Sebastian Marquez

Top 15 Artists to Watch: Shaky Knees 2018

Posted on by Sebastian Marquez
"Courtesy of aLIVE Coverage"
“Courtesy of aLIVE Coverage”

Shaky Knees season is upon us. If you have your tickets and don’t quite know who to go see tomorrow (or if you’re wondering if you’d like to jump on it last-minute) we present to you our 15 picks for emerging artists who we believe are most worth your time (and sweat!) at this wonderful festival:

Rolling Blackouts Coastal Fever

In the mood for danceable garage rock? Melbourne’s Rolling Blackouts Coastal Fever‘s nonlinear jangle and driving blend of indie rock will definitely get the pit to a rolling boil. Excuse all the coffee puns, but the energy that this band exudes might perk you up more than any espresso ever could.

Welles

If you’re in the mood for more of a more contemplative set, Welles might be more your speed. Plain spoken, matter of fact lyrics paired with expansive, driving Americana influenced rock all add up to an engrossing show with an emphasis on lyrical content. Read up on our track by track of Welles’ debut EP ‘Codeine’ here.

Marlon Williams

If you want something even quieter, maybe even a show you can sit down at, look out for New Zealand’s Marlon Williams‘ set. Eschewing the country trappings for more lushly orchestrated quietly beautiful folk songs, Williams’ vocals take the forefront. His widely praised distinctive singing voice both calms and enraptures, so if you’re looking to cozy up for a while, you’ll be hard pressed to find somewhere better.

Amasa Hines

Amasa Hines is a band, not a person. Not only are they a band: they’re a tight knit unit drawing on influences ranging from James Brown,  TV on the Radio, and DIIV. Being omnivorous with their influence is what gives them an edge: they can ride on waves of feedback but the soulful delivery of the lyrics will ensure that no one is looking at their shoes while the waves of sound hit you from the stage.

Sun Seeker

Now, I was tempted to use the analogy of a bowl of southern-ass grits falling on the band Pavement, but the fact that they’re hot enough to get signed to Jack White‘s label Third Man Records should be enough to entice fans of both the Nashville Sound and slacker rock fans alike.

Charly Bliss

VHS filters are all the rage lately. But. Can they wear it well? With Charly Bliss the answer is a resounding YES! Mining the poppier aspects of ’90s college rock with a millenial sense of irony and purpose, Charly Bliss make throwback rock for folks who know that you need some substance underneath your Instagram filter.

Broncho

When we talk about #clout, sometimes it just means having been at the right place at the right time. Who knows, but Broncho‘s music has been on multiple television shows like Girls and Santa Clarita Diet. Their lightly atmospheric mood music is a great accompaniment to a rose tinted afternoon in the Atlanta heat.

The Voidz

You can’t talk about the Voidz without mentioning that their front man is the one and only Julian Casablancas of Strokes fame (and one-time Shaky Knees headliner). However the Voidz are very much NOT the Strokes. With noisy, dense electronic arrangements, hair metal pastiche, and sheer madness making up their solid as hell second album, their tight live show will definitely be a sight to behold, especially for all those Julian fans out there.

Mt. Joy

Folk rock anyone? Philadelphia’s Mt. Joy deliver in spades. Still riding high on the viral success of their “Deadhead Jesus” song “Astrovan”, deliver slightly jaded, punchdrunk singalong music for those of us who want some rootsy fun, but aren’t shy about dishing the dirt with stories about addiction and growing up.

Wild Reeds

Now, did you think that we’d let the country genre slip through the cracks? Not with Wild Reeds. With rich, diverse instrumentation and beautiful vocal harmonies, their brisk, slightly experimental take on country rock should appeal to both un-ironic and ironic wearers of cowboy boots alike!

Post Animal

Who’s ready to rock out again? Post Animal have you covered. With strains of Thee Oh Sees, Pink Floyd, and King Tuff, the moshers in your friend group are likely to go wild alongside your more psyche tinged folks in the crowd.

Greta Van Fleet

More rock! Here at Vinyl Mag we’re no strangers to Greta Van Fleet‘s similarities to Led Zeppelin. If you’re in the mood for some ’70s throwback you have come to the right place. Bluesy guitars: check. High pitched screamalong vocals: check. Ready to get down in a sweaty mosh pit? You decide.

