Drift Into Black keep hope alive, Celtic Hills get back to the garden, Micah Shemaiah & 808 Delavega are onto something, Luciano sounds the alarm, Farewell ponder the possibilities — and you can ponder another crop of new arrivals in the second half of your Monday Roundup. Welcome back.
16 | Drift Into Black | Thread Of Hope
THE EDITED PRESS RELEASE: “One-man doom metal band Drift Into Black have released an evocative animated lyric video for Thread Of Hope. The song is taken from the upcoming album Patterns of Light, which will be released on May 28. Thread Of Hope fuses post-punk beats and haunting vocal melodies with Drift Into Black’s synth-laden progressive doom-death metal sound. The video augments the song’s dark lyrics using contorted animations of scenes including graveyards and burning forests. Craig Rossi started Drift Into Black in 2017 and since then has released three full-length albums of melodic doom-death metal. Influenced by bands including Saturnus, My Dying Bride and Ghost Brigade, Drift Into Black also incorporates elements of post-punk and progressive metal. Patterns of Light is a concept album that tells a dark and twisted story of loss, grief, religion and revenge.”
17 | Celtic Hills | Eden (ft. Germana Noage)
THE EDITED PRESS RELEASE: “Legendary Italian speed/thrash metallers Celtic Hills’ Mystai Keltoy is available now. To celebrate the new album, the band released their video for Eden, featuring Germana Noage, the former voice of Aetherna.”
18 | Micah Shemaiah & 808 Delavega | You’ve Got Something
THE EDITED PRESS RELEASE: “808 Delavega & Micah Shemaiah team up for You’ve Got Something. Tinged with Afrobeat and soul, the reggae track reveals the richness of Micah Shemaiah’s voice and an approach that establishes a new sound in the Jamaican musical landscape. It’s a perfect track to announce the summer, which will please any fan of Caribbean music.”
19 | Luciano | State of Emergency
THE EDITED PRESS RELEASE: “On State of Emergency, we experience the vocal power of Luciano. A major figure in reggae since the ’90s, on this track Luciano shows us that he has lost nothing and is still at the top, delivering a message to all politicians and sounding the alarm on the state of our world. Touching on the pandemic and ecological crisis, Luciano calls for individual awareness to offer a better world to future generations. State Of Emergency is an organic and powerful track, a rare pearl in today’s digitalized music.”
20 | Farewell | If
THE EDITED PRESS RELEASE: “French folk/nu-classical one-man band Farewell just unveiled a a video illustrating the single If. The song will featured on Jibé Calluaud’s album Spinoza to be released at the end of the month.”
21 | Yndling | Cotton Candy Skies
THE EDITED PRESS RELEASE: “Yndling is the dream-pop project of Norwegian artist Silje Espevik. This endeavour is the result of wanting to take complete creative control over her music. Through delicate soundscapes and oscillating synths, Yndling invites listeners into her own world, offering a place of escapism and resonance through her lyricism. Yndling is unveiling the sweet and euphoric Cotton Candy Skies. After feeling sad and a bit heartbroken for a while, Yndling found herself in a state of self pity she couldn’t pull herself out of, almost taking comfort in the familiar feeling of being down. She confides, “The idea for the song came as I was walking home one evening and the sky was really brilliant with pink clouds all over. Normally I’m quite good at making small moments like that lift my mood and feel better, and it kind of struck me that I hadn’t really been doing that well on being present in my life lately.”
https://youtu.be/ecWCGJbxpdE
22 | Don Mai | Caught Up
THE EDITED PRESS RELEASE: “Singer-songwriter Don Mai is back with his new single Caught Up. Influenced by the likes of Juice Wrld and Ed Sheeran, Don’s personal style of songwriting sees him open up about his emotions and feelings, relying on a song’s natural writing flow and feel to determine its sound rather than being constrained by genre. Don says: “Caught Up is about the feeling you get when no matter what you do, no matter what happens between you and this other person. You’ll always have a soft spot for them. I wrote this song because even though I’ve tried to move on from this one girl, I just haven’t been able to.”
23 | Patrice Peris | Surging On
THE EDITED PRESS RELEASE: “Singer-songwriter Patrice Peris shares the single Surging On. “Life can throw you a lot of curveballs and it is all how you handle them that determines your happiness,” says Peris. “Some songs are a struggle and others easy, for Surging On it was the latter of the two. This song, to me, embodies strength through the struggle and the power of continuing to move forward.”
