sylvan esso Archives - Various Small Flames

Music We Missed in 2020

Jon Doyle — Mon, 11 Jan 2021 19:40:36 +0000

One of the hardest things about running this site is all the great music we are unable to cover. Our inbox is in a perpetual state of bursting at the seams, and we like to spend time with every release we write about. There are simply not enough hours in the day to cover everything we’d like to, and often some of our very favourite releases slip by without a word. That makes us feel bad (and is probably the reason we didn’t reply to your email), so we decided to make a slightly different list in lieu of the usual Year End fare.

Here is a list of songs from 2020 that we liked but didn’t get around to writing about.

If you find something you like, follow the link in the embed to support the artists and labels on Bandcamp. And of course, there is a whole year’s worth of pieces on releases we did manage to write about, so have an explore through our reviews, previews and interviews from 2020.

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Various Swell Sounds #9: Cool & Crispy

Jon Doyle — Sun, 30 Sep 2018 13:50:21 +0000

Friends help friends make thoughtfully curated playlists

Various Swell Sounds is a new collaborative playlist series from Shana Hartzel of Swell Tone, Jon Chin of Cereal and Sounds, and myself. Instead of constantly exchanging tracks amongst each other, we have decided to work together to bring them to more ears. Every month, we will match a selection of our old and brand new favourites to a specific theme, as decided on a revolving basis month by month.

After the brutal summer, the leaves are finally turning, which can only mean one thing. Yep, it’s the time of year to slip on pavements, make tired jokes about pumpkin spice coffee and hide behind closed curtains to ignore the calls for candy from ghouling children. We’ve made a playlist of songs to see you through the cool and crispy season.

There’s a Playmoss and Spotify version below, so choose what suits you best, though due to incomplete catalogues the are slight discrepancies between the two.

Check out our other Various Swell Sounds entries here and here, and head over to Swell Tone and Cereal + Sounds for the edition over there.

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Oh Pep! – The Race

Jon Doyle — Thu, 09 Jul 2015 17:55:58 +0000

Oh Pep! is a collaboration between songwriters Olivia ‘Liv’ Hally and Pepita ‘Pep’ Emmerichs, from Melbourne, Australia. ‘The Race’ is the first single from upcoming EP Living, which was produced by Daniel Ledwell out in Nova Scotia. The track is what should perhaps be labelled multi-instrumental indie pop, something akin to Sylan Esso meets Vampire Weekend, skipping along with the prominent percussive backbone. While the instrumentation is hardly carefree, you get the sense that the lyrics hide something darker, a mysterious shape beneath the surface much like the critter who pops up in the second verse:

“You started skipping in a running race,
5m from the finish line you fell from grace.
Do you need to go and walk it off?
Have a sit down, maybe stretch it out.
It’ll heal itself if you give it some time.
Take a deep breath, let it unwind.

Now you’re swimming, the best exercise for pain,
out past those shark nets, you heard your name called again.
He was inviting you in with his grin,
He’s a real fast mover so swim swim swim.

Living will be released on Star House Collective on the 21st August, and the band have announced they are recording their debut full length this summer. In the mean time, you should check out their previous releases on Bandcamp.

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October 2014 Roundup – A Mixtape

Jon Doyle — Mon, 03 Nov 2014 17:59:00 +0000

Here is a collection of songs from artists we featured last month. In my humble opinion, there are some real gems.

Tracklisting

1. Saturday Night – The Wooden Sky
2. Wings – Field Report
3. Infestation – Bear Medicine
4. Cigarettes – Oquoa
5. Chris Bell – M. Lockwood Porter
6. Ride On, Molina – Rivulets
7. Farewell Transmission – Songs: Ohia
8. HSKT – Sylvan Esso
9. Reconstruct (feat. Seafloor) – Photay
10. Second Night – Mansionair
11. Beacon – DEAREST
12. Sweetness – Wayne Szalinksi
13. Yellow Leaves – Ezkiel
14. Travel Advisory – Baby Mollusk
15. ESRT (2001) – Whatever, Dad
16. Black Kettle – Real Life Buildings
17. Six Dollar Sunglasses – Steve Palmer
18. I Have Heard of a Land – C.Strøm
19. Blue Ridge Mountain Blues – Wes Tirey
20. Breaking Bad – Talons’
21. Raft – Sarah Winchester
22. Ontario Gothic – Foxes in Fiction
23. Thrown – Kiasmos
24. You (Nate Connelly Rework) – Nils Frahm
25. Form By Firelight (With Raphaelle Standell) – Jon Hopkins
26. Lights – Mt. Judge
27. I Love – David Karsten Daniels

Remember that we make a mix like this every month, so if you want even more cool new music then head over to the Wake the Deaf 8tracks page, or read the site itself!

October 2014 Mix from Wake The Deaf on 8tracks Radio.

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