Sunliner serve up some greenery, Hearts Apart are second to none, Obey Roots don’t mind the weather, Varro Vivyds is running on adrenaline — while we’re coasting to the end of your Good Friday Weekend Roundup. Amen and enjoy your weekend.
76 | Sunliner | Salad Days
THE EDITED PRESS RELEASE: “Leeds punks Sunliner treat us to an Easter surprise. Salad Days is a little taste of what is to come from the band. A message from vocalist Jake: “What really fucking sucks is when you come home from a long day at a shitty job, drift off to sleep, only to dream of working. I get it all the time when I work a lot, I close my eyes and I start serving people at the bar I work in. It’s never any of the other jobs I have, it’s always that one. Even when I wake up, shake myself off and close my eyes again I just carry on from the spot I left off. Some arrogant customer is waiting just out of shot for a their pint of lager that they cannot possible wait any fucking longer for. The verses of this song are a conversation between a person and an older figure, possibly a parent. With the first verse the person in quotes is the older person, and in the chorus and verse it’s the younger person.”
77 | Hearts Apart | Number One To No One
THE EDITED PRESS RELEASE: “Italian punks Hearts Apart announce the release of their debut EP Number One To No One on June 18, and drop another massive single: The anthemic It’s All The Same. It’s a short, poppy but pretty epic punk gem. As the band explain: “Sometimes we just need shades as excuses to pretend to be sad, blue and depressed. Sometimes we need delusions as ballasts to avoid any improvement, any positivity. Sometimes we just suck so bad ’cause we don’t challenge ourselves, we cuddle the pain to poorly sport a reason to be pitied and self indulgent. And everything looks all the same. We refuse to have a fierce glance into the mirror and say ‘Hey, fuck you my heaviest enemy, now I’m in control, let’s react.’ Pain can be coozy. And that’s too often the beginning of the end.”
78 | Obey Robots | Let It Snow
THE EDITED PRESS RELEASE: “The second song from Obey Robots, Penfriend’s collaboration project with Rat (Ned’s Atomic Dustbin) is out today. “Inside Out started off as a shimmering acoustic guitar idea that Rat demoed and saved in a folder he called ‘Maybe send to Laura,’ ” Penfriend says. “This song is about dealing with the new groundhog-day-normal many of us have been experiencing for the past year: The highs, mediums and lows of a life made much smaller by circumstance. Ravelling and unravelling at different speeds to those around us, perhaps: trying to feel a semblance of forward motion; trying to remember what the point is. Deciding to keep hoping.”
79 | Amaro Mann | Mergulho em La Herradura
THE EDITED PRESS RELEASE: “Amaro Mann is a solo project by Paraíba musician and producer Leo Marinho. Mergulho em La Herradura is a tour through the Jamaican music universe, full of guitars, scale, synthesizers and programs, resulting in a dancing and psychedelic sound, which transits between reggae, dancehall and dub, popular Jamaican styles that appeared at the end from the ’70s. The single will be on the EP Refúgio, which will be released in May.”
80 | Varro Vivyds | Adrenaline
THE EDITED PRESS RELEASE: “The opening synths of Varro Vivyds‘ new single Adrenaline will immediately throw you back half a century with its new wave nostalgia. But she also incorporates more modern pop stylings; the combination of her voice over the vague EDM track sounds like Lady Gaga’s The Fame. Choices like these make Adrenaline stand out above similarly positioned pop tracks.”
81 | The Gama Sennin | Trigger Finger
THE EDITED PRESS RELEASE: “The Gama Sennin offers an elaborate 10-song suite of exceptional psychedelic adventurism on their self-titled new album.”
82 | Lacuna J | Fool (For Loving You)
THE EDITED PRESS RELEASE: “Lacuna J is an independent singer-songwriter in Manchester. Her latest tune Fool (For Loving You) narrates her perspective as a spectator. It’s easy to become blinded by love and be blissfully unaware of someone’s toxicity and this songwriter knows all too well what it’s like to be in a vulnerable position at the hands of someone heartless. Written as a means of attempting to crack the rose-tinted glasses of a loved one, Lacuna J shares, “I guess it’s a silent plea for them to figure it out on their own without my interfering but the frustration of also sitting back not wanting to be officious.”
83 | Bendik Finborud | Tears & Laughter
THE EDITED PRESS RELEASE: “Mixing melancholic folk pop with chilling lyrics on themes from love-craving and grief to the refugee crisis, Bendik Finborud draws from similar musical landscapes as artists like Thomas Dybdhal and Jonas Alaska.”
84 | Eloise Viola | B.O.D.Y.
THE EDITED PRESS RELEASE: “Brighton singer-songwriter Eloise Viola has been causing a stir on the scene as of late, and if her seductive new release B.O.D.Y. is anything to go by, it’s easy to see why. B.O.D.Y. is a track that is set to further illuminate the multi-talented songstress’ meteoric rise to the top. Inspired by a deeply personal struggle with her mental health and body image specifically throughout her teenage years, the lyrics were penned as she battled with recovery, a time in her life that still influences her songwriting approach.”
85 | Empty Heaven | Hyperreal (ft. iamhill)
THE EDITED PRESS RELEASE: “Singer-songwriter and producer Empty Heaven continues a string of successful releases with Hyperreal, the first in a series of collaborative singles. Empty Heaven explains: “Reality gets exaggerated, filtered, and projected onto screens … and then, it gets shot back. It was cute when it was in the primitive form of reality television. Now, we look at this hyperreal version of life every day, and many make earnest attempts to make their daily lives mirror it. What happens when one can’t keep up? After all, we really can’t for long. It’s unsustainable. Between “hustle” culture, a parade of fitness gurus, the normalization of melodrama, bizarre beauty standards, and brands attempting to make people feel, exhaustion is inevitable. Hyperreal, co-written with iamhill, is about that exhaustion.”
