Back in July they released their debut album, Bonfire Etiquette, on Eternal Bummer Records. The album is a lot of fun, ten slices of reckless indie pop, perfect for summer road trips or get-togethers or whatever (yes I realise am late to the party, you’ll have to wait until next year). Frontman Geoff Baillie says that the album deals with the “carelessness, fear, confusion and spontaneity” of being young.

Preconceptions about this style of music may lead you to expect short sharp songs with simple catchy words, however the lyrics are surprisingly wordy, not verbose but detailed, poetic, something more than a series of shout-a-long choruses. For example, in opener ‘Sunday Nights To Infinity’ Baillie sings:

’With naive melody lamps that decorate the bedroom
We stripped all of the linens tracing a loose thread
If you love me till I’m dead I’ll haunt the bedroom with you
Make ourselves out to be ghosts with sheets around our heads’

The poetic theme continues throughout. The latest single from the album is called ‘Crown Victoria’ (which you can listen to exclusively in the player below), a track which was inspired by Bushfire, a poem by Philip Salom about the Victorian Alpine Fires, a series of bush fires that swept through the state of Victoria, southeast Australia, back in 2003. You can read the poem courtesy of the Australian Poetry Library here.

It is a really interesting direction to take, one that again shows the band are commited to highlighting youth as more than a superficial blend of fun and hormones. There is a depth here, an addressing of the thoughts of the young, the paradoxical concurrence of invincibility and fragility, the ticking of a clock on what appears to be a timeless scene.

’We feel like we are glorious
We drive a Crown Victoria
I’ll be your hands if you’re my eyes
And keep watching the mirrors while I drive
Unless we are stricken in a thickened haze
That’s challenging us to remain
And pressures on to break us down
Now I might be a liar but I’ll say
That we just can’t be defeated’

When looking back at our younger years the simplicity of it all is an abiding memory, a lack of commitments or responsibilities that allow for a degree of brashness. Reality, of course, is very different from our rose -tinted memories, and while we were allowed a carelessness or a selfish sense of exploration, the whole gamut of emotions were still present, with fear and confusion prevailing factors, just as Baillie describes in the album. Amity Beach show that representations of youth do not have to be simple.

If you like what you hear then you can get Bonfire Etiquette via the Amity Beach Bandcamp on a pay-what-you-can basis, as well as picking up a physical copy via the merch page.

The band also performed a studio session over at Southern Souls earlier in the year, check it out here.

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Aisha Burns

Violinist, singer-songwriter and member of instrumental outfit Balmorhea, Aisha Burns is multi-talented. She has recently released her debut full length album, Life In The Midwater, on Western Vinyl. It is a dark and brooding album, capped off with Burns’s superb vocals. Listen to my current favourite track, ‘Requiem’, burn with restrained intensity in the player below.

Dave Van Ronk

Dave Van Ronk was a folk artist who died back in 2002. A leading figure in the Greenich Village music scene, he gave help and advice to many upcoming folk acts, including a young Bob Dylan. Van Ronk is about to re-enter the limelight as the Coen brothers have made a film (the upcoming, Inside Llewyn Davis) based on his autobiography. To coincide with this, the ever brilliant Smithsonian Folkways are releasing Down In Washington Square: The Smithsonian Folkways Collection, a 3CD collection of recordings, from early live performances in 1958, to his final studio sessions in 2001, shortly before his death. The film contains Van Ronk’s version of the track ‘Fare Thee Well (Dink’s Song)’, which is included on the set and available now as a digital download from the Smithsonian Folkways website.

Inlet Sound

Canadian band Inlet Sound recently performed a lovely rendition of ‘Fake Empire’ for Southern Souls. The band have also graced the site before, with this session last year. If you like what you hear the band’s debut album, The Romantics, was released last year.

If you don’t regularly check up on what the good folks at Southern Souls are doing you really are missing out.

The River Has Many Voices

The River Has Many Voices (aka Matthew Payne) released his latest album, Division, back in June. It is an introspective album, six romantic country songs full of sorrow and yearning. It’s really pretty and really, really good and amazingly, available as a free download over at the band’s Bandcamp page. I highly recommend you give it a try.

Sam Moss

Sam Moss is back with a new single ahead of the release of his new record, No Kingdom, later in October.  ‘Hammer’ is a taste of what the Vermont based songwriter has to offer, and you can also get ‘Ocean’ from October’s edition of Textura. The album is shaping up to be a special one and we will write a full review in the next few weeks.

Nathaniel Rateliff

Nathaniel Rateliff is back with a new album, Falling Faster Than You Can Run, which is available to buy now. Those familiar with Rateliff’s previous album will be delighted to hear this follows the same recipe, stirring folk songs that seem to grant the same importance to the silence between words and notes as they do to the words and notes themselves. We aren’t quite there yet but this is sounding like the perfect winter album, contemplative with moments of fury, elemental outpourings of emotion.

Noah Gundersen

We’ll leave you with a promo for a new Noah Gundersen album that is due out early next year.

See you next month!

P.S. As ever, a stellar collection of Soundcloud picks were posted last week. Check out Head In The Clouds here.

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