The cover painting and title, is a nod to Bottles of Hope For Gaza, where in Egypt, bottles containing rice, flour, and beans were thrown into sea in hopes that they would reach the shores of Gaza. In organizing this project, I hope to offer encouragement to anyone in the music community, to speak up in song and to utilize our collective power. I believe it is vital to our own hearts, and our lives as artists, to empathize and show empathy to this cause.

All proceeds of the release will be donated to ANERA, a charity which offers a whole suite of humanitarian aid and emergency relief in Gaza, as well as across the wider Middle East. The organisation’s motto is “Where hope finds a way,” a sentiment more relevant than ever. Because for all of the hand-wringing and well-intentioned prayers, what the people need now is action. And the only way to achieve the required response is for wide swathes of those watching on to roll up their sleeves and do anything they can. Songs of Hope for Gaza is just one small effort to add to this collective action, and one which will hopefully inspire others to lend their energy to the drive. Victoria invokes a quote from Woody Guthrie’s Bound for Glory to encapsulate the spirit of the release:

All of this talking about what’s up in the sky, or down in hell, for that matter, isn’t half as important as what’s right here, right now, right in front of our eyes. Things are tough. Folks broke. Kids hungry. Sick. Everything. And people has just got to have more faith in one another, believe in each other. There’s a spirit of some kind we’ve all got. That’s got to draw us all together.

Songs of Hope for Gaza will be released on the 28th October via Pretty Purgatory and Dear Life Records and you can pre-order it now.

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Having arrived at such a space, Good Good Blood shows no signs of slowing down. Rather, Smith is looking to capitalise on his newfound confidence. New single ‘Johnny Was An Ocean’ finds an artist comfortable in his style and willing to experiment, pairing acoustic folk with glitchy electronics to tell the tale of the titular Johnny. An ocean creature caught in a net, “as cute as cute can get!” What unfolds captures some of the morbid strangeness of classic folk, where wonder and death exist on level terms, and a sense of fabulist morality hangs over every word.

Time begins to move real slow
Johnny starts to feel real low
Trying to find a way to go
But there’s no one who can show
How he can escape your net
Or how to stop being a pet
Take a look, I can bet
He’s as dead as dead can get!

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Binker & Moses – Accelerometer Overdose

The recording project of saxophonist Binker Golding and drummer and composer Moses Boyd, Binker & Moses are representative of a new wave of acts within London who look to combine the jazz tradition with hip-hop, Caribbean rhythms and various electronic styles. The latest single from forthcoming record Feeding The Machine on Gearbox Records, ‘Accelerometer Overdose’ welcomes the tape loops of Max Luthert, pushing things into ambient territory and further increasing the possibilities of the Binker & Moses sound.

Sun June – Somewhere + 3

Last year saw the release of Sun June’s excellent album Somewhere on Run For Cover Records, which recently featured on our Albums We Missed in 2021 feature. The record was released from isolation, and when the band were finally able to get back together they channelled both the frustration of those lost months and the joy of being reunited into new songs. The result is Somewhere + 3, a deluxe edition of last year’s record with three previously unreleased tracks.

The vibe of these new songs is captured perfectly on lead single ‘Easy’. “[It] is a romantic struggle song,” explains says Laura Colwell. “It’s about love and partnership and longstanding arguments that are hard to get past.”

Want it to be easy
Swore we’d be better by now
Picture of your mother
In Vietnam, 1977

Widowspeak – Everything is Simple

“Everything is simple ’til it’s not,” sings Molly Hamilton of Widowspeak on ‘Everything is Simple’, the lead single from the New York duo’s forthcoming album, The Jacket. It’s a song about how things grow complicated with time, how even situations which begin as pure potential eventually become knotted with limitations, and how, unreliable narrators that we are, we often bend reality to adapt. But despite that, the song sounds surprisingly vibrant, unfurling with a patient confidence that we’ve come to expect from Widowspeak. Check out the video, directed by OTIUM, below:

The Jacket is out via Captured Tracks on the 11th March and you can pre-order it now from the Widowspeak Bandcamp page.

