This month saw the release of sleeping giant, a brand new kissed her little sister album which continues this development in a way more sincere and personal than ever. “‘Sleeping giant’ is a phrase meaning someone or something yielding a great power that remains hidden,” Morisano explains. “It’s also the name of a mountain—near where I’m from—that looks like a giant at rest. When my son was born in 2018, he spent 100 days in the neonatal intensive care unit and we could see that mountain from the window of his hospital room. One day, in that room, with my sleeping baby, a song came to me.”

The song was ‘american boy’, the record’s opening track. Situated within the amplified experience of the moment, the song is saturated with feeling, conjuring not just the hospital room but the intricate headspace inside which Morisano experienced it. A breathless sound bursting with energy, with the sensation of not only being alive but being connected to the life all around.

lost in the screen in this world of machines
i am scrolling through memories of analogue dreams
hacked in the mainframe the main part of my brain
where all things converge from the world
look to the giant, the sleeping goliath
with beeping incessantly sounding away
fucked up my shoulder from pushing this boulder
i’ll return to light up the day

From here, sleeping giant barely lets up. The juxtaposition of darkness and light on ‘lord’ is typical of the record, as is the soaring and often mystical energy of ‘slept on’. But there is overt darkness too. ‘way to go’ offers a claustrophobic picture of distress, while ‘hypnotize’ is heartsick and bitter and ‘bubble up’ encapsulates the everything-is-different-yet-nothing-has-changed nature of early fatherhood. But true to the kissed her little sister style, the sheer energy wins out. An irrepressible desire to shake free from one’s troubles, to communicate heart to heart in a kind of ritual. In doing so, sleeping giant invites the listener to join in. “The music is for me and my son,” Morisano concludes, “whose great power continues to reveal itself. But it’s also for anyone in search of some unknown power, or at least some pop music that can be played at high volume.”

sleeping giant is out now and available on a ‘name your price’ basis from the kissed her little sister Bandcamp page.

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I Am Planet – Silene stenophylla

(RIYL: piano, soundtrack, minimalist)

Indian Bummer – bummer wars

(RIYL: bedroom pop, indie pop, DIY)

i tried to run away when i was six (but got too scared to cross the street) – Garbage / It’s So Nice

(RIYL: singer-songwriter, indie rock, lo-fi, sad)

Ikea Graveyard – Stray

(RIYL: acoustic, bedroom pop, a lo-fi Cold Specks)

Jacob Faurholt – Corners

(RIYL: indie rock, alternative, BOAT)

Japanese Breakfast – American Sound

(RIYL: bedroom pop, dream pop, Little Big League)

Jim Lawrie – Just Like Normal / Midnight Run

(RIYL: indie rock, country, The Rosebuds)

John Galm – Sky of No Stars

(RIYL: bleak folk, Low, a slow motion Mountain Goats)

Kerry – Away

(RIYL: electronic)

Kissed Her Little Sister – Mbube

(RIYL: indie pop, experimental, hip hop, reggae)

Kissing Fractures – Lost Self (you have to email to get this free)

(RIYL: acoustic, bedroom pop, poetry)

Kississippi – I Can Feel You In My Hair Still

(RIYL: bedroom pop, lo-fi, sad)

Klondike – AFRICA to MIDI

(RIYL: electronic, experimental, hi-tech tribal rythms)

KOOL A.D. – WORD O.K.

(RIYL: jazz, hip hop, Das Racist)

Laurence – It’s Real

(RIYL: dream pop, ambient, Youth Lagoon)

Lesjovka & Freund – Mold on Canvas

(RIYL: ambient, classical, sad movie soundtracks, Trouble Books)

Ligaments / Squanto – Split

(RIYL: electronic, drone, ambient)

Lost Film – Demo

(RIYL: dream pop, jangle, Orca Orca, The Smiths)

Mallory – To The Hollow Night (the band ask for donations to the people of Gaza)

(RIYL: folk, Spencer Krug, Wake Owl)

Mark Barrage – Surplus Behaviour

(RIYL: electronic, experimental, samples)

Matthew Lee Cothran and Delaney Mills – Failure II

(RIYL: bedroom pop, electronic folk, Coma Cinema)

The Meanest Creature Ever Known – You, Having Fun

(RIYL: slowcore, quiet, sad, Scottish, Meursault)

Mermaidens – O

(RIYL: dream pop, indie rock, psych)

Missing Organs – Undiscovered

(RIYL: experimental, drone, dreams)

Molly Dancer – Ripstick Can’t Jump

(RIYL: bedroom pop, odd power pop, lo-fi)

mooncreatures – Gaslamps / Sand Maps

(RIYL: shoegaze, lo-fi, ambient, cinematic soundscapes)

Movies – Horror Movies

(RIYL: bedroom pop, experimental, Los Campesinos, Arrange)

Favourite Free Music of 2014 (I-M) from Wake The Deaf on 8tracks Radio.