Frankie Rose

After all of that rock and roll I might need a chill pill. Do you like the Cocteau Twins? In that case look for Frankie Rose‘s set. They’ve got a swirling dream pop vibe that might be just what you need to cool down from some moshing—or coming up on some other stuff. Whatever floats your boat, you’ll definitely feel like you’re floating by the end of Frankie’s set.

Bayonne

While Shaky Knees is more rock focused, that doesn’t mean that fans of electronic music need to feel left out. Enter Madrid’s prodigal son Bayonne: electronic wunderkind. With pulsating and dense arrangements, if you don’t feel tempted to dance, just take all the layers in. Bayonne’s ear for samples and texture is bound to engross even the most skeptical listener.

Teenage Wrist

Teenage Wrist‘s name may imply some sort of unlearned youthfulness, but don’t be fooled—these boys make heavy rock that has been polished to a metallic sheen. Makes sense since they’re signed to Epitaph who have handled releases from the likes of Alkaline Trio and A Day to Remember. 

 

No matter who you go see, make sure to take the time to maximize your enjoyment at the festival by staying hydrated and wearing ample UV protection! Happy Shaky Knees season, everyone!

Track Premiere: Michael Flynn – “Professional Network”

Posted on by Sebastian Marquez

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Oh man, how many notifications do I have right now? There’s at least 300 for Whats-App on my phone at any given time. I can’t imagine how many LinkedIn notifications songwriting folkster Michael Flynn (formerly of Slow Runner) must have gotten to inspire this song:

“I wrote this song from beneath a giant pile of LinkedIn invitations.  They seem to be generated by robots, and there’s something almost desperate about them—maybe that’s why deleting them without even opening the email is so satisfying?  Maybe I was just disillusioned with how the world works and how hollow we all are, and I blew an afternoon trying to write a song about it?”

No matter what his particularly mixed feelings are about the ever increasing necessity of keeping up with social media, he can sure as hell produce something catchy from it. There’s an auto-tuned folk aesthetic to brand new track “Professional Network” that recalls Blood Bank-era Bon Iver, but with a lighter, more whimsical sentiment that fits right in with the subject matter. The achingly postmodern refrain, “I’d like to add you to my professional network” repeating in the background would normally drive me crazy, but Michael Flynn’s songwriting chops are powerful enough to elevate this song beyond millennial drivel. Granted, this man could probably sing the phone book, and I’d gladly listen.

Michael Flynn’s new album Pretend Like is out on May 1.

You can stream “Professional Network” below:

Track Premiere: Saw Black – “Mama Knows”

Posted on by Sebastian Marquez

SawBlack-Promo

Are you feeling comfortable right now? Wrapping up in a blanket might be the best move for listening to this one. Richmond, VA folk artist Saw Black’s new single “Mama Knows” is so pillowy and lush, that anything less than your coziest outfit will seem out of place once you press play. While his voice never falters, it feels he also never raises his voice any more than necessary to deliver his heartfelt narrative. It’s as if the song was engineered to create feelings of calm in the listener. To the songs extreme benefit, the synths recall a more sedate sitar part from a Revolver era Beatles song—sort of like a vaguely vaporwave-esque “Tomorrow Never Knows” sample. It all adds up to being the aural equivalent of a big cup of hot chocolate in the best way possible. Or maybe like floating in the air/through the clouds like a cheerleader as suggested by the album’s artwork.

You can pre-order Saw Black’s upcoming (and most likely extremely comfortable feeling) LP Water Tower from War Hen Records/Crystal Pistol Records here.

And you can stream the song here and below:

 

The Voidz: ‘Virtue’

Posted on by Sebastian Marquez

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How does Julian Casablancas want to be remembered? It’s been 17 years since the release of The Strokes‘ Is This It, and I think Julian is finally a little tired of being a Stroke. I never thought that I could have typed this sentence, but I also didn’t ever expect to be this taken aback by a new VOIDZ album. I should have realized when they dropped Julian’s name from The Voidz, I suppose. “Oh, I guess they want to be a real band instead of just a side project” is how I thought about it. And after listening to “Leave it In My Dreams” for the first time, I just kept on thinking about how it only sounded like the Strokes for about eight seconds. But then we got to “QYURRYUS”. WHAT AM I LISTENING TO? WHAT MAN IS THIS?  How was this the man that gave us “Last Nite”???

