Lead single ‘I Needed You’ started life as “a sad little break-up waltz” as Edens puts it, but input from collaborators Pat Keen, Shane Leonard and Dex Wolfe lifted the track into something richer and more nuanced. A meditation on the strangeness of an aftermath, when nothing is as it used to feel and anger and longing are impossible split. “It’s about trying to discover and center your own needs when sometimes it’s easier to lie to yourself and ignore them,” Edens explains. “It’s about perhaps not even knowing what you need and being okay with that.” The result is an ambiguous space between the past and the future. A place where nothing is solid, and is therefore both terrifying and thrilling all at once.

Wasn’t kind of you, wasn’t always true when
I needed you
How cruel to be, this kind of free when
I needed you

Photo by Elizabeth Ibarra

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This summer sees the release of Cells Remain, a brand new full-length Pat Keen record. With help from Adelyn Strei, John McCowen, Shane Leonard, and Brian Joseph, Keen weaves a complex web of arrangements, but the experimentation is devoid of pomposity or pretension. Instead, the elaborate soundscapes are an attempt at something far more organic and intimate. An inner life, and the other lives which orbit around it.

Lead single ‘Cell Song’ gives an indication of what is to come. With a gentle yet intricate sound built from dappled drums and hummed harmonies, the track has a compassionate atmosphere that proves enveloping. And this is very much in keeping with the themes of the track and the album more generally. The idea of digging beyond surface appearances and emotions, of contemplating the full depth of every person and circumstance with an eye to empathy and understanding.

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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.

Esther Rose – Don’t Blame It on the Moon

Based in New Orleans, Esther Rose is a singer-songwriter whose work continues the long and storied tradition of American folk. Rose’s latest single ‘Don’t Blame It on the Moon’, her first new music since 2017’s debut album This Time Last Night, is a wonderfully simple but bitingly honest folk song, a dialogue between two lovers that has all the barely restrained heartbreak of the country greats.

“I hope you’re worth all this heartache”
She said / outside the bar at 2 A.M.
She said, “All this pain is gonna break us down, I can’t take it”
She said, “Don’t make me cry, I’ve got my makeup on
and I haven’t had a drink in so long

Blood Cultures – Flowers For All Occasions

Blood Cultures is a cryptic “individual (or group of individuals)” from New Jersey that make a compelling brand of psych-pop while masking their identities with balaclavas. The inspiration came from a mass hijacking of local television broadcasts in 1990s NJ, the usual programming replaced by mysterious sounds and images by an anonymous infiltrator. Blood Cultures position themselves as the second coming of this unexplained phenomenon, a faceless, nameless entity looking to worm its way into your homes and minds, perhaps hoping to leave an impression on a new generation so that esoteric message might live on.

You can find Blood Cultures on Bandcamp and Youtube.

The Painters – Pieces of Life

Montreal indie pop band The Painters, led by Alex Bourque, have a new album on the way on Egg Paper Factory. This is good news in itself, but what’s even better is that the band have released an outtake from the record to raise anticipation a little. ‘Pieces of Life’ sees the band, led by Alex Bourque, continue with their bright and nostalgic indie pop aesthetic that we last heard on 2016’s Specks of Dust. There are shades of Velvet Underground and Nap Eyes in the laid-back vibes and pseudo-philosophical musings, but with more of a lo-fi folk angle, right down to the withering birdsong at the end.

Why do I need everybody to like me?
If I’d rather be alone

Craig Finn – Something To Hope For

Following on from 2017’s We All Want the Same Things, Craig Finn is set to release his third solo album this spring. I Need a New War continues Finn’s brilliant and humane songwriting while adding further dimensions and textures through a larger instrumental palette, leading to what might be his richest, most atmospheric release to date. This is displayed in latest single ‘Something To Hope For’, the light, almost celebratory tone balanced against Finn’s distinctive sing-speak delivery.

The only kind of dreams you ever seem to have
are bad dreams

I Need A New War is out via Partisan Records on the 26th April and you can pre-order it now.

Pieket – Eternal Recurrence

Pieket are a band from Dhaka in Bangladesh. Sinjan Saadat, Syed Wadud, Hasib Mahmud and Rushnaf Wadud combine to create lo-fi indie pop in the fashion of Mac DeMarco. Their latest EP, Powerpoint Depresentation, is out now, and opening track ‘Eternal Recurrence’ acts as a good introduction. The song begins with a ruminative intro, eventually giving way to languid percussion and slacker-inspired vocals, bright guitar lifting everything out of bummed-out bedroom pop territory.

