Wounded Bird is a male/female harmony-focused duo from Denver, Colorado (and not to be confused with (sadly) long gone MM indie-surf faves Two Wounded Birds).
Latest single Fall in Line is a sweetly stripped back affair of classic Americana, featuring acoustic guitar, fiddle and pedal steel along with their signature vocal harmonies.
Stream it here.
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Witch Hazel is the latest single from Historian. It is taken from upcoming long player Distractions, due for release on the 17th January.
It is a frenetic, poetic fuzzy slice of indie-punk on which the LA based band unleash their signature shamanistic Leonard Cohen vocals over a Velvet Underground meets Deerhunter style rocker.
Stream it here.
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It has been more than three years since we posted Port Juvee’s track Double Vision in one of our gone (and probably forgotten) Nickel in the Jukebox round ups.
Today we have Hope to Lose for you, a new single (and video) taken from upcoming long player Motion Control, scheduled for release at the end of February. It is another slab of typically urgent and tense post-punk that marries a classic wiry New York sound with a smidgeon of sunny side up surf rock.
Good stuff.
Stream / watch it here.
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Formed by friends in 2014 during a summer spent obsessing about the Sarah Records catalog, Michigan band Failed Flowers quickly developed into a shadowy, high-speed pop vehicle. Drawing at first from the wistful sighs of Sarah, the group grew more of an edge as they progressed, evoking elements of C86 granularity and shoegaze blur. The original lineup of bassist Erin Davis, drummer Miles Haney, and dual guitarist/singers Fred Thomas and Autumn Wetli played around the midwest for about a year, releasing an eight song demo before Wetli left the band. Close friend and collaborator Anna Burch stepped in during the spring of 2015, amplifying both the harmonies and the disquiet. This new lineup recorded a nine-song mini album of sharper material that saw release on the 25 Diamonds label before Thomas left Michigan for Montreal and Burch began a solo career with her own pristine indie-pop tunes.
The band have remained sporadically active, playing the occasional gig, doing a short run of shows with Protomartyr in 2017 and getting together to write and record in the increasingly rare moments when all parties were available. The two songs on this newly released 7″ are the fruits of Failed Flowers’ most recent sessions and are a real treat.
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Delighted to get the news that Taxi is the first single to be taken from the new album, A Northern View, from MM fave Arborist.
A stand-out, jolt-from-the-blue, set-piece, Taxi is a spoken word epic story inspired by Arab Strap, Belle and Sebastian and James Yorkston, who have made the droll Scottish storyteller’s delivery a constant. As singer-songwriter Mark McCambridge explains, “I wanted to do something similar with the Northern Irish voice. It’s a story about a claim from my Dad’s cousin and good friend through his youth, Henry McQuillan, that he conceived the idea of turning a famous Irish traditional song into a rock song.”
Arborist first came to the attention in 2015 with their brillaint debut single, the Americana tinged Twisted Arrow, that features an astonishing duet with Kim Deal of The Breeders and featured highly both in our Best of 2015 lists and our Best of the Last Ten Years countdown.
Great to have Arborist back, and some tour dates below for you too.
See Arborist live
Fri 16th Nov 2019 – Ulster Sports Club, BELFAST
Fri 31st Jan 2020 – The Band Room – LOW MILL, YORKSHIRE [w/ Kacy & Clayton]
Sat 1st Feb – Northern Rock Foundation Hall, GATESHEAD [w/ Kacy & Clayton]
Tues 4th Feb – The Railway Inn, WINCHESTER [w/ Kacy & Clayton]
Wed 5th Feb – Mothers Ruin, BRISTOL [w/ Kacy & Clayton]
Thurs 6th Feb – Fat Lils, WITNEY [w/ Kacy & Clayton]
Fri 7th Feb – St Davids City Hall, St Davids, WALES [w/ Kacy & Clayton]
Fri 14th Feb – PhilGrimes, WATERFORD, IRELAND
Fri 15th Feb – Set Theatre, KILKENNY, IRELAND
In celebration of Halloween, watch Death Valley Girls’ new video for Wear Black, which is taken from their excellent 2018 release Darkness Rains via Suicide Squeeze Records. Their world is a fusion of feral proto-punk, ‘70s scuzz dirges, and third eye mysticism and we love it….
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Hailing largely from the West Coast, the project of Nelene Deguzman formed in Tucson, The Rifle has roots in bedroom solitude, taking days when you never leave the house and putting them to music.
New single Are You Having Fun Yet? is taken from their upcoming long player Honeyden (out on Burger Records on the 31st January) and it is as charming a slice of sweet indie as you’re likely to hear this side of Christmas. Its fuzzy, psych-pop filled heart is a absolute joy.
Stream it here.
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Eyedress is the alias of Filipino artist Idris Vicuña, formerly lead guitarist of psychedelic indie/noise-pop band Bee Eyes. Born in 1990 in the city of Makati, Philippines, Vicuña relocated to the US with his family at the age of six. He was raised in Phoenix, Arizona before moving to San Clemente, California at the age of 13, where he started playing bass in The Liberal Underground, a Crass-influenced crust-punk band.
New single, the sparsely menacing I Don’t Wanna Be Your Friend is a brilliant mix of icy 80s post-punk and hip-hop style vocals and is on repeat here at MM Towers.
Watch / stream it below.
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Dan Bejar has announced that his thirteenth album as Destroyer, titled Have We Met, will be released on 31st January via Dead Oceans. To coincide, a London headline show at Village Underground has been announced for 5th May, with more tour news to follow.
The first single is Crimson Tide, a six-minute journey that sits rightfully alongside previous Destroyer epics. In typical Bejar fashion, it is a melancholy mover, whisked along by a driving beat, rumbling bass and whimsical piano, it comes as the band’s first new song since 2017’s Ken.
You can watch the cinematic video to accompany it below.
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It’s been seven years since our last Shrouded Strangers post, but good things come to he who waits…
And so it is with their new album Night Prancing, which according to them is “the soundtrack to an unrealised film script chronicling the adventures of a late-1950s surfer gang (the “Night Prancers”) in the sleepy coastal hamlet of Seaview, Washington.”
Watch the video for opening track Locust Heart below and be reassured that their own unique blend of woozy psychedelia and Link Wray inspired rumble rock remains in mighty fine fettle.
Order via Bandcamp here.
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