Good Good Blood – The Dizzying Parade

Back in November we introduced you to The Dizzying Parade, the latest album from Good Good Blood on Team Love Records, with single ‘Green Bank’. “A densely layered track which balances a propelling drum beat with an dreamy weightlessness,” we described, “Smith’s vocals finding that neo-psychedelic line between attitude and ethereality.” Ahead of the album’s release this week, Good Good Blood have unveiled the title track. Another propulsive song which gradually builds in intensity as it unfolds, the tension growing and growing before unravelling into a sonic kaleidoscope of colour and sound. A finale as disorientating as the title suggests.

Allegra Krieger – Taking It In

Brooklyn-based songwriter Allegra Krieger is back with Precious Thing, a new LP out via Northern Spy Records this spring. Lead single ‘Taking It In’ introduces the album’s distinctively inviting and wistful sound, Krieger’s gentle croon sitting within a changeable arrangement of strings that conjure the sense of memories ebbing and flowing around the present moment. “Where am I now? Where was I three years ago?” she asks, “Where is my mother where is anyone I know?” Check out the video by Samuel Ogoe, Melissa Lozada-Oliva and Koa Ho below:

Precious Thing releases via Northern Spy Records on the 4th March and you can pre-order it now from the Allegra Krieger Bandcamp page.

 chores – Trip Wire

chores are a post punk slash dream pop band from Rochester NY. They recently released their debut single, ‘Trip Wire’, taken from a forthcoming EP. It’s a wonderful introduction, the kind of lo-fi indie pop gem that would be right at home on an early 90s Sarah Records sampler. As the title suggests, it’s a song about trying to avoid all those little everyday triggers that spark anxiety. As lead Heather Swenson sings “it’s a thick mire, avoiding any tripwire / that could signal friendly fire somewhere in my brain, so many times a day.”

Melk – Yankee Division Highway

Self-described “aspiring optimists” from Washington D.C., Melk make dreamy, punky indie pop that nevertheless traverse some pretty serious emotional depths. Comprising of Melissa Kain (guitar & vocals), AJ DiGregorio (bass) and Alex Scheuer (drums), Melk have just released their second EP, a three-song collection called Somebody, Nobody, Anybody. The standout is the slow-burning final track, ‘Yankee Division Highway’, a song the band say is “about how apathy can erode the trust you have in loved ones.” Kain guides us through the patient build, matching the intensity of the instrumentation before drifting into a rueful croon.

Carrie Biell – See Through the Trees

“I’ve been living my whole damn life trying to make everybody feel alright,” sings Seattle-based singer-songwriter Carrie Biell in latest single, ‘See Through the Trees’. “Maybe I’m sick of trying.” The line captures the track’s strange relationship between uncertainty and conviction, where beliefs are felt with palpable force even when solutions might not be easy or accessible. “This is about feeling maxed out in life by people and life commitments,” Biell explains, “but still trying to open up and be vulnerable in a new relationship. It’s about responding to your own needs while also giving to a new partner and learning to trust.”

Modern Nature – Performance

Rising from the ashes of previous band Ultimate Painting, Modern Nature is the new moniker of London‘s Jack Cooper. A project which takes the compositions and songwriting developed with Ultimate Painting and builds upon them with a newfound willingness to improvise and experiment. This month sees the release of latest record Island Of Noise on Bella Union, with lead single ‘Performance’ offering a glimpse of what’s to come. A song “written from the perspective of someone seeing or realising something overwhelming for the first time,” as Cooper puts it, consisting of a multitude of moving parts that mimic a kind of irrepressible curiosity.

Check out the video by Conan Roberts, Phoebe Cooper and Cooper himself below:

Island Of Noise is out on the 28th January via Bella Union and you can pre-order it from the Modern Nature Bandcamp page.

Pompey – Overwhelmed

Montreal based artist Pompey has played in a variety of acts within the city, lending his talents to the likes of Thanya Iyer, Corey Gulkin and Paper Beat Scissors, but Overwhelmed is the first full-length album of his own. Released by Anything Bagel, the record is a self-professed pandemic album. A product not so much of the prolonged anxiety of the present but rather Pompey’s methods of coping. A deliberate search for comfort and kindness within the constant pressure, carving out a space in which to rest. The title track illustrates the mood as good as any on the record, delivered with a deliberate tenderness which invites the listener to share the safe harbour for a while.

