rock laced with electro-synth sweetness. With founding member Mark Alan’s warm and inviting vocal delivery, I call it soul food for the ears.

Alphanaut is a true passion project of ringmaster Mark Alan, along with the creative contributions of family and friends. As musicians with a shared purpose and common love of Bowie, Talking Heads, and Roxy Music. 

Upcoming album “On Some Planets This Is Pop” is a rose tinted exploration of inclusivity, praising the unordinary while championing what it means to shine as your true self.

Alphanaut · Young, Wild And Beautiful

==========================================================================

stores - bones.

The debut single from Merseyside based stores, 'bones' has already caught the attention of the likes of Speedy Wunderground founder Dan Carey, who gave the song a spin when sitting in for Steve Lamacq on BBC Radio 6 Music. The single has also found it's way on to a range of playlists including Spotify's 'Melomania', Birp FM's Indie, The So Young List and others.

The band have announced the music video for 'bones', directed by Existential Pleasures, will be released today Friday 10th September. "A story regarding the complexities and imbalances of a toxic relationship, a perpetual loop of virulent tendencies in which each consort feels like a sacrificial lamb on the altar"

The CGI animation created by Existential Pleasures Studio manifests the duo digitally in a contorted digital dreamscape. Presenting the themes of toxic relationships with the imagery of lambs for the slaughter, peace offering flowers and rabbits in the headlights.

About Existential Pleasures - Existential Pleasures are a multi-faceted creative studio formed in 2015 by Fionn de Buitlèar and Joseph Wyness. Their output of work intertwines various artistic disciplines including graphic design, 3D animation, product design and art direction. The studio looks to constantly push boundaries in its work through the use of the newest technologies to form new ways of storytelling.

==========================================================================

Family Time - New Positions.

Spanish duo Family Time share ‘New Positions’, their first release since 2019s experimental pop-opera album ‘The Great Abismo’  and their first with US indie label 22Twenty. They also announce an exclusive showcase with Oracle Sisters, in partnership with Primavera Sound and an extensive run of EU dates this Winter.

Trading the humid backdrop of holiday resorts that illuminated their last work for a snow-stormed makeshift studio-shelter in Berlin, they have been working on new material, of which we are now offered an opening taste. ‘New Positions’, with a certain fin-de-siècle allure and cinematic poise, is a reflection on the mathematics of intimacy. How does any relationship fare when faced with cold, rational scrutiny? What happens when we poke at love with our anxieties? And will our numbers hold, we are asked, by the time we get to morning?

Opening with gentle piano, the track is tinged with jazz inflections that underpin it’s captivating but laid back atmosphere. Dreamy saxophone lines enter and leave the musical conversation like guests at a dinner party, both fleeting but punctuated with meaning.

==========================================================================

Black Bordello - Sylvie - Gustaf

Black Bordello - Nunhead.

Peckham, London based quintet Black Bordello have released their new single "Nunhead". An uncompromising 5 minute art-rock attack of the senses, the track examines the gentrification of Peckham, its new generation of disrespecting residents and the inevitable fate of us all.

The release of "Nunhead" coincides with the announcement of the band's signing to Hideous Mink Records (Opus Kink, Fake Turins, Body Horror) and arrives alongside an accompanying video for the track, shot in Nunhead cemetery and directed by Will Reid (recently working with the likes of Malady, Slowthai, LEGSS and Lauren Auder).

Comprised of singer and guitarist Sienna Bordello, Eddie Amos (drums/percussion), Anthony Boatright (bass), Rachel Asafo-Agyei (backing vocals) and Henry Carpenter (keys), Black Bordello are widely regarded as one of the most unique and exciting live acts in London right now.

Pulling together the shapeshifting creativity and theatrics of PJ Harvey, the jazz-flecked tones of Billie Holiday and Bessie Smith with the emotional intensity of Patti Smith, Black Bordello are a force to be reckoned with and "Nunhead" is a momentous statement of intent from the 5-piece.

