For those eagerly awaiting the release of next month’s Little Oblivions from Julien Baker, the new single “Hardline” gives a taste of what’s to come. The 25-year-old songwriter’s latest features the kind of folksy and catchy catharsis fans have come to expect from her, alongside a stop-motion music video that looks to be a solid use of some quarantine free time. With the album due out Feb. 26 (Matador Records), “Hardline” builds on the foundation put down by October’s first single, “Faith Healer.” As Little Oblivions’ first track, it also seems to appropriately set the mood for what people should expect from one of the generation’s best emotional indie rock songstresses. Check out the video for “Hardline” below. [embedded content] Baker also appeared on Seattle’s KEXP for a ...
Although they share a name with the Ohio city, Toledo are a band from Brooklyn. The duo of Daniel Alvarez and Jordan Dunn-Pilz are in the midst of rolling out an EP called Jockeys of Love, and today they’re giving fans a preview with a song called “Dog Has Its Day”. The track follows October’s “Challenger” and December’s “It’s Alive!”, which serve as a solid representation of the sounds that Toledo’s music straddles: brisk, slightly surfy dream-pop and crisp, tranquil indie-folk. “Dog Has Its Day” retains the prettiness of the former, but musically it leans closer to the latter sensibility. Over a mellow yet steady groove, Alvarez and Dunn-Pilz stack a whispery falsetto over a mesmerizing acoustic guitar lick and let that ride for a while. Eventually, some beautifully congealed harmonies e...
IAN SWEET, the CoSigned indie project headed up by Jilian Medford, has announced a new album. Show Me How You Disappear arrives in March and is being teased today with a single called “Drink the Lake”. The upcoming effort is IAN SWEET’s third overall and follow-up to 2018’s Crush Crusher, which Medford broke down for us track by track. According to a statement, a bulk of the songs on Show Me How came to fruition after Medford completed a two-month intensive outpatient program in early 2020. The rigorous treatment involved six-hour days of therapy and saw Medford looking inward more than ever before — so much so that she even took a break from music in order to focus on her self-care. Show Me How is a direct result of those reflections and the emotional catharsis that came with them. “...
Nashville hardcore group Thirdface have announced their debut full-length, Do It With a Smile, which will arrive on March 5th via Exploding in Sound Records. In advance of the LP, they’ve unleashed the song ‘Villains!” as the first single. For many, this ripping track will their introduction to Thirdface, and a fine introduction it is. As the song title implies, “Villains!” is loud and grinding, anchored by swirling bass work and bold declarations against the oppressive forces of society. “When writing ‘Villains!’ I was watching a lot of [the anime series] Fist of the North Star, which gives the song its title,” vocalist Kathryn Edwards told BrooklynVegan. “I wanted to write a song about tearing some evil down from its pedestal like Ken from FOTNS would do. But decided to speak on reality ...
Los Angeles punk veterans NOFX have announced their 14th full-length LP, titled Single Album. In advance of its February 26th release, frontman Fat Mike and co. have unveiled the single “Linewleum” featuring contributions from members of Avenged Sevenfold. Single Album marks NOFX’s first LP since 2016’s First Ditch Effort. It is also the band’s first album since members of NOFX made highly insensitive onstage comments about the country music fans who died in the horrific Route 91 Harvest music festival massacre in Las Vegas in 2017. While the band apologized profusely, they were dropped from their own Punk in Drublic festival’s lineup and had a series of tour dates canceled. The new single, “Linewleum”, is actually an update of NOFX’s song “Linoleum”, which was the lead track on their 1994...
Speed Stick, the indie rock supergroup comprised of Polvo’s Ash Bowie, Bat Fangs’ Laura King, The Love Language’s Thomas Simpson, and The Paul Swest’s Charles Chace, have dropped the new song “Protect Your Magic”. It’s the opening track of their debut album, Volume One, which arrives later this month via Don Giovanni Records. The new single is an instrumental scorcher. “Protect Your Magic” marries Bowie’s sticky guitar riffs with Chace’s free jazz playfulness. Meanwhile the violent, thunderous drum breaks showcase the kind of bonkers percussion that’s only possible with two drummers of King’s and Simpson’s quality caliber. “Protect Your Magic” comes with a cracked music video directed by King. Using a color palette stocked with pinks and greens, she shows odd landscapes, a c...
