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Hank. Friendship
Objectively speaking nothing happens in Hank. The same pattern is repeated over and over, with a chorus in which nothing much happens either. Dull and boring, you might say. Well, not exactly. What matches nicely is the video shot on Little Cranberry Island, an island off off the coast of Maine. Far from the maddening crowd on an isolated island. Friendship is not from the island but from Philadelphia and signed to the Merge Records label to release its second album, Love A Stranger, late next month. The sound of Hank is oh so familiar and nice. A banjo is the most ear catching, its sound prominent in the mix. A deep voice is the other element sticking out. All together it makes Hank an instantly listenable song. Yes, the album will need to be more varied but Friendship, verging on folk and countryrock, certainly has made me curious with this single.
Toll also falls into folk, but of the U.K. variation. Naima Bock, who played in Goat Girl until 2019 under the name Naima Jelly, is about to release her debut solo album and did not stop at playing folk. Folk is the starting point. From there on elements from the classics come in in the form of a host of instruments. Immediately Naima Bock brings me back to 1960s folk music, in the form of a flute, where it not that the estranging elements in Toll start to play with my mind. A whirlwind of music is entering my head. Naima Bock is not the best singer, and knows it. With a slightly breathy voice she presents herself with a husky tone, supporting the music more than leading it. The music is allowed to go off in several directions. Listen to Toll and you will find how special the song is. Very present yet unobtrusive. Special is the right word, intriguing the other.
With her new album 'If I Never Know You Like This Again' out for a few weeks already, it is time to pay attention to this mighty, yet surprisingly modest single, the song ending the album. Emotions run high, but not in the music. Emotionally Swear Jar could easily have been blown up to 'November Rain' proportions. In fact Soak, also known as Bridie Monds-Watson, prefers to end the song with just her voice and in the last line switches off all the studio options on her voice as well, leaving nothing concealed. Swear Jar starts just as modest. A voice and acoustic guitar, a hi-hat and some electronics. It is all about that voice. Soak knows exactly how to get the right effect to draw a listener in. Yes, the change comes with a drum kicking up the song, strings and an electric guitar, but all still befitting the song. They drop away again to let in some community singing, before we return to the start for the end. Swear Jar is a four and a half minute, exquisite listening experience.
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Launder's third single is a collaboration. Creating a song with befriended musicians. The result is an alternative pop-rock song that is extremely alive. Expect bright and somewhat more muddied guitars, that keep coming in and in. There's always room for another overdubbed solo over the many guitar parts already there. Including a great solo. The solid drums are mixed well into the middle carrying the song as it were and allowing all the raging guitars to be there and remain firmly in place. Over it all, French singer Soko sings like a sigh girl from France should and provides Become with a dreampop quality. That is totally swept away by the guitars that slowly but surely fill the whole of the song's mix. It works though. Become makes me very curious of to what the rest of the debut album will sound like. Double LP 'Happening' is out on 15 July. The other collaborators with Jim Cudlip, who is Launder, are Zachary Cole Smith (DIIV) and Jackson Phillips (Day Wave).
Feel like jumping back in time? You are at the right address with Winston. CVC, Church Village Collective, from Wales takes you on a little trip. The song starts out like a mellow hit from the pre-punk 1970s, with a few voices singing beautiful harmonies. Enter a violin over a neat guitar solo. Let's say Wings' 'Let em In' as a reference. Until the turn around in the song. It becomes firmer, the way of singing changes and the song gets a slightly spooky atmosphere. The songs changes exactly at the 2.00 minute point. "The radio plays things I don't want no more. Song after song after song", it sounds ominously. Out go the 70s, at least had Paul McCartney not written songs like this as well in the 1970s, including references to smoking. Yes, Winston sounds familiar, it is fun though.
My musical relationship with Phoebe Bridgers remains mixed. With Sidelines she has released a new single that is easy to like though. Written for a tv show that I will most likely never see, I will stick with the song. Sidelines is a song built around or better from electronics. An electric piano starts Sidelines rather darkly. Phoebe Bridgers starts singing with an effect on her voice, underscoring the already dark mood. More sounds come in, strings, a cello, atmospherics. When the rhythm joins the single becomes more electronic. By then though, the vocal melody and the strings have already sucked me into Sidelines. Is Phoebe Bridgers growing on me? That is too early to tell. Fact is that Sidelines agrees with me quite well.
With the release of See one mystery is disclosed. The band's name is indeed pronounced as Hoover Three and not HooverI. The least important of matters, as with See Hooveriii returns to this blog with a tremendously delicious psychedelic rock single. Without laying it on too thick, psychedelia is all over the song, allowing the rock element to dominate. With 'Water For The Frogs' only a little more than a year old, the band decided to kick new music into the world. Most likely it made the most of lockdowns and created new music. Started as a one man project, Hooverii is a six piece band now and that is what I hear on See. This is a band sound, with intricate arrangements working their ways through the tougher rock sound. The interlude takes the mood down completely before a double tracked guitar kicks the song back to life but also in a slightly different direction. The riff is repeated on and on, spellbinding, until the band comes back in in full. See is more an album track than a real single. As a bellwether for 'A Round Of Applause', out on 15 July, the song does great though.
A band recreating a 20 year old work into something new? Sometimes their is reason for caution in announcements like these. For me it is a useless warning, as I had never before heard of God Is An Astronaut let alone ever heard the original song. From Dust To The Beyond is a solid postrock track. Instrumental with wide and wild ranging forays into the inner and outer sanctums, yes, plural, for both options, of the chord progressions. Expect the track to go into multiple explorations, with guitars like air raid sirens. The 7 minute plus song starts off ever so modestly though. With silence and sounds slowly faded into the song. Synths, electronics, soft guitars slowly coming into the song. A deep bass, soft drums. Another keyboard. Before I have time to recognise it all, the volume goes up, more pronounced guitar parts join and slowly but surely From Dust To The Beyond has taken on giant proportions. Throughout the song things change. It can all explode or be downsized to a bass solo. Expect the unexpected by God Is An Astronaut. Whatever this song was before, it is impressive now.
Rock from Finland is not found on this blog every day. Today it is though. Rokets from Helsinki releases its first single from the upcoming second album 'Break Free'. Cherry Kiss is one of those songs that are able to combine a golden pop melody with a dirty, sleazy rock sound. On top of the music the voice of singer Sami Mustonen is mixed in a prominent way. He is leading the way forward. Assisted by almost as prominent na-na-nahs. Which are reflected in the sparkling lead guitar parts. The rest of Rokets lays down an oh so solid foundation, giving Cherry Kiss its credibility. It allows for the more pop-laden melodies, no matter how toughly presented, to be sprinkled all over the song. Songs like this have been played for over 40 years. There's always room for another good one and here it is.
Oh, yes! About A Girl is beautiful and bittersweet single that seems to have it all. Andrea Gillis' second single on Red on Red records, a relatively new label really making a name for itself in my opinion, reflects the feeling all women experience when entering the rock and pop world (and others as well, I suppose), when expected to do all sort of uncomfortable things, in order to (be allowed to) receive attention. "Now here's a lady who was once a girl", Gillis sings and looks back on a period when she tried to break through. She is able to look back on a career in music where she served others more than herself. Now, she is the front person and shows what she is capable of. With a little vocal help from Tanya Donnelly, she does great. About A Girl is a kind of pop-rock song that I can listen to all day long.
Wout de Natris
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