Indie Rock
Future Islands Share Track by Track Breakdown of New Album As Long as You Are: Stream
Musicians take their fans through the story of their latest album with our Track by Track feature. Today, Future Islands discuss their sixth full-length, As Long as You Are. Future Islands return today with their new studio album, As Long as You Are. Stream it below via Spotify and Apple Music. The sixth album from the Baltimore synthpop band, As Long as You Are follows 2017’s The Far Field. It marks their first effort since upgrading drummer Mike Lowry from touring member to full-fledged bandmate and songwriter. Newly strengthened together, Future Islands co-produced the record themselves alongside engineer Steve Wright at Baltimore’s Wrightway Studios. Due to the ongoing pandemic, Future Islands won’t get the chance to tour behind the LP, marking the first year since 2008 they haven...
HAIM Work the Deli Counter in Paul Thomas Anderson-Directed “Man From the Magazine” Video: Watch
HAIM made the classic deli a recurring motif in the marketing for their latest album, Women in Music Pt. III. They even performed in number of delis across the country before the pandemic hit. Now, it’s all come full circle as HAIM work the counter in the video for “Man from the Magazine”. Directed by frequent collaborator Paul Thomas Anderson, the clip was shot on the same day as the WIMPIII album cover photo. It finds Danielle Haim passively serving customers at Los Angeles’ famous Canter’s Deli while she sings along to an acoustic version of “Man From the Magazine”. The mic was set up live on location, capturing all the crinkles of the deli paper and the chatter of customers in the background. “Paul came up with the idea after hearing the whole record and we both felt strongly that this...
HAERTS Reach “For the Sky” on New Song with Ed Droste: Stream
HAERTS, photo by B. Asch Synthpop duo HAERTS have released a new single called “For the Sky” featuring Grizzly Bear singer Ed Droste. It’s their first new music since releasing their sophomore album, New Compassion, in 2018. Nini Fabi and Benny Gebert, the musicians behind the moniker, are partners outside of the band. Apparently the inspiration for the song hit them after Fabi, who had recently found out she was pregnant at the time, woke up from a surreal dream. “When we finished the demo for the song, I kept hearing Ed’s voice and just thought he would sound amazing on it. We didn’t know him at the time, but were such fans,” she said in a statement. “When we reached out we honestly thought we’d never hear from him. But we did and we went into the studio in LA, and ended up recording it ...
Palberta Announce New Album Palberta5000, Share “Before I Got Here”: Stream
Indie trio Palberta will kick off the new year with a new full-length album. Titled Palberta5000, it marks the group’s fifth overall and follow-up to Roach Going Down from 2018. Over the course of their last few records, the New York natives have earned a reputation for idiosyncratic, hard-to-categorize rock — the kind that mashes together experimental, surf rock, post-punk, punk, and more. For their forthcoming effort, however, Ani Ivry-Block, Lily Konigsberg, and Nina Ryser are pumping in more pop melodies. Palberta elaborated in a statement, “While punk music was our first love, pop music has become our fixation. Throughout the making of Palberta5000, we were focused on making music that people could not only sing along to but get stuck in their heads… that and attempting to make s...
Danger Mouse and Nigel Godrich Create New Radio App Station Rotation
Danger Mouse’s Brian Burton and Radiohead producer Nigel Godrich have created a new app called Station Rotation. According to the duo, it’s a free program for artists, producers, directors, and other friends to program individually curated radio stations — not playlists, they emphasize — that can be streamed in real time within the program. Technically, the duo announced the project over social media last week, but they didn’t clearly explain what Station Rotation was at the time. Now, a press release has offered up some more specific details: Station Rotation allows Burton and Godrich’s famous friends to spin music online, and it allows fans to tune in and enjoy the music with friends who are also listening simultaneously, too. “Station creators choose their favorite songs, which (unlike ...
The Antlers Release First New Song in Six Years “Wheels Roll Home”: Stream
The Antlers have returned with their first new song in over six years. It’s called “Wheels Roll Home” and, according to lead singer and songwriter Peter Silberman, it’s about the special joy of meeting up with someone you haven’t seen a while — not unlike the strange social distancing times we’re currently living through, and what fans of The Antlers likely feel about the band’s unexpected homecoming. “‘Wheels Roll Home’ is a simple song about the hopeful promise of reunion after a long time gone,” said Silberman in a statement. “It’s that feeling of finding home in someone, eager and impatient to build a life together. It’s the experience of waiting out tumultuous times, longing for stability someday.” “Wheels Roll Home” was written by Silberman and drummer Michael Lerner, with Silberman ...
