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Mary Middlefield’s Indie Orchestral Single “Sexless” Spells Out a Situation Everyone Gets Into When They Have Standards

Mary Middlefield, photo courtesy the artist

Mary Middlefield articulates in “Sexless” a certain kind of desperation and frustration that many people can relate to at some point in their lives or for entirely too long a stretches of time. The song’s orchestral sounds and upbeat energy are a wonderful contrast to lyrics that in another context might be considered pathetic. But in Middlefield’s words we hear about how she’s not without options just none that seem appealing and she expresses how she finds even self-pleasure unsatisfying. She sings about how when she was a little younger she had that network of friends that meant she could find someone to pair off with for fun and companionship but that maybe her temperament as an artist or as a human being with regular human needs that some might see as a burden has ensured her lonely status. And she wonders how this all happened leaving her thinking, “I’m sexless and I’m not loved.” Maybe a lot of people can’t relate to it and when you watch the music video directed by Imogen Harrison you may think oh right, how is Mary Middlefield suffering from this state of things. But it happens when you have standards and you’re not someone who can feel attracted that way to just anyone for whom you feel like you’re settling. Stranger things have happened and one can only hope this plight in the life of Middleton has resolved itself or will soon and for you as well if you also find yourself “Sexless.” Watch the music video on YouTube and follow indie singer-songwriter Mary Middlefield at the links below.

Mary Middlefield on TikTok

Mary Middlefield on Instagram

L Twills’ Soulful and Menacing “Illusion II” is a Fusion of Dark R&B, Industrial and Art Techno

“Illusion II” is the second single from L Twills’ forthcoming new multimedia album [After her Destruction] (due out February 16, 2024). The album is a cybernetic sci-fi opera in which its protagonist Girl journeys through her own mind to find out whether it has mutated. In ten video chapters of the album Girl meets various characters and creatures and undergoes epiphanies that transform her and opens her to new vistas of creative imagination. “Illusion II” brings us in with a rippling low end sound like a deeply processed piano abstracted and echoing, metallic sounds counting time and creating an evolving texture while L Twills sings soulfully about a figure that seems to hold a strange and irresistible allure while she is under the spell of a mysterious affliction. Even though it’s obvious you’re hearing a portion of a larger narrative the song stands on its own. It sounds like an unlikely pairing of Fiona Apple, Malaria! and Chris & Cosey and hints at a fascinating album ahead. Listen to “Illusion II” on Soundcloud and follow L Twills at the links provided.

Kaeto’s Sultry and Urgent Synth Pop Single “No Body” is an Entrancing Mantra of Personal Liberation

Paula Romy’s video treatment for Kaeto’s sultry and urgent synth pop track “No Body” gives it a feel like if Flashdance took place in some grimy, underground Berlin industrial music venue that took over an abandoned parking structure. That this place likely doesn’t exist in reality gives the video a sense of being futuristic with the aesthetics of cyberpunk without the glitz. The fantastically driving and pulsing yet fluid bass line alongside Kaeto’s introspective and exploratory vocals in a song that seems to have something to say about the nature of personal liberation creates an immediately compelling dynamic and finely paired with the choreographed moves and dancers frolicking amid hazy lights and the shadows of a place that in addition to the aforementioned is reminiscent of a techno club that could be in Germany, London or Detroit. It lends a widely accessible spirit to the song. Fans of The Knife will appreciate the sense of mystery Kaeto establishes with the moods and rhythms that interlock and release throughout. Watch the video for “No Body” on YouTube and follow Kaeto on Instagram.

Dax’s Vulnerable and Reflective “Life” is an Embrace of Living in the Moment and Savoring the Limited Time We All Have on Earth

For his single “Life” Dax brings together a simple guitar melody played over a spare beat and lets his typically fluid and commanding vocal cadence carry the momentum of the song. For this song there’s an accompanying video, Dax’s signature and consistently creative and compelling presentation of his songs, that shows ups, downs and everyday struggles of life. We see Dax serving as a janitor in a music venue symbolizing paying his dues and how it must have felt after he’d established himself somewhat as an artist. We see Dax sitting in a classroom being open to learning and setting aside ego to learn from sources beyond his immediate faculties. In the song he refers to his faith and his battles with that and keeping it even though he finds solace and a source of strength and perseverance in it. But even if you don’t share his particular belief system the song has plenty to say about the impermanence of life and how it’s best to make the most of the time we have in this life because it’s all we know. Even if you believe in an afterlife the only life you know is this one and it’s too easy to waste that time and not make the best of our lives even with the challenges that may be in front of us. It’s a compassionate song about living life and the spirit of vulnerability that Dax expresses throughout is a welcome change from the hollow bravado positivity and toughness of entirely too much popular music in all styles. Watch the video for “Life” on YouTube and follow Dax at the links below.