Mogwai dropped a song and video for the new tune “Ritchie Sacramento,” the second release from the group’s upcoming tenth album, As the Love Continues, due out on Feb. 19. “‘Ritchie Sacramento’’s title came from a misunderstanding a friend of ours had about how to say Ryuichi Sakamoto,” Stuart Braithwaite said in a statement. “The lyrics were inspired by a story Bob Nastanovich shared about his friend and bandmate David Berman who proclaimed ‘Rise Crystal Spear’ as he threw a shovel at a sports car. The song is dedicated to all the musician friends we’ve lost over the years.” The highly cinematic video was directed by Sam Wiehl, who created a first-person, multi-level computer game for the song, then used those animations to make a narrative for the video. In October, the Scottish lin...
Over the weekend, Lana Del Rey revealed the tracklist and cover art for her upcoming album, Chemtrails Over the Country Club. Now, she’s shared the title track, along with a fittingly retro music video. She’s also confirmed a March 19th release date for the album. “Chemtrails Over the Country Club” is the latest sneak peek at what to expect from Del Rey’s seventh LP, following the previously released single “Let Me Love You Like a Woman”. It should be a shoo-in favorite for most of her fans, as it sees Del Rey lacing her glamorous, drawn-out singing style with plenty of vivid and romantic lyrics. Watch the visuals for the song — which features Del Rey in her patented face mask — below. The single’s release comes just a day after LDR started 2021 like she spent most of last year: with ...
Nearly eight months after originally announcing her album Chemtrails Over the Country Club, Lana Del Rey is sharing its title track. The new single is the second offering off the upcoming album, following “Let Me Love You Like a Woman” and is a tender piano ballad that was produced by Jack Antonoff. You can listen to it below. [embedded content] There’s also a video “Chemtrails Over the Country Club” arriving, which can you check out below. [embedded content] In addition to the new track, Del Rey also shared the album’s artwork and tracklist via social media over the weekend, which you can see below along with a few other posts describing the album. The singer detailed the new project back in September during a feature in Interview Magazine. “I’ve been really stressed about ...
Jack White has been laying low for the better part of the past year, but his Third Man Records is dusting off a classic set for its latest Vault release. The Detroit native’s 2014 show at the city’s Masonic Temple has long been one of his most revered. White performed 38 songs over the course of three-and-a-half hours that included wide-ranging covers of Beck’s “Devil’s Haircut” to Hank Williams’ “Ramblin Man.” The collection will be released on four 180-gram colored vinyl LPs, with a slipcase cover with custom printed photo inner sleeves and will include shots from the night by official tour photographer David Swanson. CREDIT: Third Man Records Listen to “Missing Pieces” from that show by clicking here. On top of that show, the set will include a seven-inch single of White’s Oct...
The buzzy Brits of Black Country, New Road have returned with the new song called “Track X”. It’s the latest preview of their debut album For the first time, out February 5th. Like previous releases, “Track X” is understated and eccentric. Frontman Isaac Wood sings in a tone just above spoken word while brass instruments sketch butterflies around his voice. Even as the music looks forward with a heady mix of post-punk and jazz, the lyrics turn fondly backwards, remembering the place “where we fucked as kids,” and the time “I told you I love you in front of black midi.” In a statement, Wood explained how the song came together, saying, “Track X is a song we first worked on in 2018 but one that never made it out into our live performances. We decided to resurrect it during the reco...
Halloween may be long past, but Danny Elfman has creepy treat for us. The beloved composer has returned with a new solo song called “Sorry” and an accompanying video. The expectedly eerie offering is only the second solo song Elfman has shared in the last 36 years (!), following last fall’s “Happy”. Like that tune, “Sorry” is being released via the indie labels ANTI-/ Epitaph Records, which feels like an interesting home for the guy who made the Nightmare Before Christmas soundtrack. In a statement, Elfman said “Sorry” is “the first song I’ve written for myself in a long time,” and detailed its “alien” beginnings, “It began as an obsessive choral-chant instrumental work, which at the time I called ‘alien orchestral chamber punk’ and evolved slowly into a song. I was surprised by the a...