Uèle Lamore orchestrates textures, melodic drones, percussive tones and swirling, swelling synths with a masterful command of dynamics on the single “The Dark” (from her forthcoming album Loom). The accompanying video directed by Akiko Nakayama perfectly embodies Lamore’s synergy of ideas and layers of sound with imagery that initially suggests plasma flares and evolves into the movement of liquid and air as if under a slide like a black and white oil projection with all the granular detail intact with the intricate and organic flow of disparate elements that together create a striking visual experience in absolute sync with Lamore’s bright and breezy yet focused composition. Watch the video for “The Dark” on YouTube and connect with Uèle Lamore at the links provided.
Nat Tate returned in the summer of 2021 with a modest two song single/EP called Penelope. The acclaimed songwriter and guitarist has produced some of the most inventive pop music in a more folk vein in the past several years and their work with experimental pop outfit Chimney Choir helped to realize Tate’s always clear and strong creative vision. Penelope is relatively speaking more minimal but also stripped back to simple and basic elements. The title track is a gentle and affectionate tribute to a loved one that expresses the uncertainties arc of that relationship and Tate’s persona insight and powers of observation in keying in to qualities of personality and behavior that might be missed by an artist with a lower degree of self-awareness. The shuffling percussion and keyboard accents that provide an unconventional melody that is a kind of counterpoint to Tate’s nuanced vocals. “Play Along” and its quivering echo treatment on the lingering fringes of vocals, the toy-like quality of the percussion track with staccato bass marking the boundaries of the melody and spare moody keyboard tones give an unconventionally surreal quality to a song about the ways people will often go along to get along and not question what other people want them to do as long as it isn’t too extreme even if it’s not what they might choose to do themselves. In that way it is one of the most tender calling out of someone’s bad impulses and instincts ever crafted into a song. It all marks a different direction for Tate who, whether it’s acknowledged much or not, has been pushing her own envelope as an artist from the beginning never being able to be pigeonholed in terms of songwriting, musicianship or mode of expression. Thus this is a promising new foray into the songwriter’s career thus far. Listen to “Penelope” and “Play Along” on Bandcamp linked below.
New Standards Men make music that defies simple genre categorization. Its threading together and fusing of multiple streams of influence has produced a music that has the subversive spirit of punk, psychedelia and the avant-garde, the technical prowess of jazz and metal and all informed by a sense of humor and disregard for stylistic convention. All while creating a prolific and surprisingly coherent and strong body of work including its 2020 and 2021 companion albums I Was A Starship and Spain’s First Astronaut respectively. The group came together in late 2016 when current members Drew Bissell and Jeremy Brashaw started jamming with another friend to produce music that drew on a desire to make music through a sort of improvisational/spontaneous composition approach that continues in the writing process to this day. The aforementioned albums were written and recorded during the same session but with the music having a slightly different flavor, one more heavy, psychedelic doom jazz, the other more John Zorn-esque free jazz. Companions in mood but clearly different facets of the New Standards Men sound. With now shows happening for over a year the group couldn’t release I Was A Starship in the usual fashion with the album release show but the record managed to pretty much sell out of its first run. It was then the band approached Chuck Coffey of the Denver-based Snappy Little Numbers imprint with the thought of reissuing the album and a tape of Spain’s First Astronaut and give a second wave of energy behind promoting those recordings. We had a chance to sit down with Bradshaw and Bissell to discuss their long history in underground music in both southern Iowa, where both spent much if not all of their formative years, and Denver and their deep comprehension of the dynamics of scenes as well as the process of making and releasing their music.
On Thursday, December 9, New Standards Men will have an album release show at the Hi-Dive as a co-album release show with Alien Neighborhood, joined for the night on stage by SPELLS and Moon Pussy. Listen to the interview with the band on Bandcamp below and connect with New Standards Men and Snappy Little Numbers at the links provided.