Emily Fairlight – Body Below

Emily Fairlight is a folk singer who lives in Dunedin, New Zealand. Fairlight makes self-described “doom folk,” which has earned comparisons with PJ Harvey (for the vocals), Will Oldham (for the writing) and Calexico (for the conjured atmosphere). Her new album, Mother of Gloom, was recorded in Austin, Texas, adding a Southern Gothic edge to the collection of rich and emotive folk songs. The album’s first track, ‘Body Below’ delves straight into weighty emotion, the label describing Fairlight’s voice as “stark and haunting […] teak-hard yet soft as crushed velvet” in some indication of the juxtaposition of power and vulnerability on display. If this is anything to go by, Emily Fairlight is about to follow the likes of Nadia Reid and Aldous Harding as the next breakout New Zealand folk artist.

Barrie – Saturated

Brooklyn’s Barrie might revolve around the work of lead Barrie Lindsay, though it’s anything but a solo project. Drawing on the talents of Dominic Apa, Spurge Carter, Sabine Holler and Noah Prebish, Barrie has recorded Happy To Be Here, an album that celebrates collaboration and inclusivity to become something larger than the sum of its parts. New single ‘Saturated’ is as good a place as any to dive into the band’s silky pop sound, with the track standing out as pure even to the band themselves. “It came out fully formed, sounding mostly like how it sounds now,” explained Lindsay. “It’s minimal and exposed, kind of vulnerable but in a confident way. I want people to relate to that state of pure, open saturation. I want this song to feel like a crush.”

Happy To Be Here will be released on the 3rd May via Winspear and you can pre-order it now.

Shane Leonard – Empire Builder

Shane Leonard is a name that pops up periodically here at Various Small Flames, with his work as Kalispell and appearances on records from the likes of Field Report and Jeremy Squires, (not to mention helping to record and produce music with Simon Balto and Anna Tivel). However, Leonard also records solo under his own name, and 2019 will see the release of a brand new album, Strange Forms.

Giving a taste of what’s to come, lead single ‘Empire Builder’ is a bright amalgamation of folk and rock, the calm energy of the song complementing Leonard’s quiet philosophising. The lyrics are balanced between confusion and peace, the unanswered and unanswerable questions of life framed not as sources of crippling doubt but mysteries to acknowledge and appreciate from outside.

Gold Light + Snakemusk – The Heart Is A Lonely Hunter

Meeting in Asheville in 2017, Joe Chang (aka Gold Light) and Beau Campolong (Snakemusk) found they shared an appreciation of the tragic heartbreak of classic country records and started making music together. Full-length album Shadows In The Shallows is the result of the collaboration, channelling the big players in folk and country to create a traditional Americana fit for the twenty-first century. Lead single ‘The Heart Is A Lonely Hunter’ is the perfect example, a narrative-driven, lovelorn track with an almost otherworldly edge, 70s folk coloured by the strangeness of Carson McCullers’ South Gothic style.

Cus the heart is a lonely hunter it seems
But your heart will miss it’s mark if it comes after me
Like a dog gone and barked up the wrong tree
Cus the heart’s gonna go wherever it please

The Chats – Pub Feed

The premiere practitioners of in-your-face, off-the-wall punk, The Chats burst onto our radar in 2017 with the raucous tongue-in-cheek EP, Get This In Ya. After a year of growing success, the Aussie trio are back with a brand new single, ‘Pub Feed’, and it’s a pleasure to report that the growing recognition has done nothing to dampen their forthright, absurd style. As the title suggests, the song finds the band hungry in a pub chain and slavering over the options. Whether it’s beef and gravy, chips and tomato sauce, chicken schnitty or parmigiana, it doesn’t really matter. Only one thing is important:

All I want, and all I need
All I crave is a good pub feed.

The track comes complete with a video directed by Matt Weston and shot by Ben Blenner, with
camera assistance from Wilson Bambrick.

The Pub Feed “7 is out now and you can get it from The Chats webpage.

JW Ridley – Homesick (Out The Blue)

JW Ridley has been steadily building a collection of songs demonstrating his incisive, emotionally-resonant sound, and latest single ‘Homesick (Out The Blue)’ is no exception. Blending the woozy melancholy of Radiohead with an insistent energy more akin to post-punk, the song is something of a juxtaposition, the momentum of the sound masking something altogether more drifting in the sentiment of lyrics. Indeed, such a contrast could be said to be a key theme of the track. “It’s about the things we hold on to,” Ridley explains, “or the things that never really leave us.”

‘Homesick’ is out now via Handsome Dad Records.

