Yonic South take to the streets, Last Call at Nightowls put it all down in black and white, Destroyer fools you, Wolftooth deliver scylla and charybdis, Running Red Lights give you a flower and more in today’s Roundup. I can’t decide whether to celebrate Star Wars Day today or Cinco de Mayo tomorrow. Guess I’ll just have to do both.
VIDEO OF THE DAY:
1 | Yonic South | Tell Me Why
THE PRESS RELEASE: “Italian three-piece Yonic South play a crude and boisterous brand of smash & grab garage punk laced with heady hits of psych and grinding bursts of noise. Comprised of members of Bee Bee Sea and Miss Chain & The Broken Heels, and sustained by a drip-feed of San Miguel, the band harbour obsessions with Twix bars, Gabber & hardcore techno, and Liverpool football club. In a squalid and assaultive sound that incorporates fanaticism and surreal humour, the band produce a signature new take on the myriad ferocities of Thee Oh Sees, Black Lips, and The Jesus & Mary Chain, whilst recalling the madcap irreverence of the Country Teasers and Swell Maps. Their prolific touring schedule has seen them deliver riotous live performances around their native Italy and on a recent European tour which saw them share stages with the likes of King Khan, Preoccupations, and Warmduscher. 2019 saw the release of their debut EP Wild Cobs. Their latest, Twix & Dive – an EP that finds them penning dedications to the Techno Viking meme / bloke and the mightiest chocolate bar of them all — is set for release on May 15.”
ALSO ON THE PLAYLIST:
2 | Last Call At Nightowls | Ask The Dust
THE PRESS RELEASE: “Cinematic dark jazz quatuor Last Call At Nightowls have shared the thrilling black & white video for the song Ask The Dust. Suggested scenes of sex and violence are making this chromatic dichotomy as frightening as it is distressing. Will you dare watch? Adriano Vincenti (synth, sample, drum programming) describes Ask The Dust in the following way: “the gloomy atmosphere is reminiscent of sex, as well as the desire to get lost forever on always dark streets. It is comprised of edited shots taken from Bara no Sōretsu (Funeral Parade of Rose), a Japanese drama film from 1969.”
3 | Destroyer | Foolssong
THE PRESS RELEASE: “In mid-February, when Dan Bejar and the Destroyer live band embarked on their North American tour in support of his new album Have We Met, practically no one anticipated what the next month would hold. Shot on the road by directors David Galloway & David Ehrenreich, the music video for Foolssong presents scenes from a caravan forced to accelerate as the world comes to a screeching halt.”
4 | Wolftooth | Scylla & Charybdis
THE PRESS RELEASE: “Midwest heavy warlords Wolftooth share the hypnotic lyric video for Scylla & Charybdis, taken from their fist-pumping new album Valhalla, due out May 22. Valhalla is a triumphant return for heavy metal unit Wolftooth, expanding on their tried and tested formula while proudly drawing from NWOBHM, Bay Area thrash and old school doom. As if their highly melodic, chugging double-guitar weren’t enough, this amped up ten-tracker also conveys an irresistible sense of blues… One motto: headbanging.”
5 | Running Red Lights | Flower In The Concrete
THE PRESS RELEASE: “Toronto folk-pop band Running Red Lights announce their retirement with the release of four singles in Spring/Summer 2020. The releases will be a part of a Sendoff Series, marking the finale of a 15-year career that includes a multitude of awards, notable performances, international tours, as well as some beautifully crafted music. Though they played a farewell show to a sold-out Toronto audience in November of 2019, RRL’s chief architects Kevin Howley and Scarlett Flynn have since been haunted by the ghosts of abandoned songs that currently exist only in the consciousness of an old hard-drive. Scarlett remarks: “There is nothing worse than banishing a song to its grave, having never given it a chance to live.” The first single in the sendoff series is a warm and fuzzy mid-tempo springtime empowerment jam called Flower in the Concrete. The song’s roots synthesize classic-country verve with dreamy soft rock (i.e Kasey Musgraves).”
6 | Perseide | Don’t Let Me Go
THE PRESS RELEASE: “French Alternative-Rock Revenants Perseide premiered the new song Don’t Let Me Go, after already sharing a bunch of audio and video excerpts from their upcoming effort with Sell Yourself, Trick Or Treat and Fade Away. Perseide was born from four childhood friends who decided to form a rock band in 2001, as they were just teenagers. Ten years later, they were crossing the frontiers to share their music widely. In 2018, they decided to go into the studio again to record their debut album, which is going to be released early 2020. Perseide is still there, stronger than ever and ready to take these four eternal teenagers as far as possible.”
