New Music – Page 231 – Queen City Sounds and Art

With Plaintive Robotic Voices and Relentless Evolving Rhythms, Oh Mr James Brings us Along for a Ride Through a Cybernetic Jungle on “Screaming Banshees”

OhMrJames_Primer_cover_crop — Oh Mr James, *Primer* EP cover

“Screaming Banshees” by Oh Mr James is the lead single from the latter’s new EP Primer. At first one hears the urgent breakbeats, alien robotic voices and ambient swells and take into consideration that the project is called Oh Mr James and wonder if that James is Richard D. James of Aphex Twin fame operating under a different moniker as the artist is also from Cornwall and the song wouldn’t be out of step with Aphex Twin’s most recent compositions. Whether that’s true or not, this song doesn’t sound like an omen of death so much as multiple planes of musical ideas working over and with each other in sync. The electronic percussion parallels and reinforces the staccato yet bouncing bass progression sounding like a frantic teletype receiving portentous news. Multiple synths come together throughout the song as the carriers of the melody while background atmospherics are the connective tissue for the song which you come to realize is a bit like the musical model of the functioning of a fast moving animal that races across the earth and arrives at its destination and place of rest at song’s end. Whatever the purpose of the song it takes us on a journey of texture and emotion rich in detail and expertly executed polyrhythms that make it impossible to ignore yet non-invasive enough to stimulate your brain into creative realms of thought. Listen to “Screaming Banshee” on Soundcloud

Marinara’s Playful Video for “Adult Body” Displays the Temptations and Pressures to Resist the Adulting That’s Long Since Become Necessary

Marinara1_sm — Marinara, photo courtesy the artists

Marinara strikes an interesting note with “Adult Body,” the lead single from its debut full length album I Feel Like Dog due out November 8. The music video depicts scenes of adolescent hijinks in the kitchen interrupting the members of the band trying to do something as simple as cooking, an activity that we don’t often think of as adult but which really is. And cooking, not heating up a can of soup, making ramen or putting a frozen meal into the microwave. It represents the temptations to resist being an adult in even the most basic, functional ways as if we need to choose between being being responsible and having fun. The music, the kind of urgent, math-y rock that made and make LVL UP and Palm such interesting bands. The style lends itself well to being both introspective and a rhythmic urgency which Marinara uses to great effect during the course of the song not just to rock out at the end but to create an emotional contrast between the exuberance of youth tempered by the demands of being an adult that knows that partying every day and blowing off mundane responsibilities that need to be taken care of is no way to sustain the life you want long term. The video, directed by Alex Dzialo, looks like scenes from an apartment of a group of young men in their late teens and early twenties living together going to college, or first jobs out of high school and able to delay facing adulthood for a little longer with an exuberance that it’s dawning on them seems foolish and not really glorious because indulging your unevolved ambitious is not truly living your dreams. No one can clean up after you your whole life, take care of all your everyday responsibilities, make your band a well-functioning unit or sustain your best aspirations past the first wave of passionate impulses. It’s, frankly, a fun song about an unfun realization. The line “Never leave the apartment, the fun will never end” speaks so much about the personal epiphany expressed in the song and the necessity of breaking out of the cocoon of your immature self and the sophisticated ways this song embodies that moment. Watch the video on YouTube and follow Marinara at the links provided.

marinaraband.com
facebook.com/yummarinara
instagram.com/marinaraband

The Fantastical Stop Motion Video for Hunting’s Cover of “Gold Day” by Sparklehorse Is a Testament to the Sincerity and Warmth of Mark Linkous’ Songwriting

In giving their cover of Sparklehorse’s “Gold Day” a slightly more upbeat pace than the original, Hunting somehow managed not to kill the utterly sensitive and tender vibe of Mark Linkous’ treatment of the It’s a Wonderful Life track. The way the chords ring out and drip tones like sunlight while nearly hushed vocals bid the best and most wondrous times to the subject of the song preserves its warm spirit. The stop motion video with mice and other animals as the principal characters lends what could be a melancholy song a freshness and wholesome quality that also doesn’t come off saccharine. Rather it’s as though director Jessicka intuited the unironic sincerity and kindness behind the song’s writing as interpreted so well by Hunting. When the mouse with the horse mask sprinkles gold dust on the cat to stave off its hunting instinct, it’s truly a magical moment. Look for Hunting’s new album Whatever You Need due out November 1, 2019.

