Vanish Valley hail from Los Angeles and offer a lovely mix of rootsy folk and hazy country psychedelia that has quality stamped all over it. Their MySpace page says they have a (presumably) self-titled album due out later this month on the 27th. The two tracks we’ve heard are destined to become regulars on the MM playlist. Become The Night chugs along on the back of … Continue reading Introducing…Vanish Valley
Without doubt The Roadside Graves are one of MM’s very bestest bands. For us, they are up there with the cream of the current crop and we greet each new release with as much excitement and anticipation as we do for anyone. So, in support of the recently released 6 song EP You Won’t Be Happy With Me, out now on Autumn Tone Records, we have … Continue reading New from The Roadside Graves…MM Rejoices
Here is our regular monthly round up of 25 of the best tracks posted on Mad Mackerel in the past month, and three new gems too. That’s a more than decent mixtape sorted even if we were crap in the World Cup! The Futurebirds – Battle For Rome mp3 Glorious, up-tempo alt-country gem that recalls Neil Young at his finest Puro Instinct – California Shakedown … Continue reading MM’s Best Of The Month: June
These United States will be releasing their new album (and their fourth in little more than two and a half years) on July 20. Titled What Lasts, the early advance track, The Great River, is another example of their top-notch country rock and songwriting chops. Perhaps this time a little edgier and a little darker? Visit their MySpace here. Download These United States – The … Continue reading New from These United States
Rhode Island residents The Benedictions play what is often called called devil music. They must do because their just released album is called The Benedictions Play Devil Music. On this occasion it’s hard folk, hard blues, hard country. It conjures images of grizzled old timers with whiskey eyes stamping their boots on beer-soaked wooden floors before heading back out into the dusty desert. It is authentic, … Continue reading Introducing…The Benedictions
Judging by their press one-sheet alone, The Victor Mourning are one of those bands that MM tends to like a lot. It talks of performing dark, thought provoking, starkly haunting songs that tell the tales of grief-torn outcasts, of confidences betrayed, of piracy, and murder. It goes on to mention a song about a man who eats nothing but locusts and Campbell’s soup, another about a … Continue reading Introducing…The Victor Mourning
Once you get past the slightly silly name (it took us a while), the music of Peter Wolf Crier is something special to behold. Their album Inter-Be is as much distorted country blues as it is intimate folk, as much delicately introspective as it is intensely passionate. However you want to describe it, the album is truly a marvellous piece of work. Download the sweetly … Continue reading Mad Mackerel Recommends…Peter Wolf Crier
Harlowe & The Great North Woods are another band from Portland, and another playing the kind of warm, mellow folk that seems so dominant in that neck of the woods. And they are another who do it extremely well. They have a six track self-titled EP out now and the track we have for you, Roses, is a song that envelops and soothes with its … Continue reading Introducing…Harlowe & The Great North Woods
Tonight’s topic: men with beards. This Friday evening, I’m out with two jolly fine chaps: MM and one of my bestest friends and main gigging partner (neither of whom currently sport beards). And off we will trot in an appropriately jaunty fashion, down the Cowley Road, to sway in time to the Band of Horses (almost uniformly, a group of men with an abundance of … Continue reading Mrs Mackerel’s TFI Friday
In 2008, Catherine Feeny drove 12,000 miles with her husband-to-be in a 1990 Mazda 323 called Swansong, playing more than 40 planned and impromptu shows in dens, living rooms and gardens all over the United States. She had just been dropped by her London-based record label and the situation called for radical action. “It was a break-up,” says Feeny. “I felt like I’d been kicked … Continue reading Mad Mackerel Recommends…Catherine Feeny
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