dream pop
Hazel English and Day Wave on The Perks of Collaborating With Your Friends
Both Hazel English and Day Wave have had a busy couple of weeks. Last Friday (June 17th), Hazel English released a new EP, the dreamy and nostalgic Summer Nights, and this Friday (June 24th), Day Wave will release his first album in five years, Pastlife. However, the pair of releases come at a very different point in each artist’s career — whereas Day Wave (the project of Oakland musician Jackson Phillips) has been a major proponent of the dreamy bedroom pop that is unavoidable on TikTok these days, Phillips has been very deliberate about taking these five years to hone his sound and arrive with a fully-formed sophomore LP. Meanwhile, Hazel English — the project of Australia-to-California musician Eleisha Caripis — has been hard at work over the last couple years, releasing her brilli...
Lykke Li Unveils New Song “Highway to Your Heart”: Stream
Lykke Li is back with “Highway to Your Heart,” the second single from her upcoming audiovisual album EYEYE. Check out the song and its accompanying music video below. Tender but devastating, “Highway to Your Heart” allows Li to mourn a lost love with slow, simmering keys and reverberating harmonies. “Night falls, it rains, I wake up alone,” she chants. At this point, loneliness is a routine: “Get high but it won’t last/ I’m still alone.” The single comes with an equally dramatic video directed by Theo Lindquist, which sees the artist engulfed in a mix of flames and rain following a car accident. While Li previously shared a teaser of EYEYE’s visual component, “Highway to Your Heart” offers listeners the first complete video from the album, which features several clips directed by...
Cocteau Twins’ Elizabeth Fraser Shares New Song “Golden Air”: Stream
Back in February, Cocteau Twins singer Elizabeth Fraser and her partner, Massive Attack drummer Damon Reece, announced a new project called Sun’s Signature. Now, ahead of their self-titled EP, the duo have shared the song “Golden Air.” Listen to the single below. Where Cocteau Twins’ textured music muddled Fraser’s famously ethereal voice, the singer beckons clearly in “Golden Air,” a sparse track that features syncopated percussion and vocalizations before exploding into a wall of synthesizers. The track comes with a visualizer that sees, naturally, golden sunlight reflect through nature. Like the four other Sun’s Signature songs, “Golden Air” has existed in some form or another for quite some time. Fraser shared “Underwater” on a limited single back in 2000, and the duo performed so...
Kanye West Is in the Studio with… Beach House?
Kanye West has worked with a number of surprising collaborators over the years: From Bon Iver to Arca to that contentious Aphex Twin sample, nobody’s off the table as long as they remain on Ye’s good side. But after his public shitshow on social media earlier this month, the rapper is evidently ready to chill out a bit, which explains why he’s been in the studio with the masters of chill themselves, Beach House. Ye shared a series of photos on his Instagram Saturday, February 26th, that appear to show him working alongside Beach House’s Victoria Legrand and Alex Scally. The photos were captioned with an ocean wave emoji, and tagged with the dreampop duo’s account. While this team-up might come as a shock, Ye isn’t the only rapper to take a liking to Beach House’s hazy indie pop. Jay-Z and ...
Slowdive Confirm Work on New Album
Slowdive have confirmed they’re at work on a new album. On Thursday, Slowdive’s official Twitter account shared a photo of Neil Halstead and Rachel Goswell with the caption, “Studio vibes.” Goswell quoted tweeted the photo on her personal Twitter account, writing, “LP5.” Slowdive released their self-titled fourth album in 2017. It marked the band’s first release in 22 years, following their reunion in 2014. Related Video This summer, Slowdive are lined up to play several European festivals, including Barcelona’s Primavera Sound and Porto’s NOS Primavera Sound. Advertisement Last year, Goswell and Slowdive bandmate, Christian Savill, collaborated with members of The Flaming Lips, Casket Girls, and The Soft Cavalry on an album under the moniker of Beachy Head. LP5 https://t.co/gtDt1OZF3N — R...
Beach House Share Once Twice Melody Chapter 3: Stream
Beach House have unveiled the third installment of their upcoming double album, Once Twice Melody. Listen to Once Twice Melody: Chapter 3 below. Once Twice Melody marks Beach House’s first full-length in four years, following 2018’s 7. Produced by Victoria Legrand and Alex Scally themselves, the record was mixed by Alan Moulder, Caesar Edmunds, Trevor Spencer, and Dave Fridmann, and features string arrangements by David Campbell. Chapter 3’s five songs swell from quiet to loud and back again; acoustic guitar jangles as Legrand does her best Julee Cruise in “Sunset,” while “Only You Know” veers toward the electric. Check out those tracks, as well as “Another Go Around,” “Masquerade,” and “Illusion of Forever,” via the visualizer below. Advertisement Related Vid...