I try not to frown
Smile spreads light throughout my crown
I will trust myself
Over time

Nuisance – Kuchisabishii

A collaboration between William J. Seidel and Ryan E. Weber (REW<<, Eric & Magill), Nuisance craft a version of dream pop coloured by folk and classical sensibilities, though the process is far more notable than that. Weber spent two years recording instruments and coding them into software, building up a library of sounds which can be downloaded at Poetic Devices. After such a laborious process, the pair decided their first use of the program should be as immediate as possible, and the first Nuisance album Kuchisabishii, (out now via Katuktu Collective) came together in just two days. A shifting, impressionistic exploration of intimacy and immediacy, it’s a wonderful example of music made from the ground up, from atomic level building blocks to an album-sized ecosystem.

Don’t Worry – Crushing Weight / Head’s Chocka

Fronted by co-leads Ronan Van Kehoe and Samuel Watson, Don’t Worry have won recognition with their blend of wry observation and nostalgic charm. Following last year’s single ‘As If By Magic‘, the outfit are returning with full-length Remorseless Swing on Specialist Subject Records, and the first singles suggest the Don’t Worry style is evolving in several directions beyond their indie rock/emo roots. Be it the poppy (or poppier) rhythms of ‘Crushing Weight’ or the sweet romance of ‘Head’s Chocka’, though the lyrics still have signature flashes of wit.

Why can’t we just take this moment
Flatter it with rapturous applause and leave early doors
Listen, my head is chocka
But I can no longer forget here and now

Oh, how
I’m tongue tied over you

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But in the gap between nostalgic mourning and the trepidation of forward motion lies an ever-present light, a small kernel of hope that refuses to disappear. It might seem strange for a record so anchored to the present to owe so much to both the past and the future, but then perhaps that’s all the present is—a collection of hopes and regrets, marbled into one experience.

Next year sees Good Good Blood return with The Dizzying Parade, a brand new record on Team Love Records. Lead single ‘Green Bank’ gives an indication of what to expect. A densely layered track which balances a propelling drum beat with an dreamy weightlessness, Smith’s vocals finding that neo-psychedelic line between attitude and ethereality.

Dear friends are all we need
It always matters
Juniper, will you plant the seed?
Or leave in tatters?

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In an age of financial insecurity, pandemics and climate collapse, such a mindset becomes all the more pertinent. Indeed, much of Smith’s music seems tied to this tension—the balance between exploring pain and offering comfort, wanting to open up a space that can encompass vulnerability and sanctuary. If there’s nothing to be hopeful about in reality, then one must look to the potential of things to come. At Your Mercy, the second Good Good Blood album released by Team Love Records, develops and expands these sensibilities, looking past what is in search of what could be. In doing so it forms the fullest, most varied Good Good Blood record to date.

We’ve previously described the music of the Fox Food canon as “heartfelt, experimental, bound not by expectation or convention but rather some gut-level intuition,” work carved out of a tradition of collaboration and solidarity. “Together, the elements coalesce into an intangible yet sustained sense of spirit, something far more powerful and lasting than anything done alone.” Whether Smith instilled or inherited this spirit is unclear, but what is apparent is how he now holds it openly and proudly.

As with previous albums, At Your Mercy sees Smith enlist the talents of an array of musicians he met through Fox Food Records. “All I had when I started Fox Food Records was a goal to somehow build a community of like minded artists who could maybe collaborate on music and create cool things,” Smiths says. “The fact that it has all happened so organically and without any real conscious effort, and that it has subsequently led me to make music with so many amazing artists and friends, is just mind boggling to me.”

Such an organic approach appears key to Smith’s personality, and the music of Good Good Blood possesses an equally intuitive and immediate sensibility. “There wasn’t really any intention or purpose behind writing the songs,” he explains. “They just sort of happened. I don’t really have any recollection of writing them, in the sense of struggling with a lyric or a word or whatever. If I had struggled to write them I’d have given up.” Considered development and reworking might lead to airtight, polished songs, but Smith sacrifices such mechanical practice in order to preserve the warm urgency of human communication. “The words just seemed to fit onto the melody really quickly, with little effort. I guess, maybe it is a subconscious thing.”

