Siv Disa released her Waltzes EP in the fall of 2018 but is now re-releasing it as a visual album. The single “Rooms” is a downtempo, melancholic number that conjures images of the mythical late night jazz lounge. Except that its drones and tonal details like candlelight and twinkling crystal make it sound like a New Wave torch song. One gets the impression that you’re sitting with Siv Disa in an antiquated simulation of that jazz lounge like the Elvis simulation from Bladerunner 2049 that K experiences in post-industrial-collapse-abandoned Vegas—so compelling and yet surreal, haunting yet comforting. That is until the end of the song when the pounding drums and accelerated pace hit and you wake from the reverie in panic at the possibility of missing the last shuttle home from the platform with access to the all but abandoned nostalgia theme park that fell out of vogue in a future when most of humanity has entered into a period of galactic diaspora looking outward with little time for recycling or revisiting past popular culture. “Rooms” has the romance of a classic piano ballad and synthesizes a sense of the past with an ineffably futuristic sensibility and a nod to the fact that good songwriting has a timelessness that transcends trends. It is a perfect blending of sounds and aesthetics that provoke reflection as well as relaxation. Listen to “Rooms” and the rest of Waltzes on Spotify and follow Siv Disa at the links below.
What:Michael McDonald w/Strange Americans When: Thursday, 07.18, 5:45 p.m. Where: Denver Botanic Gardens – York Street Why: Michael McDonald’s smooth and soulful vocals have been a part of American rock and pop music for over four decades now. Whether as a singer in Steely Dan (both live and in studio), The Doobie Brothers, as a solo artist and in his numerous collaborations including with the likes of modern hip-hop/jazz genius Thundercat, McDonald brings a deep musicality and keen ear for melody that transcends genre. This concludes his run of shows in Colorado over this past week.
What:Usnea, CHRCH, Zygrot and Limbwrecker When: Thursday, 07.18, 7 p.m. Where: Rhinoceropolis Why: Kind of a funeral doom show at Rhino tonight w/Portland, Oregon’s funeral doom juggernauts Usnea and the transcendental occult feral drone of CHRCH from Sacramento.
Friday | July 19
Spirettes, photo by Tom Murphy
What:We Are A Glum Lot and Spirettes dual album release w/Turvy Organ When: Friday, 07.19, 8 p.m. Where: Lulu’s Downstairs – Manitou Springs Why: Dream pop band Spirettes and neo-math-emo-indie rock band We Are Not a Glum Lot are releasing their new albums simultaneously this evening at Lulu’s Downstairs in Manitou Springs. Spirettes’ album being Esoteria and We Are Not a Glum Lot’s titled The Price of Simply Existing.
What:Hammer’s House Party: MC Hammer, Sir Mix-a-Lot, Sisqo, Biz Markie, 2 Live Crew, The Funky Bunch When: Friday, 07.19, 6:30 p.m. Where: Fiddler’s Green
Why: At this show you can party like it’s 1992 or 1999 depending on who you’re going to see. MC Hammer was ubiquitous in the early 90s with multiple hit songs that helped to put hip-hop into the mainstream. Sir Mix-a-Lot is perhaps best known for his hit song “Baby Got Back” but he was a big deal in Seattle before that and his records worth listening to generally for their swagger and sly and pointed humor. Biz Markie is a character in hip-hop who burst the boundaries of what was acceptable by owning being a little rough around the edges in his rapping and his outlandish performance persona. His 1989 song “Just a Friend” is a classic of the genre. 2 Live Crew traded in x-rated rap for years and garnered attention for its high profile lawsuit regarding its 1989 album As Nasty As They Wanna Be over the record’s alleged obscenity. Seems quaint and inconsequential now considering how the President of the United States has and continued to talk about women but back in the day it made the news and catapulted the underground group into the national consciousness. Sisqó is the lead singer of Dru Hill but in 1999 he had hit songs like “Thong Song” and “Incomplete.” So you’ll get to take in a good swath of 90s mainstream hip-hop in one concert if you go.
Saturday | July 20
Flipper circa 2012, photo by Tom Murphy
What: Flipper 40th Anniversary Tour with David Yow When: Saturday, 07.20, 8 p.m. Where: Marquis Theater Why: David Yow of The Jesus Lizard and Scratch Acid will front the notorious San Francisco post-punk band Flipper for this tour and he’s one singer who still seems to have some disregard for his personal safety as a performer.