Indeed it is. And he does not give a DAMN what you expect. Where the previous Voidz album left me looking for something more melodic in the waves of super compressed noise, Virtue instead reigns in the noise of its predecessor Tyranny and brings us almost an hour of new jamz (sorry, the z is going to come out a few timez here) for us to wrap our heads around. Ostensibly at the forefront of the main creative process of the Voidz as a whole, this could be one of the biggest creative flexes of Julian Casablancas’ career.

It seems pretty hyperbolic once it’s all typed out, but the sheer amount of genres he crams into nearly every song (and successfully, in my humble opinion) is pretty staggering. Be it the schlocky ’80s hair metal guitars in “Pyramid of Bone” or the ’00s pop piano and hip hop influenced drum sounds on “ALieNNatioN,” or the downright Latin sounding percussion on “All Wordz are Made Up”—and how he uses the vocoder to essentially change the key signature on “Wordz” in the second half—Julian feels in control. Does he make it look easy? You bet. I don’t even know if they can play all of these songs live, since theres so impossibly much going on at once.

Right now: Forget about a legacy. Do you feel it? Is that what rock and roll feels like in 2018? Does it even really matter? Julian Casablancas knows what he’s doing. By some strange coincidence he’s decided that no, he’s not done. This timeline is real weird, but at least our boy still has some jamz in him.

8.5/10

Preoccupations: ‘New Material’

Posted on by Sebastian Marquez

new Mat

Have you ever been to a rave? No, like a real one. I’m talking about the kind that would be in warehouses, bunkers, or maybe even condemned buildings. What if the new generation of post punk kids all decided to throw a new kind of rave together in that fashion? New Material by Preoccupations asks this question. Are they having a good time? I really hope so. With lyrics this bleak and production this icy I really hope that the dancing is keeping them warm.

Jokes aside for now, there is a different sense of groove present here that didn’t exist on earlier Preoccupations albums. While rhythmically repetitive (read: danceable) like most rave and classic post punk, most of the songs on New Material carry with them a dismal, apocalyptic sentiment, but their anxiety is masked (or more likely accentuated) by the very new wavey melodies employed throughout (look to the Duran Duran-esque chorus of “Antidote” for a bold example). Locking into a groove and sticking with it is what most of New Material traffics in and when the band is successful, I couldn’t imagine anyone ditching the dance floor to watch the sun explode.

When the groove exits, the ambience that Preoccupations has excelled in creating since their first album as Viet Cong comes to the forefront. Album closer “Compliance” creates a transfixing miasma that really shows off the band’s ambient chops. It really does feel like it was recorded in the concrete room on the album cover. The same can be said about the production aesthetic of entire album. True to their roots, the production feels sufficiently frigid and distant at times which creates a sense of something more immediate than full on detachment, but not close enough to feel like any sort of embrace. Instead it feels more like slowly losing yourself in a dense, choking fog with nothing but an array of strobe lights to guide you deeper in. It might feel disorienting at first but there is a deliberate nature to the strobes; a definite modus operandi that never lets itself get obfuscated by the swathes of reverb on the guitars and synthesizers. To disorient and thrill is the name of the game, and Preoccupations are dead set on doing that better than anyone right now.

I really hope those ravers brought jackets, but then again, I don’t think they even care. The world’s ending anyway.

8/10

Artist to Watch: Molly Burch

Posted on by Sebastian Marquez

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Like a well-maintained and beautifully hand carved wooden sculpture, Molly Burch’s music has a sort of softly natural, matte glow to it. Influenced by the music of her childhood spent growing up in LA, her early country influenced songwriting and equally paisley patterned arrangements have caught the ear of record labels, including Captured Tracks (who released her debut album Please Be Mine) and many publications, ourselves included.

Her voice, which some would compare to Angel Olsen, has a well-trained crushed velvety texture that sets it apart from many other vocalists in her field. Having gone to school for jazz singing, her emotive vocalizations lend itself to the cinematic or melodramatic nature of her band’s music. That being said, there’s a gentle sentiment of something that isn’t quite like full on naivety there, but more like a gentle innocence behind her croons.

Currently on the road supporting Alex Cameron on the tour for his new album, I got on the phone with Molly to have a quiet conversation to get to know her better both as a songwriter and as a person.