The War on Drugs Announce New Live Album LIVE DRUGS
The War on Drugs have announced a new live album. Titled LIVE DRUGS, it’s due out November 20th through frontman Adam Granduciel’s own Super High Quality Records. According to a statement, the 10-track effort was “culled from over 40 hard drives” of concert recordings. There are selections from across the indie rock band’s impressive catalog — including the 2008 debut Wagonwheel Blues, 2014’s Lost in the Dream, and A Deeper Understanding from 2017 — but many are captured like never before. For example, their live rendition of “Under the Pressure” features 20,000 audience members singing along to the extended guitar melody. Another inclusion, “Eyes to the Wind”, has “grown wholly independent” of the final album version. Editors’ Picks “As a band leader, I always want to know...
Bon Iver Pays Tribute to Ruth Bader Ginsburg with New Song “Your Honor”: Watch
Bon Iver’s Justin Vernon (photo by Ben Kaye) and Ruth Bader Ginsburg (photo via WikiCommons) Ever the political advocator, Justin Vernon recently launched For Wisconsin, a get-out-the-vote initiative in his home state. As part of the registration drive, the Bon Iver frontman is hosting “A Visit with Vernon”, in which fans nominate a friend who is undecided about voting to have a conversation with Vernon. Video of the first visit has been revealed, and it includes the debut a new Bon Iver song dedicated to Ruth Bader Ginsburg. Entitled “Your Honor”, the song came about shortly after RBG’s passing two weeks ago. Though Vernon said writing new music is something “I never do anymore,” he was compelled to recognize the late Supreme Court Justice’s legacy. “Times getting sho...
Sego Break Down Their New EP Life of Pam Track by Track: Stream
With our Track by Track feature, musicians lead fans by the ear through each song on their latest effort. Today, Sego introduce us to their Life of Pam EP. Sego have shared a new EP called Life with Pam in a unique fashion: as a single uncut 17-minute music video. Watch the visual to hear the whole thing below. The former Artist of the Month chose to release Life with Pam as a continuous block of music as opposed to broken into tracks to capture the “seamless, deliberate” structure of their live shows. The songs contained within this 17 minute track intentionally sit on adjacent lines to each other thematically, sonically, and in energy,” explained frontman Spencer Petersen. “Obviously, I hope people find connection with the individual parts, but like our shows, the collective sum cre...
Shamir’s Self-Titled Album Shows Them Coming into Their Own: Review
The Lowdown: In a recent interview with the Los Angeles Times, Shamir referred to their new album as “definitely a COVID record.” The Philadelphia-based nonbinary artist, born Shamir Bailey, has cited influences all over the map for the album recorded entirely in quarantine, from Gwen Stefani and Miranda Lambert to Unsolved Mysteries and My Friend Dahmer, and you can hear it in the music. Despite being only 25, Shamir has already released a prolific number of albums and EPs, all of them experimenting boldly with indie rock, electronics, R&B, and pop styles branching back through several decades. Their self-titled album is a sure-handed invention that finds their myriad influences colliding and coalescing more smoothly than ever before and ultimately crystallizing into something new. [e...
Woods Share New Rarities Collection Reflections Vol. 1 (Bumble Bee Crown King): Stream
Indie folk outfit Woods have returned with a new rarities collection called Reflections Vol. 1 (Bumble Bee Crown King). The full album is available to purchase for Bandcamp Friday, and you can stream a few of its tracks below. The project follows Woods’ 11th studio effort, Strange To Explain, from this past May. In normal, pre-coronavirus times, they’d be touring the world in support of it, but they decided to roll with the punches and unlock some unreleased material from the vault. In a statement, Woods summarized all the goodies that can be found on Reflections, which they consider “a lost record”: “With no touring this year, and possibly next, we decided to take a deep dive into our archives and put together the first volume of our much discussed archival series, Reflections. Featuring ...
Hamilton Leithauser Teams with Lucy Dacus for New Version of “Isabella”: Stream
Back in March, Hamilton Leithauser introduced us to his new album, The Loves of Your Life, with the lead single “Isabella”. Now, half a year later, the former Walkmen frontman has delivered a new version of the track, this time featuring Lucy Dacus. Originally, “Isabella” was built of a plucky piano and swaying pedal steel, giving it a breezy country-pop feel. This new take started as a simple guitar groove Leithauser was toying with in his home studio, The Struggle Hut. Realizing it fit “Isabella”, he decided to record “a whole new version” of the single. “I guess this amounts to the kind of evolving a new song goes through after a few months on tour… but without the tour,” he said in a press release. A female vocalist also appears on the album version of the song, but for this remake, Le...
