Tracklisting:

Mike Pace and the Child Actors – Everyone Out of the Car
Miranda Winters – The Futuristic District
Exam Season – Strawberry Milk
Saccharine – Pumpkin Guts
Tuvaband – Wolfpack
Devon Welsh – Dreams Have Pushed You Around
Mending – Alan after the Fire
Reddening West – Even If
Valley Maker – Light on the Ground
The Washboard Abs – Return to You
Manatree – Brushfire
Miserable Chillers – Horse Opera
Saint Charles – She Don’t Wanna Know
new casino – going for a walk*
Frankie Valet – Why Blue
Goodbye Max – Old Photos
Adeline Hotel – Habits
Joe Kaplow – I Said I Was Going and I Went
Pecas – Tuesdays
Sun Kin – Neglect
Baby Cages – flowers
Crooked Spine – Skinned Knees
Lauren O’Connell – Out of Focus
Mount Goldie – Summer
Harvey Trisdale – Baby
american poetry club – the sum of your parts
Babehoven – Out of the Country
Adam Arcuragi – Low Parade Rain
Jason Bemis Lawrence – Southern Midwest
Campdogzz – Sorceress
Barfoot – A Thin Place Between Worlds

* not on Playmoss

The post August 2018 Roundup appeared first on Various Small Flames.

The album begins with ‘Isla Blake’ a song that builds from delicate vocals and reserved guitar to confident drums and a big, spacious final third, all buzzing guitar effects and a sense of decisive direction. It’s the first example of how Mount Goldie is able to deal in both the macro and the micro, switching from slow, poignant introspection to electric indie rock, often in the space of one song.

By comparison the start of ‘Blue Green’ feels wrapped in a murky malaise, periods of negative space between lines and notes charged with feeling. This only serves to make the cathartic finale all the more effective when it ultimately arrives, snarling guitar and rolling percussion puncturing the fog as Snow repeats the mantra-like line “it could be all about me”.

‘Not A Demon’ is an unhurried folk-tinged song that is almost reminiscent of Friendship, while ‘Breathe Baby Breathe’ slows things down even further, and ‘Out in the Streets’ builds with a warm and golden glow. There’s a gentle sort of hope here, the kind exclusive to those that rise at dawn and venture out before the rest of the world, finding a previously absent fondness in the closed curtains and empty streets.

As we described in Bright Sparks, ‘Summer’ is a song perfect for long humid August days. “Building slowly with a sense of weight, the track has sense of stifling summer stillness, a lack of movement that becomes oppressive, as though rising toward some sudden break, though never quite coming to anything.” This is followed by the hushed closing track ‘Spring’, with its patient guitar and murmured vocals, creating an atmosphere insular and enclosed, as if Snow is sitting right next to you in a small and dimly lit room. “You can’t ignore it,” he sings, “the sweet sweet smell of spring.”

All My Friends are Mothers is out now and you can get it on LP or download from the Mount Goldie Bandcamp page.

The post Mount Goldie – All My Friends Are Mothers appeared first on Various Small Flames.

Featuring:

Petal – I’m Sorry
Wild Pink – The Seance On St. Augustine St
Big Thing – Spin
Bombshell Nightlight – Death Day
Mount Goldie – Summer
Elsa Lester – Pretty Bad, Man
Why Bonnie – Gold Rush
Devon Welsh – Vampires
Max García Conover – Another Travelling Man
Floating Room – Dog
Izaak Opatz – Bathing in the Ganges
Free Cake For Every Creature – Around You
Indigo De Souza – Home Team
Museum Food Court – bad song
Crisco Dreams – I Like Your Bed
You’re Sister – I Think About You
Russel the Leaf – Let ‘Em Run
Fresh – Daytime
Stevhen Peters – Phone Talk
Tender Age – Don’t Mind
Lord Youth – Do You Have Anything To Add?
Quiet Hollers – Addicted
Blue J – Hard to Know
Post Moves – The Arc of Life
Angus & Julia Stone – Nothing Else
Gia Margaret – Birthday
Sun June – Discotheque
Campdogzz – Souvenir
Field Report – Every Time

*(Due to various issues of availability and licensing, neither playlist has the complete quota of acts, but welcome to the modern age).

You can find all of the previous instalments of Bright Sparks here, and be sure to check back in a few weeks to see what makes the next edition.

The post July 2018 Roundup appeared first on Various Small Flames.