Peter Doherty & Frederic Lo – “You Can’t Keep It From Me Forever” Kae Tempest – “More Pressure” w/Kevin Abstract Jeremy Ivey – “Orphan Child” Artsick – “Despise” The Faim – “The Hills”
A graying Peter Doherty re-emerges to the release calendar with francophone arrangements and deft lyrics thanks to Frederic Lo, a Paris-based composer and producer best known for his work with Daniel Darc, Pony Pony Run Run, Stephan Eicher among others.
The new music video/single, “You Can’t Keep It From Me Forever”, is something different, yet familiar, for Doherty.
The Fantasy Life of Poetry & Crime was recorded at Studio Water Music in Paris and Cateuil in Étretat (Normandy). Mixing was provided by François Delabrière at Studio Moderne in Paris.
In addition to composer and producer, Lo also wears singer/songwriter, musician and musical director to his roster. He is best known for his work with Daniel Darc, Pony Pony Run Run, Stephan Eicher, among others.
Doherty released three albums with The Libertines between 2002 and 2015; three albums with Babyshambles from 2005 through 2013 and more recently two solor albums, Hamburg Demonstrations (2017) and Peter Doherty & The Puta Madres (2019).
On her new single, “More Pressure”, Kae Tempest gets help from executive producer Rick Rubin and longtime collaborator Dan Carey
Fontaines DC’s Grian Chatten, Brockhampton’s Kevin Abstract, Confucius MC, and Lianne La Havas.
Her new album, The Line is a Curve, drops on April 8th.
His music eminds us of The Kinks and Kurt Vile, which was even surprising to us.
U.K. musician Jeremy Ivey dropped this new video for the song “Orphan Child,” a track that combines the best of classic and indie rock.
His new album, Invisible Pictures, will drop on March 11th via ANTI-Records.
The new Bay Area hardcore trio, Artsick, was formed from underground bands like Lunchbox, Burnt Palms, and Kids On a Crime Spree.
The interpid members show-off their breadth of music influences – that marriy nicely with the trio’s penchant for fusing jangle pop and sounds of bands like The Velvet Underground and Beat Happening.
Primal drums with reverb-heavy guitars and comforting melodies that harken back to more innocent times.
Artsick’s debut album, Fingers Crossed, dropped January 21st via Slumberland Records.
The new music video for the song “The Hills” follows Australian pop-rock band The Faim‘s popular single last November, “Ease My Mind”.
“The Hills’ is a song which touches on anxiety and the desire to go back to that place where you can reconnect with yourself and take a breath,” says guitarist/songwriter Sam Tye.
“For Josh [Raven] and I, the Perth Hills is one of these places and after two years of being on the road, coming home gave us a moment to reflect on the sometimes-overwhelming experiences you have whilst touring. I hope this song helps people find that place for themselves.”
“The Hills’ music video involves a stylistic representation of life inside the band,” continues Tye, who created the concept for the video.
“The driving connects to life on the road and experiencing the world through a moving window as they travel to their next destination.”
The band’s debut album, State of Mind, spawned underground/streaming hits like “Summer Is A Curse” and “Humans.” The band is now one of the hottest new indie pop/rock bands Down Under and making in-roads to the U.S. and Europe.
This first official DIY edition of 2022 features new music from artists both familiar and those that are brand new to our ears.
King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard – Melbourne, Australia Electric Lecture – Los Angeles, California Strangejuice – Perth, Australia The Flashcrackers – Dublin, California NEEDSHES – Tula, Russia HYDE OUT – London, England
King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard- Butterfly 3001
As late arrivers (like really late) to the King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard bandwagon of musical pranksters, their new drop is a remix album of hit (mostly hit) and miss mixes.
That said, the band’s abundantly creative exploits into offbeat, even wacky-rock, experiments are exciting artistic sonic paintings – like Picaso meets Pollock and they eat some shrooms. Once you start to dig into their discography, it becomes apparent why they have a loyal following.
Interestingly, the band has their own label – KGLW – and so, they are effectively DIY.
If you’re not on the King Giz and Liz Wiz band wagon, and remixes are not your favs, check out releases like 2016’s Nonagon Infinity or their last two studio releases – L.W. (2021) and K.G. (2020). Those might just be the ones that get you to hop aboard.
The guests making contributions include Vril, DJ Shadow, Yu Su, DaM-Funk, The Flaming Lips, and many others.
Electric Lecture – “Beam Me Up”
Los Angeles-based band Electric Lecture has dropped another new dream-pop/alt. country rock style single with the single “Beam Me Up.”
