New Music – Page 247 – Queen City Sounds and Art

Secret Shame’s “Calm” is a Deathrock Tale of Troubled Times Exorcised With Startling Emotional Honesty

SecretShame1_sm_crop — Secret Shame, photo courtesy the artists

“Calm” by Secret Shame is probably the state of mind this song is a kind of an emotional exorcism to attain given its narrative of chaos and anxiety among a circle of friends and associates. Comparisons to Siouxsie & The Banshees is inevitable as Lena’s vocals have a similar power and versatility. The rhythms are steady and appropriately brooding and the guitar minimal yet melodic and spidery after the manner of early Sisters of Mercy. But when the guitars, bass and drums sync up with the vocals, including the backup vocals, for the choruses the band alchemically attains an electrifying frisson that pushes the sound beyond what one might expect with the intentionally lo-fi recording. The latter actually contributes to a sense that this song could have come out in 1983 or today except that, while also reminiscent at times of Denver’s Your Funeral or a death rock version of The Vanishing, there is nothing museum piece about what the band is doing. It’s moods are introspective and its words unsparing yet poetic and compassionate in their examination of self and socio-political issues—aspects of the music that often seem underappreciated in a lot of dark post-punk. And it is that side of the songwriting that gives the music its powerful emotional resonance. Look for the group’s debut full-length Dark Synthetics out on Portrayal of Guilt Records (yes, run by the great weirdo hardcore band) on September 6, 2019. Listen to “Calm” on Soundcloud and follow Asheville, North Carolina’s Secret Shame at the links below.

soundcloud.com/user-477692705
open.spotify.com/artist/0QFIowD5P1Ej1Pb0gsZPzN
secretshame.bandcamp.com
twitter.com/ShameSecret
facebook.com/secretshameband
instagram.com/secretshameband

Seattle’s Peyote Ugly Examines the Perils of Our Personal Blind and Collective Blind Spots on its New Single “Myopia”

PeyoteUgly3_sm — Peyote Ugly, photo courtesy the artists

“Myopia” by Seattle band Peyote Ugly sounds like a song about one’s own inability to see situations in our lives clearly until they’re right before us because we’re so focused on our own context most of the time. Our blind spots are often revealed to us when we’re least prepared to deal with the fallout, a phenomenon that seems to have run amok in the society at large from politicians, corporations and humans in general or maybe we’re just examining the things we refused to look at for years. The coruscating psychedelic riffs of “Myopia” express this cognitive dissonance perfectly as Peyote Ugly channel shades of Built to Spill, The Posies and Dinosaur Jr while in the end casting itself in a different mold of its own making. The fiery guitar work and the subtle and dynamic atmospheres and emotional awareness informing the lyrics are a refreshingly rare pairing. Watch the video for “Myopia,” filmed and edited by Kyle Toda of the band Antonioni, on YouTube and follow Peyote Ugly at the links provided.

peyoteugly.com
open.spotify.com/artist/1jdrxYFuQLx3OOJU7R2jML
peyoteuglyseattle.bandcamp.com
twitter.com/PeyoteUgly_
facebook.com/peyoteugly
instagram.com/peyote_ugly

“Die For Your Love” is LP’s Triumphant Ballad About the Inspirational Power of Love

LP’s new single “Die For Your Love” bursts with her signature passionate delivery and emotional vulnerability. Yes, the title of the song might be interpreted as a hackneyed and melodramatic premise in pop music. But LP never sounds less than utterly sincere and the triumphant and bombastically expansive dynamic to the song is stirring and imbued with a sense of endless possibilities and hope. Many pop artists write romantic ballads but with “Die For Your Love” one gets a real feeling for the romance of the moment in that sense that one knows the validity of one’s feelings and how the strength of that certainty can inspire you in other ways to work toward positive ends in all areas of your life. Listen to “Die For Your Love” on Soundcloud and follow LP at the link below.

open.spotify.com/artist/0J7U24vlOOIeMpuaO6Q85A

Palm Haze Brings an Emotional Weightiness to the Ethereal Fuzz and Drone of “Almost Soon”