“Dream Weaver” builds in your mind images of clear lines, open spaces and unstructured time. The latter suggested by its spare rhythms and cycling melodic synth line with languid, echoing arc of luminous tones over delicate bass accents. It is the mood of a countryside train ride with hours to go to reach your destination and no demands on your attention or energy. It eases your mind into a leisurely state ready to take in whatever comes your way with a Zen-like tranquility. Its minimal techno beat is akin to more chill IDM or trance and while unobtrusive it isn’t music that fades into the background so much as actively soothes your conscious mind. Listen to “Dream Weaver” on Spotify and connect with Mokhov at the links below where you can also listen to the Solid State Dreams album in its entirety.
“Welcome to SMELVE VILLAGE” are the first words we see in KEG’s video for “Farmhands” before we enter a village of mushroom houses, green skinned short humanoids with pointy ears and the band performing in herky jerky manner citing a litany of complaints and observations which the aforementioned creatures object to with a parade carrying signs saying “HUMANS FUCK OFF” while one of their number summons a giant creature that shows up out of the local pond and consumes the band as the view pulls back and we come to see it was either a very strange TV show, certainly an unusual music video and/or a glimpse into an alternate reality we may not want to visit but where certainly magic is real and our species doesn’t dominate the world. There is some comfort in that mere possibility even as the band carries on with a frantic yet tuneful song of rapid guitar arpeggios and vocals on the verge of some kind of break. Visually the video is like a cross between what Dash Shaw did for My Entire High School Sinking Into the Sea, the cartoon style of Adventure Time and what Richard Linklater did with Waking Life. Musically imagine the borderline unhinged moments of The Rapture, the surreal wordplay and off kilter rhythms of Parquet Courts and the irreverence and disregard for all regular song logic of their own of Happy Mondays and you’ll be somewhere near the inherent charm of the track. Watch the music video below on YouTube and connect with KEG at the links provided.
“Teenage Teardrops” begins with a hushed and stirring dynamic to frame a narrative about the ways youthful aspirations and ability to see possibilities and find meaning in simple things like, as mentioned early in the song, meaning on a seven inch record, can be leached from your psyche if you’re in an environment that doesn’t nourish the soul in even the simplest ways. “I can’t cry anymore” is such a simply lyric but in the context of the song it encapsulates having reached a point where you find yourself in a place geographically and/or emotionally where you have lost the ability to even mourn a situation that no longer serves you because you’ve given so much so freely without thinking about it. When you’re young you think you have infinite time and opportunity to do what you would like but even at a young age bleeding yourself dry for a lifestyle or a job or a relationship or for anything or anyone can catch up to you. Later in life that timeline shortens and this song acknowledges that reality of having moments of vitality feeling like youth and when you’re tapped out it can leave you feeling confused and devastated. The orchestral quality of the song with melancholic piano and synths driving the melody while husky vocals seem to dance and sway with the gently strummed guitar line and finely accented percussion suggests a cinematic quality and experience evocative of everyday experiences elevated to the mythic. After that fashion it is reminiscent of where XTC went with its own songwriting from the mid-80s onward and early solo Barry Adamson. Listen to “Teenage Teardrops” on Bandcamp and follow the Rec at the links provided.
George McFall took samples of songs by Big Country as an element for the sonic palette for his Diurnal Patio EP. The title track melds the upbeat, jaunty quality of Big Country with an almost cut-up style of repeated images for lyrics in free associating how so many of the crises and dramatic events we’ve been experiencing of late are just another version of something we’ve had shoved down our throats before like it’s something new but in the end (“another panic attack, another century, another sentiment, another cigarette, another apathy) it’s a collection of feelings we process and when things fly at us with what feels like a rapid fire of stimulation it’s easy to become numb to the full impact of the events as we try to sort through what might actually have meaning and significance and do our best as humans with limitations of cognition in processing so much information that may or may not have an impact on our lives directly. It’s like an irreverent post-punk track built on a cheeky remix and collage/barrage of ideas and images that takes the very absurdity of the situation and suggests that so much of what’s floated our way is the detritus of history we can brush aside and not get lost in the flood of distractions. The song and perhaps the EP is a way to comment the Marcel Duchamp once did in his concept of “Readymades” or even the radical social deconstructionist impulses of Dada to mulch culture to create something new out the other end of the process. But whatever the intentions or methods, McFall has created a fascinating and compelling work that fans of both TransAm and The Fall equally might appreciate. Listen to “Diurnal Patio” (surely a Dada-esque title) on Spotify and connect with McFall at the links provided.