Ruthie – Spirit Now Moves

Ruthie is the new recording project of Naomi Baguley, who you might know as the former front of cult punk outfit, Bruising. Taking a new direction, Ruthie now peddles an altogether more luscious sound, taking equals parts folk and indie rock and crafting a 70s-inspired middle ground. Inspired by David Szalay’s novel All That Man Is, new single ‘Spirit Moves Now’ not only highlights Ruthie honeyed style but also the considered approached to songwriting that underpins it, Baguley creating an admirable thematic and emotional depth.

Check out a video from Kamil Dymek below:

You can find all relevant links on the Ruthie website, and listen to more on Spotify and Soundcloud.

The Curfews – Rose

The Curfews are a fuzz pop band who have recently relocated from the Upper Peninsula of Michigan to Santa Cruz, California. Their latest single ‘Rose’ shows off their style very nicely, the hazy style distorting an otherwise upbeat sound and giving the whole thing a carefree edge, a kind of loose-limbed stride forwards irrespective of whatever might be weighing you down.

Blush – Forever Is a Long Time

The recording project of Maura M. Lynch, along with Jonathan Campolo (drums, piano, vocals), Nicholas Campolo (guitar) and Andrew Chugg (bass, synth), New York’s Blush makes an intimate brand of bedroom pop that hinges about Lynch’s restrained vocal style and the warm instrumental arrangements. Following on from 2017’s self-titled debut album, Blush is back with a brand new single, ‘Forever is a Long Time’, taking the soft earnestness of Free Cake For Every Creature and adding something a little more pressing so as to exist halfway between bedroom pop and garage rock.

Shutups – Yellowjacket

Oakland-based duo Shutups is a band based on a connection deeper than most. After being college friends, life and geography separated Mia and Hadley, but after an accident left Hadley housebound, the bond persevered and grew. Shutups became the mechanism with which to realign life, a reason to continue despite difficulty. “It didn’t feel like a happy ending movie plot,” Hadley says of his eventual re-emergence into the world. “I came out depressed and not wanting to do anything. The band saved me.”

Four EPs later, the band have honed their angular pop punk style for a debut full-length, Every Day I’m Less Zen. Lead single ‘Yellowjacket’ serves as an introduction, it’s urgent and off-kilter style creating a frantic abandon that lifts the act above its peers, the pair’s obvious connection allowing a tight-knit yet idiosyncratic sound. Check out the video shot edited by Braith Miller below:

Head to Bandcamp for more from Shutups.

The post Bright Sparks: Vol 23 appeared first on Various Small Flames.

Simon was kind enough to answer some of our questions about the album’s conception, its themes of love and loss in the Midwest and his day job as a college professor. I think you’ll agree that his responses are excellent.

Hi Simon, thanks for speaking with us. How is life now that your new album Murmurations is out in the world?

Hi Liam. Great talking to you. Life’s great, both related to and beyond the record itself. But it does feel good to have it out in the world. It was a long time gestating, and I’m an embarrassingly and foolishly impatient person when it comes to the creative process. I was patient here, and it paid off. But I’m glad that the wait is over.

You now live in Indianapolis but returned to WI to record the album. When listening to the album I get the feeling that this was necessary, that you needed to return home to capture a certain atmosphere during the recording. Is this a romantic idea on my part, or is there an element of truth in it?

It’s actually kind of both. We started the first sessions recording the record as I was in the process of moving to Indianapolis. I still technically had an address in Wisconsin, but everything that was there was in flux and, quite literally, in boxes. I didn’t necessarily “return” to Wisconsin to record, but I did make a conscious choice to do the recording before I left.

This was both pragmatic and romantic. On the one hand, the people that I really wanted to work with on the record were mostly based in Eau Claire, WI, or could easily get there. We recorded at Shane Leonard’s (Kalispell, Field Report) home studio. Shane played percussion, additional guitars, banjo, and other instruments on the record, in addition to engineering and co-producing it. Ben Lester lives literally a couple blocks down the street from Shane, and Ben’s one of my favorite pedal steel players. His stuff with everyone from The Tallest Man on Earth to Aero Flynn to S. Carey is just such a great example of the instrument’s beauty. Steve Hobert, who played keys and accordion, lives about 90 minutes away in Minneapolis/St. Paul, and Kevin Rowe, who played bass, is in Madison, WI, which is a few hours from Eau Claire. Those were the central players on the record, so it made sense to try to do the recording in a place that they could easily access.

But my connection to Wisconsin is also very intimate and very deep. I literally have the state outline tattooed on my arm. And as I’ve gotten older, its pull on me has only gotten stronger. A lot of the songs are written with Wisconsin landscapes in mind, and I couldn’t imagine having recorded it outside of Wisconsin.

