breathe and exhale

24 Mar

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Today’s Indie: Under / AOSOON 

‘when we go under / we don’t stay down, we come up’

I came across AOSOON on Saturday night when their track  interrupted an evening of cheap wine and much better conversation with my friend Kristen, and I had one of my drop everything, who is this playing moments. With an instrumental intro out of Friday Night Lights, rich, accent laden vocals, and the simplest and most reassuring of choruses, I was transfixed. And now in the light of the day, I still have Under on repeat.

AOSOON stands for A Lot of Something Out of Nothing (not so sure where that L went, but willing to let it slide) and is compromised of London’s 20 year old (!!) vocalist/guitarist Marisa Hylton and bassist Manny Flolorunso. What has won me over is Marisa’s voice, which reminds of me of the likes of Of Monster and Men‘s Nanna Bryndís Hilmarsdóttir’s mixed with Cold Specks. The duo have released an EP, What is This About, featuring Under, and it is all well worth a listen. Happy discovery.  #indie

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racing glaciers

10 Jan

RG

Today’s Indie: New Country / Racing Glaciers

‘I’ve been sitting on my hands / I’ve been coasting on this tide too long’

Drop everything and listen. New Country is that good. There is something cinematic about the entire piece, starting with its theatrical spread of an intro carrying into crisp vocals and a pulling chorus with a perfect pace and balance– that  place a song can get to when it has just enough restraint to rest beautifully on the edge of overdoing it without tipping over.

Lead singer Tim Monoghan’s voice reminds me a bit of the lead of Bombay Bicycle Club, but what he has created with his bandmates is all their own. Racing Glaciers is a Liverpool quintet that has been around a couple years and is geared to release an EP, Ahead of You Forever, February second. Now repeat. #indie

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tops

27 Dec

Tops

Today’s Untz: Tops / Lincoln Jesser 

‘we’re just like dice / rolling around in space / trying to find our place’

Friends, the end of 2013 has not been so good to me. A couple of days before Christmas I got hit with the worst food poisoning in my life (think sleeping on bathroom floor / losing nine pounds in 48 hours), and then when I could finally start contemplating the concept of eating food again, I woke up with a head cold. So instead of catching up on the wonderful music that I have been to0 busy to listen to because of work in the past couple of months, I instead spent most of my holiday needing a holiday, semi-conscious but well cared for by loved ones. Let’s hope 2014 starts on a better foot. To help wrap 2013 here is some celestial feel good sound from LA producer Lincoln Jesser that hit the top of Hypem earlier this month. My interest in the song was immediately piqued when I started visualizing dice rolling around in space, but then realized they wouldn’t really be rolling sans-gravity, right? Anyway, enjoy, great track. #untz

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wrecking ball

12 Dec

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Today’s Indie: Wrecking Ball / London Grammar (Miley Cyrus cover)

‘we clawed, we chained our hearts in vain / we jumped never asking why’

Guilty pleasure confession time: I like Wrecking Ball. I can’t help it. Great discovery time: I love this London Grammar cover of Ms. Crazy’s track, which takes Miley’s foundation of this compelling ballad and its beautiful lyrics, and makes it sound stunning on the ears, washed clean of the guilt and naked thrusting around on a ball. #indie/tory

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hide

10 Nov

LittleMay

Today’s Indie: Hide / Little May

‘you feed me words when you had her between your sheets / bet she likes that’

I have noticed that folk debuts can tend to be people pleasers, lurring me in with their promises of comforting front porches and cheery foot stomping melodies that pull the heartstrings in and keep them firmly entrapped with the snap of deliciously sweet bubblegum, so it is fun to see this Aussie trio debut with something a little more dark, sinister and ambitious right out of the gate. It is also fun to see a female folk trio hitting that gate from Sydney, well beyond the recently well trodden US and European boarders.

Little May has the earnest rumblings of Black Prairie met with the beautiful young girl power who can harmonize appeal of First Aid Kit (see above photo) and I am excited to see what they have in store for us with their early 2014 EP. Until then, repeat. I like that. #inde

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see you on a dark night

25 Oct

DarkNight

Today’s Indie: Oblivion / Wilsen (Grimes cover)

‘I will wait forever, always looking straight / thinking, counting, all the hours you wait’

While spending the afternoon seeking inspiration for my office halloween party and scanning endless Pinterst boards of spider ridden cobwebs and pumpkins with exasperated expressions, this unexpected cover of Grime’s classic Oblivion came on and immediately gave me pause; I found myself taken by hearing such a shrill and sprawling song performed with such restraint. In the NY based folk group Wilsen’s take the track comes across as a little dark, while sounding silvery on the ears via font woman Tasmin Wilson’s lush vocals.