The new single follows a number of singles dropped by the band over the past couple of years.
“Reverse Evolution” plays like a laid back alt-country pop anthem that pulls together a wide variety of influences.
The track successfully marries elements of Tom Petty and Beck, while presenting an arsenal of inspired sounds unique to the new band. Reverse Evolution hits home in a familiar way, yet it’s unlike anything you’ve heard: ‘Reverse evolution/we want a war/find a solution?/we just want the war.’
Musicians and songwriters Bronson Taalbi and Greg Ansin, the band’s fronters, sing drunkenly in the chorus. This lyric says a lot about the state of some people in the world who are set in their ways instead of welcoming change.
“The ship is sinking!” Bronson sings out as overdriven guitar harmonies steal you away for a monster hook, and what happens next can only be described “as a deconstructed orchestra, flying through space at fiery speeds, and crashing onto a timpani that tosses us int
The third band member, Anthony J. Resta, is a multi-platinum producer, composer and guitar collector whose collaborations include Collective Soul; Elton John and Duran Duran among others.
Ansin, a songwriter, producer and filmmaker is the co-creator of the movies The Drive-In Horrorshow and Infinite Santa 8000.
Taalbi, a singer, songwriter and guitarist, is the second-half of the guitar duo Taalbi Brothers. Their music has been featured in the TV shows like Breaking Bad.
Strangejuice – “The Moth”
Last year, one of our favorite Australian DIY artists, Strangejuice, was featured on our pages because his amazing 2019 album, Raising Cannibals, was, and is, a DIY, under-the-radar classic.
He lives on Mount Nasura in Perth crafting a banquet of sounds, styles and moods such as tracks like “Ghost” “Embreyo” and “The Moth,” to name just a few.
“The Moth” is a grungy rock number with a theatrical element that rolls into a full-on chorus and a romping, slightly meancing beat.
“This is the second track and first single from my 13th album release “The Last Year,” Michael Andersen, aka Strangejuice, says.
A moth symbolises tremendous change, he says, and the song “is about the relationship breakdown of the mother of my child and the change that lead to me being a single father.”
“A moth thinks its beautiful like the butterfly, but it is neither beautiful nor majestic.”
For the actual recording and production process, Andersen used a number of techniques and gear.
“I use tape stops instead of faders to bring music sections in and out,” he addds.
He recorded the song in his home studio with cardboard boxes to “insulate the squawking chickens next door to my makeshift studio using a PRS custom guitar into a Klon Pedal out to a Fender Princeton amp and a Neumann U87 microphone.”
“The Moth” appears on Strangejuice’s 17-track album, The Last Year, available on Bandcamp.
The Last Year is an album written as part if a grieving and healing” he says, adding that he was partly inspired by Beck’s Seachange album
“Into the Sea” is a minimalist and dreamy new track from Dublin, California indie band The Flashcrackers.
The warm track is full of melody and emotion with a sweet rythym to keep it grounded.
“The bass is the anchor of the song with guitar, piano and vocal hanging off it,” says frontman Dave Fedorenko (Curbside Journal; Brave Music).
There are no extra notes, he says, with each instrument “used to maximum effect.” The lyric is about “staring down the future and realizing our best years are ahead of us regardless of what noise our culture throws at us.”
Written and recorded in 30 days, the recording, Fedorenko says, was “a personal challenge to start and finish a song in a limited time frame.”
The Flashcrackers forge decades of varied and disparate influences into their own distinctive style of dreampop. Their music is full of seeming contradictions: sparse yet full, melancholy yet uplifting.
We were immediately taken by the amazing motion picture collage video, and the song itself too, for the new track “One Day” from a DIY band in Russia.
“One Day” is a dreamy retro ode, emotive and epic composition that makes us think about living in the present instead of being caught in dreams of a better future.
The track comes by way of NEEDSHES – an indie rock/alternative band founded by songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, and producer Otabek ‘Beck’ Salamov who is originally from Uzbekistan.
“I wrote the melody for the verse probably in 2010 in my hometown of Tashkent. The sketch was in a bad condition until 2020. Sometimes it takes something from outside to push you,” Salamov says.
“For me, it was my friend, music supervisor who asked me to show something old school and dreamy enough to be a song for the closing of the movie. This movie has never been finished but I got the song. I can tell for sure this song was easy to sing and record. It’s personal stuff, I can feel it one hundred percent…”
The story about the kite was a “really bright event” of his childhood Salamov exclaims. “All I had was this kite. When you grow up in poverty and have no future, you don’t waste time on dreams. You have to think about how to find your piece of bread tomorrow.”
