Boniface keep it up, Basia Bulat is your girl, Destroyer makes it happen, Hawktail introduce you to Annbjørg and more in today’s Roundup. Khaaaaaaaaannnnnnnn!
1 | Boniface | Keeping Up
THE PRESS RELEASE: “Boniface is pleased to share details of their highly anticipated self-titled debut record, out Feb. 14. The self-titled album was recorded between Winnipeg and London by Boniface themselves, and producer Neil Comber. To coincide with the album’s announcement, Boniface is pleased to share the moody and magnetic single Keeping Up. Boniface explains, “In high school I met some friends that changed me forever. They all thought different, acted different than anyone I’d met, but everything about them seemed so right and so safe to me. I was a weird music nerd and they played music in basements and after a few nights getting wasted together there was a deep, platonic love between us.”
2 | Basia Bulat | Your Girl
THE PRESS RELEASE: “Critically acclaimed singer-songwriter Basia Bulat is joining forces once again with Jim James (My Morning Jacket) for her new album, Are You in Love?, out March 27. In celebration of the forthcoming album Bulat is premiering her new single and video Your Girl. “I wrote Your Girl during a snowstorm in Montreal and recorded it under the warm desert sun in Joshua Tree,” says Bulat. “Someone once told me you can’t sing and cry at the same time but that wasn’t true for me when we were recording this one. There’s joy in finally being free from a painful situation, relief, laughter—even as it feels impossible to ever forget the pain or understand why that storm came through your life the way it did. And so, light on your feet, you dance with the memory instead. If you’re listening to this song and understand what I mean, know that I’m singing with you as we’re dancing in that swirling wind.”
3 | Destroyer | It Just Doesn’t Happen
THE PRESS RELEASE: “Destroyer proudly shares a new video for It Just Doesn’t Happen, the second single from the Canadian outfit’s upcoming album Have We Met, due on Jan. 31. The vocals from lead singer Dan Bejar, initially sparsely accompanied by a guitar, sound as if they’re coming from a PA system. When the chorus hits, a thrumming bassline and percussion arrive to carry him forward. Where the visuals for previous single Crimson Tide featured Bejar and various slices of life, It Just Doesn’t Happen hardly features any “visuals” at all. A lone snowmobiler travels through the night, only the light of their vehicle illuminating any of the surrounding area. The traveler meets a number of figures along the way, but largely spends their journey alone on in the frigid, dark night. Slightly foreboding yet comforting in its delivery, It Just Doesn’t Happen plays into Bejar’s initial vision for Have We Met as a Y2K album. A statement from the band confirms “the songs do seem to point at a very modern dread — one that heightens the more you consider it.”
4 | Hawktail | Annbjørg
THE PRESS RELEASE: “Known collectively as Hawktail, fiddler Brittany Haas, bassist Paul Kowert, guitarist Jordan Tice, and mandolinist Dominick Leslie have combined their monstrous compositional and instrumental forces once again for a much-anticipated sophomore album, Formations, out Jan. 10. First single and opening track Annbjørg is a dizzying, Scandinavian-tinged choose-your-own-adventure tune; the band shared a live video for the track. Listeners might decide to get lost in the whirlwind of fiddle and bass interplay or focus on the impeccable, time-keeping groove of the guitar and mandolin — collectively though, the song echoes a thread which runs through the entirety of Formations; a familiar nostalgia with more than enough musical depth to satisfy even the most discerning ears.”
5 | Mieko Shimizu | Snake Of Summer
THE PRESS RELEASE: “With a career that has seen her as an acclaimed Japanese electronic artist and producer, a trailblazing female drum’n’bass DJ, a collaborator with the likes of Riz MC and Mick Karn, it’s safe to say that Mieko Shimizu is sui generis. Upcoming single Snake Of Summer takes the avant-garde sensibilities of Bjork, and combines them with the pastoral harp sounds of Joanna Newsom to create a completely unique sonic amalgamation. Opening with the gentle striking of the Koto (Japanese harp) to create a soothing, pastoral and traditional sound, Mieko’s vocals soon enter with a breezy, rustic melody. A testament to her creative ability, Snake Of Summer is a complete departure from the more electronic focused tracks on upcoming album I Bloom. “I wrote Snake of Summer about my mum and dad while they were still alive, they both passed away recently,” says Mieko. “I sang this song at my mother’s funeral and refer to them in the lyric “It’s time for Thinker and his Foxy Bride to go under the seasons to die”. I can hear my mother’s voice in the recording of this song, near the end!”
6 | Michael Malarkey | Graveracer
THE PRESS RELEASE: “Multi-talented singer-songwriter-actor Michael Malarkey renders another brooding deep cut with new single Graveracer, the first offering and title track from Michael’s upcoming second full length album, due Jan. 10. “This record is my Odyssey in a way. It’s the journey back home after being ravaged in the seas of your own mind and finding the strength to carry on after the storm. I was left with a feeling of freedom and I found it through these songs. The opening track to the record, Graveracer, is the hearthstone of this journey. The road may be dark, but the night is full of stars”, reveals Michael.”
7 | Ephemerals | Blur
THE PRESS RELEASE: “Blur is the first track taken from Ephemerals’ fourth album The Third Eye, which explores boundaries both sonically and lyrically. Like Blur, the album is a challenging but ultimately uplifting listen which uses recording techniques to explore the duality of sexuality with masculine and feminine sounds being panned to different sides to give each side of the brain a different effect. Blur talks of songwriter Hillman Mondegreen’s experiences as a teenager trying to visualize her body through blurred eyes in the mirror to see herself as she wanted to be. Hillman takes influence from the yoga instruction to look soft over your hands which has the effect of softening your mind to observe and not judge through the blurring of the hand which in turn led her back to childhood and the way she tried to view herself then.”
8 | OvO | Miasma
THE PRESS RELEASE: “Celebrating its 20th anniversary in 2020 – with over 1,000 shows played, nine studio albums released, and a slew of splits and live recordings – OvO is a singular force in the underground. With a mix of electronic and acoustic instruments, founding members Stefania Pedretti and Bruno Dorella take influence from the likes of Swans and Diamanda Galas. At the dawn of its 20th anniversary, OvO presents a thrilling new piece of work: ninth full-length, Miasma. “A contagious miasma, coming from the most remote swamps, is surrounding cities and villages. It can be an alien disease, like in a sci-fi movie, or it can be some deeper fear caused by whoever wants to control us, like in real life. Freaks, queers and outsiders will be the first ones to realize and fight it. But still: expect mutations. We are trying to represent how close science-fiction and reality are nowadays, and how close to us the miasma really is…”
9 | C. Shirock | Lost To the Night
THE PRESS RELEASE: “C. Shirock is Chuck Shirock – founder, frontman and primary writer for internationally acclaimed band, Shirock. Blending anthemic choruses, musical builds and releases with heartfelt and personal lyrics, the new music from C. Shirock delivers a vulnerability, urgency and an aching vocal that is uniquely his own. Driving rhythms and bass are anchors to the soaring melodies, layers of keyboards, and programming that call to mind the emotive, intelligent pop music of artists such as Peter Gabriel and David Bowie. Continuing to carve out his unique place with this new project, C. Shirock describes his songwriting as vulnerable and honest, “whether it’s capturing a feeling, or telling a specific story, it’s always based on my own life. If it doesn’t come out of my own emotional experience, it feels inauthentic and I don’t feel connected to it”.
