The Deslondes - Jillette Johnson - Dot Allison - DIVES

Photo by Bobbi Wernig

The Deslondes - Dunes.

The Deslondes are set to return with Ways & Means July 8th, 2022 via New West Records. The 14-song set is their first album in five years and follows 2017’s critically acclaimed Hurry Home. Ways & Means was produced by The Deslondes & their longtime collaborator Andrija Tokic (Alabama Shakes) and was recorded at The Bombshelter in Nashville, TN. The album features Margo Price on the title track, as well as Twain and the multi-instrumentalist Billy Contreras on multiple songs as well. 

Long combining elements of early Stax, Sun, and Atlantic Records with the influence of a more raw, stripped-down sound gleaned off field recordings from Alan Lomax and the Mississippi Records catalog, the band also incorporate psychedelic flourishes that bring to mind the sonic experimentation of Joe Meek, Lee Hazlewood and the Velvet Underground. Infusing everything from saxophone, flute, and synth to string arrangements and a full drum kit for the first time, the group naturally progresses and evolves in real-time on their third full-length offering.

Lauded as “burgeoning stars” by The New York Times, The Deslondes’ 2014 self-titled debut was a breakout hit praised by NPR as “energized, elegant, and new,” and their follow-up, Hurry Home, earned similar acclaim with Rolling Stone calling it “a gritty, grimy mix of early rock ‘n’ roll and lo-fi R&B.” Following the band’s hiatus in late 2018, members Sam Doores and Riley Downing each released debut solo albums to critical acclaim. 

PopMatters called Doore’s eponymous debut “...a deeply poetic and haunting collection that draws upon the musicians’ disparate influences” and “Perhaps not since Los Lobos’ Kiko has an artist so effortlessly married avant-garde and everyman sensibilities, arriving at a place where childlike curiosity meets the fruits of patient practice and ambition. Deep knowledge and unbound imagination coexist peacefully, happily, throughout." Of Downing’s Start It Over (2021), Uncut Magazine in the U.K. called it a “dusty triumph” and described his voice  “...like Johnny Cash with a hangover,” exclaiming “His brain…is abuzz with sounds and ideas, which makes his solo debut a thrill.”

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Jillette Johnson - Cul De Sac.

Nashville-based artist Jillette Johnson has just announced her new EP Normal Kid with the official video for the new song “Cul De Sac.” The four song EP, due out on June 15, was co-written and produced by Joe Pisapia who collaborated with Johnson on her critically acclaimed 2021 album It’s A Beautiful Day And I Love You. 

“‘Cul De Sac’ is about wanting to feel special and wanting to belong, all at the same time,” explains Johnson. “Growing up, it often felt like I had to choose between the two, but as I got older I realized that my me-ness was only made more radiant in connection to the world around me. I am no more or less than anyone else, and by freeing myself of those comparisons, my star really has the space to shine.”

The Normal Kid EP draws upon late '70s new wave, early '80s synth-pop, and '90s R&B, finding Johnson turning personal revelations about childhood dreams and adulthood realities into universal pop anthems. The EP will arrive with a trio of music videos directed by Grant Claire that were shot over the course of a single day on a vintage Sony Betamax 88 camera. Last month, Johnson released the official video for the EP’s title track.

Normal Kid follows Johnson’s first full length in more than 4 years, It’s A Beautiful Day And I Love You. The album was praised by American Songwriter,  GRAMMY.com, No Depression, NPR Music, Refinery29, Rolling Stone and UNCUT, who called it “a springboard into '60s pop, '70s rock, and Noughties indie...It's an adventurous palette that suits her well.” The Nashville Scene said the album “...offers the kind of songwriting that can make a record feel truly timeless… anchored by floating piano and Johnson’s smooth, flawless vocals.”

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Photo - Maria Mochnacz

Dot Allison - Cue the Tears (Anton Newcombe Remix).

Dot Allison releases the third single from The Entangled Remix EP, a reimagining of the Heart-Shaped Scars album track “Cue The Tears” by The Brian Jonestown Massacre founder and frontman Anton Newcombe. This release follows Lee “Scratch” Perry’s remix of “Love Died In Our Arms,” the final production of his career, and The Anchoress’ remix of the previously unreleased “Murder By Heartbreak.”