Salamov encapsulates his art for composing soaring ballads with funk-soul anthems mixed with swagger rock and suffocating alternative. While studying at the music academy, Bek was awarded the first prize for his precision on clarinet.
As a teen, he was drawn to compose metalcore. He growled hardcore music in nightclubs with the cross-painted face. One day he decided to dilute the hard album with melodic undertones.
The switch gravitated to his liking leading to the formation of NEEDSHES in 2013. Among his main influences, there are Jack White, The Killers, James Brown, Queen, RHCP, among others.
Salamov’s music has been featured in commercials in 32 countries of Europe and television/cable programming.
Currently based in Tula (Russia), he continues to expand his eclectic style rooted in David Bowie, Queen, and James Brown in 2022.
Hyde Out is a London hard rock duo by Omar Merlo (from Switzerland and Australia) and Jaka (from Slovenia).
Last week, the duo dropped their sophomore album, Tunnel Vision, featuring a set of 12 original songs with stronger hard rock influences, opening up yet a new style and direction for the band.
Omar and Jaka come from broad creative musical backgrounds and have played in several groups around the world. Their musical style and influences are diverse, ranging from British alt-pop to American folk music, and from pop-rock to hard rock.
Their music often tries to blend different styles and genres, leading to creative and interesting musical results. Hyde Out make music simply out of passion, looking for new ways to bring to life the sounds that defined their own musical origins.
Following a few experimental self-produced demo projects and collaborations, in November 2020 Hyde Out finally released their first studio album, Smoke and Mirrors , a collection of original songs showcasing Hyde Out’s varied influences and softer side.
Two songs from that album have done particularly well: “Alive” and “Smoke and Mirrors” (the latter was a semi-finalist in the 2021 International Song-writing Contest).
Irish indie rock bands like Fontaine DC and Silverbacks headline IRC’s first bi-monthly best new singles report of 2022.
We also just posted our Best Songs of 2021 – 125 amazing tracks from the best indie and non-indie albums of the year (and it was a blockbuster year for albums!). Plus, new music from Pavement, Spiritualized and Holodrum.
Dublin indie rockers Fontaines DC just announced a new album Skinty Fia for release this spring. The first new single from the band’s forthcoming third album is the driving first single “Jackie Down The Line”.
There’s confusion about the title of the album swirling around. Basically ‘skinty fia’ is an expletive, but historically it’s an Irish phrase that translates to ‘the damnation of the deer.’ Over time, the original meaning has been Anglicized and diluted.
The band have also announced a North American tour for this spring along with fellow Irish band Just Mustard.
Fontaines DC is one of the hottest Irish indie rock bands of the past half decade. The band members are Grian Chatten, Carlos O’Connell, Conor Curley, Conor Deegan III, and Tom Coll.
Silverbacks start ’22 wih latest single from Archive Material
Irish indie band Silverbacks kick off 2022 with the fourth single, “A Job Worth Something”, from the Archive Material album due out later this month.
“A Job Worth Something” is latest single drop and their first new material of the year. The previous three singles dropped include “Rolodex City”, “Archive Material” and “Wear My Medals”.
“For most of the pandemic I lived with my sister who is a healthcare worker and was working in the designated Covid hospital in St James’ Dublin,” says frontman Daniel O’Kelly. “Unfortunately, I was far less heroic, writing copy for a car insurance company.”
“This song is about feeling embarrassed about how different our lives were at this time,” O’Kelly adds. “When it comes to telling my grandchildren what all this was like, I’ll be telling them about my sisters who have more important stories to share.”
Archive Material drops officially on January 21 .
Pavement drops ‘new’ single from massive Terror Twilight re-issue
As one of the clear purveyors of the indie/alt rock sound slack rockers Pavement will drop a deluxe reissue of Terror Twilight in February with three previously unreleased songs. Here is one of them: “Be The Hook”. Thoughts?
Matador Records will release the reissue on April 8th. According to the label, the reissue will reincarnate producer Nigel Goodrich‘s (Beck, Radiohead) original track listing suggestion along with Pavement’s final track order.
The four LP/2-CD editions will also include a book featuring previously unreleased photos and notes. Obviously, a must-have for die-hard Pavement fans.
The reissue includes a stunning 45 tracks and a remastering of the original album, as well as B-sides, rehearsal tapes, live recordings, home demos, rehearsal tapes, live recordings and sessions – such as recordings from a scrapped session at Sonic Youth’s Echo Canyon studio. In all, the compilation offers 28 unreleased tracks, including “Be The Hook.”
The LP will restore Terror‘s producer Nigel Goodrich (Radiohead, Beck) suggested sequence, yet the new CD will preserve the final track order lined up by Pavement.
