SubmitHub – Page 167 – Queen City Sounds and Art

Jan Echo Delves Into the Dystopian Standardization of Thought and Culture Through Social Networks on the Industrial Post-punk Song “Our Lies”

JanEcho_OurLies1_lg — Jan Echo, “Our Lies” cover, image courtesy the artists

With its new single “Our Lies” Jan Echo delves into the phenomenon of social media and the media in general and their impact on not just the narratives floating about in society and influencing public opinion but often our sense of ourselves and our place in this new social universe. The brooding synths and lingering vocals is reminiscent of a more industrial Depeche Mode. Guitar accents work like impressionistic tonal motes in the flow of slowly arcing melodic drones and meditative percussion. But unlike entirely too much modern music the song goes beyond one mood and a single, narrow dynamic particularly in the last half of the song when the band indulges a tasteful guitar solo that traces a line out of the dullened and even norm that is that increasingly internationally standardized modes of thought, expression and conceptualization that widespread interconnectivity has spawned. “Our Lies” suggests it needn’t be this way, and it does not, with the sheer potential of sharing diverse ideas, perspectives and experiences but as it is all being administered by a few corporations for their profit, the monetizable aspects of these interactions are most rewarded. A different kind of flattening of the curve to benefit the technocratic class at the expense of human independence of thought by increasing our dependence on being plugged into the network for communication, information, engagement with society and more so than ever the economy. Listen to “Our Lies” on Soundcloud and connect with Jan Echo at Instagram.

NTHN Evokes the Transformative Nature of a Deep Bond of Love and Understanding on “About Her”

NTHN_AboutHer3_sm — NTHN, photo courtesy the artist

Songs about devoted love can be overblown with purple prose and hackneyed premises in the pop world but NTHN brings an insight to a powerful connection that seems pretty rare in relationships in “About Her.” He sings as though he wrote down all the ways he feels loved and understood beyond there needing to be some transactional aspect to the bond. Taking that list, NTHN took the real gems and laid them out in a series of couplets that he set to a lush production of echo-y beats, an electronic string melody and sang those words as if contemplating their impact. The electronic saxophone line is even soulful in in the outro and when you hear the words you sense that it’s through the experience of the relationship that NTHN has come to know himself better and his own limitations and his gratitude in being transformed by it. Listen to “About Her” on Soundcloud and connect with NTHN at the links below.

soundcloud.com/producedbynthn
open.spotify.com/artist/1PqBLuAl3tnYxpG08RgD3U
business.facebook.com/producedbynthn
instagram.com/producedbynthn

Grace Gillespie’s “Goodbye” is a Gentle Farewell to Your Old Self to Make Way for a More Fulfilling Life

GraceGillespie_Photo — Grace Gillespie, photo courtesy the artist

Grace Gillespie’s voice is so vivid, intimate and direct on “Goodbye” and its shuffling, evolving guitar melody and spare rhythms so subtly moving and upbeat that you can get lost in the song before its depth and heaviness hit you. Certainly it’s a matter of interpretation but the folk-inflected piece comes off like a conversation to yourself writing a letter to someone you love but of whom you don’t know how you could be worthy. The chorus of “I don’t want to say goodbye/I’m not afraid of dying now/I am afraid to be alive” could take on multiple meanings like maybe you don’t want to sabotage something good and the prospect of doing so seems so terrible; that maybe you were seeing a blank horizon of your life without music or your chosen vocation to completely define it and that someone came along to expand what you thought could be your life with a meaningful relationship in it and that living in that expanded sense is scary because it will force you to change and face things about your personality you weren’t yet ready to look at and change. But the tone of the song is one of soothing and calming those anxieties and fears and a gentle call to be brave. Like in the beginning and the end of the song when Gillespie sings of putting down her guitars for awhile and “See what’s left of me under the sea of tangled wires.” The song is about choosing what might be great for you, challenging your insecurities because you need to whether or not it’s for anyone else and being willing to say goodbye to long cherished notions of what you have held onto as your identity even when it no longer makes sense or serves a life you want. Listen to “Goodbye” on Soundcloud and connect with Gillespie at the links provided.

gracegillespie.co.uk
soundcloud.com/grace-gillespie-music
open.spotify.com/artist/4owaayCKTzC8Y7PeADjuAk
twitter.com/GraceyGillespie
facebook.com/GraceGillespieMusic

The Granular Sonic and Emotional Collage of Vijuuns’ “Overlay” Makes For an Immersive Listen

