Darren Cross has just released his new album Distorder on digital and limited edition CD, available now via Bandcamp. It’s a great trip through the wildly inventive musical mind of Cross, stretching from the sound he created in the 90s with Gerling, right up his more recent solo albums Peacer and Xantastic! Check out the new animated clip for the track ‘Given’ Up?’. Continue reading NEW MUSIC: Darren Cross – Givin’ Up?
Black Midi Cavalcade Rough Trade / Remote Control Records The new wave of prodigious, forward-thinking and bold UK musicians continues unabated as we near the middle of 2021. With the underground jazz scene taking its divergent strands overground to international acclaim and songwriters and players of the experimental indie rock persuasion, who were barely born when Radiohead released OK Computer, soaking up and reimagining all … Continue reading ALBUM REVIEW: Black Midi – Cavalcade
This is Last Wars‘ take on the Flipper single ‘Get Away’, from the late 70s. I dig the way the different tracks and layers operate in their own segregated corners of the song. Primitive bass grooving away while synths cycle around, getting progressively weirder and wonkier with each digressive spin. The drums sound like they’re lifted from a Sisters Of Mercy practice session while the … Continue reading NEW MUSIC: Last Wars – Get Away
In the words of Bendigo VIC artist Jakson, “this song is a call to arms against the world’s richest. Eat the rich.” In a colloquial accent he reels off some of the world’s richest and their associated estimated wealth. Over jagged, scratching guitar and a dub-influenced post-punk rhythm section, the song builds intensity, bursting into see-sawing distorted guitars that sound like a cross between 3Ds … Continue reading NEW MUSIC: Jakson – hey jeff come to bendigo i just want to chat i totally won’t punch you in the head i promise // guillotine
Darren Cross returns with a new album called Keeping Up? In recent years he’s explored folk noir with Jep and Dep, his own eclectic solo albums and a pair of instrumental acoustic folk albums under the moniker D.C Cross. Here he orbits planet Gerling closer than he has since the band split back in in the late 00s. It’s still a totally different musical creature … Continue reading ALBUM REVIEW: Darren Cross – Keeping Up?
There’s some clever stuff going on with this glorious new single from Dave Cherub. Sweet soul music meets 60s psych pop, country-folk and the kind of skewed indie guitar rock that bands like Built To Spill and Flaming Lips mastered. ‘Chalk and Glitter’ comes from Dave Cherub, the self-titled debut album from the Vancouver country-folk singer-songwriter and multi-instrumentalist of the same name. Thirteen songs, written … Continue reading NEW MUSIC: Dave Cherub – Chalk and Glitter
Straight out of the gates into a krautrock, psych sprint from Chicago group Montecore. The song comes from their One Night album that came out in May and they’ve already followed it up with a new album, House Fire Themes, which hits the same frantic, hyper-melodic hypnotic sweet-spot, Those kinds of songs that could (and should) go on endlessly as guitar solos fire off into … Continue reading NEW MUSIC: Montecore – Ott Sauce
Japanese genre-destroyers Boris return with a new album, NO, due out July 3rd, self-released on Bandcamp. Check out the searing, careening distortion punk-fest that is ‘Loveless’. A message from BORIS: “International borders are ‘closed’ now. All kinds of anxieties, fear, sadness, anger, and hatred have arisen to drive the world apart.Everyone is in a process of trial and error, doing what they can to live.The … Continue reading NEWS: Boris Announce New Album ‘NO’ and Release Single ‘Loveless’
Out of Norway comes this fascinating piece of experimental dubbed and smeared atmospheric jazz fusion from Past Present & Tortusa. The trio of trumpet, upright bass and live sampling is composed and performed by Simen Kiil Halvorsen, Alexander Hoholm and Tortusa respectively. Space is the key to what makes ‘Black Mist’ so compelling as the digital details flicker and dance around the edge of the music, creating … Continue reading NEW MUSIC: Past Present & Tortusa – Black Mist
Here’s a great slice of authentic garage psych rock from Los Angeles band Velvet Starlings, fronted by Christian Gisborne. ‘Kids In Droves’ cuts a fine balance between 60s UK mods sounds, a tough Britpop angle and US garage rock circa Nuggets. The single follows their self-titled EP of last year which has seen them generate some major radio attention and a US and UK tour dates. Continue reading NEW MUSIC: Velvet Starlings – Kids In Droves
Beastwars IV Destroy Records Sometimes it takes monumental life events to galvanise a band, or any creative endeavour for that matter. In the case of New Zealand band Beastwars it was the diagnosis singer Matt Hyde received, confirming Non-Hodgkin’s Lymphoma. In the weeks following his chemotherapy treatment the band hit the studio and recorded their fourth album – a blistering, pummelling, cathartic battle cry of … Continue reading ALBUM REVIEW: Beastwars – IV
Christopher Willits is an acclaimed ambient composer and musician who has opened for the late Jóhann Jóhannsson and released two albums with Ryuichi Sakamoto and productions with Tycho as part of his impressive back catalogue. The five compositions on his new album Sunset move from warm to cool designed as a soundtrack to embrace the day’s end. ‘Coast’ rises and falls like the ocean currents, a tidal blend of synth … Continue reading NEW MUSIC: Christopher Willits – Sunset
Doubtful Sounds 