7 | VoidCeremony | Desiccated Whispers
THE PRESS RELEASE: “Circulating in the pits of the deepest underground for nearly seven years, VoidCeremony presents their long-awaited first full-length, Entropic Reflections Continuum: Dimensional Unravel, out on June 26. While earlier releases hinted at the band’s unique potential and frenzied imagination, on their proper debut album, it takes its most actualized form thus far, looking ahead to darker visions of indefinable cosmic obscurity. Furiously fragmented death metal rips though the reflective fabric of reality sinking deep memory hooks into the innermost cerebral chasms. Out of the technically warped twists and unpredictable turns emerge progressively skyward guitar leads and mercilessly precise percussion work. Concurrently, the fretless bass mastery on display permeates the entire framework with an otherworldly time bending defiance. Stream the lead single Desiccated Whispers now.”
8 | ILS | Bad Parts
THE PRESS RELEASE: “ILS has announced their debut LP and released a new single entitled Bad Parts. (Pronounced ilz) ILS is a four-piece disaster chic band from Portland. ILS consists of Tom Glose (Black Elk) on vocals, Nate Abner (The Days, The Nights) on guitar, Tim Steiner (Passerby) on drums and Adam Pike (White Orange) on bass.” EDITOR’S NOTE: I don’t know if those are their nicknames or their former bands in the parantheses, but if that guy isn’t already calling himself Black Elk, I’m totally stealing it.
9 | Ash | Floating Away
THE PRESS RELEASE: “Ash is a lively, seven-piece pop/R&B band. Songwriter Ash McMillan was born in Northern England, and is now based in NYC. The band was formed while all seven members were studying at the Conservatory of Music at Purchase College in New York, and now perform her original music about the pains and joys of everyday life. McMillan began her musical career at the age of 12, learning piano from her neighbor across the street. While she spent many years playing piano, and singing in school choirs, it wasn’t until age 15, when she picked up the guitar, that her love for music truly developed. Their latest single is Floating Away. “I wrote it about recovering from sexual assault. While the lyrics are honest about my grief and the feeling of losing myself, the song fits with our upbeat and funky sounds.”
10 | Velvet Vaughan | Sleep Walk
THE PRESS RELEASE: “Born and raised in Nashville, TN, Velvet Vaughan has been surrounded by the music industry since she was conceived after her parents played a gig together at Dollywood. Her father, a legendary session guitar player and mother, a respected background singer and multi-instrumentalist, brought her on the tour bus when she was 6 months old. Vaughan grew up touring the country with her parents, watching side stage as they performed with acts such as Lucinda Williams, Carly Simon, James Taylor, Reba McEntire and Marty Stuart. At 18, Vaughan moved to NYC to study acting and English literature. During a particularly strong bout of homesickness her second year there, Vaughan began writing songs, drawing inspiration from influences such as Dolly Parton, Carole King and Stevie Nicks. After writing and singing for herself for several years, Vaughan decided it was time to let others hear the songs she had carefully crafted. She sourced a band of close friends in the Brooklyn music scene, and began recording and playing shows within a month or two. Sleep Walk is her first single, and she is currently working on her debut album.”
11 | Ziminy | She (Zoey Deutch)
THE PRESS RELEASE: “A Los Angeles native and former member of Awolnation, David Amezcua steps back in to the spotlight with his latest solo effort, Ziminy. The first single She (Zoey Deutch) harkens back to the beloved tones of 80’s, surf and R&B music, (think Bill Champlin, Beach Boys, Toto) with a modern twist. “Professionally, my instrument has always been bass. But piano has remained as my first love. It feels good to get back to it. Sitting back down to write songs on the piano, the first one I wrote was She (Zoey Deutch), so it felt appropriate to make it my first offering. Ironically this song literally has nothing to do with Zoey Deutch, yet everything at the same time.”
12 | Jacqueline Kroft | Waves of Love
THE PRESS RELEASE: “Working with an abundance of sounds and styles in her adventurous and curious manner, Jacqueline Kroft’s unique approach to lyrical soundscaping provides unusual, eclectic compositions for her audiences to embrace. With a classical piano background at the Toronto Royal Conservatory of Music from the age of 10, Jacqueline grew up exploring jazz, soul, and pop, appreciating the welcome company of great musicians. Born in Liverpool and growing up in Canada gave her the springboard to dive into her European tours and songwriting.”
13 | Leo Lauren | Lovesick
THE PRESS RELEASE: “Southern California songwriter and visual artist Leo Lauren has released his newest single Lovesick. About the single: Lovesick is a sonic fever dream of desire, where Lauren plays a character ill with distance and separation. In this landscape, vision is infected by the haze of far off sunsets and candy-colored skies, and doing anything is a battle with vertigo. Lauren characterizes the atmosphere of the song as “Paradise Goth,” arranging bright exotic xylophone lines, sandy percussive acoustic guitars, and fantastically melancholy pan flutes around a yearning, tortured vocal. He portrays the precariousness of love sickness, the physical and psychological instability of being torn apart by a heart beating in two places at once: the body of the obsessed and the estranged place of the desired. In Lovesick, this bilocation sets the stage for Lauren’s drama, with a chorus that is not just concerned with the experience of love but the performance of it.”
