Bright Sparks is posted once a month and offers a collection of really great songs that we’re determined not to let slip past our radar. Say hello to Vol. 18.
Spielbergs – 4AM
Spielbergs are Mads Baklien, Stian Brennskag and Christian Løvhaug, an Olso-based trio who push a frantic brand of indie rock. Coupling nostalgic emotion with carefree abandon, the outfit draw comparisons to the likes of Japandroids and Beach Slang, and their debut album This Is Not The End promises to live up to such billing. Lead single ‘4AM’ is good supporting evidence, a racing number that forgoes none of the emotional intensity, turning what could be a fun but superficial track into something far deeper and more rewarding.
This Is Not The End is set for release on the 1st February via By The Time It Gets Dark and you can pre-order it now.
Anna Tivel – Fenceline
Here at VSF we often find ourselves drawn to the folk music coming out of Wisconsin, with blog favourites Old Earth and Field Report having held our attention for a long while, not to mention Bon Iver, Aero Flynn, and on and on. So, while Anna Tivel herself is based in Portland, Oregon, the fact that she recorded her new album, The Question, with Shane Leonard and Brian Joseph in Eau Claire suggests the kind of folk pedigree to which she belongs.
‘Fenceline’ is our first taste of The Question, a follow-up to 2017’s Small Believer, and suggests that Tivel has picked up where she left off. Using her distinctively haunting writing, the song explores issues of gates and walls in their various guises. Such imagery is perhaps at its most pertinent since the end of the Cold War, and Tivel taps into the humanity that such partitions bisect, allowing more complex, human emotions to form. “This is a song about the divisions we create to keep each other out,” Tivel explains, “from fences and walls, to the gates of heaven. I guess I got to thinking a lot about what makes us different and what makes us the same, what breeds hatred and fear and what breeds understanding.”
You can find Anna Tivel’s music on her Bandcamp page.
Pizzagirl – body part
Pizzagirl is the recording project of Liverpool native Liam Brown, who has released a number of singles that exist within a distinct soundscape, with his bio describing how he marries “80s teen-film nostalgia, 90s dial-up internet culture and the modern meme age” to form his own style. Latest track ‘body part’ takes us a step further into the strange, bright world, opening in a lonely haze which soon morphs into a more traditional pop song. Brown’s baritone brings to mind Devon Welsh’s Dream Songs, and certainly add feeling, like watching your own nighttime hallucinations on VHS.
‘body part’ is out now and can be found on the pizzagirl Bandcamp page, along with all previous releases.
Satanic Ritual Abuse – Hurting (Adjective/Verb)
Satanic Ritual Abuse is the project of Josh Cohen, who you may know better as the person behind the label Memorials of Distinction. His debut album, Hurting, is due for release at the end of November, a collection of songs written between 2009 (when a 16 year old Cohen began making music) and 2014, which are only now seeing the light of day.
Cohen is currently drip-feeding singles to amp up anticipation, and the latest is the title track, a self-described “noisy, anti-doo-wop, anti-romance croon about feeling trapped in dysfunction, finding yourself snared in circles of emotional violence.” As all that suggests, this isn’t a bright and sunny pop song. Cohen’s vocals echo as if from a dark and clammy cavern, skittering drums crawling the walls in a kind of itchy and feverish paranoia. The whole thing lights up sporadically in the song’s second half with a blare of strangely joyous noise, just a glimpse of the unstable emotions that the album promises to provide.
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Hurting will be released on the 30th November and you can pre-order it now from the Memorials of Distinction Bandcamp page.
Meat Wave – That’s Alright
Chicago punks Meat Wave have carved out a niche of intelligent noise, with records such as 2017’s The Incessant capable of raw emotion and release while also drawing from literary influences. Last month saw the release of a split 7″ single with fellow Chicagoites Lifestyle, and Meat Wave’s offering, ‘That’s Alright’, continues their careful balance between thoughtful and furious. However, the track does stand out from the rest of their discography for its (relatively) tender tone. A lullaby this is not, though the dark, dystopian atmosphere is at least used to highlight the brilliance of any beams of light.
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The split is out now via No Trend Records and you can get it from the Meat Wave Bandcamp page.