Speaking on the track, the band said: "'Nunhead' was written during the plague, at a time when people were confined to their houses. Sienna would visit Nunhead cemetery frequently as a place of refuge and to see the graves of her family members. There she was met face to face by the ills of gentrification. The place that always held profound, peaceful contemplation and wisdom buried deep within its grounds was now ruined by over-privileged pleasure makers who had no real connection to the area or its history. Sienna and the band felt this reflected the overarching psychopathy in our times."

==========================================================================

Sylvie - Falls on me.

Last month Sylvie announced their self-titled debut EP on Terrible Records, and shared its epononymous title track. The song is a cover of a song from an obscure 1970s record by Ian Matthews called Later That Same Year, and a track that serves as a partial inspiration for the band's existence. Before they adopted it as a name, the band (which is led by some time Drugdealer & Golden Daze member Benjamin Schwab and features Marina Allen and Sam Burton) started using the term "a Sylvie" to refer to "a song from the past that’s incredible but for whatever reason, is basically unknown," and the group's sound is a sort of homage to lost gems like Matthew's songs, and the recordings of Mad Anthony, the Southern California group that Benjamin's father John Schwab played in during the '70s. 

Now the band are sharing a new single from the EP and their first original composition, a track entitled "Falls on me" that features lead vocals from Allen, whose well-regarded solo debut Candlepower, came out on Fire Records earlier this year.

A gorgeously rendered song that feels as though it could have been airlifted directly out of Laurel Canyon, the track is anchored by a powerful and strikingly nuanced performance from Allen, but was written by Schwab who identifies it as the most personal song on Sylvie's debut.

"A lot of the songs on the EP feel like they're about other people's lives, my experience with them, or a time and place in the past, but this is the one off the EP that is directly about my life and my growth," Schwab explains. "When I was writing 'Falls on me', I was sorting through all these emotions that had built up over the past 5-10 years. Through rel-tionships ending, bridges burning, or whatever it was, I found myself at a place where I felt very distant from the source. 

Repeating similar patterns, being heartbroken over someone over and over again or whatever it was. I found myself really lost to the point where there was really no other place to go but home. The first half of the song explores this feeling, and then 3/4 of the way through the character meets a friend who reminds them of themselves. There is this person who reminds them just enough of who they are so that they can see themselves again or what it would be like to return home, back to the source, to yourself. This song to me is about deliverance and a returning home that took me many years to arrive at. Itʼs sung by Marina Allen, who realy did such an amazing job delivering the sentiment."

==========================================================================

Gustaf - Best Behavior.

Brooklyn’s Gustaf are sharing "Best Behavior", the follow up to the NPR-approved "Book" and second offering from the debut album Audio Drag For Ego Slobs, out October 1st on Royal Mountain Records. A frenetic and suitably buzzing from one of New York’s “hardest working…and most reliably fun bands” (BrooklynVegan), it comes ahead of an extensive of touring throughout the US, UK and Europe that sees them sharing the stage with IDLES, Pillow Queens, and Osees.

Vocalist Lydia Gammill explains, "“Best Behavior” was fun to record because it was one of the first songs we finished/crafted in the studio rather than onstage. It started out as a demo we had in the early days of the band but never ended up playing live. It sat forgotten until we began planning the record and came together pretty effortlessly in the studio." She continues, "Unlike the bulk of the album that we developed over the course of many live shows, it was exciting to be making decisions and constructing the final song as it was happening. It also helped us get our footing and identify how we wanted to steer and produce the remaining recordings."

"The song’s ethos is a bit of the old and the new attitude for Gustaf. Our narrator, the ‘ego slob’, is bargaining with itself, scrounging for self compassion and self assurance despite a pile of hurt feelings in its wake. In demanding spoils despite having done nothing to earn them, we see the initial cracks in a brutish facade— our antihero slowly realizing maybe the shell they built for themselves was not built for the world."

==========================================================================