VM: After reading your bio, I saw that you did your growing up in LA, but then went to school in Asheville and then moved to Austin, correct?

MB: Yeah. I graduated High School in LA, was born and raised there, and then I spend one year in New York at Sarah Lawrence College and then decided to transfer to UNC Asheville, because my mom had moved to North Carolina, so that made the most sense at the time. I graduated there then spent a year out of college in Asheville feeling pretty lost, so I just moved to Austin on a whim.

VM: I can definitely relate to that. Would you ever move back to Asheville or NYC?

MB: Uh, I don’t know. No. I wouldn’t want to live in New York. I’ve actually just recently moved to an even smaller place in Austin. We live right outside of Austin. So I’m sure as I get older and also with playing music and touring I’ve been more attracted to like smaller cities, smaller towns.  I guess I don’t know.  We recently just went to Asheville on tour, and it was really lovely. I really do miss a lot of it, but I don’t know; I don’t think I would want to move back anytime soon.

VM: Austin is really cool. There are a lot of really cool weird places to go. Do you have any specific places you like to go to when you just want to chill out or have an escape within the city limits?

MB: Sure. Right now we live a little outside of Austin, so I feel like that, plus being on tour for more of this year makes me feel a little disconnected from Austin but let me try to think of where I’d go; I’m very much a homebody. A really nice bar to go get a drink is this place called Kinda Tropical. And there ‘s a little coffee shop on the east side called Bliss Coffee that one of my good friends runs, and the thing is a little Air Stream with a really nice outdoor patio. It’s really gorgeous.

So after taking a few listens to Please Be Mine, I immediately thought Nashville. There’s a very old school country vibe to it. Were there any artists from Nashville that you were listening to while you were writing those songs, or that you grew up listening to?

MB: Not really.  These songs are like a collection of the first songs I’ve ever written, because that sort of just came later for me. I wasn’t comfortable writing before these songs. That style is just what comes natural to me. I went to school for jazz, and I would listen to older country music, but I don’t feel up to date on current country or Nashville music. Classic sounds for sure. And I wasn’t really listening to anything at the time, since I wrote the songs over a period of a couple of years.

VM: So it’s much more holistic. So, when you write songs, do you prefer to write alone, or do you have a favorite houseplant that you sit next to, or do you have a pet? Or do you like to write with your friends?

MB: I do have a cat, and I do have a lot of houseplants, but I feel like it’s different every time when I’ve been in different homes over the past couple of years. I definitely need to be fully alone. I don’t like to write anything if there are people at the house, or if my boyfriend is there. What I usually do is, I’ll write the song and get it fully done, and I’ll show it to Dailey—who’s my boyfriend and lead guitarist—and we try it together, and we figure out at that point if we like it or if I need to work on it more. Then we bring it to a band.

VM: So you’re signed to Captured Tracks records. What’s your experience being signed to a label like for your first record?  Is it really laissez faire, or have they been very involved in the album process for you?

MB: They’ve been sort of involved, but in that sense they’re really supportive. They really support and believe in the artists they have. Going into signing with them and not knowing anything about labels, I sent them a cold demo submission. I have definitely learned a lot pretty quickly signing with them and not being used to it. It’s been a lot of new things signing with them and releasing my first album. They’re wonderful, and I feel extremely lucky. They’re really open, supportive, and they make me feel like I have tons of freedom. They’re just really cool people in general.

VM: So, have you been listening to any other artists right now? Has anyone excited you or just drawn your attention?

MB: I’ve been listening to a lot of Alex Cameron every day.

VM: Since you’ve been on tour with them?

MB: And my friend and ex-band mate Katie Schaffer and her boyfriend Shane just released a new album. Their band is called Olden Yoke. Also some friends of mine just released an album. They’re called Loma, and I’m excited for that. And my friend Jeff Williamson also has an album coming out.

VM: Well, thanks so much for talking with us! Do you have any other miscellaneous shout-outs that you before we wrap up here?

MB: I have one more friend, I just remembered [laughs]. This girl who lives in New York named Nadia but who records under the name Nadine just released her first album.

Check out Molly’s album Please Be Mine here and on all streaming platforms and follow her on Facebook. 

