i think i better follow you around

The Neverly Boys, the Los Angeles-based duo of TV on The Radio’s David Sitek and acclaimed songwriter/producer Daniel Ledinsky (Carly Rae Jepsen, CeeLo Green, Pussy Riot), have released an enhanced version of their debut album, making Dark Side of Everything Deluxe available today via Alchemy Recordings/BMG.

Dark Side of Everything Deluxe track list:

1. Burn Hollywood
2. Never Come Down
3. Red Flag
4. Without You
5. Let Love In
6. Misery
7. Mighty Pine
8. Wheel of Fortune
9. Mushroom Cloud
10. Director’s Cut
11. Your Life is Blooming
12. 9 to 5

The newly expanded release includes a cover of the Dolly Parton classic “9 to 5,” with a video directed by Mason Poole.

A brief note from the Neverly Boys reads: “The Neverly Boys know you are many things. You are a pilot, flying on a giant rock through space. You are an explorer, navigating the depths of modern living. You are an animal seeking shelter from the blue flickering light of modern living. If you can manage to cultivate stillness in the midst of the hustle The Neverly Boys would like to present to you a human story. An honest story about finding your place in the world. With all of its glory and all of its drama, they seek to give a voice to the unknown, the magic, the heartbreak and the aspirations. They hope you find comfort in their songs.”

Please listen to the album. It’s important. Now, more than ever.

Author & Punisher returns with a new album, Krüller, out February 11th, via Relapse Records.

Krüller tracklist:

1. Drone Carrying Dread
2. Incinerator
3. Centurion
4. Maiden Star
5. Misery
6. Glorybox (Portishead cover)
7. Blacksmith
8. Krüller

News of the new album come with the release of the first single for the opening track “Drone Carrying Dread”. The video was directed by Monte Legaspi and features illustrations from album cover artist Zlatko Mitev.

“’Drone Carrying Dread’ was the first song I wrote on Krüller,” explains Tristan Shone of the album that thematically was inspired by Octavia E. Butler’s Parable series. “I had just gotten home from the final tour of the Beastland album cycle and I spent a couple weeks updating my overall tones with a nice balance of sub, saw/synth and tube amp. This track was basically the one where it all clicked and I had these chords that resonated just right, shaking the entire warehouse. It’s a simple but raw progression that was ripe for the addition of melodic guitars, as well as synthesizer programming from myself and co-producer Jason Begin (Vytear). Lyrically, it’s about escape and survival, as the events that were unfolding in 2020 were prophesied by the books I was reading throughout the year.”

Shone began work on Krüller after returning from his opening slot with Tool across the U.S., Australia, and New Zealand, before being cut short due to the March 2020 lockdowns. “Melody has been and is still a part of my sound,” says Shone. “I’ve always bathed them in a lot of reverb, delay, and distortion, though. This time around, I was bothered by the wall of distortion I had created. I wanted a little more clarity. I wanted to refine the sound. I wanted to step back from my own show and analyze it a bit. I had all these competing distortions that I wanted to streamline. I like contrast and wanted the vocals to be immediately noticeable. There’s something about mixing punishing drones and rumble with a mellow thing on top that I really like on Krüller.” Shone’s digitized snarls rightfully had their place on earlier tracks like “Doppler,” “Terrorbird,” and “Nihil Strength,” but contrasting mellow vocals atop Author & Punisher’s unparalleled heft made dynamic sense. Indeed, with Shone’s singing on songs like “Drone Carrying Dread,” “Maiden Star,” and the exceptional translation of Portishead hit “Glory Box,” Author & Punisher have projected an air of uncertainty around the steely, often slow-motion grind. On this album he was joined by handful of guest players including Tool’s Danny Carey and Justin Chancellor.

Author & Punisher has announced two rounds of 2022 European tour dates with North American performances to be announced soon and hopefully a Tijuana date as well.

Capsula released their new album Phantasmaville on October 15th via Silver Recordings.