PalmeHaze1_lg — Palm Haze, image courtesy the artists

Palm Haze’s melding of ethereal vocals and distorted drones on “Almost Soon” may remind some listeners of how Medicine could come across like a blend of Bailter Space’s fuzzy and urgent space rock drone and Band of Susans at their most minimal and gently crushing. The song keeps to a similar pace throughout but because of the modulation in tone and melody alongside the introspective and enigmatic vocals and phased and hypnotic yet driving fuzz the song has a surprising emotional weightiness. At one point the song’s noisiness drops off into a purely delicate, downtempo vocals and undistorted guitar tone. This dynamic of the song as well as how the short expansive bursts of synth toward the end are emblematic of the chorus of “It’s okay” as a mantra of hope for the end of a tough time that has gone on too long and will end, almost soon. And, with any luck, soon enough. Listen to the song on Soundcloud and follow Palm Haze at the links below. Also, look for the album Rêve Bleu due out August 30 on YHS Records.

soundcloud.com/palmhaze
palmhaze.bandcamp.com
facebook.com/palmhaze
instagram.com/lovepalmhaze

Grey Mcmurray’s “Keep Your Mind” Shows a Path of Hope for Those On the Verge of Nervous Exhaustion

GreyMcmurray2_sm — Grey Mcmurray, photo courtesy the artist

With the video for his song “Keep Your Mind,” Grey Mcmurray gives us a timelapsed view into a windy morning. Is it a harp or dulcimer creating the delicate, ethereal string melody? Is part of it guitar? It matters less than how the music draws us into a dream-like sonic realm punctuated by sharp ululations like a rooster crowing with the dawn. A harmonium drone and organ drift in with a kind of complimentary counter melody for a song about trying to keep it together despite great internal and external pressures making keeping any kind of equilibrium challenging. And as the song comes to its conclusion the elements fall apart and piano breaks off into a kind of anti-melody and the rhythm comes off the rails ever so gently yet abruptly. It is an unsettling moment yet Mcmurray’s treatments in the song give an often abstract and mysterious process a form that is explicable that he was able to articulate in an accessible format thus giving voice to struggles many people face daily but in which they often feel alone. Mcmurray shows how it’s possible to pull back from the ledge through living in the moment and honoring your feelings. Listen to “Keep Your Mind” on YouTube and watch the attendant video and keep a lookout for Mcmurray’s first solo album Stay Up due out September 19, 2019 through Shahzad Ismaily’s figureight records. You can follow Mcmurray and figureight records at the links below.

twitter.com/figureight8
facebook.com/figureightrecords
instagram.com/muchgrey

kyaro. Brings Swagger and the Urban Asian American Experience Into Vivid Detail on Jazz Rap Track “Forever Jaeyoung”

Kyaro2-sm — kyaro., photo courtesy the artist

“Forever Jaeyoung” isn’t just a play on words, it reflects the background and life of Korea Town, Los Angeles rapper kyaro.. Taken from the recently released album The Choom Gang Chronicles, the track has kyaro. spitting bars over downtempo jazz beats about his life and adventures at home and in his journeys living in various parts of the world and picking up local slang and forming observations about culture and society to weave into his storytelling. Apparently kyaro. was once a boxer and some of the necessary combative attitude transformed into the swagger he brings to his vocal deliver. Though a Korean American, kyaro. references “gaijin goons” invoking the Japanese word for “foreigner” but often adapted as an ironic pejorative term for wack white people, inverting the sense of who is a foreigner and where. Featured vocalist Mzee Macharia talks about being tokenized when he was about five, as often happens to people of color in general and articulates an experience that isn’t often addressed in music. But most of the story in “Forever Jaeyoung”is a relatable story of coming up needing to be tough and navigating where one belongs and if indeed one does belong in the context of American society. The specific biographical details of the story, as with any artist worth listening to, are what makes the song stand out but its core meaning about identity and figuring out how to get through life is universal. Listen to “Forever Jaeyoung” on Spotify and follow kyaro. at any of the links below.

open.spotify.com/artist/6J1Z7HEQ67KGuzt3mITHJw
youtube.com/channel/UCHjT7bn_VcVJrLRFt9gmOcg
twitter.com/kyarorap
facebook.com/kyarorap
instagram.com/kyarorap

“Deaf Ears” is Kevin Bowe & The Okemah Prophets Spirited Rejection Letter to Destructive Relationships

KevinBoweAndTheOkemahProphets_EveryPartOfTheBuffalo_lg — Kevin Bowe & The Okemah Prophets, *Every Part of the Buffalo* cover (cropped)