The album is a full-band effort, which is a stark departure from your debut, The Roads That Make Men Weary. How does the recording process differ when working with a band? Did you set out to make a full-band album from the start? Or did you write the songs alone and build them up from there?

In a lot of ways, the experience was totally different. I wanted to make a full band record; I knew that much right away. I also knew that I wanted to work with Shane on it – I love the work he does as a player and writer, and thought that he’d be able to build the sonic landscapes with me in ways that would enrich the sound without losing the songs’ core saliencies. I still started off the process in the same way as I did with Roads, though. Even though I wanted a full-band record, I wanted to write the guitar and lyrical frameworks for the songs on my own before bringing them to Shane and, eventually, the band.

It was a really welcome departure from Roads, honestly. I’m proud of that record, but in a lot of ways it very much reflects a writing stage that I think I’ve grown out of. The recording process for Roads was a lot of fun, with a friend of mine and I holing up in a cabin in Wisconsin for a few days and him recording me on a pretty minimalist setup. But at the end of the day, it was essentially just me that was laid out on the tracks. I really enjoyed watching the songs grow and gather legs and lungs and breathe as Shane, Steve, Ben, Kevin, Amanda, and Margaret got their hands in the dough.

The state of Wisconsin, and the Midwest in general, is a major theme on the album. What does Wisconsin mean to you? What are the main issues that people there deal with, and what do you think about when you think about home?

Oh, man. This could be a book. You’re right. It is a major theme. It might in fact be the major theme.

For me, the Midwest, and Wisconsin in particular, has a supremely calming effect. Part of that I suppose is just a matter of comfort, since I’ve lived in Wisconsin for about 90% of my life and in the Midwest for all of it. But it’s deeper than simple familiarity, I think. I come from the southwest corner of Wisconsin, which is very, very hilly and very rural. It’s gorgeous – like, stunning in its natural beauty. And the particular plot of land on which I grew up was at the dead end of a mile-long road in the bottom of a valley, where the closest neighbor was at least a fifteen-minute walk away. When I was a kid, I hated the isolation, but it had the effect of really priming me to the rhythms of the seasons, the power of nature, and the beauty of physical and auditory spaces that don’t have much of a human footprint.

So now, fast forward to me at 33, I still think in similar ways about nature, and there’s no place that puts a grip on me in this way more than the Midwest. I’ve traveled all over the U.S. and seen many beautiful natural spaces. But for me, nothing compares to that little isolated pocket of Wisconsin. We’re about to hit autumn here, and I wish you could see it. Words can’t do it justice.

Finally, I’d just say that the Midwest is important to me because of the kinship I feel with so many of the people here. A mentor and friend of mine who grew up near me, but was about twenty years older, passed away on New Years this year. But one comment he made that will stick with me: we were drinking beers at a bar in Wisconsin after a cross-country trip he’d made scouting bluegrass bands for a festival he curated. I asked how it had been, and he said that it was good, but that he preferred to be home. I asked how come. He mentioned the beauty that I talked about a minute ago. But he also said, simply, “the people here aren’t assholes.” I know there are plenty of people elsewhere in the States who aren’t assholes; I’m privileged to know a great many of them. But at least in Wisconsin, I think there are fewer of them per capita than there are elsewhere.

Another prominent image is one of the murmuration. What is it about starlings that made you want to name an album after them?

The visual effect of watching starlings in murmuration is, to me, one of the most awe-inspiring in nature. I absolutely love it and am totally confounded by it. One day I started sketching the song that became the title track (“I hope your heart breaks into starlings when it’s time for you to go”), and knew that Murmurations was going to the record title.

But perhaps the strongest thread of all is that of loss, be it in terms of the death of a loved one or a traditional way of life. Is the sense of loss in your music based on personal experience or are they works of fiction? And do you ever think about the positive effect your music could have on people going through such issues?

I get variations of the question “why are your songs so sad” a lot. Before the record came out, I jokingly told a friend of mine that she’d be pleasantly surprised because there were at least two songs on it that were not discernibly sad.

The irony is that I’m actually a really happy person for the most part, but I think loss is such a universal human experience that it’s worth spending time thinking about and writing about. I don’t generally write about my own experiences, and if I do, it’s usually in fairly opaque ways. The songs about loss that are really lyrically specific (‘Midwest Elegy’ and ‘Ohio,’ in particular) are far more observational than personal. As much as I love where I come from, it’s a place that’s seen a lot of people struggle in the post-industrial age, and I wanted to try to capture the experiences of people trying to cope with the loss of a way of life. A few others (‘Dark Burns,’ ‘Revelation Road’) have more elements of my own life in there; ‘Dark Burns’ draws some from the experience of losing my mom, while ‘Revelation Road’ comes in part from the death of a friend in a car accident two winters ago. For the most part, though, even though I’m a very specific lyricist, I try to universalize experiences rather than just talking about my own. The pool from which you can draw as a writer gets so much more expansive and interesting if you start putting yourself in other people’s shoes.