Annika Grace Calls Out Obsolete, Judgmental Habits on “Crazy Stupid Bitch”

AnnikaGrace_CrazyStupidBitch_cover_crop — Annika Grace, “Crazy Stupid Bitch” cover (cropped)

One might be excused for thinking a song called “Crazy Stupid Bitch” is an example of internalized misogyny when written by a woman. But Annika Grace calls to attention in her song the ways people tear each other down in myriad ways, dehumanizing each other across a spectrum of criteria by which we’d never want to be judged. If we want something for ourselves, we’re selfish. If we have sex outside traditional relationships and for pure curiosity or enjoyment of course one must be a person of low character. Whatever transgresses arbitrary norms that don’t really match most people’s actual experiences and against which many if not most of us will find ourselves failing to meet if we’re frankly honest with ourselves. Grace, in identifying this crassly judgmental and destructive mentality and put it into language that is plainly absurd and lacking in creativity both critiques and diminishes the power of that way of relating to people. That she chose to do so in a simple, succinct pop song with spare production and lightly processed vocals is a way to present a complex and nuanced social issue in a highly accessible and direct way. Listen to “Crazy Stupid Bitch” on Soundcloud and follow Annika Grace at the links below.

soundcloud.com/annikagrace
open.spotify.com/artist/0GDGlBEVKIishPVmrI8xkX
twitter.com/AnniGraceMusic
facebook.com/Annikagracemusic
instagram.com/annikagracemusic

TROVA’s Enigmatic New Single “Littelwaf Linden” Puts Your Mind in Contemplation of the Long Arcs of Your Life and of Human Civilization Generally

TROVA_Oct1_crop — TROVA, photo courtesy the artist

“Littelwaf Linden” finds TROVA exploring the use of textures and phasing as methods of conveying depth of audio field. The track creates a sense of space in your mind like driving through a part of a future city where the windmills are running slowly in the middle of a warm, midspring night, the blades of the windmills turning slowly as you edge past them, lights blinking at intervals up to their heights to signal aircraft, all but silently providing providing power with a mechanistic grace and efficiency. As you pass a field of them on your way to your destination to meet a friend for drinks and to hang out and discuss plans for the future, the windmills strike you as a constant presence that we will all come to take for granted as a means of a stable energy future that impinges little on our environment compared to the way our civilization now goes about things. Almost like the benefits of an old civilization that for a moment took the time to plan for a more sustainable future. Listening to the track in the present tense it puts you in a contemplative mood pondering how we might put in place new ways of being and living that would afford us the luxury of not always needing to work ourselves to the bone and have the time to ponder longer arcs of human civilization and our own lives as embodied by some of the great, large public works of the past that lasted decades or centuries for the benefit for those beyond the immediate generations of their establishment. Listen to “Littelwaf Linden” on Soundcloud and follow TROVA at the links provided.

music.apple.com/us/artist/trova/59287114
soundcloud.com/user-487741800
open.spotify.com/artist/5pOnm9kSmgcipVGbvyVknv
twitter.com/TROVAOfficial
facebook.com/TROVA.Ambient
instagram.com/trova.official

Mending’s Single “Emma’s Morning” is a Pastoral Contemplation of the Sprawling Family Song Cycle Album We Gathered at Wakerobin Hollow

Mending1_crop — Mending, image courtesy the artists

The gentle oscillating tone at the beginning of Mending’s “Emma’s Morning” sounds like the first rays of dawn trickling through your window. And when the piano comes in, like waking up at your leisure. Then the story in the lyrics takes us into a slice of the life of a woman who takes stock of her life and ponders her existence in the context of her family history and the events that have shaped the direction of her life. It begins like a more conventional folk song but then that convention breaks down into interrupted melodies like a digital TV signal glitching out not unlike the way one’s direct connections to the people and the experiences of our past may distort as we proceed into the next chapters of our lives. It’s a fascinating approach to songwriting and it’s one part of the sprawling, conceptual album We Gathered at Wakerobin Hollow, a four hour, forty song “speculative narrative song cycle” released in nine chapters over eighteen months, using drone, noise, songwriting and tracing “the lives of a family and friends over a 40 year period in a series of connected vignettes.” The story is set in motion by a fire at an oil refinery in Odena, Alabama and follows the diaspora of those connected to the incident throughout the country. The project launched in August 2018 and concludes in January 2020. As a piece of art its reminiscent of some of Jeff Lemire’s poignant graphic novels about life in what might consider mundane places where he finds what is most interesting under the veneer of normalcy and brings it to life in a riveting fashion as he did in his also sprawling Essex County Trilogy and Roughneck. Engrossing and sonically daring, “Emma’s Morning” hints at what promises to be a revelatory story arc of a series of songs. Listen to the track on Soundcloud and follow Mending at the links below.

mendingband.tumblr.com
soundcloud.com/mending
mendingband.bandcamp.com

Cubgod and KingPup Take Us on a Short, Free Verse Time Travel Trip on Miniature Darkwave Hip-Hop Opus “Little Butt”

CubgodAndKingPup1_sm — Cubgod and KingPup, image courtesy the artists

In some near future Cubgod and KingPup’s song “Little Butt” is a classic of not just IDM/Industrial-inflected hip-hop but of free verse cultural reference poetry. The opening line sounds like a a sample coming to us from the past via a time traveler recording a secret message made on a 78 record, grainy, mysterious and initially seeming sinister but ultimately a surreal swagger delivered in a way that subverts the aggression. Something like Danny Brown gone not cyberpunk but steampunk. The lyrics extol the virtues of everyday joys like you would hope for at a minimum in a good hip-hop song but the wordplay is so well structured and evocative, so vivid in its imagery, so poignant in its crafting of emotional memories that it’s almost easy to miss how in just over three minutes the duo has taken us deep into a slice of life that weaves together the painful experiences of childhood as overlapped with resonances with adulthood and the oppression many of us experience in another form and how we manage to get a little fun out of life with the thrill of exorcising some of that angst through a creative outlet that embodies and honors those experiences and thus releasing some of that tension. And on “Little Butt” Cubgod and KingPup do so with a playful creativity with a beat that is not simply the sampling of a tried and tested aesthetic, rather, a collage of sounds that serve as a direct analogue of the internal emotional experience of a dystopian present projected onto the future in order to escape it. Maybe that’s overthinking a simple song but the unpacking its complexity and sophistication is a rewarding endeavor. Listen to “Little Butt” on Soundcloud and follow Cubgod further there as well.