It would be impossible to not compare Kevin Bowe & The Okemah Prophets’ song “Deaf Ears” to The Replacements because of the sheer grit and attitude yet irresistible tunefulness of the song. At the same time the cadence of the vocals and the way the lines are arranged in the context of the song is reminiscent of Bob Dylan circa Street Legal but with more urgency. The guitar chords are struck with an offhanded fluidity and left to hang as the distorted glitter of the jangle-y dynamic rings out between the complimentary riffing as if to reflect a sense of being completely and utterly done with the deceptions, other mind games and the self-sabotage in giving a relationship that was always toxic yet another chance. Listen to “Deaf Ears” on Soundcloud and follow the band on its website.

https://kevinbowe.com/okemah-prophets

Rich Field Recordings, Flute and Organic Percussion Help Make DJ Zeyhan’s Trance-esque “Sri Lanka” Into a World Beat Synth Pop Dance Track

DJZeyhan2_sm — DJ Zeyhan, photo courtesy the artist

DJ Zeyhan used field recordings captured in the place for which “Sri Lanka” was named in the mix for the song. Combined with flutes and organic percussion, the song has a multi-dimensional quality that strongly suggests place and context, particularly at the end when insects are sounding out into the night. Zeyhan’s trance-like synths, shakers, robust, melodic low end synth melody and intertwining with the flute and undercurrents of bright electronic tone drone convey the jungles, wetlands, rivers and dynamism of a place like Sri Lanka. Altogether the song hits your ears like a world music synth pop song created after the 90s when Future Sound of London’s “Papua New Guinea” did a similar mixing of aesthetics and concepts. Listen to “Sri Lanka” on Soundcloud and follow DJ Zeyhan at the links provided.

beatz4freakz.de
soundcloud.com/dj-zeyhan
open.spotify.com/artist/1CVs58PrLbZ4Y4sylFhmd4
facebook.com/DJZeyhan

Trovato’s “Crash” is Like the Soundtrack to an Automated Sentient Terraforming Project

Trovato1_sm — Trovato, image courtesy the artist

The texture of Trovato’s new single “Crash” is metallic. It begins with string tones processed through reverse delay to suggest latency in the launch of what’s to come. Then, like robots building a new city from the ground up in the foothills of a vast mountain range, the song unfolds and develops with pounding bass, spring-like sounds, gently whorling guitar like fiber optic lines coiling out and put in place as the central nervous system of the nascent urban center. The cybernetic bird chirping is like the cadence to which the robots work away the day as if part of the design of the program of instant-city-assemblage in case someone were to come along and encounter the project and instead of necessarily thinking it a purely destructive and exploitative endeavor, more like an unusual, automated art project. It’s reminiscent of Ian McDonald’s 1988 novel Desolation Road about the terraforming of Mars and the cultures that develop out of it in that that novel doesn’t focus so much on the ooh wow technology aspect of the story so much as the impact of those events on a macro, historical scale without ignoring the micro and deeply personal. Listen to “Crash” on Soundcloud and follow Trovato at the links below.

soundcloud.com/trovatomusic
open.spotify.com/artist/68HgefrInFm8lY0y4MEEgG
facebook.com/trovatomusic
instagram.com/trovatomusic

Rob Simonsen’s Enigmatic Video for the “Coeur” Single Reflect’s the Song’s Sense of Acceptance of Life’s Ambiguities

RobSimonsen2 — Rob Simonsen, photo courtesy the artist

Rob Simonsen’s enigmatic composition “Coeur” leads us through a desolate emotional landscape with minimalist piano and electronic sounds and tones with the texture and analog of breezes and wind. The music video for the song shows two sets of seekers, mystics, coming together at a sacred spot marked by a spiritual symbol where they enact an ancient ritual of grounding and reconciliation between the dark side and the day side of the psyche in, coming together in a dance from which one of the seekers walks away preferring to shoulder a mysterious burden to the blissful state offered. Perhaps it represents taking on the challenges of knowing and of creative fulfillment over comfort and too easy answers. The video also made by Simonsen leaves the interpretation to the viewer but it fits well a song that seems resigned to its own ambiguity much as the lead subject of the video. Watch Simonsen’s videographic treatment of “Coeur” and follow the artist at the links below. Simonsen will release his debut solo album Rêveries on September 6 through Sony Music Masterworks.

open.spotify.com/artist/2ZeUaZT3s3NSbeV7OS094J
twitter.com/robsimonsen
facebook.com/robsimonsen
instagram.com/rob_simonsen