Dax on TikTok

Dax on Facebook

Dax on Instagram

Salvana’s “Cielos Rojos” is a Deep Dream Pop Song to Warm Your Winter Months

The drift of melody in Salvana’s “Cielos Rojos” (“Red Skies” in English) is anchored to a weighty sound when the song shifts gentle from ethereal to a gentle boil. The percussion provides a physicality that frames the song with a meditative rhythm as its guitars billow forth and the vocals occupy the center of the song like a spirit of warmth commenting on nostalgic memories. The resonant guitar tones that linger have a crystalline quality like something you’d hear in a Slowdive song from the Pygmalion period. While the atmospheres here are full there is a spaciousness that draws you into its immersive, dreamlike moods. The pairing of heaviness and lightness also brings to mind the more gentle end of Slow Crush and SOM and a more dream pop cousin to Holy Fawn. Comparison’s aside “Cielos Rojos” evokes a time of life one can look back on fondly to warm the colder months. Listen to the song on Spotify and follow Barcelona, Spain’s Salvana at the links below.

Salvana on Facebook

Salvana on Instagram

“Chrysanthemum Rock” is llawgne’s Shoegaze Ballad Against Capitalism’s Culture of Toxic Striving

“Chrysanthemum Rock” engages in a bit of subversive songwriting in opening with a burst of noise before settling into a measured pace with layers of melody and texture on guitar. The song rushes and whirls while glittering with guitar jangle in a wall of noise mode while Matthew Engwall sings about personal decline and how that often comes about from burnout and the depression at so many factors living in a world mostly dominated by the extractive economic system that is capitalism that demands more and more of everyone at all levels while delivering little to anyone but the system itself and its biggest “winners.” Instead you have to do more faster and more efficiently but that isn’t what humans are built for and Engwall’s song takes aim at that culture of striving and grinding yourself to death and making yourself useful to a system on its own terms and not meeting you on yours. The chorus of “Teach yourself to ease the pain of learning how to live again/Prepare your body for the shock of learning to sing chrysanthemum rock”is so poignant if you know that chrysanthemums in many European cultures symbolizes death and the flower is used for funerals and left at graves and in China, Japan and Korea the flower symbolizes adversity and grief. In his own poetic and clever away Engwall has given us a song about how we’re all encouraged to work ourselves to death even if we no longer possess the capacity to operate at 100% at some job all the time. No one has that capability without it costing them long term. But at this point hopefully all of us realize this at some level but in America people largely still suffer from capitalism’s equivalent of the Stockholm Syndrome yet it seems more and more people are becoming aware of the deleterious effects of overwork and having little to show for it. This song is a lively expression of solidarity for that awakening. Listen to “Chrysanthemum Rock” on Spotify and follow llawgne at the links provided.

DSTRY Guides us on a Trip Through the Cosmos in the Video for Psychedelic IDM Track “Cassini Shields”

Pulses of hazy, gritty tone and click-y percussion guide us into DSTRY’s “Cassini Shields.” The song (referencing the space probe that studied Saturn and its system including its rings and satellites) has an animated music video that features a colorful outer space environment that shifts into scenes of the heroine of the song falling through space and roaming around an evolving set of scenery from buildings to ocean and more fantastical realms of existence. All the while almost pointillist rhythms and the sample of a tambourine keeps beat while various strands of bright electronic melody trace the paces of the song and warp off into the distance and vocals that sing and utter phrases that have emotional resonance even as their actual meaning is not discernible. None of it matters on this cosmic journey of music and visuals to the center of the galaxy where by the end of the video you see black holes forming and then transforming into planets as a figure in a space suit like those worn by American astronauts drifts forward. Is there a genre for this music outside of maybe calling it an IDM or more loosely and vaguely an “experimental electronic” song? The arbitrary designations and reference points don’t matter and the song draws you in with its warmly otherworldly energy and constantly evolving melodies and beats and within it an appealing sense of wonder and a spirit of adventure to match that seen in its visual representation. Watch the video for “Cassini Shields” on YouTube and follow DSTRY at the links below.