U.K. indie trailblazers Spiritutalized drop second single
Ahead of the release of their forthcoming new album, long-time English space rockers Spiritualized unveiled a video for the fresh single, “Crazy.”
The single follows the release of the first single, and opener, “Always Together With You” from the upcoming album release, Everything Was Beautiful, set to drop February 25 on Fat Possum.
For 30 years, Spiritualized, easily one of the U.K.’s first popular ‘indie’ bands, has remained innovative and relevant. The new country-soul single features backing vocals from Nikki Lane. Directing the video – and inspired by Andy Warhol’s 60’s silent film, Kiss – frontman Jason Pierce, a.k.a., J Spaceman.
Speaking of ‘crazy’, the album was recorded in 11 different studios over a couple of years. Pierce plays 16 different instruments on the album with help from some 30 invited musicians, including choirs, chimes, brass and string section and finger bells.
“I felt like I’d been in training for this my whole life,” Pierce said in a statement. “There was so much information on it that the slightest move would unbalance it, but going around in circles is important to me.
“Not like you’re spiraling out of control but you’re going around and around and on each revolution you hold onto the good each time. Sure, you get mistakes as well, but you hold on to some of those too and that’s how you kind of… achieve. Well, you get there.”
Holodrum drops debut single “Free Advice”
Shimmering with disco-like electro-pop, U.K. supergroup Holodrum has drop the debut single, “Free Advice”. The track is layered and complex and atmospheric.
“When it comes to doing music, most bands fall between two extremes of doing it for some goal or as an end to itself,” says guitarist/vocalist Sam Shjipstone. “I think Holodrum is about the joy and complexity of living, and I just hope to god everyone gets to have a good time doing it.”
“[Free Advice] expresses the state of feeling invincible in the face of adversity,” says lead vocalist Emily Garner, “and acts quite explicitly as a piece of good advice, applicable to anyone that’s gone out of their way just to harsh your vibe.”
The accompanying video is steep deep in technicolour with 8-bit animation. “[It] mostly includes things we miss and love about being in a band. Namely jamming, travelling, seeing stuff and enjoying the local delicacies. Iced in a candy-core palette, the video art is a motion collage of 2D, 2.5D and isometric 3D graphics.” shares the group.
“Free Advice” is out now and the debut album drops February 25.
The latest edition of best indie rock music video submissions features new indie music videos from the new super-trio Blunt Bangs; Helsinki indie band Missier; U.K. DIY artist SeaDog, plus Pinegrove and The Joy Formidable.
Blunt Bangs – ”Silence is Golden”
The new power-pop sugergroup, Blunt Bangs, recently dropped its debut single, “Silence is Golden”, a gritty track with indie-punk vibes and a chunky bassline that was produced by Drew Vandenberg (Toro Y Moi, of Montreal).
The new super-trio is the brainchild of Reggie Youngblood (Black Kids) on guitar and vocals and includes Christian “Smokey” DeRoeck (Woods, Deep State, Meneguar, Little Gold) on bass and vocals with Cash Carter (Tracy Shedd, The Cadets) on drums.
Reggie’s unquestionable indie rock contributions over the years works nicely with Blunt Bang’s pop-punk grit sound and attitude. The trio’s debut LP, Proper Smoker, is out now.
Here are two other top videos featuring the new-to-us artist Pinegrove and indie veterans The Joy Formidable.
messier – “Salt Water Flush”
Bio: “Balancing beauty and anger, hope and despair, tension and release, Finnish trio messier’s exhilarating debut, ‘On Malaise,’ is an explosive mix of indie rock, alt-pop, and classic punk energy fueled by instantly memorable hooks and airtight vocal harmonies. Location: Helsinki, Finland Genre(s): indie rock Members: Lauri Huumonen – vocals, guitar / Antti Orajärvi – vocals, bass guitar / Kristian Jokilahti – drums
SeaDog – “Tidal Wave”
Bio: Seadog is the project of Brighton-based musician and songwriter Mark Benton.
The U.K. project evolved into a revolving cast of musical friends with Benton at the helm all of the way. Recently, they’ve released the dreamy pop single and video for “Tidal Wave.” SeaDog combines a variety of influences into a myriad of sounds and lullabies with anthemic electric and acoustic textures.