Tracklist:

1. Behind the trees
2. You won’t believe it
3. The möbius strip
4. All my friends
5. Into the sun
6. El camino de La Plata
7. I don’t mind
8. (Don’t be afraid and play) Rock ‘n’ roll
9. Melting dowon
10. Ciudad fantasma
11. Esferas

The first video Capsula released was for the song “Behind The Trees”. The video was done in collaboration by Arturo Baston handling animation and post-production, Bittor Fortes doing the camera work and the editing in collaboration with Capsula’s own Coni Duchess.

Capsula have just premiered the video for “Esferas”. This video was done by Arturo Baston.

Martin Guevara and Coni Duchess are joined this time around by Alvaro Olaetxea on drums and he brings something subtle and powerful to the album’s voyage. It doesn’t necessarily address the world at large right now more than it takes you inwards and beyond yourself.

This album is a rock n roll album as if the big loud albums from the 70’s never ended. Listening to it you can almost feel or imagine that somehow this is the sound that someone like Jack White has been searching for and missing the mark on his solo albums.

One of the best accomplishments and virtues that Capsula have is that their songs work just as amazing in Spanish as they do in English regardless if Coni or Martin is singing. The feeling and the message gets conveyed equally.

The band said of the album: “Es un disco de rock’n’roll hecho por unos punks en una máquina del tiempo analógica. Sin mucho juicio, como mirando el universo por primera vez. Mucha visión… y un mapa celeste distinto, esférico”.

Hiatus Kaiyote released their new album “Mood Valiant” on June 25th via Brainfeeder and Ninja Tune Records.

TRACKLIST:
1. Flight Of The Tiger Lily
2. Sip Into Something Soft
3. Chivalry Is Not Dead
4. And We Go Gentle
5. Get Sun (feat. Arthur Verocai)
6. All The Words We Don’t Say
7. Hush Rattle
8. Rose Water
9. Red Room
10. Sparkle Tape Break Up
11. Stone Or Lavender
12. Blood And Marrow

The first single they released was for the song “Get Sun (feat. Arthur Verocai). The video was directed by Grey Ghost (Jeremy Koren).

That was followed shortly after by the song “Red Room”. This video was directed by Tré Koch.

Hiatus Kaiyote is comprised of Naomi “Nai Palm” Saalfield (guitar, vocals), Paul Bender (bass), Simon Mavin (keys), and Perrin Moss (drums).

They’ve been sampled and/or collaborated with the likes of The Carters (Beyonce & Jay-Z), Kendrick Lamar, Anderson .Paak, Chance The Rapper, Q-Tip and others.

The music they create is not something you can just label a specific genre which in a way is very fitting that they released this album on Flying Lotus Brainfeeder label. Just like him or Thundercat they just don’t make a particular style of music. They’re artists and they create.

The journey of the album originally began on the road, as they began to add new material to their live sets in while touring in support of Choose Your Weapon. By the fall of 2018, backing tracks had largely been laid, ready for Nai’s vocals. Then, during a brief swing through the U.S., Hiatus’s frontwoman was diagnosed with breast cancer. “That was a massive scare,” recalls Nai. Her mother’s death from the same disease was never far from her mind. Nai rushed back to Australia and into the hospital, where she underwent a life-saving mastectomy. As Nai recovered, the band turned back to their work with altered perspectives. Her lyrics, even those written before her illness, took on a prescient quality. It wasn’t until a trip to Rio de Janeiro in late-2019 to work with legendary Brazilian arranger Arthur Verocai on “Get Sun” that the vibe of the entire album shifted. “When you think your life is going to be taken away from you, it makes you think about who you are,” Nai says. “I guess after the breast cancer scare I decided that I needed to prove to life that the offering I have is genuine. My only wish is to live and offer my experience of time and beauty.”

As of yet no tour dates have been announced for the USofA.

Sonido De La Frontera have announced the release of their upcoming album “Sonidero Guerrillero” vía Three One G out on September 24th, 2021.

Tracklist:
Cumbia De La Frontera
Culebra
Si Quieres Mas (Ft El Chevy)
Sonidero Guerrillero
Cumbia Pacífica Del Mar
La Lucha Continua
Somos Sonideros
Soñando
Galaxia
Libre Como El Viento
El Callo De Jose
Zopilote
Prisionero Yo No Soy

They’ve shared the first video from the album for the track “Somos Sonideros”. The video was directed by Luke Henshaw, it was shot by Becky DiGiglio and edited by Displaced/Replaced.

