Browsing Tag indie
The Soft Cavalry – Bulletproof
Singer and multi-instrumentalist Rachel Goswell is part of legendary ’90s shoegazers Slowdive, but she also released a solo album and formed the super band Minor Victories. Now, she is half of yet another project, The Soft Cavalry, which also contains her husband Steve Clarke.
Bulletproof is only the pair’s second single. The striking black and white video features the band performing the song via sign language, in tribute to Goswell’s son Jesse. He is profoundly deaf due to a genetic disorder. The singer herself also suffered hearing loss, stemming from an ear infection called labyrinthitis.
The Soft Cavalry’s self-titled debut album will be out on 5 July. Clarke’s brother Michael Clarke produced the long-player, which also features keyboardist Jesse Chandler (Mercury Rev, Midlake), guitarist Tom Livermore, and drummer Stuart Wilkinson.
For more great new music, follow the constantly updated Carte Blanche Music playlist.
Music industry watcher and journalist. Worked at a CD club, a record store chain and was editor in chief of an entertainment trade magazine. Has been in the radio business since 1987, producing and presenting shows. Was music director of several stations. Also, he developed the European Border Breakers Chart, Music Moves Europe Talent Chart and ESNS Chart.
Sløtface – Telepathetic
In 2017, Norway four-piece Sløtface released their debut album Try Not To Freak Out, which featured great singles like Magazine and Backyard. They just broke a two-year silence with a brand-new offering.
The band’s brilliantly titled new single Telepathetic sees the band sharing production duties for the first time with Odd Martin Skålnes, who worked with fellow-Norwegians like Sigrid and Aurora before. The collaboration results in one of Sløtface’s most infectious, energetic and exciting songs so far.
Speaking about the new track, bassist Lasse Lokøy says: “It was written in approximately 2 hours, at 11 in the evening, after a full day of recording. Most of us don’t remember any of it because we were so tired.” Singer Haley Shea adds: “It’s pretty much just about feeling you’re in the wrong place, like a small town or a job you don’t like, and thinking ‘there must be something else.”
For more great new music, follow the constantly updated Carte Blanche Music playlist.
Music industry watcher and journalist. Worked at a CD club, a record store chain and was editor in chief of an entertainment trade magazine. Has been in the radio business since 1987, producing and presenting shows. Was music director of several stations. Also, he developed the European Border Breakers Chart, Music Moves Europe Talent Chart and ESNS Chart.
Jesse Merineau – She Knows
Last year, Canadian indie pop artist Jesse Merineau released four singles, which were collected on his debut EP That Night. These were all ballads with big production. He now plans to release upbeat, catchy crowd favourites. She Knows is the first of them. Once again a song with stellar production, heavily inspired by the likes of Arctic Monkeys, The Kooks, and Franz Ferdinand. Fans of The 1975 are sure to like it as well.
Merineau says about his best song so far: “Being young, stupid, and head-over-heels for a beautiful girl is what sparked my new single, She Knows. All it took was putting pen to paper with the thought of her on my mind. We all had a blast in the studio recording this one, running on espresso and adrenaline. It was magical, filled with moments that I’ll cherish forever. She Knows is about good times and good vibes.”
For more great new music, follow the constantly updated Carte Blanche Music playlist.
Music industry watcher and journalist. Worked at a CD club, a record store chain and was editor in chief of an entertainment trade magazine. Has been in the radio business since 1987, producing and presenting shows. Was music director of several stations. Also, he developed the European Border Breakers Chart, Music Moves Europe Talent Chart and ESNS Chart.
Wildcard (week 24):
Jay Som – Superbike
One to look forward to: on 23 August, Los Angeles-based singer-songwriter Melina Dutertre releases her new album Anak Ko, which means ‘my child’ in the Filipino language. It’s the 25-year-old’s third full length since recording as Jay Som. As always, she produced and engineered it all herself.
Let’s be honest: what can go wrong when an artist cites acts like Prefab Sprout, The Cure and Cocteau Twins as her main influences? As a consequence, Jay Som’s new single Superbike sounds familiar from the first note on. About this song, Duterte says she wrote it ‘aiming for a combination of Cocteau Twins and Alanis Morissette’. To me, it sounds as if Natalie Imbruglia were into shoegaze. It’s indie music, drenched in Californian sunshine.