Vijunns_Overlay1_crop — Vijunns “Overlay” cover

Vijunns’ song “Overlay,” named after the Photoshop blending tool, explores the theme of urban decay. With the accompanying music video with performance artist playing the role of an enigmatic figure walking through and moving about various settings in Bombay Beach on the Salton Sea, the layers of sound – flowing and swirling winds of white noise, granular, melodic tones, pulsing arpeggios, meditative beats – work enhance each other while existing independent of each other. The effect gives a different emotional context when taken as a whole and the use of the imagery of urban decay draws on a sense of a memory of a place that persists in the mind that in your emotions overlays the current conditions of the landscape. Walking through them those layers of meaning for you mingle and you come to appreciate the world as it is now in a new way as it has a new context for people that don’t remember it as you once did and so it exists in experience purely in its current form. The track, too, is reminiscent of early Tycho or early 2000s Boards of Canada with their own drawing upon sonic and emotional artifacts of an earlier era to craft a musical experience for today that anchors the listening experience across time if you can tap into its references and if not just provides a soothing and deeply immersive and lush bit of ear candy. Watch the video for “Overlay” on YouTube and connect with Vijunns at the links below.

vijunns.com
soundcloud.com/vijunns
facebook.com/vijunns

“Of Two Minds (feat. Boy Indigo)” by Adrianna Krikl is Like the Romantic Outro Music to an Unconventional, Sprawling Space Opera

AdrianaKrikl_OfTwoMinds1_crop — Adrianna Krikl “Of Two Minds” cover

The appropriately titled “Of Two Minds” by Adrianna Krikl featuring with Boy Indigo is like being invited into a windswept realm of streaming, melodic drones, floating on rising, blissful clouds of tone while a nearly androgynous voice sings like the collective voice of that ethereal space. What the song brings to mind is what the outro soundtrack to a cinematic version of the Saga comic series by Brian K. Vaughan and Fiona Staples might sound like. There is an air of romance and mystery to the song, of promise and uncertainty but unshakeable hope and inner tranquility in the face of any turmoil to come. Listen to “Of Two Minds” on Bandcamp and connect with Adrianna Krikl at the links below.

adriannakrikl.com
tidal.com/browse/album/131467630
deezer.com/us/album/131894332
soundcloud.com/adriannakrikl/of-two-minds-feat-boy-indigo
music.apple.com/us/album/of-two-minds-feat-boy-indigo/1499157476?i=1499157477
open.spotify.com/album/0IQPOJ8hrz2GP9vlTkoU0M?highlight=spotify:track:2bAXwwOPcrm5OQ5Yu8sD83

Laveda Makes Having Youthful Illusions of Immortality and Vigor Shattered Sound Triumphant and Life-Affirming on “Ghost”

Laveda_Ghost1_crop — Laveda, photo courtesy the artists

Give Laveda’s “Ghost” some of your time to come to full bloom. The introduction sounds like someone recorded a secret practice session, like the first recordings you might make before you figure out anything like mic placement or having a real mic at all. It is a sonic metaphor for the vulnerability and tenderness, hopefulness, honesty and bravery in the music and words to follow. The song quickly gets to its grand sweeps of melodic guitar and vocals that both sit perfectly with that melody and float breathily over the quiet sections. Though the song is about being in a situation that changes your perspective on life in an instant by shattering the illusions you might have about your own immortality when you’re young or your personal myth of willpower overcoming all when you’re a little older. Laveda’s great momentum in the song also indulges in moments of imperfection that give it the grit and unvarnished quality that actually complements well its polished grandeur. Fans of Slowdive and Alvvays will appreciate not just the delicious atmospheres but the song’s creative dynamics and layered emotional colorings. Listen to “Ghost” on Spotify, connect with Laveda at the links below and look out for the group’s new full length What Happens After out April 24 via Color Station.

soundcloud.com/lavedamusic
open.spotify.com/artist/4k9HOB4zrVAEasP7nm31F7
facebook.com/lavedamusic
instagram.com/lavedamusic

Owsey Remixes Koresma’s “Northern Lights” to Craft the Chillout Lounge Music For a Floating Nightclub in Full View of the Aurora Borealis

Koresma_NorthernLights_OwseyRemix1_crop — Koresma “Northern Lights (Owsey remix)” cover (cropped)

The Owsey remix of Koresma’s “Northern Lights” gives it a dusky and lush, downtempo sheen. Adding sultry vocals, some subtle low end, and luminous strings, Owsey has enhanced the electronic horns of the original so that the song develops from a late night jazz vibe to a trance-y, chillout atmosphere that glimmers with shifting colors of the actual Northern Lights. Like if you could be in some kind of floating nightclub somewhere within clear visual distance of the phenomenon and the sense of wonder and calm that might fill you seeing them for the first time in person without the haze of pollution putting a filter between you and the experience. Listen Koresma’s “Northern Lights” as remixed by Irish producer Owsey on Soundcloud and connect with Koresma at the links provided.

soundcloud.com/koresma
open.spotify.com/artist/14EybDMySlkntyuxgm1pek
twitter.com/Koresmamusic
facebook.com/koresmamusic
instagram.com/koresmamusic