Sonido De La Frontera is made up of Karlos Paez, Mr. Henshaw, and DJ Unite. Karlos Paez is also known for his role as vocalist for San Diego’s Latin Music project, The B-Side Players. DJ Unite is a veteran DJ for Tribe of Kings Soundsystem as well as First Power Crew. Mr. Henshaw is the producer for First Power Crew, and has produced many break records directed towards the avid turntablist. His sound is dark and heavy, with an emphasis on big drums and bass, as evident in his current projects Planet B and Satanic Planet.

Sonido De La Frontera is the combination of Soundsystem culture, hip hop production aesthetic and cumbia. The result is a bass oriented, dance driven music with a sound unique to the border between San Diego, California and Tijuana, Mexico. 

Psychic Graveyard have premiered the second single, “A Good Looking Ghost”, off their new album ‘Veins Feels Strange’ out September 10th via Deathbomb Arc.

The video for “A Good Looking Ghost” was directed by the multitalented Eric Livingston and he, as usual, did not disappoint.

As you’ve come to expect from Psychic Graveyard, this song is built around the knob handling from Nathan Joyner and the pounding from Charles Ovett behind the drums, Paul Vieira and the poetry from Eric Paul rounding out the post synth punk sound.

They have 2 upcoming supporting tours for 2022. One with Daughters with a couple of shows so far in NYC.

The other one supporting METZ across Europe.

No additional dates for the USofA (or Tijuana) have been announced yet.

Annette is a magical, glorious and delirious musical tragedy.

Annette comes from a concept album idea from the band Sparks, who are having a mainstream moment thanks to this and a documentary that was directed by Edgar Wright. The band met Carax in Cannes when the director was premiering “Holy Motors” and he had used a Sparks song for that movie and their collaboration began.

(There are some spoilers in the review below.)

Leos Carax directs a wonderful Marion Cotillard (Ann). She’s a revered opera actress. The audience loves her as much as her accompanist. She’s accomplished and always gives more on each subsequent performance. Her audience is captivated and in awe, at one point her boyfriend, Adam Driver (Henry) gets to see her the finale of one of her performances and you bear witness to him realizing (confirming?) that she’s the better part of the relationship.

Adam Driver plays Henry. Henry is a stand up comedian. He’s the opposite of Ann. His onstage persona is a robe wearing always smoking angry, confrontational smart eloquent and hostile comedian. Basically he’s Bill Hicks with a robe and a great body. Now, there is no way to confirm this but the basis for this assumption comes from the fact that he goes after the audience a couple of times, the self deprecating humor, the constant questioning of why is he funny and why would.anyone find him attractive. The dick jokes. He gets shot onstage.

They get engaged. They get married. They get pregnant. The baby comes along. The stress fractures the fragile relationship. They go away from the spotlight to rekindle their love. Tragedy strikes. A return from the ashes looks possible. Magic and wonder ensues. Self inflicted tragedy strikes again.

It’s in the third act that the movie gets surreal. And magical. And tender. Almost dreamlike before human nature and it’s shortcomings take over and replaces those tender feelings with a hopeless self inflicted tragedy.

The more I think of the movie the more I remember things and the more I find moments that stayed with me permanently.

Obviously the music is the most fundamental aspect of the movie and it doesn’t let down from the start with the aptly titled “So May We Start” at the beginning of the movie that, literally, sets you up for what’s to come. To the voyeuristic romance of “We Love Each Other” to the sociopathic “I’m an Accompanist” to the loving “True Love Always Finds A Way” and “Aria” to the personal favorite “You Used To Laugh” to the tragic “Let’s Waltz in the Storm” and lastly all of the Annette songs “We’ve Washed Ashore” and the “Premiere Songs”. There isn’t a bad song in the whole movie. The performances are impecable. It’s a musical and a tragedy and a comedy and a drama and an opus all into one.

Go watch the movie and let it live within you. Give it the space it needs to breathe and grow.