Last year during covid lockdowns, Dot met Anton online and they began working together, sharing songs back and forth and forming a relationship that eventually resulted in their collaborative creation of the soundtrack for the TV series “Annika.” With proven artistic chemistry between them, Anton’s remix of “Cue The Tears” showcases his unparalleled musical prowess alongside Dot’s one-of-a-kind songwriting and vocals.

The original version of the song, a sound of sparse, intoxicating dream folk, is here reimagined into a hypnotic, psychedelic soundscape under Anton’s production. Dot’s serene, otherworldly vocals are embraced and elevated by the ethereal sound, becoming an instrument of their own, floating dreamily throughout the song.

“I respect Dot's artistry so much.” Says Anton, “I have worked with a great many people, but she is truly unique and an important artist. I have the utmost respect for her personally, artistically, and for her work ethic, and it is a great honor to be asked to do a remix of sorts. Like much of our work together, I try to work around her ideas, rather than gut them, or change the arrangements too much.”

On working with Anton, Dot says, “I love Anton’s music, his unique sound, his perspective on creativity & his approach and vibe as a collaborator..”

The full Entangled Remix EP, out on May 27, also includes contributions from Saint Etienne and Lomond Campbell. Saint Etienne, who remixes the track “One Love,” have always had close ties to Dot, thanks to their mutual connection to Heavenly and Andrew Weatherall, as well as both having come up in the UK indie dance scene of the early 1990s. Lomond Campbell, a BAFTA-winning songwriter and shortlister for the Scottish Album of the Year Award, combines his ambitious creative spirit with Dot’s poignant lyricism on his remix of “Ghost Orchid.”

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 Photographed by Marie Haefner

DIVES - Ego.

Following tours with L.A. Witch and Courtney Barnett, and fresh from being invited to record a session for NPR, Vienna 3-piece DIVES release their first UK single Ego.

DIVES are rock ‘n’ roll time travellers taking you on wild 70s road trips and through Venice beach nostalgia with their earworm blend of surf-pop, garage-rock, and Riot Grrrl attitude, with a message very much for the now: Anti-discrimination and pro-equality and humanity. Ego explores selfishness and narcissism via strange conversations, it’s about people who never listen and just keep talking. "You got to listen and stop, listen and stop,” the lyrics say, “This conversation is too odd, you better shut it up”.

The chords and melodies are the sonic equivalent of road-tripping down the highways in a convertible, tying in with the metaphoric chorus "Ego babe, it's your ego babe, you're on a one-way road and you're driving too fast”. On this one-way street is only room for the ego of the person. "Do you worry at all about someone that's not you? “

DIVES are Dora de Goederen, Viktoria Kirner and Tamara Leichtfried, the 3-piece have previously released one album, their debut Teenage Years Are Over (2019, Siluh Records) which showed them to be profound songwriters, with statements against the patriarchy and toxic macho attitudes wrapped in catchy rock ‘n’ roll songs and sweet melodies. They have played over 150 shows in 13 different countries around Europe, supporting Courtney Barnett and L.A. Witch.

Ego is taken from DIVES second album Wanna Take You There which follows in October 2022 via Siluh Records.

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Many Voices Speak - Susan Cattaneo - Jesse D'Kora - Georgia State Line - The Deslondes - Nice Vice

Photo - Julia Mard

Many Voices Speak - Nothing's Gone.

Swedish artist Many Voices Speak has announced her second album 'Gestures' will be out on 29th April via Strangers Candy. Having released two previous singles 'Seat for Sadness' and 'Within Reach', she has now shared new track 'Nothing is Gone'. She explains: "Nothing’s Gone is about coping with the physical presence of something that is no longer there."

Many Voices Speak, the project of Swedish musician Matilda Mård, has always found its power in its ability to capture an eternity in an expression. Mård’s elegant, yearning dream-pop makes the world seem to slow down around it, where time stretches out, and you can get lost in the deep pools of memory and emotion. After the success of her 2018 debut 'Tank Town,' her new album 'Gestures' showcases her growth as a songwriter, one more comfortable in her own skin.