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Tracklist:

1. Trying To Walk – Kissed Her Little Sister
2. Kickar Grus – Johan Hedberg
3. Harvey – Alex G
4. I Kept Your Teeth in a Jar By My Bed – Gorgeous Bully
5. Hypochondriac – Diveliner
6. Hallow – Cloud Boat
7. Hunting – Dearest
8. Rain, Windows – Sad Souls
9. Weeding Riverbanks (Excerpt) – The Volume Settings Folder & Tanner Garza
10. Side A (Excerpt) – Wes Tirey
11. Elevator Song – Keaton Henson
12. Y.O.Y.O. – Thom Byles
13. Accept That the Mark Will Outlast You – Old Earth
14. Dog – Jeremiah Nelson
15. PRPL – Ava Luna
16. Wire Frame Mattress – The Wytches
17. Post Holiday Dead Song – Tyrannosaurus Dead
18. Shut In – Strand Of Oaks
19. Pocket Knife – Liam Betson
20. Jean Moulin – VTCN RADIO
21. Temporary View (feat. Sampha) – SBTRKT
22. Yogyakarta – Derek Piotr
23. Can’t Do Without You – Caribou
24. Days With You (feat Sinead Harnett) – Snakehips

If you missed them, we have such mixes for January, February, March, April and May too.

June Mix from Wake The Deaf on 8tracks Radio.

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Mbube is a strange mix of indie pop, hip hop and reggae. Opening track ‘miracle of birth’ is odd and slightly unsettling, all desperation and claustrophobic paranoia. It signals a real departure from the primarily jaunty indie pop of 2012’s Sailor (perhaps closer in sound to KHLS’s debut album high & low). The second track, ‘connected to my body’, is far more easygoing, with a lilting reggae vibe, a vibe which continues into the following tracks. ‘trying to walk’ is a good example of how Morisano’s three-pronged attack of weird/sad/feel-good is so effective, with the lyrics that are strange and unclear and could mean a number of things:

“i walk in the woods and i walk to the water lord
i wash my feet in the water lord
i wash my body in the water lord
i wash my head in the water lord

trying to wash this away
been trying to walk.”

The strangeness continues on ‘I’m feeling high’, which ends with clip from a videotape created by the leader of the infamous Heaven’s Gate UFO religion-cum-mass-suicide tragedy. Things change direction again with ‘mbube baobab,’ an instrumental track that sounds like a hip hop remix of a video game soundtrack, and the final two tracks which lean towards the indie pop side of things, giving the album a sunny and catchy finale.

Morisano is an experimentalist, someone who does his own thing (or, more accurately, his own 50 things). He isn’t afraid to chop and change, to mess with sounds and atmospheres. He uses a whole host of instruments, vocal samples and loops, and in the wrong hands this could prove a recipe for disaster. Luckily for us, Morisano proves himself more than capable, turning the numerous building blocks into something moreish, a joyously weird trip into the recesses of his brain.

Get Mbube right now on a pay-what-you-want basis over at Bandcamp.

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Earth Person – Summer Recordings

(RIYL – Experimental, New Age Ideologies, Peace)

Eat Your Birthday Cake – For Alex (Single)

(RIYL – Indie Rock, Friendship, The Eels)

Eef Barzelay – Songs We Made: Part One

(RIYL – Clem Snide, Will Johnson, John Vanderslice)

Elvis Depressedly – Mickey’s Dead

(RIYL – Bedroom Pop, Coma Cinema, The ill will of the world)

Flight Tonight – Flight Tonight

(RIYL – Post-Dubstep, R&B, Mount Kimbie, Jamie XX)

Fog Lake – inference (iii)

(RIYL – Bedroom Pop, Coma Cinema, Youth Lagoon)

Ghibli – Rare Pleasures

(RIYL – Experimental, Dance, Samples)

Gorgeous Bully – The Young Obese

(RIYL – DIY Rock, Fluffy Lumbers, ARMS)

GSJF –MONDAYMARCH26TH2012

(RIYL – Graham Wright,Spencer MacEachren and the Fabulous Yawn, Travelling Willburys)

Hanetration – Tenth Oar EP / Torn Heat EP

(RIYL – Ambient, Electronic, Drone, IDM)

Hazy Memories – Out Of Place EP

(RIYL – Hip Hop, Electronic, Ambient, Spoken Word)

High Pop – Hip Hip Hooray

(RIYL – Garage Rock, fuzz, Wavves)

Ice Dragon – Dream Dragon

(RIYL – Psychedelic, Doom, Rock).

Jacob Augustine – Bikini Island

(RIYL – David Bazan, Shearwater, Bon Iver)

Jake Klar – Jake Klar

(RIYL – Bob Dylan, Joe Pug, Tallest Man On Earth)

Jeannot – Turner Street EP

(RIYL – Folk, young summers, nostalgia)

Jonny Kates – Groombridge

(RIYL – Ambient, drone, Tim Hecker, Loscil)

Kissed Her Little Sister – Sailor

(RIYL – Lo-Fi, Indie pop, Throw Me The Statue, ARMS, Why?)

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It sort of sounds like as if Owen Ashworth and Yoni Wolf sat down with some indie rock bands (for some reason Arms kept coming to mind as I listen to this album, I think due to the vocals on Catfish, the 9+ minute closer), decided to make an album of ragged campfire songs and then hired a group of carefree teenagers to sing along (I mean this in an entirely positive way). In this mish mash of sounds and influences lies most of Sailor’s appeal. It’s eclectic and it’s fun and it’s catchy, but it also isn’t afraid to experiment. The collision of genres could easily grate, but this doesn’t. It remains fresh and endearing after repeated listens and still sounds as good today (maybe due to the fact the sun is finally shining here in the UK) as it did when I first listened almost a month ago. The best news of all is that the album is completely free from the band’s Bandcamp page.

NOTE – Kissed Her Little Sister’s first album is also available for free from Bandcamp. I’d thoroughly recommend you check that out while you’re downloading Sailor. It even features a sneaky sample of the Inspector Gadget theme tune.

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