Caleb Landry Jones has announced the release of his new album “Gadzooks Vol. 1”, out September 24th via Sacred Bones Records.

TRACKLIST:
1. Never Wet
2. Yesterday Will Come
3. The Loon (A Gate Away)
4. Bogie
5. Gloria
6. California
7. For A Short Time (There Was Loving)
8. A Slice Of Dream
9. This Won’t Come Back

The first single off the album is ‘Bogie’. The video was created by Jacqueline Castel.

Caleb Landry Jones just won the Best Actor award at Cannes for his role in the movie “Nitram”. Some of the previous acting roles he’s had have been Banshee in X-Men First Class, Get Out, Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri, a few episodes in Twin Peaks and the Dead Don’t Die. These last 2, the one’s with David Lynch and Jim Jarmusch, were done with directors that are part of Sacred Bones Records roster. And it was Jim Jarmusch himself that made the introduction between the actor/musician and the label.

Caleb said this of his album: “I stole from what was around me, what fell out of the television, what passed below my windows, relationships, old and new. My frustrations, desires, day dreams and fears scattered themselves throughout my writing. It is a direct response to the album before it. I felt whatever I wrote next needed to be more consistent. I knew that I wanted to put everything down on tape. I wanted the same players as before but to go further. The perspectives from which I write, jump erratically and can turn on a dime. Others grow and burn, only to sometimes vanish on the spot, just before the hat drops… My intention is to not rob the listener of their own fantasies by describing the annals of purpose which in turn, only unearth a fragile magic. I am interested only in the album’s response by its audience. The album is there to be digested, not by the front of your brain, but by the back. It is for the lover of labyrinths and quagmires.”

No tour dates have been announced yet for the USofA (or Tijuana).

Small Isles released their debut album “The Valley, The Mountains, The Sea” on June 25th via AKP Recordings, an imprint of Dangerbird Records.

Tracklist: 1 – The Concept
2 – Walked From Ruin
3 – I Came as a Faux
4 – Life at One
5 – Fort Wayne
6 – Lake Superior
7 – Maybe We Will
8 – The Plot to Take Clover

The video for the single ‘Life at One’ was done Riley Anderson. About the video Jim Fairchild said: “I had this vague concept of a person facing down their mortality and then finding redemption and purpose. Where Riley took the song was beyond what I’d hoped for. It is heartbreaking in the best possible way, without becoming didactic. He is also making a chopped and screwed version of the video which will serve as a chaptered visual accompaniment for the whole album. Riley’s work brought the whole album to life in a way I’d hoped for but couldn’t have imagined.”

Small Isles is the new instrumental project of guitarist Jim Fairchild (Grandaddy / Modest Mouse / All Smiles) and songwriter/composer Jacob Snider, Small Isles inhabits a rare hypnotic twilight between motion picture music and incandescent cosmic folk. At once a love letter to film soundtracks and a meditative balm for our troubled times, The Valley, The Mountains, The Sea was recorded by Fairchild on a bare-bones mobile rig while on tour with Modest Mouse, in the cracks of time between soundchecks and performances, from city to city, in darkened hotel rooms and over-lit backstage dressing rooms, giving the album a sense of intimacy, of stolen time and weary after show solitude.

This is what Jim Fairchild had to say about Small Isles: “I began writing this album with a vague prompt. I wanted to conceive music that would inspire Ang Lee and Rick Moody to come together and use my work as a mood board for creating a spiritual sequel to The Ice Storm. And then use the album as cues for the score to the movie. I worked on it backstage almost every day during a tour with Modest Mouse. It was a dark time and it was healing to set up my rig and make music as a ritual. I was feeling good about the results, but it wasn’t until Jacob Snider started adding to the songs that they felt as beautiful and evocative as I’d imagined they could. Once Mike Cresswell sent me back the mixes, my favorite songs were the ones Jacob was on. So Small Isles the band was born. Now we have this album and another five-song EP that we’ll start mixing in the next couple of weeks with live strings and a fully formed collaboration between Jacob and me.”

There are no tour dates as of yet for the USofA (or Tijuana).