Martha and the Muffins dance like nobody’s watching, Beat Hotel get the feels, Hard Target has a full day and more in today’s Roundup. Hope your semi-holiday was as pleasant as mine.
1 | Martha and the Muffins | Stay Home and Dance
THE PRESS RELEASE: “A while back, our manager, Graham Stairs, challenged us to take our song, Come Out and Dance from our 1984 album Mystery Walk and create a social distancing version called Stay Home and Dance. This coincided with Speaker of the United States House of Representatives Nancy Pelosi’s advice during an April 2, 2020 press conference call to reporters that “You can never dance too much, especially when you’re home.” With a retro dance groove, lyrics both from the original song as well as new verses which recall the cheer-up songs of Vera Lynn during World War II, we send Stay Home and Dance out to spread a little light and as a heartfelt thank you to all the doctors, nurses, first responders, farmers, truckers, factory and postal workers and the countless others who are keeping it together for all of us.”
2 | Beat Hotel | Feel It
THE PRESS RELEASE: “Southern UK indie-rock outfit Beat Hotel have finally released their self-titled EP via online platforms. They also present a new video for lead track Feel It. The Beat Hotel EP features current and former members of The June Brides, The Loft, The Weather Prophets, The Distractions, Mudlow, Mojo Fins and Lolita Storm. “It was the lockdown that made me finally realize that I could get an animated video made without any physical human interaction being necessary and run with the whole Vertigo Hitchcock/Saul Bass graphics idea,” says frontman and producer Paul Pascoe. “Fortunately I know an amazing animation guy called Simon Hill and he made the idea come to life brilliantly. He incorporated the cover photo and we looked at the famous title sequence for Vertigo and also The Man With The Golden Arm and Casino. So Simon made our “falling man” and the whole thing works so well with the sentiment and lyrics of the song.”
3 | Hard Target | All Day
THE PRESS RELEASE: “Florida rapper Hard Target has revealed the details for his new album Joy Ridin’, which will surface July 10. To celebrate the impending release of his new album, Hard Target has released the music video for the first single All Day. The video was shot by Target and Breadwin in Hernando County, Florida before the pandemic broke out, as Hard Target gathered his crew of misfits to get faded in the sun at an epic house party. “Honestly, most of my albums always end up being very dark, angry, moody, and deal with a lot of real-life struggles and issues. This time around I’m letting loose and having a good time,” commented Hard Target about the new album. “A lot of people joked with me when’Chevrolet broke out last year that I had sold my soul to get a hit record, so I came in with the mentality that I don’t have got shit to prove to folks. I just had fun with it and went in trying to make some music you can pop in, press play and joy ride to.”
4 | Desource | Sheepdogs
THE PRESS RELEASE: “Italian progressive metal band Desource have unleashed a lyric video for their new single Sheepdogs featuring Monuments drummer Mike Malyan. The track is taken from their forthcoming EP Ambition due out September 2020. “Sheepdogs is one of the craziest and certainly heaviest songs on the whole EP. It involves unusual jazzy chords and insane patterns. It has been inspired by TDEP, Meshuggah, Decapitated but also Architects and generally modern metalcore such as early Northlane. A short but deadly cocktail of different elements!” Guitarist Edoardo Casini adds: “Ambition, as the title explains is a very ambitious record. It’s way more technical, progressive and dense than our debut album Dirty Happiness. It’s really a step forward in every direction both musically and lyrically. There are also so many genres combined in the songs such as Mathcore, Djent, Progressive Metal, Metalcore, Rock, Grind.”
5 | DDent | Volemie
THE PRESS RELEASE: “French post-metal instrumentalists DDent present their gripping video for Volemie, the first single off their massive and mind-elevating new album Couvre-sang due for release on July 3. Once again injecting poetry and philosophy into music, DDent‘s third full-length depicts their own vision of reality in the form of a time-lapse. Entirely written and recorded by multi-instrumentalist Louis Lambert, Couvre-sang won’t leave you unmoved, with dark and elegant atmospheres that keep pushing the genre’s boundaries by intelligently blending in expansive post-metal soundscapes with industrial and black metal patterns dear to their maker.”
6 | Alexandra Lost | Trying 2 Grow
THE PRESS RELEASE: “Hailing from Québec, Alexandra Lost is the brainchild of veteran songwriter Jane Ehrhardt and composer/producer Simon Paradis. It was formed as a vehicle for expressing their love of classic pop arrangements, vintage synthesizers and well-crafted songs. After releasing two acclaimed singles, Alexandra Lost just released their debut full-length. Their debut album sees them exploring the outer boundaries of the singer-songwriter genre while managing to be both danceable and thought-provoking. Beats, layers of synths and artful lyricism are used to convey feelings of loss across the spectrum. This blend of synth-driven danceable pop is highlighted on this album. Listen now to the focus track, Trying 2 Grow.“
7 | WHOOP-Szo | Cut Your Hair (Zoon Remix)
THE PRESS RELEASE: “WHOOP-Szo announce their upcoming EP of remixes of their acclaimed new album, Warrior Down, featuring alterations by Zoon, DOOMSQUAD, Ice Cream, AG47 (nêhiyawak), and more. “Warrior Down was a record that was a long time coming. At times it felt like nobody would touch the finished album,” says Adam Sturgeon. “‘It’s too heavy’ from the indies and ‘It’s not heavy enough’ from the metalheads. We’ve never really played into either of those narratives and so when the pandemic hit we decided to switch gears entirely. We had already been working and reworking a version of our song Cut Your Hair and were craving some interaction from our space of self-quarantine after cancelling well over 50 shows. We decided to reach out to contemporaries who also do their ‘own thing’ in the electronic world and before we knew it we had an EP’s worth of Warrior Down alterations. Each song provides a new take on songs from Warrior Down, but also covers a wide range of electronic subgenres in the process.”
8 | Raquel Lily | Ghost
THE PRESS RELEASE: “Born in the Philippines, raised in New York and currently residing in Atlanta, Georgia, Raquel Lily is an independent singer, songwriter, producer, guitarist and online personality. Her upcoming debut, full-length concept album, I’m Leaving, features eight songs, narrating a coming of age story about someone going through their 20s. Raquel confides, “Everyone’s been broken from something. You smoke some weed, you fall in love, they turn out to be a fuckboy, you’re with someone shitty, you break up, you ghost them, you still love them, you resign, you meet someone new and there’s hope again.”
9 | Marie-Clo | Trophy Wife
THE PRESS RELEASE: “A true creative chameleon, Quebec-based Marie-Clo is a born performer who ropes her audiences into a feverish pitch in both French and English. Singer-songwriter and dancer, her eclectic indie pop tackles current themes & conscious lyrics, but also conjures a colourful and enchanted world. Marie-Clo’s new single, Trophy Wife,”was originally written as a ballad and went through numerous shifts before its raw, bold, and uptempo final version that was produced by Fairfield. The song speaks of Marie-Clo’s voiceless, nameless time as a hockey wife. As a feminist, she witnessed and lived first hand objectification, double standards, emotional abuse & unsettling normalcy around sexist behaviors within the industry her partner thrived in. Unfaithfulness was simply the unoriginal cherry on top of a patriarchal sundae.”