24 | Jabobo | Walk Through The Snow
THE EDITED PRESS RELEASE: “Jabobo are Manuel Miller and Jack. They’ve played in several bands in Chicago together, and also busked outside Wrigley Field for drunk Cubs fans from 2016 to 2018. They find inspiration from acts like King Krule, High Club and Mk.Gee. “That sort of slacker jazz chordy stuff really inspires me to make the dumb songs I make,” Miller says. Their new song is Walk Through The Snow. Miller says: “The song was written about someone I was dating at the time, you know how songs are, and i just wanted to talk about some of the real sorta grounded things you do for folk you’re into, sometimes the kinda things that are a little bit of a pain, like walking through the snow for a long time.”
25 | Nimkish | YSB (ft. Ascxnsion)
THE EDITED PRESS RELEASE: “To fully immerse in the multitudes of rising queer Indigenous star Nimkish is to honour the past, look ahead to the future, and bask in the resplendent present all at once. The Vancouver artist is fearless in her lyricism, confronting racism and colonial violence alongside other hard subjects like anxiety, grief and heartache. To the great tradition of singer-songwriters healing through their music, Nimkish brings a bright-eyed aim to flourish in all she has experienced. Her lyrics give affirmation to past pain while living in the moment. To some it may sound like escapism, to others it may sound like moxie-driven R&B-pop pulsing through the club. What’s certain is her fortitude — she’s on a mission, combining the coolness and creativity of the TikTok generation with the lucidity and confidence of a grown woman. Her anthemic new single YSB features Ascxnsion and is about the need for healing, freedom, and to be heard.”
26 | Said Sara | Bleedways
THE EDITED PRESS RELEASE: “San Francisco singer-songwriter and multi-instrumentalist David Benson, aka Said Sara, follows up last year’s eponymous EP with the new track Bleedways. The song was born of necessity. Its roots scratched at Benson as if begging for expulsion. Its chords came almost instantly, and its shape morphed and refined itself until it breathed on its own. Its lyrical concept, similarly, is of purging. The spiral frustration from years of attempting to erase — to strikethrough — one’s past failures can ultimately lead to acceptance via ownership. We are as defined by our moments of horror as we are by our moments of peace.
27 | Dan Davidson | Roll With It
THE EDITED PRESS RELEASE: “Never one to shy away from his creativity, Edmonton’s Dan Davidson has managed to flourish during this unprecedented global pandemic. Pivoting quickly from in-person performances to digital platforms, Davidson was the first to host a virtual concert series (Diesel Bird Fest) and has since kept busy writing, producing, recording and even acting. Today, he releases Roll With It, an anthem for the times and a true testament to what is possible when boundaries no longer exist. “This is a song about grinning and bearing it,” explained Davidson. “It’s all about keeping a smile on your face and making the best of things until the bad times get better — and they always do.”
28 | Jamestown Revival | Prospector’s Blues
THE EDITED PRESS RELEASE: “The frontier stories of American novelist Louis L’Amour have been an influence on Jonathan Clay and Zach Chance of Jamestown Revival since the band’s formation. At the age of 23, both Clay and Chance read L’Amour’s memoir, The Education Of A Wandering Man, and since then, fans haven’t had to dig very deep to find their hat tips to the late, great legend. On May 28, Jamestown Revival’s EP Fireside With Louis L’Amour will immortalize the guys’ love for L’Amour’s storytelling in a six-song roundup of tunes directly inspired by his short stories. Start with Prospector’s Blues.”
29 | Voodoo Bloo | MMA
THE EDITED PRESS RELEASE: “Alt-punk rock band Voodoo Bloo have released their second UK. single MMA, the follow to their February debut Her Name Was Human. Singer-songwriter Rory McDonald says: “MMA was also originally going to be called ‘moshpit martial arts’, and is all about those drunken idiots who, in an effort to make themselves look cool, end up making regretful decisions that don’t mean much until they wake up the next morning. I feel everyone has let something fall through the cracks that shouldn’t have when intoxicated.”
30+31 | Albai | Aura + All Night (ft. Colby Hansen)
THE EDITED PRESS RELEASE: “Aibai is a 23-year-old producer based in Minneapolis. She just dropped a double release with singer Colby Hansen. Aura is a whirlpool of excitement, narrating a queer relationship and the emotions of seeing a cute girl in a crowd at a concert and wanting to dance with her. All Night speaks about being in a relationship that you may have to sacrifice due to moving somewhere to chase your dreams and potentially losing the relationship forever due to that.”
BONUS TRACK: New River Beach | More Or Less
THE EDITED PRESS RELEASE: “Toronto outfit New River Beach’s latest single and third release More Or Less was written and recorded during the winter of 2021. They say: “We wrote this song as a triptych: three equal parts that never repeat. Marney wrote and played the sections and Mark sampled and arranged. You can hear layers of instruments in each section from a mini drum kit to an out of tune piano. We added a Casio keyboard, slide guitar, and a borrowed Pro One synth. The result is a pop tune with a driving beat that travels through three distinct parts.”