The aesthetic was facilitated by the conditions in which the album was crafted. Smith created At Your Mercy at home. With a full-time job and four kids, he was forced to record in the brief pauses in life, cobbling the songs together in the too-small lulls when the children were in bed and work was done for another day. Far from trying to polish over this fact, Smith has left in the textures of life—the footfall and creaking, the small commotion of family—and the result is a collection of songs woven out of the very same spirit of togetherness.

With this present tense, the album exists in a kind of suspended state where what is lost is missed dearly, and what is to come carries no small amount of terror. But in the gap between nostalgic mourning and the trepidation of forward motion lies an ever-present light, a small kernel of hope that refuses to disappear. It might seem strange for a record so anchored to the present to owe so much to both the past and the future, but then perhaps that’s all the present is—a collection of hopes and regrets, marbled into one experience.

“People do tell me regularly that they get a mixed bag vibes from my songs,” Smith says. “Sadness and hope are the main two.” And the juxtaposition is not as counterintuitive as it might first appear. “For me, sadness and hope can go hand in hand,” he continues. “Without sadness or loss or pain there can’t be any hope. We have to hope for a better feeling or situation or whatever because that is what keeps us all keeping on.”

At Your Mercy is out now via Team Love Records and you can get it from the Good Good Blood Bandcamp page.

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Adrianne Lenker – cradle
German Error Message – Hopelessness
Jo Schornikow – Incomplete
Grizzly Coast – Half-Light Boy
Taylor Hamilton – Might Say
Porridge Radio – Give / Take
Patio – Scum
Ruthie – Spirit Now Moves
Esther Rose – Don’t Blame It On the Moon
Blood Cultures – Flowers For All Occasions
Puddle-Cuddle – Compost
Mess – Dead Space
Cry Babe – Soft Honk
The Painters – Pieces of Life
Two Meters – Ground
Erin Durant – Take a Load Off
Michelle Blades – Ring
Eric & Magill – Thanks to Sciences
Foundlings – Caught Up on You
Craig Finn – Something To Hope For
JW Ridley – Homesick (Out The Blue)
Pieket – Eternal Recurrence
The Curfews – Rose
Emily Fairlight – Body Below
Raggedy – Brainwash
Barrie – Saturated
Blush – Forever Is a Long Time
Shane Leonard – Empire Builder
Con Davison – Sofa Bed
Gold Light + Snakemusk – The Heart Is A Lonely Hunter
The Chats – Pub Feed
Shutups – Yellowjacket
Izzy Heltai – Stuck In Stone
Adam Ostrar – Take It Back
The Death Of Pop – Last
Toledo – Some Samurai
Yot Club – Japan
Evan Thomas Way & The Phasers – Long Distance
K. Campbell – Heads Up
The Duke of Norfolk – As the Heralds Revere You
Leaky Engine-John Birch Society Blues
naps – treading
Vieo Abiungo – What the Rain Restores
Old Earth – The Friends ∴ The Gods
Good Good Blood & Astral Social Club – Heathen Astronaut

Like what you hear? Catch up with the rest of our Monthly Mixes!

The post April 2019 Roundup Mix appeared first on Various Small Flames.

Today marks the fifth anniversary of Fox Food Records, and to celebrate James Smith has gathered a large number of the label’s artists for a special compilation, Something’s There But You’re Not Sure What. Essentially a who’s who of the Fox Food roster, the release represents a celebration of what truly independent labels can offer—a diverse group of people from all over the world linked not by a specific sound and style but rather the spirit within.

Opening with an acoustic version of Oh Rose‘s ‘Prom’, Something’s There But You’re Not Sure What features a whole host of our favourites. Nice Legs stop by with another slice of delightfully warm fuzz pop, Spartan Jet-Plex provides an alternate take on single ‘Meant’ and Monarch Mtn returns with his characteristically intimate and melancholic whisper-folk.