As to your final question, I’m not sure if I ever put a lot of thought into my music helping people work through things. But at least in some measure, it seems to have had that effect on some people. When I first debuted ‘Midwest Elegy’ in a live session on Wisconsin Public Radio, my email inbox got blown up by people talking about how it related to things they were dealing with. When I was out on tour playing ‘Dark Burns’ last month, a number of people came up afterward for a hug and to talk about their own experience losing a parent. Those are the experiences that really make touring worth it.

This isn’t strictly about your music, but I read online that you have a doctoral degree and teach history at a university in Indiana. Do you have a specific area of interest? And what effect do your intellectual pursuits have on your music?

Ha! A newspaper in Madison, Wisconsin previewed my show there this summer by calling me something like “a Ryan Adams-esque vocalist who also happens to be a college professor,” which made me laugh. But yes, it’s true. I generally try to keep those worlds separate; and mostly only tour in the summer as a result.

I teach history, and specialize in African American History. Honestly, the biggest way that it comes to bear on my music is that being a history professor is a job that requires you to read A LOT. And I think that the more you read, the more you refine your own skills as a wordsmith and lyricist. I know that I feel exponentially more primed to write if I’ve been reading a good book – even a good history book – before I sit down to write. And when I think about some other great lyricists of my generation – folks like Chris Porterfield of Field Report, Justin Kinkel-Schuster of Water Liars, Amanda Shires – one of the things that we have in common is a passion for books and good wordsmithing. I’m not saying I wouldn’t read as much if I didn’t teach history; but it certainly forces me to do so and pays dividends musically as a result.

Finally, could you name 4/5 artists that you’ve been listening to recently? They can be brand new or golden oldies, whatever you’re into.

Great question. My listening tastes are all over the map, but I’ll give it a crack. Probably the most-anticipated album of this year for me is Hiss Golden Messenger’s one, due out next month. Mike Taylor is hands-down one of my favorite writers, and the band he’s assembled around him is just right in my wheelhouse. There’s a rapper out of Chicago named Noname, and her new mixtape Telefone might be my favorite record of the year so far. Its closest competition is the new Mount Moriah record, which is essentially perfect. I’m also completely in love with the new record Cartoon Moon by my friends Dead Horses, who do pretty much perfect Americana. And finally, for the traditional crowd, Bruce Molsky’s new project Molsky’s Mountain Drifters is just fantastic fiddle tunes and traditional folk.

Wow. That’s six, and I didn’t even mention my Springsteen and Kendrick Lamar obsessions. I guess I’ll stop there*.

*Simon has since emailed to let us know that Bon Iver’s 22, A Million is (and I quote) “blowing my mind”.

Murmurations is out now and you can get it from the Simon Balto Bandcamp page.

The post Interview: Simon Balto appeared first on Various Small Flames.

The first thing to mention is that Squires is a super talented (and self taught!) musician, here playing guitar, banjo, piano and resonator guitar, as well as providing the large majority of the vocals (which are just perfect, by the way). He recorded, mixed and produced the whole thing on his own, which lends well to the personal atmosphere of the record. He also gets some help from a few friends, namely Anna-Lynne Williams (of Lotte Kestner/Trespassers William fame) and Shane Leonard of Kalispell and Field Report. All of this comes together to create an album of sparse, melancholy Americana reminiscent of artists such as J. Tillman and Richard Buckner.

The second strength of the album is the songwriting, When Will You Go… being an apt title for an album that attempts to deal with death and the fear of losing loved ones. Squires’s voice is candid and confessional, and the listener gets the sense that he is opening up to them, offering a glimpse of the demons that haunt many of us. This is a man who has battled with struggle and hardship and is now honest and open enough to channel that into something really very beautiful.

One of Jeremy Squires’s greatest skills is his ability to prevent the whole thing descending into cheerless gloom. Yes the atmosphere is sad and lonely, but the album seems to have just the opposite effect, proving oddly comforting.

Having had the album on repeat for the last few weeks, I have come to the conclusion that the opening lines, just eight words, somehow sum the whole thing up better than I ever could.

“I dreamt my life away
I never told” 

You can buy the album now via the Jeremy Squires Bandcamp page. I highly recommend that you do. This is one of the finest albums released this year and one worth every minute of your time and attention.

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