Oh we had time, well you know, at times
Time was all we had
Our distances fell flat to parallel horizons
Not quite happy, not quite sad

‘Garbage’ possesses the lonely intimacy of an empty room, nothing but plucked guitar and vocals for the opening half before layers of samples build like memories flashing past. ‘November’ is also full of sober feeling. As we wrote in a preview, the track takes “the melancholy of the titular month and infus[es] it with a marching rhythm to evoke the precious fragility of love.” A similar momentum drives ‘Fascinated’, the first full song on the record which immediately pitches the audience into the cathartic spirit of the Cloudbelly sound. It’s an anthemic introduction, compete with pounded percussion and singalong chorus of the tears-in-your eyes, empowering variety, but its again shaded with a sense of tender intimacy, a refusal to gloss over life’s anxieties and complications.

What results is a sense of hard won conviction. Lessons learnt not via bright epiphany but the slow grind of living through difficult circumstances. Understanding how to not only roll with the punches but rise from knockout blows. “So it’s been strange sailing these days,” as Laitman sings on ‘Bloom’, “The nights turn my empty pockets out / And fill them with moon, and the wind / And the wild, blooming bruise / Of beginning again.” With resilience comes the hope of something better and kinder. Days in which they might step out of their body, or finally burst into bloom.

i know i know i know is out now via Strange Library Records and available from the Cloudbelly Bandcamp page.

The post Cloudbelly – i know i know i know appeared first on Various Small Flames.

Following last year’s ‘November’, which we said “[took the] melancholy of the titular month and infus[ed] it with a marching rhythm to evoke the precious fragility of love,” Cloudbelly have now released another single from the record. ‘If You Want’ was actually the first track they completed for the album and proves the perfect introduction for new listeners. What the label describe as “an impassioned conversation between two voices residing in the same body, reckoning with a tendency to run from the things you want the most,” the song starts slow and syrupy, warm and nostalgic but tempered with a sharp edge of loss and regret and conflicted emotion.

The post Cloudbelly – If You Want appeared first on Various Small Flames.

“Moves through sounds and emotions like scenes in a dream, seemingly disparate thoughts and feeling united by an uncanny common thread.” So we wrote of Water Words, an album by Bay Area artist Asha Wells which combined a number of genres to “sit in the strange space at the heart of any new relationship,” as we continued, “the period where nothing is decided in any one direction, the potential of both promise and regret latent within every detail.” Next year, Wells is releasing a brand new EP Tears of a Clown on Anxiety Blanket Records and first single ‘Impermanent I’ shows a clear evolution of this style. A piece of idiosyncratic pop which melds the experience of classical training with a willingness to push beyond conventions to mine the fertile ground outside.

Cloudbelly – November

Last year we featured ‘Leavened‘ by Montague, Massachusetts‘s Cloudbelly, introducing Corey Laitman’s expansive yet personal style which “[found] assurance in their contemplation of identity and relationships.” New single ‘November’ is no less heartfelt and confident, taking the melancholy of the titular month and infusing it with a marching rhythm to evoke the precious fragility of love. “Say my love’s marked ‘return to sender’ / Teach me mercy, cold November,” as Laitman sings. “Hungry lungs, my love’s the space between the notes / I meant them, every word I ever spoke.” Here, the onset of winter is both a threat and a reminder, as well as something which might yet be outrun.

Daphne’s Demise – Bedroom Window

The solo project of Sarnia, Ontario’s Zoë L, Daphne’s Demise has made a name with a home-recorded blend of indie pop, folk and ambient sensibilities. However, the new ‘Bedroom Window’ represents something of a change, with the track seeing Daphne’s Demise take to the studio with a full band. What emerges is a country-inflected labour of love which taps into the dreamy richness of the seventies. But within the enveloping wistfulness and languid drift lies something more direct. “No more can I be / The one that you keep inside your head,” as the opening lines play, “Looming over me is a thing I just won’t see / Can’t watch it spin.”

Through the bedroom window
See it light up green
And fly away

Dead Bandit – Staircase

The recording project of Ellis Swan and James Schimpl, the music of Dead Bandit might be instrumental, but it is decidedly lyrical in spirit. Swan is known for haunting murder ballads within his solo work, while multi-instrumentalist Schimpl weaves expansive soundscapes. So it followed that the debut Dead Bandit album From the Basement combined these sensibilities into a raw, shadowy sound which merged Southern Gothic needle and hauntological strangeness. Again on Quindi Records, new album Memory Thirteen is no less evocative, with single ‘Staircase’ presenting a cryptic mood. Is the past returning to haunt the present? Or is that the future we glimpse breaking through the clouds?