Good at Rockets is an Orange County Trio that released its latest single “The Margin.” The track certainly bears comparison to late 80s R.E.M. with jangly guitar work paired with poetically introspective lyrics that examine the strange ways humans conduct their lives and engage with the world around them by way of behaviors intended to be statements of identity not often examined enough, a pantomime of intentionality. The spare piano work accents the melodic line and as a subtle element it helps to emphasize an underlying message in the song to think beyond the usual frames and narratives that ring in your life out of force of habit even when situations call for greater nuance, understanding and compassion. Every day, John McCabe suggests in his singing, is a chance to get this dynamic right and to inculcate better habits but self-awareness is a good place to start and without judgment. Listen to “The Margin” on Spotify and follow Good at Rockets at the links provided.
Icarus Phoenix “80’s Night Dance Party Singing ‘Send Me an Angel’” cover
Icarus Phoenix uses the vehicle of power pop Americana with “80’s Night Dance Party Singing ‘Send Me an Angel’” to deliver the realest lines about social anxiety rendered in thoughtful couplets. It’s posed as a series of questions coming from a place of compassionate curiosity and works whether directed to a friend or to oneself. Singing “Why’s it gotta be you feel alive with no one round?” A.R. Herrin sums up what it means to be an introvert but recognizing the limitations of going too far into yourself to the point of isolation. “Riding on my bike abandoning social events every time” is a line at the end of the song that so succinctly creates an image of a habit of a different kind of escapism than simply binging on entertaining media or chemical alteration. The sparkling, jangly guitar work as almost processional strumming frames this song about getting to the root of one’s anxieties that one’s well-constructed system of coping mechanisms aren’t fooling anyone and no longer serve the interests of your heart. Listen to “80’s Night Dance Party Singing ‘Send Me an Angel’” on Bandcamp and perhaps further explore the full album No tree can grow to heaven unless its roots reach down to hell out now on Telos Tapes. Also, connect with Icarus Phoenix at the links provided.
Siv Disa aka Siv Anderson is a Reyjavik, Iceland-based songwriter who released her debut album Dreamhouse through the UK imprint Trapped Animal in November 2021. Anderson had been recording her eclective and evocative experimental dream pop and releasing singles for the past couple of years and demonstrated a knack for delivering a whole concept with her songs and accompanying music videos. From early forays into songwriting and performing while in college in the Boston area to becoming immersed in the underground music world of New York City post-grad and working as a teacher, Anderson’s style of soundscaping and storytelling is riveting in its quality of operating from a place outside standard logical though. Dreamhouse itself follows a bit of a story arc in the way Anderson spent a great deal of time figuring out an order for the songs in terms of themes both subject matter and musical. The album’s free association of ideas with psychedelia/shoegaze, jazz structures, noise, ambient and pop in a way that seems to invoke concepts of non-linear film making has resulted in a set of songs that takes you through a broad range of emotions and a gentle catharsis. We had the opportunity to speak with the songwriter at length through the benefit of speaking over the internet about her roots in becoming an artist rather than something her parents would have approved right away, her development as a musician and film maker as well as the themes of some of her music.
Listen to the interview with Siv Disa on Bandcamp linked below (where you can also order a vinyl edition of Dreamhouse), check out the video for “Whistle” (filmed in Iceland) and connect with her at the links provided.
Queen City Sounds and Art 
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