The Dark Atmospherics and Breakbeats of “No Fun” by Sundaes is the Soundtrack to Falling Out of Fascination With Self-Destructive Fun

Sundaes_NoFun2_crop — Sundaes, photo courtesy the artist

When “No Fun” by Sundaes begins you may have a flashback to 90s electronic music like Underworld with some hushed atmospherics and low key breakbeats. But when the nearly whispered vocals come in it takes on the quality of one of those dreams where everything seems murky, dark and lit by cool colors. The most distinct sonics are the shimmery drones and the accents of tone like glitches, flashes of another world, in the beat. The narrative could be a dialogue or memories of an emotionally abusive relationship with someone or some thing that seemed to be so fun and exciting until things took a turn toward the worse. The vocals and words don’t seem anguished but understanding of the dark appeal of Dionysian fun that lasts until its borderline forbidden exotic quality turns from pleasure into pain. It’s almost as if the song is capturing in retrospect the early phases of being in the social circles of someone mysterious and exciting who does help facilitate moments of seeming transcendence in hedonistic pursuits until you have to deal with real life stuff and that person proves not to be as amazing as maybe you once thought. “No Fun” is the third single from Sundaes’ debut full length Volume 1 out on Nashville’s Banana Tapes. Listen to the song Soundcloud and connect with Sundaes at the links provided.

sundaes.band
soundcloud.com/sundaesmackenzie
open.spotify.com/artist/7qiXFwby9N5MEUFATBy5cp
youtube.com/channel/UCPR0cy8PuhdGR5-4eGa6iSQ
facebook.com/sundaesyummysundaes

Suzie Chism’s New Album Where Examines and Questions the Internal Narratives of Our Lives

SuzieChism_Talkers1_Crop — Suzie Chism, photo courtesy the artist

Suzie Chism’s new album Where dabbles in styles across its nine tracks but in doing so it reflects the themes of the record. Fuzzy guitar give a quality of modern garage rock or neo-grunge, melancholic synths create introspective moods and textural acoustic guitar give a sense of spontaneity. All contribute to an album that seems to come from the perspective of someone who left her home town to go to some place more seemingly glamorous until you get there no matter how streetwise you thought you were before getting there. The story arc of the album, if indeed there really is a through line, is one of a person who puts on a brave face in situations that seem to call for it and in a process of self-discovery and adapting to life in a bigger city with a culture where presenting yourself is expected one can come to lose a bit of a sense of self for a moment or for an extended period of time until you realize you yearn for real connection with people. Throughout the album you get the feeling the narrator in each song is struck with a forlorn heart. On the title track the line “If lonely is a state of mind then where am I?” speaks to the existential crisis you hit when deep down you know that so much upon which you’ve been focusing your energy is folly.

On “Something Blue” we hear that maybe the spirit of making the best of things is derailed when the subject of the some comes to the realization that in her headlong pace to reach what she thought was desirable is making her miss what’s actually good in her life and that she’s fearful of staying in bad habits that make that an inevitability. And by the end of the album, these personal insights set the stage for at least trying to make one’s actual dreams come true. “Night Walks” is like a cross of rockabilly and 60s pop and there is a vibe of 60s girl groups and the compelling melodrama of that music to Chism’s songwriting on Where but it has that sense of self-awareness that one hears in more modern times by similarly influenced music with Best Coast—the knowledge that maybe you have made some missteps in life but having an internal compass can keep you aimed toward what matters. It is a record about questioning your own assumptions about what you’re life is supposed to be about. Listen to Where on Spotify.

Emiji’s Transcendent “Mountains” Drifts Into the Intersecting Realms of New Age and Ambient

Emiji_Mountains2_crop — Emiji “Mountains” cover

“Mountains” is a bit of a new direction for Irish ambient artist Emiji. It still features well crafted, melodic drifts, drones as ethereal wind blowing through the track and a sense of a spiritual journey in sound. With Heart Singing providing non-verbal vocals that trail off into echoes that dissolve into the rest of the soundscape there is an even stronger sense of grounding in tangible emotions and a sense of wonder. With the slowly ascending arc of piano that runs through the song it suggests being at the heights of the title and looking across the landscape and its tranquil grandeur when the sun is beginning to come up, peeking through rainclouds or slowly going past the horizon toward night. The second piano figure toward the end of the song changes the tone slightly to give the ethereal song a hopeful flavor. The effect of the vocals with the organic instrumentation and electronic drones is reminiscent of the better New Age music of the 80s and 90s without the pretentious baggage attendant with some of that musical milieu. Listen to “Mountains” on YouTube and connect with Emiji at the links provided. “Mountains” is the first song from Emiji’s new LP My Journeys due out in 2020.

emijimusic.com
open.spotify.com/artist/3U5ch0tyGeTVlf3YCRY9Eq
emijimusic.bandcamp.com
facebook.com/emijimusic
instagram.com/emijimusic