Working in the spirit of what poet Adrienne Rich has labelled “a dream of a common language,” Hot Creek sees Duffy x Uhlmann celebrate and deepen their relationship, again using two guitars and leaning into the instinctive energy which sparks between two trusting musicians. The record takes its title from Hot Creek in Mono County, California, and uses the site as a thematic cornerstone. For just as a geothermal spring is both contained by the land and capable of shaping it, the music of Duffy and Uhlmann seems at once controlled by its creators and somehow controlling them, the act of playing a mutual relationship between the art and the artist where neither emerges quite the same as before. As you might expect, the result has an organic quality very different from the atmosphere on its predecessor. Playing with ideas of change and repetition, climax and understatement.

Ahead of the release this August, Duffy x Uhlmann have shared two tracks, ‘Doing It for Me’ and ‘Public Life’. The former, being the opening track, plays something like an introduction, the dual guitars circling one another as though renewing their familiarity, while ‘Public Life’ finds them closer than ever. An ostensibly restrained, meandering number which nevertheless carries the suggestion of something deeper. A subterranean double of itself lurking underneath.

Hot Creek on the 14th August via Orindal Records and you can pre-order it now.

Album cover art by Christina Huang, photo by Harrison Whitford

The post Duffy x Uhlmann – Hot Creek appeared first on Various Small Flames.

On Reticular McArdle’s vocals are noticeably more delicate and fragile than we’re used to. Well, except for when they’re not. Sometimes they’re barely more than a whisper and others they’re delivered with considerable force. It isn’t as raucous as her usual work, but it’s suffused with a different sort of energy, hushed and restrained but also an exercise in fierce personal expression. This is a great example of what has come to be known as “bedroom pop”, the antithesis of the over-produced, smart-ass music that has become so prevalent, even in the so-called indie scene.

The EP opens with ‘You’re a Disease’, a lonely-sounding acoustic track that seems to explore the end of something. The chorus of “It’s in your blood, so it’s okay if you hate it, but passing it on isn’t my fault, so don’t hate me” ends with a sucker punch of a final line, “Are you scared? Don’t be”. Somehow those five words capture a sense of forgiveness and kindness that elevates the song far beyond the usual break-up fare.

What follows is four more tracks in this vein, including a great cover of Perfume Genius’s ‘Take Me Home’, a track which suits McArdle’s style perfectly. But my current favourite is the final track, ‘Snow’, which for all the melancholy is actually a beam-of-light love song. McArdle sings:

“I’m moving soon and things will get better
while you’re clearing out your room, lamenting the weather.
And it’s been seven years, when you thought you lost me
I’ll stay right here, whatever it costs me
My love for you is endless, make sure to remind me
how I can get through the night”

What I’m getting it is that this is the sound of somebody who’s trying. There is a very real danger when people full of feelings pick up guitars in quiet bedrooms that they make something cynical and (quietly) destructive. But this isn’t like that. If you’ve read Wake the Deaf at all in the past you’ll have probably figured out that most of our favourite music can be applied like a salve. We like sad songs for not completely sad people, songs shot through with hope, something for every single one of us to hold on to. And that’s why I like this little EP so much. How could you not love a record that ends with the words “It’s alright?”

You can get Reticular on a pay-what-you-want basis over at the Alana McArdle Bandcamp page.

The post Alanna McArdle – Reticular appeared first on Various Small Flames.

Tracklisting:

1. On A Good Day (Joanna Newsom Cover) – Jordan Klassen & Brian Chan
2. Storm Windows (John Prine Cover) – Jeffrey Foucault
3. I’m Going Home (Hank Williams Cover) – Teen Suicide
4. You Are the Everything (R.E.M. Cover) – Redbird
5. You and I Are a Gang of Losers (The Dears Cover) – Admiral Fallow
6. Won’t Back Down (Tom Petty Cover) – Benjamin Francis Leftwich
7. I Dreamed I Saw St. Augustine (Bob Dylan Cover) – Dirty Projectors
8. Storms (Fleetwood Mac Cover) – Matt Sweeney & Bonnie Prince Billy
9. It’s Not Happening (Be Good Tanyas Cover) – Lowpines
10. Two Headed Boy (Neutral Milk Hotel) – My Latest Novel
11. Cruel Summer (Bananarama Cover) – Superchunk
12. Southern Girls (Cheap Trick Cover) – Cold Warps
13. Tambourine Man (Bob Dylan Cover) – Cloud Cult
14. Black Cat (Donkeys Cover) – Advance Base
15. Save Yourself (Sharon Van Etten Cover) – Brendan Losch
16. Learning (Perfume Genius Cover) – The Bearcat
17. Wicked Game (Chris Isaak Cover) – Widowspeak
18. John Wayne Gacy Jr. (Sufjan Stevens Cover) – Bryan John Appleby
19. Reason To Believe (Tim Hardin Cover) – Evening Hymns
20. You Are My Sunshine (Oliver Hood Cover) – Peter Broderick

As ever, please please please support the musicians we feature if you enjoy what you hear. The artist names in the tracklisting will take you to a page for each so please explore their music catalogues.

The Covers Mix: Volume #5 from Wake The Deaf on 8tracks Radio.

The post The Covers Mix: Volume #5 appeared first on Various Small Flames.