Working with longtime producer Petter Nygårdh, the writing process, and how Mård thinks about it, grew into something new on 'Gestures'. She wrote the early versions of the songs on piano, as she always has. But before, she thought as a singer-songwriter, determined to make the songs stand up on their own, in their stripped-back version. Here, she wrote them merely as beginnings, aware of the possibility to evolve them into something more. “I want to capture these things that I can’t really put my finger on”, says Mård. “The lyrics have become more important for me. I’ve put a lot of trust in the text this time. I could explore this darker and more cinematic sound, I didn’t just think about writing a pop song”. That step made for an album that presents a more mature, developed vision of Many Voices Speak.

As well as an artist, the album has seen Mård grow as a person through writing it. Each song represents an issue she has struggled with - they tell a story of unspectacular, but deeply meaningful, transformation. Mård says “What unites the songs is a need for inner change, to handle the things in life that can’t be changed. I’m creating strategies for myself - new ways of thinking, so I can live with certain things. The title comes from that. I’ve figured out that gestures are important because they’re proof of love, and that’s the only power we have against death and separation”. It’s a theme that’s very personal to Mård, but one that resonates with a lot of people – something that could be said about Many Voices Speak itself. The stargazing mood of Gestures makes for an album that’s powerfully moving, one that creates a space apart from the noise of the world around it – a little retreat for Mård, and her listeners, to call their own.

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Susan Cattaneo - Borrowed Blue.

Boston award-winning, songwriting boss Susan Cattaneo has shared "Borrowed Blue," from her forthcoming LP, All Is Quiet, which is also released today.

This spare, beautiful track tackles the complicated relationships we, as women, have with our mothers and our daughters - "What do we, as women, inherit and what do we pass on? What roles do we play and what sacrifices do we make?" Susan asks. "I am the daughter of a mother in her nineties and the mother of a teenage daughter, and I wanted to explore these themes and show how sometimes we are caught between what we’ve been taught and being our true selves."

The most powerful voice in the room isn't always the loudest one.  On her new album, All is Quiet, Susan Cattaneo sings softly and carries a big song. Nine big songs, actually. Recorded remotely during the initial months of the pandemic, All is Quiet reflects Susan’s heartache for the world, but also reveals how she rediscovered joy and resiliency through music. 

It’s been an extraordinary and challenging time to be a musician and creative person in the world. For many artists and musicians including Susan, those first few months of the pandemic were filled with uncertainty and fear. When the quarantine shut everything down, opportunities were cancelled, collaborations were scrapped and most importantly, momentum was lost. For the first time in her life, Susan felt creatively muted. All is Quiet was the project that helped her process these feelings and in making this album, she found the joy and redemption that only music can bring.

 

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Jesse D'Kora - Dont fool with a phantom.

Jesse D’Kora is an indie/dream pop artist based in Salford (UK). His new song - ‘dont fool with a phantom’ - is his 4th single in as many months. Continuing on the one release per month plan for 2022, this latest track is fun, nostalgic, and crammed full of great vibes.

Jesse tells us "I wanted to make a song that made me feel like I was back in the 90s watching cartoons again. Inspired by those early mornings as a child in front of the tv with some sort of ridiculously unhealthy and tasty cereal, the title of this track is taken from an original classic Scooby Doo episode. Looking back I find the idea of chasing and unmasking the bad guys for them to only turn out to be someone you know and don’t expect strangely paralleltek in adult life. Specifically with the new age anonymity that the internet brings, I decided this song is for the trolls. So any internet trolls out there, this ones for you! ;)"

He continues "Musically it's similar to many of my other tracks; it's got the jangling guitars, surfing drums, washed out vocals and to the point structure. On its own, I think it's a track that wants to chase you down a hallway lined with doors, for you to go in one door and come out of another and the chased become the chaser… or something like that!"

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Georgia State Line - Jackson.