Dana Gavanski joins Kaiya Cade on the haunting ‘Garden’, Fazed on a Pony serves up a dose of wonky nostalgia and Goodbye Max welcomes us back into his wistful warmth with the modest wonder of ‘Search Party.’ Then there’s the icy pop of Bloodhype, the whimsical momentum of Plant Food, not to mention the playful hush of Lewtrakimou and cool swagger of Saint Charles. Mixing things up, Henoheno and Fair Mothers offer different takes on patient, sprawling music—the ethereal gloom of the former matched in mood and scope by the foreboding creep of the latter.

Elsewhere, Unisex offer a carefree sway with ‘Let the Tide Take You’, Fairy Godmother a garage rock washed with dreamy haze and the likes of Ratbath, Hairpins, Suzy Jivotovski (of GRNDMS) and Deer Scout all provide stellar examples of intimate bedroom folk. Then, in a fitting finale, Smith’s own Good Good Blood teams up with Astral Social Club for mammoth closer ‘Heathen Astronaut’.

With ambient textures and electronic beeps and glimpses of sincere emotion peeking through the fog, the track acts as a kind of summary of the compilation and therefore the Fox Food Record’s mission as a whole. Heartfelt, experimental, bound not by expectation or convention but rather some gut-level intuition. Together, the elements coalesce into an intangible yet sustained sense of spirit, something far more powerful and lasting than anything done alone. This might not be something than can be adequately put into words, but that it exists is a testament to Smith’s judgement and effort. Because something is there, even if you’re not sure what.

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Various Swell Sounds is a new collaborative playlist series from Shana Hartzel of Swell Tone, Jon Chin of Cereal and Sounds, and myself. Instead of constantly exchanging tracks amongst each other, we have decided to work together to bring them to more ears. Every month, we will match a selection of our old and brand new favourites to a specific theme, as decided on a revolving basis month by month.

Following the dangerous freedom of Shana’s Unguarded Beach, and the angsty heartbreak of Jon’s Violet’s Aren’t Blue, the third edition sees us take up the mantle with something altogether more unsettling. Because, let’s be honest, we live in unsettling times. Silicon Valley is (allegedly) controlling our elections, Russian spies are being attacked on foreign soil and Infowars has a White House press pass. Yes, we’re paranoid. But are we paranoid enough?

1. Crystal Stilts – Alien Rivers
2. Sixteen Jackies – VHS #1
3. The Paranoyds – Sleep Paralysis
4. The Buttertones – Ghost Safari
5. Total Control – Stonehenge
6. WINT – Dark Matter) We (Endless
7. Iguana Death Cult – Whispers
8. Screaming Females – Glass House
9. Vundabar – No People to Person
10. Liza Anne – Paranoia
11. Big Air – Mr. Mind Control
12. Matias Aguayo & The Desdemonas – Cold Fever
13. Baby Brains – Walk Alone (The Cave Collection)
14. Pye Corner Audio – The Black Mill Video Tape
15. Protomartyr – Here Is The Thing
16. Eddy Current Suppression Ring – Colour Television
17. Silly Pillows – Figment of Your Imagination
18. Stef Chura – Becoming Shadows
19. JACK – Fear Of
20. Eerie Wanda – Happy Hard Times
21. Cave & Lenderson – Friedgeman
22. La Luz – Cicada
23. Snakadaktal – Fall Underneath
24. Institute – Familiar Stranger
25. NOTS – Fluorescent Sunset
26. CLINIC – The Return of Evil Bill
27. Lying Down – Betty and Barney
28. Dr Dog – Listening In
29. Timber Timbre – Creep on Creepin On
30. Good Good Blood – Dinosauria

Spotify:

Playmoss:

Artwork by Liam Doyle, logo by Stolen Chapstick

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In a recent interview with Trevor Elkin over at Gold Flake Paint, Smith revealed his recent issues with depression, and Heart Land marks a shift towards a more honest, transparent brand of songwriting. Despite being made in what Smith describes as “pretty much the lowest time in my life,” the EP is lighter than many previous releases, with opener ‘Never Doubt Us’ the perfect introduction, an instrumental of shifting, shimmering guitar.