DSTRY on Bandcamp

DSTRY on Instagram

dstrymusic.com

The Binary Marketing Show Take Us on a Trip Into the Neglected Realms of the Imagination on Psychedelic IDM Track “Estu Vi”

The Binary Marketing Show, photo courtesy the artists

When “Estu Vi” by The Binary Marketing Show opens with a sound of a cycling drone, a pulsing rhythm and percussive tone echoing you’re not expecting the song to develop into something with a subversion of pop song structure when the distorted vocals kick in. It almost sounds like an homage to “Wild in Blue” by Suicide or Drifters period Dirty Beaches. But the vocals have a quality like something put through reverse reverb with the full resonance cut off. The sound is reminiscent of something The Knife might have done. The drifting chime of a keyboard melody mid-song has a physicality like a steel drum processed beyond immediate recognition. Horns come into the mix and metallic rattling. The vocals take on a ritualistic aspect in the last quarter of the song and anyone lucky enough to have caught High Places in its tropical pop phase will have an appreciation for how The Binary Marketing Show has turned an organic aesthetic into something otherworldly. That the song ends abruptly simply adds to a sense that you’re visiting a hidden part of the world or a neglected part of the mind that can seem alien as the title of the song means “Be You.” Listen to “Estu Vi” on Spotify and follow The Binary Marketing Show at the links provided. The duo’s new album Dancing With Shadows emerged on September 22, 2023.

The Binary Marketing Show on Facebook

The Binary Marketing Show on Instagram

“Vague Flesh” Finds Taleen Kali Embracing Romance in a Warm Embrace of Gossamer Melodies

Taleen Kali closes out 2023 which saw the release of her new album Flower of Life in March with the video for “Vague Flesh.” The single was featured in the time-travel horror comedy Totally Killer and the style of the video and the hazy atmospheres of the song have a certain resonance with the 1980s setting of the film. But there isn’t an element of camp to the song itself. Its gauzy melodies and streams of sound that trail off into infinity set to a processional rhythm like a seamless blend of 60s girl group pop, Cocteau Twins and the use of vocals as an integral instrument and the ethereal and entrancing guitar interplay of Lush. The introspective lyrics seem to point to making a decisive choice for joy and connection in the chorus: “I chose love/it chose me/I can’t help myself.” The video features Kali walking the beach at sunset and the band performing in a room dimly lit in warm colors sealing the impression of embracing romance fully as a mutually consensual occurrence. Watch the video for “Vague Flesh” on YouTube and follow Taleen Kali at the links below.

Taleen Kali on TikTok

Taleen Kali on Facebook

Taleen Kali on Instagram

Luminatrix Creates a Compelling and Dark Vitality on Smoldering, Punk Breakup Song “China Again”

The edgy jangle of the introduction to “China Again” by Luminatrix promises something menacing ahead. What makes this song so fascinating and definitely sets it apart from other rock songs that are clearly tapping into earlier eras of music is that the strands of influence are rich and intertwining and result in something original but with a classic resonance. In Jenna McGrath’s vocals you can hear some of the poetic inflection of Patti Smith and Chrissie Hynde and the emotional intensity of Carrie Brownstein when the latter channels harrowing experiences and mixes them with a delicacy of feeling to create a psychologically complex mood. The crunchy guitar riff alongside a haunting, hovering surf rock warble, the enigmatic laughter early in the song, the steady cadence and the sense that the song could tip over into a dramatic emotional outburst gives this song of a relationship being at a decisive end over being weary of one’s partner’s numerous offenses and foibles a dark vitality that invites repeated listens. Fans of Death Valley Girls will definitely appreciate what Luminatrix has to offer in its own songwriting. Listen to “China Again” on Spotify. Luminatrix’s new album Antihero dropped September 25, 2023.