How apt to hear an eerie cover in the week leading up to All Hallo’s Eve, a holiday which has become about dressing up as someone you are not, temporarily taking someone else’s identity as your own. Loving the way Wilsen is wearing this one. #indie

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I remember my first love

17 Oct

PostTropicalToday’s Indie: Caviliar / James Vincent McMorrow

‘I read it somewhere / that they would lie still’

Cavilar is the light lowering, candle burning, begging to be played behind closed doors first single from my favorite Irish singer songwriter, James Vincent McMorrow’s new album.  James is no stranger to TUATI, and it is wonderful surprise to have a  taste of his new album after three years since his debut.

JVMM’s aching falsetto has gotten the obvious comparison Bon Iver, but Caviliar also has something reminiscent of Maxwell, or even D’Angelo, and the slow jam angle is really working for him, with his hushed and steady vocals and measured pauses. We can expect a different sound from 2010’s Early in the Morning, says James, who wrote Post Tropical album tucked away in Mexo: “I’m so proud of that album, but I never longed to be a guy with a guitar. You play these songs live as best you can, and suddenly you’re a Folk musician. But the texture of this record is completely different. This is the kind of stuff I actually listen to.” The new album is due stateside in January 2014.

Now repeat.

‘I remember how clothes hung / half waist and high raised arms / kicking at the slightest form / I remember my first love’

#indie

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come sleepwalk with me

14 Oct

Today’s Indie: Come Sleepwalk With Me / Young Galaxy

‘come sleep walk with me / look here comes the sunrise’

Welp it has been one of those Mondays, complete with waking up on the wrong side of the bed, having a to do list that only got longer as the day wore on, having a piece of food stuck in my teeth for the entire afternoon without anyone telling me, and finally making it to the safety of  my apartment only to immediately witness a construction worker verbally and then almost physically assault a cyclist and threaten charges of aggravated assault. Humans. As Monica would say, just one of dem days, that a girl goes through.

Can’t take it personal, but can light a a candle and give myself an auditory change of scene with this sleepy tropically infused track from Vancouver’s Young Galaxy, which was shared with me by favorite sleepwalker, TheTrashJuice. The calming effect of this blissed out synth and ethereal female vocals has me toes in the sand under the night sky, far far away. I won’t even let the first Google search result I came across for “sleepwalking on the beach” (which I typed in for photo ideas for this post) get me back down. #indie

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let’s be still

9 Oct

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Today’s Indie: Gone / The Head and the Heart

‘so don’t send me no postcards telling me you miss me / ’cause I’m trying here’

The Head and the Heart is streaming their full album, Let’s Be Still, on Rolling Stone this week before its release on Tuesday and accordingly I ended yesterday evening curled up in bed with a glass of red wine, giving it that critical first listen and my full attention. I smiled, I sighed, I cringed, but overall, I am very proud of my favorite Seattle sextet, and what they have accomplished with their sophomore effort.  While the buttered up pop debacle Summertime feels like a terribly poor use of Charity’s talents, the album is a flush with heart pullers and show stoppers, including last week’s TUATI feature, Another Story.

But the most telling song of how far the band has come on the new album is surprisingly not new at all, but rather something I first heard live at Coachella in the spring of 2012, the album’s final track, Gone. The song has progressed immensely since the initial version I took in in the desert sun, coming together in a calculated and remastered manner that shows THATH’s evolution as a band. From the detail of the gentle string plucks in its initial moments to Jonathan’s restraint ladden opening vocals giving way to a perfectly harmonized crescendo and all the way through the string and piano laced break to the tremble inducing finale, the finished version of Gone is a culmination of every band member at their best. I see great days ahead.  #indie

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another story

2 Oct

Today’s Indie: Another Story / The Head and the Heart

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‘I tell you one thing / we ain’t gonna change love / the sun still rises / even through the rain’

Hearing a great new song from a favorite band is like seeing a dear, dear friend you haven’t seen in forever… an encounter ripe with emotional stirrings, some mild heart palpitations, and ultimately the music surrounding you like an embrace. There is comfort in the familiarity and excitement for what is ahead.

The Head and the Heart have released their second single off of their upcoming sophomore album, Let’s Be Still, and it has all the signature components in it to make me feel like home: the strings, the poetry laced lyrics, the piano, the crooning, the crescendo… the heart. While I was left somewhat wanting from their first single Shake, this second glimpse into the record, met with the additional few new songs I heard at Outside Lands this year, have set my expectations excitedly (and probably impossibly) high for THATH. We have both come along a way since my first post on them (and first post ever) back in January 2011. Here is to many more. #indie

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