Sunday | July 21
Elizabeth Colour Wheel, photo courtesy the artists
What:Elizabeth Colour Wheel w/Drowse, New Standards Men and BleakHeart When: Sunday, 07.21, 8 p.m. Where: Hi-Dive Why: Elizabeth Colour Wheel’s ritual drone, blackened shoegaze, mystic doom, pagan crust sound on its 2019 album Nocebo is Diamanda Galas-esque in its cathartic intensity and SubRosa-like in its sense of mystery.
Tuesday | July 23
Starcrawler, photo by Cameron Mccool
What:Beck w/Cage the Elephant, Spoon and Starcrawler When: Tuesday, 07.23, 4:30 p.m. Where: Fiddler’s Green Why: Beck went from eccentric underground artist with releases on K Records and Flipside early in his career to late-era alternative icon in the mid-to-late 90s with hit songs and videos on MTV to mature singer songwriter with a gift for inventive soundscaping. All the while Beck’s genre-bending instincts and disregard for expectation and convention has meant all of his albums are worth a listen. Cage the Elephant has made a bit of a name for itself by mixing together punk, psychedelia and bluesy garage rock. Even though Spoon has hit the greatest hits compilation (minus tracks from great albums like Girls Can Tell and Hot Thoughts), the Austin-based, arty post-punk outfit has raised its songwriting bar with every album since its 1996 debut Telephono bringing in electronic elements more to the fore on 2017’s Hot Thoughts and always with the rhythm anchoring and guiding the music. That politicians and public radio station managers cite Spoon as a favorite band shouldn’t be held against them. L.A.’s Starcrawler opens the show with its mélange of punk, 70s glam and stoner rock. Which might get the group lumped in with the recent wave of 90s fuzz rock worshippers. But Starcrawler’s songwriting tends to unironically embrace the swagger of yesteryear and take inspiration from the bands that influenced grunge rather than simply the 90s amalgamation of all of it.
“Astroboy” finds Birmingham, UK band The Lizards taking us on a trip down a worm hole of winding passages of color and hypnotic imagery. The bright synths glitter and seethe in and out of hearing as our guides carry us across a kaleidoscopic starscape of pleasantly disorienting melody in which its easy to get lost and hope back on for the ride to who knows where. To simply call this psychedelic rock does an injustice to how it has musical roots in stuff like Ozric Tentacles and its own beautifully bizarre mixture of folk, psychedelia, electronic music and prog. But The Lizards reign things in a bit on the sprawl out into musical outer space and ultimately don’t sound like much of anyone else while bringing together sonic elements that resonate with the mind-altering aesthetic of early Black Moth Super Rainbow and a more space rock “Madchester” band. However one might pick apart the song it will take you places if you let it and there isn’t nearly enough music that does so. Listen below and follow The Lizards at the links provided.
Theo Bard used ice and snow to make the textural sounds heard on “Forget” instead of the usual percussion. At first it sounds like white noise but it has a little too much physicality and it’s a nice, subtle contrast with the staccato melody struck by the synth and the wash of droning sounds in the background. Bard sounds like he’s getting lost in the soundscape to soothe the pain of the realization that a relationship he wasn’t over has no chance of rekindling because the other party has obviously moved on to other people. The vocals express a wish to forget but the repetition as almost a mantra doesn’t necessarily manifest in the psyche. There isn’t anguish in the vocals, but a kind of disaffected, almost numb quality that people take on when they don’t want to believe something is true even though it’s before them and that the time to accept the truth was extended enough and the compartmentalizing of the pain to take in doses one can handle may be another process yet. Listen to “Forget” on Soundcloud and follow Theo Bard at the links provided.
“Coast to Coast” is an loving homage to cross country late night driving and listening to the arcane lore broadcast on AM radio and hosted now by George Noory and George Knapp from 1 a.m. to 5 a.m. Eastern but famously headed by its creator Art Bell. It’s a fitting song for a band of friends collaborated remotely from Austin, Texas, Louisville, Kentucky and Water Valley, Mississippi, calling themselves Coral Moon. Because Coast to Coast is syndicated its unusual stories of the paranormal and the unexplained serve as a kind of bond between fans of the program. Musically, the soft and playful pop song is reminiscent of a Jamboree-period Beat Happening song or something by Magnetic Fields circa Get Lost. Jangle-y guitar, violin cutting a figure over the proceedings and bleeps and bloops to represent switching stations to catch the aforementioned broadcast has the sound of like-minded friends getting together to talk about wild imaginative ideas late into the night. Coral Moon recently released its self-titled album and you can listen to “Coast to Coast” on YouTube as well as exploring the band’s catalog further at the links below.