Location: Brighton, England Genre(s): pop,drem,rock Members: Mark Benton, guitars/vocals; Tom Chadd Keys, synths/drum machines Has Opened For: Grandaddy, Arab Strap, Haley Musical Influences: Grandaddy, Radio Dept, Radiohead, Guided by Voices, Sparklehorse Instagram: @seadogmusic
So much terrific indie rock and alt rock music – from well-known to lesser-known to brand new artists and bands – crosses our wires and desks each week. Here is just a small selection of some of the best in recent weeks. More amazing posts – Best of 2021 Indie Rock; Best of 2021 DIY Songs; Best 2021 Indie Albums, are in the works.
Sea Power (formerly British Sea Power) – London, England Colleen Green – Los Angeles, California Sundog – Chugiak, Alaska Katherine Priddy – Birmingham, England The Wonderfool – Athens, Ohio
Sea Power – “Two Fingers”
The members of Sea Power, formerly British Sea Power, veterans of the U.K. indie scene for two decades, have officially changed the band’s name with new material.
“The band name was intended with a kind of wry humor. The idea of British sea power in the historical sense was an obsolete thing. It was now just the name of a rock band… Now, 20 years later, we’re recasting the name.”
It’s quite a crazy thing to really take in that this incredible band is 20 years on. Wow, the years really do fucking fly on by too fast.
Anyways the band’s newest album, Everything Was Forever, has spawned its first single, “Two Fingers.” The track has a strong modern alt. rock feel that should be interesting for the band’s long-time fans. The new album is set to drop in February 2022.
Colleen Green – “Someone Else”
Los Angeles singer/songwriter/guitarist Colleen Green‘s third 2021 single from her recent album Cool, “Someone Else,” is a deep, thoughtful track we really dig.
“This song is about double standards within a relationship, and how they can go both ways,” she said in a press release.
“It’s about coming to terms with you how you actually feel about something and taking responsibility for how that affects you. It’s about taking back power in a one-sided relationship and not letting someone else dictate your happiness. It’s about choices and the act of making them.”
From Hardly Art Records: “The track is a paean to power in which Green lets a lover know that double standards can go both ways. A groovy bass loop and zig-zagging guitar lines underscore her realization that happiness is in her own hands, and the vibe is set.”
Previously Green shared Cool’s first single, “I Wanna Be a Dog,” via a video for it. She is best known for the mini-Spotify hit, “Deeper Than Love.”
Cool is Green’s fourth album and the follow-up to 2015’s I Want to Grow Up. Green co-produced the album with Gordon Raphael. The LP was mixed by Brendan Eder.
Sundog – “Millennial Man”
The minimalist-driven “Millennial Man” from Chugiak, Alaskan funkadelic band SunDog grooves on 70s-inspired garage-rock psych. The airy vocals of frontman Abi Sparkman along with the soaring chorus stir with powerful guitars, driving drums, and bass from Deven Lind and Philip Giannuli.
The unconventional single is gripping and potent, one of a few on the band’s most recent album, Cabin Fever.
Katherine Priddy – “About Rosie”
Based in Birmingham, England, folk artist Katherine Priddy is a hypnotic singer-songwriter who encapsulates the rich and often solemn side of artists gone by such as Nick Drake and John Martyn, delivering each word with genuine warmth and charm. This is her latest single, “About Rosie.”
(From GratefulWeb) The Wonderfool – the recording project of Ohio singer-songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, and producer Matt Vinson —has released “Cool Shade.”
American Songwriter unveiled The Wonderfool’s single raving that “Cool Shade” “evokes a hypnotic dream state…a shimmering texture, creating more melodic depth to the summertime song…‘Cool Shade’ furthers his folk agenda, moving with ease into a dynamic new soundscape.”
Notably one third of the chart-topping folk group CAAMP, Vinson says: “‘Cool Shade’ is a song about finding a nice quiet place in your mind & observing all the good in the world around you. We all share the feeling sometimes of thinking that there’s more work to be done; love to share – But chances are everyone around you probably thinks you’re doing just fine!”
Zoee is the art-pop project of London-based musician Harriet Zoe Pittard.
“No Great Endings” is a fairly straightforward song that feels a bit bent and warped by the strange gravity of Zoee’s voice, which sounds something like a depressed faerie. You mainly hear this in a keyboard part that seems to wobble like jello at some points and in others more like a crude caricature of a harp.
But it’s there in the rest of the arrangement too, which moves with a solid groove but projects a dazed and detached vibe. The lyrics are full of poetic descriptions in the verses, but the chorus is quite plain and direct: “Where to put this pain? / It’s always the same.”
The emphasis on pragmatism is interesting – she doesn’t sound like she wants to bury it or deny the feeling, but is jaded enough to half-expect more is on the way.
It’s less like an expression of denial and more like imagining a plan to carefully catalog it all in some kind of emotional library.
