Basement Revolver – Red Light
We’ve long followed the work of Hamilton’s Basement Revolver, most recently in 2022 with the full-length Embody, which used the band’s signature weight and compassion “to confront the intricacies of modern life with a newfound steel and depth.” This usually involves complicated themes of identity and faith, though latest single ‘Red Light’ offers a picture of a far more specific problem of modern living—the infuriating experience of getting a red light ticket that costs far more than a pay check. But through a blend of pummelling energy, dreamy textures and Chrisy Hurn’s earnest vocals, the song becomes a wider meditation on the inevitable costs of pursuing one’s dreams, and how society can appear to be constructed in opposition to anyone looking to pursue creative ideals.
‘Red Light’ is out now and available from the usual places.
Casual Technicians – Homecoming
Following last year’s Four Corners EP, Portland-centred but now geographically separated indie rock band Casual Technicians have announced their debut full-length record. Self-titled and comprising of 19 tracks, it promises to be a comprehensive introduction to the band’s style, what we described previously as “[a] playful sound that’s not only willing to experiment between genres but to meld them together seamlessly.” Following the oddball lo-fi pop of lead single ‘Lucy in the Dark’, Casual Technicians have now released a second song from the record, ‘Homecoming’. It’s just as strange, but in a different way, possessing a homebrew folk style that centres around the signature deadpan delivery.
Casual Technicians will be released via Repeating Cloud on 29th March. Pre-order it now from Bandcamp.
clay pigeon – Dark Blue
The new recording project of Canadian songwriter James Clayton, clay pigeon makes songs that combine a laidback, listenable quality with impressive emotional depth. In July, he will release The Aching Taste of Blue, his debut full-length recorded at Hotel2Tango in Montreal with acclaimed engineer Howard Bilerman. In anticipation, he has released lead single ‘Dark Blue’, a song that acts as the perfect calling card for what clay pigeon is all about. “’Dark Blue’ was one of the first songs I wrote for the project and in hindsight, it set the canvas for the rest of the record,” Clayton describes. “The fingerpicking pattern melted the beginning and end of the phrase together and everything became very meditative, yet unresolved, as if to ask a question. Is everything okay?”
‘Dark Blue’ is out now via the clay pigeon Bandcamp page.
Daniel Brouns – Lizard Killer
Described as a concept album about first experiences, Stock Music For The Cosmos sees songwriter Daniel Brouns condense his life into nine seminal moments—including brushes with love, death, pornography. With the album coming this May on Anxiety Blanket Records, Brouns has unveiled single ‘Lizard Killer’. As the title suggests, the song presents an encounter with loss in the form of a class pet, Brouns describing the experience of finding the lizard dead in its cage with the flat, near-spoken despondency of David Bazan. Indeed, the latest Pedro The Lion albums are a good touchstone for the Daniel Brouns sound, where the past is presented as a kind of duality between fond nostalgia and bitter regret. Watch the video by Dalton Pate below:
Stock Music For The Cosmos is out on the 17th May 17th via Anxiety Blanket Records.
DD Island – Runnin’
Originating as a solo project in Nashville, DD Island moved to New York in 2021, where lead Brandon Rhodes recruited an assortment of friends and accomplices to build a fresh line-up capable of bringing a new era of the project to life. Rhodes used live shows as the nursery for this version of the band, so its fitting that the new DD Island EP Runnin’ was recorded live to embrace this spirit. But as the lead single and title track confirms, this immediacy does not preclude a sense of intention, the band tapping into an easy-going rhythm to support the wistful lyrics and warm sound to create something as heartfelt as it is fun.
Runnin’ is out now and available from the usual places.
MVSO – Heaven
An exploration of the “universal themes of life, death and the passing of time through a decidedly personal lens.” That’s how we’ve previously described the work of MVSO (AKA duo Mat Vairo and Saumon Oboudiyat), singing the praises of both ‘Hold Clear’ and ‘Passing Through‘. With the release of EP Proprioception fast approaching, new single ‘Heaven’ follows suit with another sparsely evocative sound, marbling intimate tenderness and haunting space to form something airy yet loaded with unseen weight. The song was inspired by the 2019 film The Specials (originally Hors normes) directed by Olivier Nakache and Éric Toledano, which tells the true story of two men who train underprivileged youth to care for young people with autism. It serves as a testament to the compassionate potential of people in a world which can seem determined to prove the opposite.
Proprioception will be released in spring 2024. You can find MSVO on socials and streaming services.
Oscilla – Tongue-Tied
Back in December, we featured Oscilla, the project of San Francisco‘s Frances England, describing how the quiet sincerity of single ‘Tornado’ “functions something like a plea in the face of elemental danger. An attempt to will oneself onto surer ground.” The song was the first from a forthcoming EP called Drink Up the Sun, which is due for release later in the Spring. Now Oscilla have unveiled the record’s second single, ‘Tongue-Tied’, a nostalgic indie pop song with the warm and oversaturated tones of a photograph from an old summer vacation. England creates this sound with the help of producer Omar Akrouche (who also plays in LA art pop band Worthitpurchase), elevating what would be a pretty and melodic song into something thick with the sweet and hazy poignance of long summertime days.
July, cherry juice stains on your chin and fingers
Sweet grass almost knee high
Rolling down the windows past the field and pine trees
Power lines flash by
Razor Braids – It Goes Quiet
Back in November we introduced Brooklyn-based outfit Razor Braids with single ‘She’. A song which typified both the band’s nineties rock aesthetic and the spirit at the heart of their work, “willingly shaking itself from past desires in order to find new hope and joy in desires as of yet unrealised.” The track was taken from upcoming full-length Big Wave, and new single ‘It Goes Quiet’ offers another glimpse at the album’s bittersweet mood. Hesitant uncertainty and cathartic motion collide on the same song, encapsulating an album that promises to explore not only love but the constant process of growth and change which accompanies it.
Roselove – Marionette
‘Marionette’ is the latest single from Roselove, a musician, photographer, visual artist and writer based between New York and Philadelphia. Taking equal parts London indie sleaze pop and Philly shoegaze, the song draws on personal experience of the difficulty living and working as transgender woman in creative industries to explore loneliness more generally. But while the track comes with an understandable degree of frustration and longing, it is far more than such emotions. Rather, it offers a voice of empathy and solidarity to every person suffering within this contemporary epidemic, as well as a steely intensity to face down those who reinforce the conditions which allow it to fester.