simianthinker

Janna Pelle Indulges the Comforting Reverie of the Lingering Romantic Feelings for a Lost Love on “Know Too Much”

There is a hazy softness to the synths in Janna Pelle’s “Know Too Much” that is matched in the spacious production on her vocals in the beginning of the song And repeated again later on into the song to express musically the lyrics in which the singer reflects on being haunted by the memories of a lost love. But this granular tone clears up in the part of the song near the beginning when the fog of lingering love for someone in her past parts for a moment only to be enveloped by the spell of romantic reverie once again because even though it’s past-tense there is something comforting and pleasant in revisiting that feeling when you know you can step out of it at the proper time. The finely accented drums act as an emotional anchor throughout the dreamlike atmosphere of the song and it is the percussion that cuts through with the greatest clarity throughout. The title of the song also suggests a self-awareness with indulging feelings of tenderness and affection for someone you had to leave behind. Listen to “Know Too Much” on Spotify and follow the songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, drummer and producer Janna Pelle at the links below.

Janna Pelle on Facebook

Janna Pelle on Instagram

Janna Pelle on Soundcloud

King Black Acid’s Video for “Kissed at the Cemetery” is a Darkly Fantastical Yet Sweet Telling of an Unlikely Love Story

King Black Acid, photo courtesy the artist

The stop motion/claymation music video for King Black Acid’s “Kissed at the Cemetery” with the images a cemetery, the vampire guitarist/singer, aliens coming down to harass and then put into coffins is the perfect storybook presentation for the song’s lyrics. Musically it’s a gentle, psychedelic pop number with a luminous guitar melody and paired vocals that are both elevated and whimsical that fans of Broncho and The Flaming Lips will appreciate though it has a more lighthearted pop touch. The surreal lyrics are about true love and the perils of the forces of evil coming to threaten it. In this case the character of The Devil so maybe the story is set in a universe where our protagonist is in uneasy cahoots with the Horned One. But whatever the case, as if a song has to make strict narrative sense anyway, apparently the titular cemetery is a party on the weekend and marijuana gives our narrator special powers and an unlikely true love wins out in the end. Watch the highly creative video for “Kissed at the Cemetery” on YouTube and connect with the long-running space rock/psychedelic band King Black Acid at the links below. The project’s latest album The Rainbow Lodge released on April 7, 2023.

King Black Acid on Facebook

King Black Acid on Instagram

“Smoke” by Leen is a Dream Pop Love Song Warmed by the Passion of Culturally Forbidden Expressions of Love

“Smoke” is a song based on the forbidden love stories that were common in Leen’s home country of Syria. It smolders with the subsumed passions that one often had to keep to oneself in observance of the laws of a “traditional” culture and the norms that reinforced those laws in the everyday, outward behaviors of people going about their day. But the drifty guitar melodies and Leen’s tenderly warm vocals and the sheer spaciousness of the song gives the impression of wide open possibilities in one’s imagination and in the spirit of love when people want to make it happen and find the ways to consummate it in spite of arbitrary customs that place barriers between people that never need to be there. It’s the kind of romantic dream pop song that teems with the energy and spirit of its chosen subject. Listen to “Smoke” on Spotify and connect with the Sweden-based artist at the links provided.

Night Movies Crafts a Deep Sense of Spiritual Displacement and Yearning on “Enough”

“Enough” by Night Movies is a soundtrack in search of a worthy existential dystopian science fiction film in which it can be placed. The distorted droning and slow-twisting soundscapes and sense of desperate menace mixed with desolation whorls around Anna Papadimitriou’s (of Hawxx) clear and evocative vocals calling out yearning for confirmation of being enough, being worthy of all the dignity and respect all people should have but articulating a deep felt sense of not knowing if that is the case, intoning a haunted sense of displacement at one’s core. Musically it’s reminiscent of something by Swans or Growing with the heightened mood of spiritual exploration and catharsis and ends peacefully without a clear cut mood of resolution which is a more brave creative choice than one hears in a lot of modern music. Listen to “Enough” on Bandcamp and follow Night Movies at the links provided. The single is paired with a industrial drone cover of “The End” by The Doors comparable to the dark expanses of Patti Smith circa Radio Ethiopia.

Night Movies on Instagram

Amos Waits Floats Through a Slow Moving Parade of the Shades of Romantic Possibilities on Dream Pop Single “Berlin Blue”

The sound of rain, tinkling of glasses and ghostly synth tones wafting through before lingering splashes of melody bring us into Amos Waits’ “Berlin Blue.” It has an early morning feel, or one of being up way long into the night. When Waits’ vocals begin it’s like a reflective narrative to self on recent events and overthinking what happened when meeting someone new with whom one feels a real connection but mixed signals either real or imagined are contemplated and examined for what’s real and what might be wishful thinking and giving into one’s fantasies that aren’t rooted in something mutual. The details tonal sweep of the song is a little like inhabiting a dream where the ghosts and veils of a life that could be but may not be float by as tantalizing possibilities if only they weren’t delusions and yet holding on to these phantoms of joy isn’t all bad even if it amounts to nothing because having nothing can often feel worse. Listen to “Berlin Blue” on Spotify and follow Amos Waits on Instagram.