This week, Superbike by Jay Som is the new Carte Blanche Music Wildcard!
In the Wildcards 2019 playlist you can find all of this year’s Carte Blanche Music Wildcards so far.
Music industry watcher and journalist. Worked at a CD club, a record store chain and was editor in chief of an entertainment trade magazine. Has been in the radio business since 1987, producing and presenting shows. Was music director of several stations. Also, he developed the European Border Breakers Chart, Music Moves Europe Talent Chart and ESNS Chart.
Altered By Mom – Hear That Sound
Altered By Mom started as an excuse for producer/songwriter Devon Lougheed to play with some of his favourite musicians from all across Canada, but really took shape with the permanent addition of Gina Kennedy (bass/vocals) and Jamie Williamson (drums).
Ahead of their new album Trapped In An MP3 (due later this year) the Toronto-based pop-rock band have a new single out. Hear That Sound showcases their knack for classic song-writing with a tongue-in-cheek sense of humour. And the way the male and female vocals are juxtaposed is just lovely. Boy, would this have been a radio hit when radio was still about smart and catchy pop songs!
The band says about the track: “Hear That Sound is about making someone else cry. It’s such a universal yet specific moment – because people cry all the time, but when it happens, nothing feels more deeply personal. In the audio world, we talk about crossfades where one bit of audio blends seamlessly into another, and sometimes relationships end and begin like that too. This song encompasses the sound of artefacts from a previous relationship fading out while a new one begins.”
For more great new music, follow the constantly updated Carte Blanche Music playlist.
Music industry watcher and journalist. Worked at a CD club, a record store chain and was editor in chief of an entertainment trade magazine. Has been in the radio business since 1987, producing and presenting shows. Was music director of several stations. Also, he developed the European Border Breakers Chart, Music Moves Europe Talent Chart and ESNS Chart.
Kidsmoke – She Takes You Under
North Wales band Kidsmoke cite Real Estate, Wild Nothing, The Smiths and Kate Bush among their influences, but I’m sure they are fans of New Order and The Cure as well. The latter’s band’s frontman Robert Smith already invited the quarter (Lance – vocals/guitar, James – bass/vocals, Sophie – guitar/vocals, and Ash – drums) to play his Meltdown Festival.
The band spent last summer in the studio with long-time producer Russ Hayes, working on their forthcoming debut album, due in the summer. She Takes You Under has just been put forward as Kidsmoke’s new single. Bringing a dreamy edge to melodic indie-pop, their sound will certainly appeal to fans of Pale Waves.
For more great new music, follow the constantly updated Carte Blanche Music playlist.
Music industry watcher and journalist. Worked at a CD club, a record store chain and was editor in chief of an entertainment trade magazine. Has been in the radio business since 1987, producing and presenting shows. Was music director of several stations. Also, he developed the European Border Breakers Chart, Music Moves Europe Talent Chart and ESNS Chart.
Sorcha Richardson – Don’t Talk About It
New York-based, Dublin-born Sorcha Richardson has been making a name for herself for some seven years now, but her debut album First Prize Bravery is yet to be released. It’s due for this autumn, and Don’t Talk About It is the elegantly fresh first single.
The track marks a new, more mature sonic path for the singer-songwriter, which I like a lot. It’s a great piece of bedroom pop with a retro touch, where Richardson’s lush vocals are accompanied by edgy guitars, sweeping synths and warm textures. While this makes for a sweet and nostalgic musical vibe, the lyrics point in another direction.
“It’s a song about avoiding conflict and trying to keep the peace, no matter how much you end up sacrificing in order to do so”, according to the singer. “Sometimes it feels much easier to convince yourself that you’re happy in a relationship, or in a city, or in a job, than to admit to yourself that you’re not, and to have to drag that problem out the light and deal with it. But that never works, and when you leave a problem alone, 99% of the time it just grows and grows until you can’t ignore it. I’ve learned that lesson the hard way, more than once. This is a song about what you end up losing when you smile and hold your tongue, but also what an achievement it is when you do learn to confront a situation that scares you.”