Widowspeak Announce New Album The Jacket, Share “Everything Is Simple”: Stream
New York indie rockers Widowspeak have announced their sixth studio album, The Jacket. The record is out March 11th via Captured Tracks, but first single “Everything Is Simple” is available to stream now, along with a music video directed by OTIUM. Check it out below. Widowspeak recorded The Jacket with producer Homer Steinweiss. The record, initially a concept album centered around the formation and disintegration of a fictional band, is rife with self-referential, full-circle moments. Now a duo, band members Molly Hamilton and Robert Earl Thomas reunited with founding drummer Michael Stasiak for the recording, which also features J.D. Sumner on bass, and piano and keyboard contributions from Michael Hess. “Everything Is Simple” previews The Jacket with a minimalist, country groove. ...
Beach House Unveil Once Twice Melody Chapter 2: Stream
Last month Beach House returned with their first new music in four years, and now, they’re back with more. The dream pop duo just released Once Twice Melody: Chapter 2, the second installment of their upcoming double album, Once Twice Melody. Take a listen below. Broken up into four chapters, Victoria Legrand and Alex Scally announced Once Twice Melody by sharing its first four songs. Once Twice Melody: Chapter 2 offers a look at the next four, and sees the pair try on a couple different hats: Frenetic keys pulsate in “Runaway,” while a gentle acoustic guitar line pokes out of “ESP;” “New Romance” keeps things light, and “Over and Over” extends into seven minutes. Each song comes with a fittingly psychedelic lyric video, which you can vibe out to below. Once Twice Melody was produced ...
Beach House Announce New Album, 2022 Tour Dates
At long last, Beach House have announced a new album. Titled Once Twice Melody, the dream pop duo’s first long player in four years will be released in four distinct chapters, with the first arriving tomorrow (!), November 10th. Chapter two will released on December 8th, followed by chapter three on January 19th. The full album will then be revealed when the fourth and final chapter is published on February 18th. All told, Once Twice Melody spans 18 tracks entirely self-produced by Beach House. Victoria Legrand Alex Scally are accompanied on the album by a live string ensemble. Advertisement Related Video To support the release, Beach House have mapped out an expansive tour that includes two separate North American legs, as well as a Eurotrip. Tickets go on sale starting Friday, Novem...
Phantogram’s Sarah Barthel on Coping with Traumatic Loss
Listen via: Apple Podcasts | Spotify | Pandora | Stitcher | Google | Pocket Casts | Radio Public | RSS Musician Sarah Barthel of Phantogram joins Dr. Mike Friedman on the Going There podcast to share her struggle with devastating and traumatic loss in her life. Advertisement Related Video The Phantogram singer has been a fantastic mental health advocate over the years, and has been very forthcoming and outspoken about how she not only lost her sister, Becky, when she committed suicide, but also had previously lost her father to cancer, and coped with her mother and other friends having the disease. What the “You Don’t Get High Anymore” artist describes is years of different devastating losses one on top of another a...
Grouper Shares New Single “Ode to the blue”: Stream
Almost as if she knew we needed her in times like these, Liz Harris will be releasing her next album as Grouper next month. Shade is out October 22nd via Kranky, and today, the ambient musician has shared the album’s latest single, “Ode to the blue.” Check it below via its accompanying music video. As to be expected of anything with Harris’ name attached, “Ode to the blue” is hushed and spare, with her delicate vocals nearly slipping away into the background. Some of the material on Shade was written as long as 15 years ago, and “Ode to the blue” features the same style of lo-fi acoustic guitar work that comprised many early Grouper tracks. The music video for the song comes from director Dicky Bahto. It’s correspondingly haunting and mild, showing black-and-white film foota...
Song of the Week: Lorde Paints a Sunny Portrait With “Solar Power,” Her First Song in 4 Years
Song of the Week breaks down and talks about the song we just can’t get out of our head each week. Find these songs and more on our Spotify Top Songs playlist. For our favorite new songs from emerging artists, check out our Spotify New Sounds playlist. This week, Lorde returns with a bright new song after four years. It’s been four years since we got new music from Lorde, and she seems happy. That’s enough to make us happy, too. After vanishing almost entirely from the public eye in 2017, the New Zealand singer-songwriter has only been heard from on a few sporadic occasions. Understandable: it’s probably difficult to write or share new music from Antarctica, where Lorde spent part of her hiatus. Related Video From one extreme to another, Lorde released “Solar Power” with little fanfare or ...