Mary Lou Newmark’s “Stitch” is a Delightfully Accessible Mashup and Collage of Classical Violin, Field Recordings and Electronic Beats

Mary Lou Newmark’s “Stitch” from her 2022 EP A Stitch in Time could be considered to be in the same realm of music as early The Art of Noise. What genre is a song that pulls together the sounds of classical violin in a modern pop mode, impressionistic percussion accents, the sound of a train horn, shakers, little glitches and pointillistic beeps and a jaunty dynamic that ties it together into a coherent whole? And then for the song to have an interlude of sampled clicks, water flowing, teletype machine running and video game-esque noises before heading back into violin led sections like a post-modern interpretation of Aaron Copland’s “Hoedown” that shifts seamlessly between all of these soundscapes for a song unlike much of anything anyone else is doing now. Listen to “Stitch” on Spotify.

Yvie Oddly Upends the Heteronormative Paradigm on Surreal and Playful Hip-Hop Track “Topsy Turvy”

Yvie Oddly punches up with swagger on “Topsy Turvy.” The beat is like surreal carnival music in a horror comedy film with ascending percussive tones marking time and accenting the vocals. Oddly sounds so comfortable with her sassy lines about living life how she wants and deserves like there could be any doubt and anyone questioning pretty basic stuff are on a fool’s errand. The title could refer to the dynamic in society where a queer person of color is expected to be on the bottom rung but not here, not in Yvie Oddly’s town where wears the crown. There’s something undeniably fun and appealing about the rapper’s upending of the usual paradigms and conceptions running what many might think of as mainstream society but it’s just what many of us have been used to and to expect and this song with its playful and strong music and wordplay offers an alternative to a bland and conformist world. Listen to “Topsy Turvy” on Spotify and follow Yvie Oddly at the links provided. Catch Oddly on the Strange Love Tour throughout the USA Starting November 1, 2023.

Yvie Oddly on Facebook

Yvie Oddly on Twitter

Yvie Oddly on Instagram

yvieoddly.com

Cosmic Kitten Gives Us a Glimpse Into the Recording of Its Grunge Punk Album Laugh of a Lifetime in the Video for “Songbird”

Cosmic Kitten, photo courtesy the artists

Cosmic Kitten from Long Beach, California offer us a unique behind the scenes look into the recording process of its new record Laugh of a Lifetime in the music video for “Songbird.” Charmingly enough the group recorded its setting off to San Francisco to record with Steve Moriarty former drummer of Seattle punk legends The Gits and throughout the video we see scenes in the studio working on music likely beyond the single in question. But the song’s fuzzy melodies and introspective mood syncs so well to what the song seems to be about and the self-doubt that can bring you to self-sabotage and how being self-aware of one’s own self-destructive impulses aren’t something to hide from because that can lead one into a shame spiral of dissociation and avoiding the parts of yourself that are wonderful and underrated and shoving that to the side when exploring the paths to behaviors can be more productive than judgment. The easy pace of the song points to that kind of calm and patience one can cultivate by just being honest and realistic with yourself. Sure Cosmic Kitten is recording the album with the drummer of one of the great, underrated bands of the alternative rock era and having it mastered by Jack Endino whose touch on all the early Sub Pop releases and well beyond is kind of a big deal too though Jack is someone you can write to and enlist his services without going into a panic about the cost. “Songbird” is emblematic of being a creative person and struggling with bouts of impostor syndrome and sidestepping that pitfall by taking a moment out to living in those feelings and instead of avoiding them leaning into them. The rest of the album is less introspective and more outright punk in that late alternative rock era fashion and scrappy and thoughtful at once. Fans of L7 and Betty Blowtoch will definitely find something to like about what Cosmic Kitten has been crafting across its career thus far. Watch the video for “Songbird” on YouTube and follow Cosmic Kitten at the links provided. Laugh of a Lifetime released on May 5, 2023 and is available for you to give a listen on the band’s Spotify page.

Cosmic Kitten on Instagram

Nightdrator’s “Wilted Wings” is Like an Epic Dirge for Thwarted Potential

Nighdrator builds a scaffolding for the unfolding sounds of the rest of “Wilted Wings” with its opening guitar riff. But the song ramps up into a processional ritual of contemplative, distorted spirals within which Emma Fruit with soaring vocals offers a rare insight into how often our best efforts can seem doomed from the beginning from reaching full flight like Icarus and his wings of wax rendered inadequate because of his hubris. There’s a tragedy to that psychological dynamic that the band captures so well with its ability to let tones hang and burn giving the whole song an elevated sense of world weariness. Sonically it seems to bring together the aesthetics of post-punk and the tribal doom of a band like SubRosa and in moments it’s reminiscent of Gerard McMahon’s song “Cry Little Sister” from The Lost Boys but more epic in tone and poignantly mournful of the thwarted potential presented in the song’s words. Listen to “Wilted Wings” on Spotify and follow Nighdrator at the links below.

Nighdrator on TikTok

Nighdrator on Instagram

Nighdrator on Bandcamp

Feefawfum’s Noisy Post-Punk Single “So Capable” is an Unhinged Takedown of the Myth of Meritocracy

Feefawfum sound like a band that is working at musical cross-purposes but with great precision on “So Capable.” The dissonant vocals shouldn’t work but do because the song seems to be one about the breakdown of the established social order when it’s stressed. There is a frantic quality to the collision of guitar, drums and bass that is reminiscent of The Fall gone even more mad or like Preoccupations before the name change at its most unhinged. Guitars sometimes sound like horns when the chords ring out in a shifting sustain. But the whole time it feels like the whole thing could call over like when Protomartyr goes off its own rails into the realm of borderline chaos but reeling it back in with an intensity of feeling that imbues the song with a heightened mood of thrilling tentativeness that finally releases that nervous energy in the end. Listen to “So Capable” on Spotify, follow Feefawfum at the links below and look for the full length Feefawfum album 100 due out on digital and vinyl September 8, 2023.

Feefawfum on Facebook

Feefawfum on Instagram