Humbird – Child of Violence

“Another blue sky morning,” sings Humbird’s Siri Undlin on new single ‘Child of Violence’, “In the land of the free to believe / Lies on the Internet and the glamor of money / Missing the real thing.” The Minnesota artist has been releasing a number of singles via Nettwerk in recent months, channelling the politically charged folk rock of yesteryear, and the new track is perhaps the most direct and cutting yet. A song which refuses to treat acts of violence within the US as tragedies or aberrations, but rather a cornerstone of the entire national project. And perhaps most importantly, it identifies how honesty around this fact is central to any hope of change.

I could be a break in the chain
I could be a piece of the change
When I talk about it
I’ll call it by its name

Little Kid – Something to Say

Back in 2020, Toronto‘s Little Kid released Transfiguration Highway, an album “at least in part inspired by an enduring interest in Christian mysticism,” as we described, “and themes of epiphany and revelation allow [lead Kenny] Boothby to explore his own growth.” Next year will see Little Kid return with A Million Easy Payments, a new full-length on Orindal Records, which finds Boothby and co. again probing at the line between the corporeal and the spiritual. Lead single ‘Something to Say’ offers a picture of reality so keenly observed that a sense of latent mystery begins to suggest itself, and with it the possibility of transcendence.

Nora Roy – No Steppy Snik

“Sometimes I want to pull my teeth out / unzip my skin / start over.” So sings Nora Roy on ‘No Steppy Snik’, a new single which pairs surreal detachment and forthright confession to welcome the listener deep into its heart. Joined by Julian Fader (guitar) Brett Nash (bass) and Daniel Siles (drums), Roy follows this dreamlike thread through murmured quiet and towering peaks, though for all of the song’s unreal qualities, the parting sense is that of having been told something true which might not have been communicable any other way. “You love / Like a snake I saw,” as Roy continues, “in a magazine / some time.”

‘No Steppy Snik’ is out now and you can find Nora Roy on streaming services.

Parademaker – Utah

The recording project of Houston‘s Shaun Clarkson, Parademaker creates folk in the mould of John Prine, where heartfelt emotion and wry humour intertwine to form a picture of a specific period and place. New album Good Shit is full of such songs, but single ‘Utah’ encapsulates the spirit perfectly. A story of the second coming where Jesus is kicking about America, looking for somewhere to settle down. “This time he came to live and not to die,” as the lyrics offer. But that’s not to say Christ has no standards when it comes to potential homes. “You won’t find me in Utah / the Latter-day Saints and the petite bourgeoisie ain’t seen a cage they didn’t want to climb inside.”

You won’t find me in U-hecking-tah
the worst damn state that you ever saw
along with Texas, Florida, most of Indiana
and the whole goddam Bible Belt

Prism Bitch – City Nights

Albuquerque’s Prism Bitch originated when Lauren Poole and Chris Walsh met at a small theatre group and imagined creating a band as a piece of performance art. But upon adding Lilah Rose and Teresa Cruces to the line-up, they found themselves shedding the performance aspect and becoming the real deal. Establishing their rambunctious and often flamboyant brand of garage rock, debut full-length Perla showed the switch was more than justified, and it is fitting that new single ‘City Nights’ sees the outfit return to their theatrical roots. A sleek, sensual eighties bop which comes complete with a delightfully tongue-in-cheek video filmed at the Albuquerque public access studio, directed by Lauren Poole with cinematography by Colemar Nichols:

‘City Nights’ is out now and available from Bandcamp.

The post Weekly Listening: December 2023 #1 appeared first on Various Small Flames.

Latest single ‘Leavened’ follows on from this. A track built on a bed of gentle, dreamy synths, over which Laitman’s vocals are left to drift. But as the song progresses this backdrop gradually swells with rich ambient tones and vocal harmonies, a steady increase which never quite reaches any cathartic crescendo yet nevertheless realises a certain power. This is turn lifts Laitman’s delivery into its own confident space, the lyrics finding assurance in their contemplation of identity and relationships.

and sometimes I’m a cowboy
and sometimes, I’m a girl
but mostly I’m a pale blue thief
whose water drank the world

‘Leavened’ is out now and available from the Cloudbelly Bandcamp page. thou / them will be released later this year on Signature Sounds.

The post Cloudbelly – Leavened appeared first on Various Small Flames.