‘Shake off the Present’ sees Good Good Blood doing what he does best, taking what’s essentially a folk song and running it through a twenty-first century filter – guitar and floaty atmospherics and crunchy percussion. The lyrics, which deal pretty explicitly with Smith’s recent mental health struggles, bring to mind the style of Strand of Oaks’ Timothy Showalter, self-deprecating in a heart-on-the-sleeve way and propelled by urgent momentum, as though drawing a certain joyous energy from the catharsis of exposing inner thoughts and feelings:

“I been riding around on the subway
feet are turning round and round
feeling like I let my whole family down
but I just cannot seem to shake of the present
worrying about the pas
knowing that my futile future ain’t gonna last”

The title track sways with gentle percussion and buzzing keys, Smith’s vocals a soft croon, before the surprisingly bright ‘I’m So Ugly’, the guitar here like sunlight prismed through water droplets on the morning after a storm. Gathering momentum just beyond the minute mark, the song becomes what can only be described as a mournfully upbeat dream pop jam that defies its own lyrics (“I’m so ugly / you dare not hold me / I know, I know”).

‘Spiralling’ is another track that sounds deceptively buoyant, and a look at the lyrics raises the question as to whether the music is conquering the sadness or merely working to mask it (“here I go / spiralling / out of control / when did this begin? “). There’s also an audio sample of everyone’s favourite misanthrope, Bukowski, who we’ll quote at length because he gets at the kind of awful stasis of contemporary living, where freedom has been contorted into bars of its own and the struggle for identity and meaning is swamped by the well-worn script of adult responsibilities and should-dos:

“Generally speaking, you’re free until you’re about four years old. And then five arrives, then you go to grammar school and then you start becoming demented and solved and orientated and shoved into areas. You lose what individualism you have. If you have enough, of course, you retain some of it. But most don’t have enough so you become watchers of game shows, you know, and things like that.”

The release finishes on a second instrumental track which, despite its wordless nature, somehow rings as true as any of the others. An all-pervading drone rings bright and clear behind picked guitar and barely-there snatches of real life, the clatter of kitchen utensils, the cries of children, but mostly tape hiss and rustling movement. It’s delicate and pretty at first but soon becomes claustrophobic, a tinnitus-ridden paralysis that something like a view of the inside of your own head, life rolling by oblivious, as is its way.

You can get Heart Land now from the Fox Food Records Bandcamp page. All proceeds go to The Samaritans, so give a couple of pounds and everyone’s a winner.

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And, of course, being comprehensive is impossible these days, so let us know if we missed your favourite and maybe we’ll add it to the collection.

Emily Yacina – Nice Try
(RIYL: bedroom pop)

Evening River Band – EP5
(RIYL: country, folk, psych rock)

Ever – But I Am
(RIYL: bedroom pop, dark rooms)

Exam Season – Mostly Homely
(RIYL: indie rock, emo, Trust Fund)

Family Video – Places To Sleep
(RIYL: indie rock, lo-fi, longing)

Field Medic – that beer called becks reminds me of a haiku i wrote
(RIYL: lo-fi, indie pop, modern folk)

Fish Food – For Shadow Hurts
(RIYL: indie pop, lo-fi, weird lyrics)

Folktale Records – Folktale Sampler (COMPILATION)
(RIYL: experimental, folk, indie pop)

Fossil Jane – will you?/you will.
(RIYL: bedroom pop, singer songwriter, )

Free Space – Ahead of Myself
(RIYL: bedroom pop, lo-fi, Trace Mountains)

Generifus – Peace Sign Rising
(RIYL: indie pop, indie rock)

Georgia Maq – Brain Studio Session
(RIYL: acoustic, bedroom pop, Camp Cope)

Ghost Camp – Great Lakes
(RIYL: indie rock, psych pop)

Glider – Demos
(RIYL: lo-fi, psych pop)

GoldFlakePaint – Too Far From Town To Learn
(RIYL: indie pop, lo-fi, Gold Flake Paint)

Good Good Blood – O Belong / Motion Sickness
(RIYL: ambient, dream pop, folk)

Gorgeous Bully – Better Demons
(RIYL: lo-fi, indie rock, fuzz)

Govier – Predator
(RIYL: indie rock, lo-fi, “alien folk”)

High Sunn – i will never learn
(RIYL: chillwave, lo-fi, dream pop)

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