Their debut full-length, dark/gold, is the one of the latest releases on the ever-reliable Father/Daughter Records, and has all the ideals and heart that you’d expect from a F/D album.
The quartet swap lyrical duties and add vocals in charming four-part harmonies, creating an album that’s equally adept at tender openness and rocking out. ‘Fort Funston’ has a joyride-style indie pop meets crunchy punk rock vibe, telling the story of a break-up, set against a backdrop of the titular Bay Area nature reserve.

“Bury it in the mollusc and moss
to be forgotten in the rocks
let the waves erase
the Milky Way of shattered bones”

There’s a weary and emotionally fragile vibe on ‘Fatigue’, the narrator frustrated by a lack of reciprocation from a loved one. This theme is continued ’19th Ave’. “Loneliness is my worst addiction” go the lyrics, “But I can’t stop checking my phone, I’m so scared of being alone”. The track is about warily beginning a new relationship, of taking that risk in opening up to someone new. But, despite the apprehension and uncertainty, it ends on a positive note, including the line “I’m learning how to allow happiness.”

‘Old Dogs’ seems to flip the situation on its head, the narrator now the one who isn’t returning calls. It’s a neat twist from previous tracks, and one which reminds us that problems in any given situation is rarely the fault of just one person, that this human interaction business can be complicated.

“I’m sorry I can’t express
the feelings that I suppress
I can’t keep making you guess”

‘Domino’ hits that perfect balance between serious songwriting and subtly joyous pop punk. Set in the aftermath of a sudden death, the song sounds strong and resilient despite the pensive tone, the group chorus a bright and heartening peak. Final track ‘Keeping a Record’ smoulders with a tension that builds to a finale which sees all the band members join in with the lines, “I am keeping a record, you gave me”.

The vocal harmonies and shared songwriting, combined with the personal themes and self-reflection, have a curious effect. Whether by intent or accident, it feels like whatever problems and worries are raised are shared across the band, and by extension all of us. Too often music deals with these issues in a raw and lonely way, but SOAR show that it’s possible to be introspective and offer a sense of community at the same time.

dark/gold is out now on cassette via Father/Daughter Records, in November on vinyl via Salinas Records and as a download from the SOAR Bandcamp page.

The post SOAR – dark/gold appeared first on Various Small Flames.

Opener ‘how it feels’ dives right in, the guitars squealing and shredding in carefree triumph. But Jenna Marx’s vocals hold an uncertain edge and bring a depth to things, the emotional texture that puts Joyride! ahead of many bands who try to carve a similar niche. Half Moon Bay deals mainly in pensive reflections on relationships and how they alter with the passing of time. It’s punk pop without the brash sneering, the perfect centre of a Venn diagram between fun rock ‘n roll and reflective bedroom pop. “How it feels is like a steady build / or a subtle loss that you won’t notice ’til your sense of self is gone” Marx sings, “do you feel anything when you look at me after all these years?”

The vocals push through a squall of guitar and crashing percussion on ‘for good’, before the bounding 90 seconds that are ‘hold that thought’ which, in a just universe, would become a car stereo singalong hit.

Another of my favourites is ‘running on empty’, which opens with big crunchy guitars that wouldn’t be out of place on a Japandroids record and the great opening lines “Young and running on empty / you said that you thought I looked pretty with my makeup on / so I went home and I took it off”. The song goes on to talk about how some things remain, sometimes turning stale and sometimes not.

“And he said I don’t wanna grow up
because I don’t wanna grow apart
so we’re just gonna keep showing up
save face from another change of heart”

‘rumors’ comes tearing in from nowhere, before the frenetic energy of ‘bargain barn’ which feels like the breathless (and somehow slightly sad) escape after stealing a sweater, ending with the line “I don’t know why I’m so sentimental”. There are a couple more rockers before the album ends on a reflective note with ‘how to tell her’.  ‘girls who wanna realize themselves’ has a rich and fuzzy melody, while ‘boardwalk’ has a mid-tempo 90s alt-rock dynamic, complete with screeching guitar and pounding drums. The aforementioned closer has shades of the stripped-back, frankly honest indie rock of Family Video. It’s a fitting end to what’s a really great album and, after all the thoughts and doubts throughout, leaves the listener with a calm sense of wistful acceptance.

“I’m still mad that we all wound up here
with the same distorted view
I was hoping that one of us would’ve made it out
but we’re still wading through
a waist-deep water, cannon fodder
I know that I’m my mother’s daughter”

You can get Half Moon Bay on vinyl from Salinas Records, cassette from Stupid Bag Records, or as a name-your-price download from the Joyride! Bandcamp page.

The post Joyride! – Half Moon Bay appeared first on Various Small Flames.

Radiator Hospital is Sam Cook-Parrott and friends (friends with indie rock pedigree – including members of Waxahatchee, All Dogs and Swearin’), who join together to form a pretty formidable lo-fi rock band.

There are fifteen songs on this album, with not one deserving to have been left out, and the band smash through them in under 35 minutes. Opener ‘Leather and Lace’ sets the tone, with a hectic beginning sweeping you off your feet before you know what has hit you, and this continues through to ‘Blue Gown’, with the space for breath between songs small but welcome.

But this isn’t one of those quick albums that attempts to make you dizzy and smash your eardrums and little else. By ‘Cut Your Bangs’ you realise that there is something sad and sincere in the lyrics, forcing you back to the start to reconsider the opening pair. Once this moment of realisation has occurred, Torch Song spreads its wings into its true form, a mishmash of pop and punk and poetry. Sincerity and honesty set this aside from the usual ‘Let’s Fuck Shit Up’ garage rock bands, and allows Radiator Hospital to achieve something with much greater nuance and depth (while still having fun).

The lyrics are displayed as prose on the Bandcamp page and reading them really helps the narrative of Torch Song to stand out. A tale of love punctuated with joy and regret and depression, the story is highly detailed yet curiously vague, with names and genders left unclear, leaving a You and a Me and the feelings that You and Me always seem to share. The result is something which feels highly personal but could be applied to anyone. It’s highly personal for everybody.

“We walked further than I thought we would. You looked at me like I was your way out, I looked at you, thought I’d never stop lookin’.”

The Torch Song LP is out now on Salinas Records. Order it here!

The post Radiator Hospital – Torch Song appeared first on Various Small Flames.

The real triumph of Bodies of Water is the way in which Joyride! are able to marry their infectious hooks and DIY punk energy with lyrics that have an honest tenderness, more akin to something you’d expect from a bedroom pop act than a rock band. There are awkward tales of young love and anxious innocent yearning. Listening to the lyrics feels like reading the poetic scrawls in the margins of Marx’s diary. With lines such as:

“you’ve got a big heart but they say it doesn’t work well. i’m not that surprised” on ‘earthquake’, and:

“We might not say much but we still like to talk”, on ‘small talk’.

My current favourite track is ‘all the experts say’, which is all fuzzy distorted guitars as Marx sings sweetly of past hopes and current compromises. Then, in the last third, drums kick in and Marx delivers the repeated refrain of, “how to sit still, how to stand straight, how to move on from a southern state.”

Bodies of Water is out now on cassette via Lauren Records, order it here. It is also being released on vinyl by Salinas Records. The release date is the 18th of September and you can pre-order it here. Finally, you can also download it for as much as you’d like via the Joyride! Bandcamp page.

The post Joyride! – Bodies of Water appeared first on Various Small Flames.