Brooklyn band The Davenports have released their new single, “Miranda in Her Room,” featuring Shirley Simms of one our favorite indie bands, The Magnetic Fields. The track is the latest in a string of singles the band has released since the beginning of the year.
Simms, a Boston vocalist well known for her work on The Magnetic Fields’ 69 Love Songs, and all of their releases since then, duets on the new single, “Miranda In Her Room,” with Brooklyn band The Davenports’ singer/songwriter Scott Klass. Klass is best known for “Five Steps,” the theme song to A&E’s Emmy-nominated Intervention.
The song, a country waltz infused with McCartney-esque medlodies, and lyrics reminiscent of Emily Dickenson, had been dormant as a demo for a long time, waiting for the right vocal pairing to bring it to life.
Klass and producer Charles Newman, who has worked with The Magnetic Fields and The Davenports for over a decade, considered an array of singers until choosing Simms.
The next track, “Airplanes” from the reunited Minneapolis band Chasing Colors’ new, self-titled EP, has been on regular rotation in the cafe for at least a week now.
The band members, that include singer/songwriter Louie Paretta, Scott Patton on guitar, Dave Paquette on drums, and Dave Wagner on bass, grew up listening to The Beatles, David Bowie and The Rolling Stones, among other classic rock bands, as well as the 1980s new wave sound, with bands like The Cars, and indie bands like Death Cab For Cutie.
Chasing Colors has opened for bands like Crow, Badfinger, Johnny Rey and the Reaction, and Urban Guerillas. Check out the “Airplanes” music video via YouTube.
Airplanes – Chasing Colors from Chasing Colors
Heartbeats – Chasing Colors from Chasing Colors
Chasing Colors official website
Hillary Bratton – “Fuck It’s Cold Outside”
Hillary Bratton is a talented Los Angeles singer/songwriter who is increasingly on the rise, as demonstrated by her new album, Tears On My Pillow But The Rest Of The Bed’s OK, featuring the
This haunting work is a carefully-chosen collection of songs written by the legendary Barry Reynolds, best known for his work with artists such as Marianne Faithful, Grace Jones, Antony & the Johnsons, Brazilian Girls, and many others.
Bratton’s newest stylistic endeavors are more relaxed and stoic – she’s picked up a few tricks in the eight years she lived in New York City and the two years she spent in Paris. She was inspired to record the album after seeing Marianne Faithful in concert; when she heard the song “Guilt” she was determined to work with Reynolds.
“I wanted to make an album but it was Barry’s songs that were the impetus,” says Bratton. “I wanted to share these songs that I had fallen in love with and for people to know what a great songwriter he is. It’s the only album comprised entirely of his songs”.
Listen to the ironic track, “Fuck It’s Cold”. Ironic because it’s one of the warmest Decembers in the northeast anyone can remember.
Eight Belles – “Darkness In Me”
Three years after the release of its debut album, Girls Underground, Oakland indie folk duo Eight Belles just dropped a self-titled sophomore album.
Vocalist Jessi Phillips, guitarist Henry Aloysius Nagle, and engineer Ross Harris (Emily Jane White) tracked the album over three years, enlisting a cadre of prominent Bay Area musicians, including singer/pianist Joel Robinow (Once and Future Band, Howlin’ Rain); drummer Shaun Lowecki (Painted Palms); bassist Jonathan Kirchner (Con Brio); and singer Katie Colver (Cave Clove).
The duo has arranged an album brimming with intricately woven, almost earthy, folk music, and a variety of other styles and flavors, set against lyrics of a highly personal nature. The backup musicians really fill out the songs and the album as a whole.
The first single “Darkness in Me” tells the “mostly true but somewhat metaphorical” story of Phillips’ return to her native Michigan in an ill-fated attempt to reconnect with a past lover.