We’re a bit late with this one we know, as it has been doing the blog rounds for a little while and we have been meaning to post it for ages. The reason is we have caught ourselves humming and nodding along to Shadow by Grass Widow on countless occasions recently. It is from their forthcoming album Past Time, due next month on Kill Rock Stars. Grass … Continue reading Mad Mackerel Recommends…Grass Widow
We discovered the delights of Bridal Party from the good folk over at Sonic Masala. Immediately boasting one of our favourite covers of the year so far with the Tim Burtonesque sleeve to Born Again On Dark Star, the band are offering a completely free download of the album on their Bandcamp page here. Not even asking for an e-mail address in return either. The music is a … Continue reading Introducing…Bridal Party
Secret Colours are purveyors of a very fine blend of psych-pop with a classic retro feel that has more than an echo of the late 60s and early 70s heyday for such things. Their self titled LP gets a release on August 3rd (though you can stream it all over on their Bandcamp page) and Jellybean the taster track we have is evocative of lava … Continue reading Mad Mackerel Recommends Secret Colours
Pretty confident we’ve given you a hat-trick of great posts and songs now. After the skewed, unsettling brilliance of Lower Dens and the promise of newbies Rare Grooves comes the downright catchy, 60s inspired, garage-psych of The Fungi Girls (who you won’t be surprised to learn are an all boy trio from Texas). We first became aware of them last year with promising debut album Seafaring … Continue reading Mad Mackerel Recommends…The Fungi Girls
Tuesday next week will see the release of Twin-Hand Movement, the debut album by Lower Dens. It is the new vehicle for the renowned, but as yet relatively unknown, Jana Hunter. Weirdly beautiful, it is throbbing, insistent drone-pop on the one hand and haunting, ghostly freak-folk on the other. It brilliantly mixes styles and approaches in a way that is accessible, surprising and despite some … Continue reading Mad Mackerel (thoroughly) Recommends…Lower Dens
For Posterity is the second album from Toronto four-piece Ten Kens. Having not come across them before, the blurb with the release mentioned inspiration from psychedelia to hardcore, which had to make them worth a listen. Now, we also know better than most that the blurb can often bear no relation to the sounds coming from the speakers. But not this time! Johnny Ventura, the … Continue reading Mad Mackerel Recommends…Ten Kens
No falling asleep on the job this week and waking up and finding out Friday’s gone and Saturday’s in its place. This week I’ve been quite excited (yet again) over listening to the new offering – Hawk – from Isobel Campbell and Mark Lanegan (whose name must be spoken in hushed tones in this house). A review will follow just as soon as we know … Continue reading Mrs Mackerel’s TFI Friday
We’ve come across a number of excellent freebies recently and thought we ought to share some with you. First up, top record label Suburban Home have been releasing a series of excellent mix cds for a while now, which this time (volume 5) they have made available as a completely free download. Containing 30 tracks from bands old and new – Townes Van Zandt through … Continue reading Some Great Free Stuff
Big Blood are entirely new to us, although they have released a handful of CD-Rs (see Dontrustheruin here), Dead Songs is apparently their first CD and vinyl release proper. The only track we’ve heard is this one, e-mailed through to us from a source we can’t quite identify, but whoever you are, we’re most grateful. Lay Your Head On The Rails II comes across like … Continue reading Mad Mackerel Recommends…Big Blood
If we’re being honest, until recently the appeal of Ariel Pink had passed us by somewhat…call us heathens or all manner of other things, but we couldn’t quite fathom the exulted status and unequivocal praise they seemed to garner from every quarter. However, we have overcome our prejudices to become big fans of the Before Today album and particularly Revolution’s A Lie which is one … Continue reading New Tracks from Ariel Pink
The Mad Mackerel 