The Phone Booth – Ballad of Indifference / Swim in Oceans
Santa Barbara band The Phone Booth are currently putting the finishing touches to their debut album, Roman. Though the record could not quite be said to be a concept album, it is structured around voicemail recordings from Steven Roman Gonzales, the best friend of the lead songwriter who passed away two years ago. Indeed, the album is something of a tribute to the lasting influence of Gonzales as a friend and artist, and marries cathartic indie rock with personal, intimate lyrics in a manner that feels at once angry, celebratory and nuanced.
In preparation, the band have put out two singles which introduce their sound. ‘Ballad of Indifference’ is a slow burning slice of lo-fi rock, the smoulder eventually drawing flame which quickly transforms into a hectic blaze of emotional release. ‘Swim in Oceans’ bursts into life from the ashes, switching the style to the breathless cool of No Age.
Katie Mullins – Crocuses
Katie Mullins didn’t think she was going to sing again, let alone record and release a new album. After haemorrhaging her left vocal chord for the third time, Mullins turned to meditation and experienced something of a miraculous healing, from which “digital triptych” Three Songs “flowed involuntarily […] during winter walks from one teaching gig to the next.” ‘Crocuses’ is one such example—joining contemporaries such as Mountain Man in crafting classic, hymn-like folk that draws its primary inspiration from the splendour and severity of the natural world.
Three Songs is out now and you can get it from the Katie Mullins Bandcamp page.
Troy Everett – Absent
Troy Everett is a songwriter and composer from Washington DC who is now based in Los Angeles. Serving as an introduction to his sound, ‘Absent’ is a swirling slice of ambient textures and frantic drums, pitching the track at the intersection of ambient, neo-classical and Burial-esque dubstep. Everett’s vocals emerge through this clamour with ethereal force, as though conjured by the motion of the instrumentation, leading to a style that is both compelling and haunting.
You can find Troy Everett on Soundcloud.
Nathan Ball -All Or Nothing
Splitting his time between Cornwall and London, Nathan Ball makes a charged brand of folk music that draws as much from War on Drugs as it does from songwriters such as Jose Gonzalez. His latest single ‘All or Nothing’ is proof, the confident, uplifting tempo balanced against a sensitive emotion. “It’s about trying to stay focused on something whilst feeling a weight of expectation on you,” Ball explains of the track. “And, instead of talking about it, becoming more introverted.”
You can hear more on Soundcloud, or find more information on the Nathan Ball website.
Balto – Bullshit Dream
The music of Balto has come in a variety of forms and styles, from the bluegrassy folk of October Road to the psych and pop inspired rock of Strangers, though never have Daniel Sheron and co. released what could be said to be an explicitly political song. However, with ‘Bullshit Dream’, this changes, the song coming to Sheron in one spontaneous moment and released as a stand alone single for election season.
The bullshit dream of the title is name-checked as socialism, though in reality the song re-positions the phrase to examine the wafer thin promise of American life, running through a frantic list of the banal and narcissistic trappings of contemporary existence, as well as the consequences of what Chekov might call such ‘moral illness’. The result is the bizarre and the ridiculous placed alongside the chronic afflictions of our time, all raced through with Dylan-esque abandon.
“Snapchat, pornhub, cyber sex
Electronic cigarettes
A spray tan on the president
He’s just working on a dream I guess
Slimfast, botox trophy wives
Pool boys, fuck toys, magic mikes
You’re so pretty, won’t you get in line
A face like that goes viral”
You can find Balto on Bandcamp.
Vender & The Cobras – Everything is Beautiful
Vender & The Cobras is a Chicago-based band led by Matt Beard (who also plays in Friends of the Bog). Last month saw the release of the outfit’s second album, The Lion’s Boy, and ‘Everything is Beautiful’ is a good introduction for the uninitiated. Because Vender & The Cobras is a personal and sincere album that’s nonetheless underscored by a certain wry wit—like two parts Bright Eyes to one part Sufjan. Within the wistful flow of ‘Everything is Beautiful’ lies cutting emotion and a hint of self-deprecation, though all warmed through by a persistent sense of hope.
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The Lion’s Boy is out now and you can get it from the Vender & The Cobras Bandcamp page.