 

Nap Eyes: ‘ I’m Bad Now ‘

Posted on by Sebastian Marquez

nap eyes

Upon first listen, Nova Scotia, Canada natives Nap Eyes‘ I’m Bad Now felt like nothing but a snarky stoner’s revelry. Too zonked or tired out to outgrow the comfortable Loaded era Velvet Underground,  Nashville or SoCal instrumental trappings, the album on first listen quite frankly felt very flat.

Oh, how wrong I was.

Like an unglazed clay pot viewed at first from a distance, Nigel Chapman’s rich lyrical details reveal themselves like thoughtful patterns carefully etched into the surface with a surprising amount of attention to detail and clarity upon closer inspection. Chapman’s lyrics, delivered with a Lou Reed-meets-Steven Malkmus-esque dry listlessness serve as a pitch perfect contrast to the weighty album themes of existential meaninglessness and sadness.

In the hands of a less capable songwriter, these musings would have just come off as some stoned pseudo philosopher with an acoustic guitar in one hand and a lit marijuana cigarette in the other. The dry delivery of such heavy themes is beautifully on display in the song “Every Time the Feeling”:

Oh I can’t tell what’s worse
The meaninglessness
Or the negative meaning
I figured out a way to get on with my life
And to keep on dreaming

Every time the feeling comes
You never question why
It comes to you this way
You say you never get an answer that way
But then you wonder anyway
Just you don’t really think about it
And you don’t really try to figure it out, out

Nap Eye’s lilting instrumentation provided by Brad Loughead (lead guitar), Josh Salter (bass), and Seamus Dalton (drums) also provide a deft and wonderfully understated backdrop. Unburdened by the need to flex too hard on their technical chops (even though they’re all fantastic players) they focus more on providing necessarily a sunny sonic color palette. Because of this, even Nap Eyes’ bitterest pills go down nice and easy.

As if they were borrowing from Of Montreal‘s playbook of pairing their darkest, most morose subject matter, Nap Eyes make even the depths of their low key existential dread feel like easy listening. Maybe that’s why it took me so long to get into the lyrics, when I think about it. “Easy” digestion is the name of the game here. I’m not to say that any of this was easy or slapped together, though. Nap Eyes just happen to make it look effortless.

7.9/10

Camp Cope: ‘How to Socialise and Make Friends’

Posted on by Sebastian Marquez
photo courtesy of the artist
photo courtesy of the artist

Let me get one thing out of the way: Camp Cope are not fucking around. The moment singer/guitarist Georgia “Maq” McDonald lets loose the first lyrics of the How to Socialise and Make Friends, all bets are off that this is going to be an easy listen. Don’t get me wrong, the instrumentation on the album bears more than a passing resemblance to the relatively placid Galaxie 500, but Maq has a lot of shit to say and damnit, we owe it to ourselves to listen.

Dismantling the patriarchy is a full time job and Camp Cope need overtime pay for the amount of emotional labor put into this album. Laying her (and many other women’s, for that matter) frustrations bare about the overabundance of machismo in the music industry in the aptly titled song, “The Opener”, Maq lets out full-throated screams about the misogyny that is all too common in the music industry:

It’s another man telling us we can’t fill up the room
It’s another man telling us to book a smaller venue
‘Nah, hey, cmon girls we’re only thinking about you’
Well, see how far we’ve come not listening to you

“Yeah, just get a female opener, that’ll fill the quota.”

And that’s just in the first song.

On an aesthetic level “The Opener” is a perfect crystallization of Camp Cope’s sound on How to Socialize. In a very punk move, the arrangement never strays from the bare bones guitar-bass-drums set-up because it never needs to. Maq’s voice and lyrics are the stars of the show here and I wouldn’t have it any other way.

Her voice never falters even at the albums most tender moments, like the devastating, haunting acoustic closer “I’ve Got You”. The autobiographical tale of a relative’s or friend’s slow descent into death and her attempts to figure out hers and their place amid the cruel realities of the world is only made even more heartbreaking by her acknowledgement how much they’re a part of each other.

The sheer breadth and depth of the emotion conveyed on this record is astounding, reaching an intensity that I haven’t really felt since Blonde dropped. Yes, this might be devolving into gushing but if the rush of emotion I felt after I listened to this for the first time is any indication I’ll be listening to this album A LOT. I hope you will as well.

9.5/10