For more great new music, follow the constantly updated Carte Blanche Music playlist.
Music industry watcher and journalist. Worked at a CD club, a record store chain and was editor in chief of an entertainment trade magazine. Has been in the radio business since 1987, producing and presenting shows. Was music director of several stations. Also, he developed the European Border Breakers Chart, Music Moves Europe Talent Chart and ESNS Chart.
Werner’s Weekly (week 24)
This is Werner’s Weekly, your compass to the music that matters, containing the two most recent Carte Blanche Music Wildcards, and the best of the other new releases in alphabetical order:
- Rammstein – Ausländer (Wildcard this week)
- boy pablo – 50 Souls And A Discobowl (Wildcard last week)
- Lucy Spraggan – Today Was A Good Day
- Mosa – Losts And Founds
- Otherkin – On And On
- The Allergies feat. Andy Cooper – 2 Much!
- The New Nostalgia – Fragile Bones
Click the links for more info and listen to each of the tracks via the Werner’s Weekly player below.
For more great new music, follow the constantly updated Carte Blanche Music playlist. Also added last week: Death Cab For Cutie, The Divine Comedy, Fatboy Slim, Jovanotti (with Dardust), Liam Gallagher, Machine Gun Kelly (with Yungblud & Travis Barker), Sofi Tukker & Bomba Estéreo, and many more.
Music industry watcher and journalist. Worked at a CD club, a record store chain and was editor in chief of an entertainment trade magazine. Has been in the radio business since 1987, producing and presenting shows. Was music director of several stations. Also, he developed the European Border Breakers Chart, Music Moves Europe Talent Chart and ESNS Chart.
The New Nostalgia – Fragile Bones
The New Nostalgia are a London-based rock band, whose UK-born lead singer Patrick McCallion is currently living in Amsterdam, the Netherlands. That’s also where they played their sold out debut show, which was met with praise. The band are currently playing venues and festivals across the UK and the Netherlands. How about that for a quartet (including James Sands, Sam Bramhall and Charley Adey), whose first single is only out since this week?
Fragile Bones is a reflective song about the post-university haze that many twenty-somethings find themselves in. McCallion says: “It’s a song about getting home after an embarrassing night of heavy drinking and having a talk with yourself about life in the bathroom mirror. I think a lot of people in their early twenties start to realise that when their parents were their age they had careers, houses and kids. You realise that you’re still essentially living the same way that you did when you were a student and it hits you over the head like a tonne of bricks.”
The explosive single is taken from their debut album which is currently being recorded and due for release later this year.
For more great new music, follow the constantly updated Carte Blanche Music playlist.
Music industry watcher and journalist. Worked at a CD club, a record store chain and was editor in chief of an entertainment trade magazine. Has been in the radio business since 1987, producing and presenting shows. Was music director of several stations. Also, he developed the European Border Breakers Chart, Music Moves Europe Talent Chart and ESNS Chart.
The Allergies feat. Andy Cooper – 2 Much!
The Allergies (a production/DJ outfit consisting of Rackabeat and Moneyshot, from Bristol, UK) are a busy bunch. Their stream of releases never seems to dry, they’re gigging all over the place, record podcasts and mixtapes, and make remixes of other people’s tunes (most recently of Get A Hold On This by Aldo Vanucci feat. Kylie Auldist)…
Next up is this great new single. 2 Much! is funky as hell, groovy as no other and full of vibes. It features Marietta Smith on vocals, Mr. Woodnote on sax, and of course lyrics by Andy Cooper, who is rapidly becoming The Allergies’ third member. Talking of speed: 2 Much! includes one of the fastest rap verses ever laid down. Ch-ch-check it out!
For more great new music, follow the constantly updated Carte Blanche Music playlist.
Music industry watcher and journalist. Worked at a CD club, a record store chain and was editor in chief of an entertainment trade magazine. Has been in the radio business since 1987, producing and presenting shows. Was music director of several stations. Also, he developed the European Border Breakers Chart, Music Moves Europe Talent Chart and ESNS Chart.