soundcloud.com/cubgod

Wolf & Moon’s “Situations” Encourages Us to Have Faith In Ourselves and Our Lives in Moments When We Feel Stagnant

WolfAndMoon2017_1_sm — Wolf & Moon, photo courtesy the artists

On their new single “Situations” Wolf & Moon seem to sing to us or to themselves a song of hope and encouragement. The trading vocal leads and harmonies give the song an almost informal dynamic that gives it an emotional momentum that the songwriters seem to want to project to the listener to achieve their hopes and dreams despite whatever situation we may find ourselves in by imagining an opportunity for us to take out of a feeling of stasis and stagnation. The accented bass line that grounds the song and gives it a steady but upbeat quality is the fulcrum of that momentum, the consistent presence that drives the song forward. We’ve all been in a place in our lives where everything feels like you can’t catch a break and you get stuck and we need something to happen that we couldn’t have predicted which Wolf & The Moon articulate with the final full line, “You’re going to make an impossible move out of this situation.” The song and its spare, spacious melody, encourages the listener to have some faith in forces in your own mind and in your life that operate beyond your conscious thinking and to accept that unexpected inspiration and chance when it comes. Listen to “Situations” on Soundcloud and follow Wolf & Moon at the links below.

soundcloud.com/wolfandmoonmusic
facebook.com/WolfAndMoonMusic

Sulkin’ Raven’s Sprawling Un-Pop Synth Pop Song is an Engine For Turning Anxiety Into Melancholic Beauty

SulkinRaven1_sm — Sulkin’ Raven, photo courtesy the artist

Sulkin’ Raven’s “Run” has a melodic progression that turns on a fine emotional line like you’re moving headlong forward while scenes and experiences stream by you as though you’re the one doing the running from awkward situations and failures. The chiptune synths toward the end of the song mixed with the dreamlike tone of the composition is reminiscent of something Depreciation Guild might have done and with the same melancholic and surreal overtones but darker in a way. The song feels like the soundtrack to a new Inio Asano graphic novel but one that ends inconclusively rather than in the sinister places Asano sometimes takes his work. Even though the beat is consistent throughout with an even pace it serves as the song’s anchor and the dynamic qualities are found in the expressive guitar work in sync with dispassionate but introspective vocals and beautifully composed synth lines that take you to an otherworldly place that you’d rather be than trapped in a place in your head that seems to make everything impossible. In the end the song strikes one as a vehicle for using imagination and creativity to transform the energy of emotional paralysis and self-loathing into something productive. Listen to “Run” on Soundcloud and follow Sulkin’ Raven at the links below.

twitch.tv/sulkin_raven
soundcloud.com/sulkin_raven
open.spotify.com/artist/6VnwwmueJBAA0YAEeuE564
sulkinraven.bandcamp.com
instagram.com/sulkin_raven

Stand Up And Say No Rejects the Nihilism of Self-Involved Defeatism in the Face of Modern Fascism on “Daily Reminders”

StandUpAndSayNo3_sm — Stand Up And Say No, photo courtesy the artist

Stand Up And Say No’s Andre Nault takes an interesting approach to world events on “Daily Reminders.” Rather than directly prescribing solutions, he asks questions of himself, of others and the world. He gives voice to a natural impulse to need to shield oneself from the seemingly endless barrage of bad news and overwhelming developments of late and not be subjected to the ruthless scrutiny that seems to have been projected at everyone in public life of late. He implores, albeit it offhandedly, to “ let me know when it’s over” and asking “Does it really work out? Can the good guys win?” The latter because seemingly anywhere and everywhere the forces of authoritarianism generally, fascism in particular, have seized the reigns of power and poisoned civil society. And yet, in his questioning, Nault suggests we have the power to turn back that tide if we’re willing to make the effort and not simply surrender to the type of despair and nihilism born of being overwhelmed by the wave of nonsense but that maybe we can take a break from taking it all in so that we can more ably stand against the erosion of our own quality of life and be part of a ripple effect that will ensure a better, or at least a slightly more fulfilling future. Cast in scintillating synth melodies, fluid yet angular bass lines and vocals that sound both disaffected and defiant, “Daily Reminders” is the sound of a songwriter who has found his voice again with more conviction behind it minus the unrealistic expectations of youth. Listen to the song on Soundcloud and follow Stand Up And Say No at the links below.

standupandsayno.com
soundcloud.com/standupandsayno
twitter.com/standupandsayno
facebook.com/musicstandupandsayno
instagram.com/musicstandupandsayno