Georgia State Line has been on a hot streak since the release of the highly acclaimed and ARIA charting album, ‘In Colour’, released through Cheatin’ Heart Records/Spunk Records.

As one of the most talked about Americana acts in Australia thanks to the refreshingly honest, yet melancholy sounds, that are even parts heartsick and hopeful, Georgia State Line takes the third single from the album to Australian radio, ‘Jackson’.

According to Georgia Delves, ‘Jackson’, is a track inspired by the comfort found in an old worn song.

“Just like good friends, they’re there for us in the best and worst of times, softening the blows and making us all feel a little less alone”.

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Photo by Bobbi Wernig

The Deslondes - South Dakota Wild One.

The Deslondes are set to return with Ways & Means July 8th, 2022 via New West Records. The 14-song set is their first album in five years and follows 2017’s critically acclaimed Hurry Home. Ways & Means was produced by The Deslondes & their longtime collaborator Andrija Tokic (Alabama Shakes) and was recorded at The Bombshelter in Nashville, TN. The album features Margo Price on the title track, as well as Twain and the multi-instrumentalist Billy Contreras on multiple songs as well. 

Long combining elements of early Stax, Sun, and Atlantic Records with the influence of a more raw, stripped-down sound gleaned off field recordings from Alan Lomax and the Mississippi Records catalog, the band also incorporate psychedelic flourishes that bring to mind the sonic experimentation of Joe Meek, Lee Hazlewood and the Velvet Underground. Infusing everything from saxophone, flute, and synth to string arrangements and a full drum kit for the first time, the group naturally progresses and evolves in real-time on their third full-length offering.

Lauded as “burgeoning stars” by The New York Times, The Deslondes’ 2014 self-titled debut was a breakout hit praised by NPR as “energized, elegant, and new,” and their follow-up, Hurry Home, earned similar acclaim with Rolling Stone calling it “a gritty, grimy mix of early rock ‘n’ roll and lo-fi R&B.” Following the band’s hiatus in late 2018, members Sam Doores and Riley Downing each released their debut solo albums to critical acclaim. PopMatters called Doores' eponymous debut “...a deeply poetic and haunting collection that draws upon the musicians’ disparate influences” and “Perhaps not since Los Lobos’ Kiko has an artist so effortlessly married avant-garde and everyman sensibilities, arriving at a place where childlike curiosity meets the fruits of patient practice and ambition. 

Deep knowledge and unbound imagination coexist peacefully, happily, throughout. Of Downing’s Start It Over (2021), Uncut Magazine in the U.K. called it a “dusty triumph” and described his voice  “...like Johnny Cash with a hangover,” exclaiming “His brain…is abuzz with sounds and ideas, which makes his solo debut a thrill.” The first sampling of Ways & Means is “South Dakota Wild One.”

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Nice Vice - No Ends.

Indie-rock trailblazer Nice Vice has just released his latest single, “No Ends.” The new song vividly shows his inspiration from ‘90s rock icons and features melodic guitars, heavy undertones, and honest, reflective lyricism. “No Ends” is now available to stream worldwide on digital music platforms.

“No Ends” conveys to listeners the range of talent of which Seth Horst, known musically as Nice Vice, is capable. Being in your twenties is an exhilarating yet confusing time, and “No Ends” displays the personal strife of having to figure that out. Horst explores how to set boundaries, learn and maybe unlearn life habits, and simply understand how to let things be in his newest single. 

“‘No Ends’ went through a lot of phases,” says Horst. “The chorus of this song was originally a slower verse from another track, but after some experimenting and switching things around, it somehow turned into this! It ended up being my favorite recording process of all the songs on the EP!” Similar to his previous release, “Bloom,” the new single was also mixed by Zak Van Zeumeren and mastered by Theodore Papadopoulos. Both songs have been a thrilling look into the upcoming EP from Nice Vice, which he has described as having two main themes. 

“Half of the tracks deal with different stages of being in love,” explains Horst. “Some good, some bad, and just the general feeling of new love and how great that can be and then also how bad it can be. The other theme is ego death: dealing with your own personality, breaking points, and becoming someone else.” The EP, entitled First Dose, will be released later this year.

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