Anyone that’s ever felt like they get stuck emotionally and embarrassed by their own emotional stubbornness, perhaps born of some bit of arrested personal development, and acted out will relate deeply to Ava Heatley’s “Shitty Tattoo.” The song starts out simply enough with piano and voice outlining several times in life where everything feels raw and too real and you want to travel back to a time to fix the mistakes you made when you didn’t have adult responsibilities and maybe throwing a tantrum over much of anything wouldn’t be so consequential. The quiet part of contemplation escalates from the introspective yet dramatic self-loathing to an examination of repeating patterns of not wanting to deal with frustrating situations and poor life decisions. Even decisions as minor but so symbolic as an awful tattoo that one got thinking in the moment it would be something you wanted to commit to for the rest of your life because everything seems so significant to you in your tumultuous teen years and twenties when, really, as you get older you realize they didn’t matter that much—the relationships, the impulsive behavior in a moment of peak feeling, the angst over relatively minor matters. Guitar and drums come in to give voice to that cacophony in your head as every thing you think you fucked up and ruined come crashing in. If you live past thirty-five it’s safe to say you’ve been there and if not you probably are either in denial or have lead a boring life both outwardly and inwardly. Listen to “Shitty Tattoo” on Soundcloud and follow Heatley at the link below. Her new EP Beautiful/Terrifying is due for release on November 2 and she recently debuted “Shitty Tattoo” at The Bitter End in New York City on July 6.
“Azure,” Omer Gronich’s latest single, fades in with a warble of atmospherics before his vocals come in, slightly processed to have an otherworldly feel like you might hear on an early Peter Gabriel solo song. The repeating, simple guitar figure evolves subtly, floating through the song as a companion to the background vocals. But then in the last roughly third of the song synth beeps poke through what was the dreamy fog of the earlier part of the song and like waking up from a weird, troubling dream in which one relives the cycle of a love beginning and ending as a symbol for larger patterns in our lives whether birth to death and all the experience in between or in specific realms like the natural cycles of a career or creative path and how they interconnect and inform each other. By diving deep into these themes, Gronich untangles them a bit and makes them more discernible by connecting them to sounds in a song that doesn’t have to be fully understood on a conscious, logical level. Listen to “Azure” on Spotify and follow Gronich on his website linked below. Also, look out for his forthcoming album The Art of Sinking.
Julia And The Basement Tapes, photo courtesy the artists
Julia And The Basement Tapes employ some evocatively melancholic chords throughout its “Something More” single. It is reminiscent at times of Zeppelin’s “Thank You” and, curiously, Duran Duran’s “Ordinary World.” The shimmer around the gentle guitar work and the warm vocals, the piano accents and the tasteful pedal steel flourishes gives the track an expansive lushness and grace it’s easy to forget it’s firmly rooted in blues music. When the guitar takes a lead toward the end of the song it feels more like the climax of the piece and not merely an excuse to show off chops. And that’s it, all elements of this song showcase a band that writes to further the song and its impact rather than a display of individual ego. It’s an affecting song that puts you in a contemplative mood. Listen to “Something More” on Spotify and follow Julia And The Basement Tapes at the links below. Apparently “Something More” is the lead single on the group’s forthcoming album due out later in the year.
Working with Colin Greenwood, Toronto’s Kyle Yip has created a song and video called “In My Room” that sonically and visually feels like clandestine and arcane work in hidden places. The single bell tone marking time, the collage of metronomic percussion and tones, the nearly whispered vocals—all contributing to an evolving narrative wherein our usual rational methods of measure and assessing our reality come up wanting as we encounter higher or unhitherto known aspects of the universe around us. The video is like a David Cronenberg and Chris Cunningham science fiction/horror mash-up, the music like Aphex Twin gone minimal and mutated directly by aesthetics of free jazz. Watch the video on YouTube and follow Discrete at the links below including that of his music imprint Savvy Records.
Megan Dixon-Hood’s acoustic piano version of “Sea of Ice” sounds like it was written in a house on a mountainside looking down into white valleys after a quiet but powerful snowstorm. She sings of a sense of desolation but one that affords a climate where turning inward in meditative contemplation waiting by the fire is the only way to weather the chill alone. Dixon-Hood’s breathy, melodious voice and the spare piano work brings an elevated tone to what might otherwise be a purely melancholic and introspective piece. It’s not a contrasting quality so much as complimentary. It’s rare in the modern world that we are afforded such experiences without intentionally seeking them out. This song captures what might be magical about a situation that many would dread and find boring. Dixon-Hood draws out the harsh and stark beauty of having no options but patience and no companion but your own memories and imagination. Listen to “Sea of Ice” on Spotify and explore more of Megan Dixon-Hood’s new collection of singles comprising acoustic versions of her older material at the links below.
Queen City Sounds and Art 
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