What a cracking start to the weekend. We’ve already given you two absolute gems from Howling Owls in the shape of the down-tempo, disconcerting Snake Charmer (No Money In The Bank) and the captivating and sinister Family Tree, and now rejoice because we have a third. It is another brand new track, another gem. That’s a 100% record so far. So download, lay back, turn up the … Continue reading Rejoice: more from Howling Owls
Surely May must be my favourite month – or maybe September? – it’s too close to call. Anyway, traditionally a time of spring cleaning, I thought I might make the most of my enforced incarceration this week owing to one poorly daughter. Alas, I didn’t get much further than a bag of old letters and photos – letters from old friends and older boyfriends. How … Continue reading Mrs Mackerel’s TFI Friday
Nice free summer sampler available from Peapod Recordings just by clicking here. It includes an unreleased track from MM faves Brown Bird amongst others. And if you don’t know how good Brown Bird are just check this out – no. 6 in our top ten of 2009. Get more of their stuff from eMusic here. Visit MySpace here. Download Brown Bird – Wrong Black Mare … Continue reading Free sampler from Peapod Recordings
Busy, busy, busy today but wanted to post this. Cloudy Shoes is from Damien Jurado’s forthcoming album Saint Bartlett. Out on May 25th. Visit his MySpace here. Pre-order the album here. Download Damien Jurado – Cloudy Shoes mp3 (from Saint Bartlett) Continue reading New from Damien Jurado
The Diamond Center are psychedelic folk-rockers who pair a wall of reverb and noise with an eerie gothic country creeper, creating an unique blend that is hard to put a finger on. Influenced by albums spanning the musical spectrum, they hint of Phil Spector and Joe Meek’s experimental studio style, the live rawness of the Velvet Underground, as well as the nouveau psych-folk stylings of … Continue reading Mad Mackerel Recommends…The Diamond Center
It’s been a long time since MM has used the word cretin, despite it being a prime insult of choice during long-ago school days. So who better than MM fave Wooden Wand to resurrect it into our daily vocabulary. Following (for him) a rather lengthy silence since the outstanding Born Bad album, he has self-released Wither Thou Goest, Cretin in a limited edition of 200 … Continue reading Wooden Wand releases Wither Thou Goest, Cretin
We’re a little late to the party with this one, but like us, some of you may not yet have experienced the myriad charms of Boy & Bear, and if you haven’t then you need to. Simple as that. An Australian five piece, that you would probably best label as folk-rock, they have recently released their debut five track EP titled With Emperor Antarctica, and also toured … Continue reading Mad Mackerel Recommends…Boy & Bear
We’ve put Jason Ward’s acerbic Bless You up on MM a couple of times already. Now he is releasing it as a free digital single and download and we have the b-side for you too. It’s called Dark In Here and also comes from his excellent Graceful Bow EP. Ward says, “This is an instance where the blogosphere gets to act as the gatekeeper, releasing the … Continue reading Jason Ward releases Bless You
We first became aware of Mountain Man via Alex Bleeker & The Freaks superb cover of their song Animal Tracks. Once we had finally realised it was a cover, we tracked down the original and were equally impressed. Now the band, of which none are men, are following their limited self-released CD with a ‘proper’ debut long player, Made The Harbor, which will be out on … Continue reading Mad Mackerel Recommends…Mountain Man
Indulge me today. My youngest boy was six on Tuesday. Blessed with an excellent fledgling taste in music, his current faves includes Jason Ward, Stornoway and Dr Dog. Perhaps being named after MM’s all time hero, Joe Strummer (or Joe Drummer as our Joe called him for some time), has helped. So much personality packed into one so small. Anyway, enough of these frivolities, we’ve … Continue reading Mrs Mackerel’s TFI Friday
The Mad Mackerel 