The second fresh indie songs playlist of 2020 features bands from the U.S. south and the west, and from Brazil, Spain, and Greece. Fire em up and share on your socials for more to hear.
There are some amazing tracks here (like all of our playlists – you could spend days here listening to – and discovering – spectacular songs you’ll be happy you found). Full playlist at the end of the post.
In This Installment:
CHICKN – Anthens, Greece
Population U – Anaheim, California
The Benkens – Rio De Janerio, Brazil
WD-HAN – Tampa, Florida
Blurred Colors – Barcelona, Spain
CHICKN – “Infrared Panda Club”
The five-piece Athens, Greece band CHICKN reminded us right away of bands like Devo and the B52s with their weird-ass vocal and instrumental styles.
The band’s freaked-out single, “Infrared Panda Club,” is almost impossible to turn away from. It will get into your head.
With determined, bouncing beats, strange synth transitions, odd-ball lyrics and an impossible electro-charged riff, it gets you, pulls you in and makes you listen to its wonderfully bizarro twists and turns with sheer abandonment and joy.
“It’s a truly bizarre yet uplifting song originated after it popped [guitarist/vocalist] Angelos out of a nightmare into another dream involving the smallest, strangest club run by glowing pandas,” said guitarist Axios Zefeirakos.
“That nightmare and dream sequence became the basis for the track,” he adds.
CHICKN’s accompanying music video is the icing on the cake for this crazy-ass, but awesome, single. We’ll be watching for more from CHICKN in el futuro.
The band has opened for bands like the Budos Band, Preoccupations (formerly Vietcong), Moon Duo, and Underground Youth. They are most influenced by artists like Captain Beefheart, Tom Tom Club, and Talking Heads.
Population U – “Let It Go”
From the L.A. Basin city of Anaheim, and home of the Disney empire, alt. rock band Population U delivers a fast-driving, hard-hitting rocker with a chorus-filled punk-pop verve and an obvious love for rock.
Not long after the mid-point, the track slows down a bit only to come roaring back to life with an unshakable series of “oh ohs.”
Three brothers – Juan Preciado on lead guitar, backed by bassist Paco Preciado and drummer Julio Preciado – and vocalist/guitarist Carlos Molina make up Population U.
The band recorded the track with musician and Grammy-winning engineer Shawn Sullivan (Mars Volta, Saosin) using ProTools and recorders via analog boards to give the music it’s warm, vintage 90’s sound.
“He’s great to work with,” says Paco Preciado, “and the band loves working and drinking whiskey with him!”
The track was originally written before the band formed. “During practice, we started playing the song again with no lyrics, just the ‘woah-oh-ohs’ for the melody,” says Molina. “The song structure was pretty much complete by then.
“I wrote down exactly what/how I was feeling in about 10 minutes; the phrase ‘let it go’ is still on my mind. We try to move on but sometimes it’s hard,” he adds.
The band influences include RATM, Pearl Jam, Smashing Pumpkins, Nofx, Bruce Springsteen, and Led Zeppelin. Population U have opened for bands like Missing Persons, Bistol to Memory, The Skatelites, The Pilfers, and Half Past Two.
The Benkens – “Make Me So Lonely”
Brazilian indie rock band The Benkens kick off a new year with their riveting new single, “Make Me So Lonely.”
“Make Me So Lonely is a story of someone who has been left behind, but who found out on his/her suffering was actually the exit door to overcome the past,” says drummer Felipe Rodriques. (That’s what Budda says too).
The Rio de Janerio-based band’s music merges the classic and the contemporary through engaging arrangements and lyrics that aptly touch on the everyday life of a young person in the 21st century.
The Benkens’ mix of genres includes elements of post-punk, Britpop, alternative rock and pop-punk.
The band – which also includes bassist Thiago Rodrigues (Felipe’s brother); vocalist/guitarist Jonathan Assis and guitarist Alexandr Behnkens – met in 2015 while attending university in Rio.
The Benkens’ music influences include bands such as Arctic Monkeys, Kings of Leon, Interpol, Franz Ferdinand, and The Kooks.
In 2017, they dropped their debut single and an E.P. titled Song of Memories, setting the stage for a steady ascent going into 2020.
https://soundcloud.com/wd-han/icarus-1
WD-HAN – “Icarus”
Tampa indie rock band, WD-HAN, is back with their first single of 2020, “Icarus.” The smoking track rings with guitars and rolls with heavy percussions.
The band is led by Aussie frontman, Spencer Barnes, and backed up by the badass female drummer, Lea Campbell, and the soulful guitarist Cal Henry.
They’ve shared the stage with bands like Silversun Pickups, Paramore and Kaleo and toured parts of Asia a number of times.
WD-HAN has been laying down their brand of blues, pop, and rock in the Tampa area and throughout the southeast for more than a decade. “Icarus” is just the latest track from the band that solidifies their cred in Tampa’s rock orbit.
The band members’ biggest influences include Young The Giant, The Black Keys, Jimi Hendrix and Imagine Dragons.
The band’s debut album, Kings of Castles, is out now. In 2018, they releaesed the E.P. Monkey, spawning a number of solid tracks that made the band even more popular beyond their local haunts.
Blurred Colors – “Fix My Heart”
Josep Oriol Ivern is a Barcelona-based songwriter and musician who records under a number of different names.
His latest venture is an indie rock moniker Blurred Colors (he also uses ‘Joseph Winters’ – ok, dude, stop) from which he has produced the heartfelt and lo-fi track, “Fix My Heart.”
Starting out as a teenager doing covers of Nirvana and Arctic Monkeys, Ivern graduated to writing and producing his own music. He organized with a group of friends to form Blurred Colors.
Ivern apparently went into semi-isolation to write a series of songs and one of the ones he emerged with and recorded with the band is “Fix My Heart.” In all, he, and his band, are a bit of mystery and thin on details.
www.facebook.com/Blurredcolors
