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Manhood. Girljockey
Strap yourself to your chair, tie your headphones to your head so it doesn't run off and then quietly undergo the varied and extremely different sides of Girljockey's debut single Manhood. From a voice accompanied by an electric guitar, not necessarily playing an average chord with a sound somewhere between clean and dirty, with a little sloppiness as a bonus and a cello, to an eruption the Etna would be proud of. Gillian Chamberlin, who formed the band last year, really is letting herself, her voice and the band rip it up and even more than that in the solo section. My ears have barely escaped catching fire. If anything Manhood reminds me of Hole but then even more extreme. The bio says PJ Harvey but I'll have to take its word for that. I could not get through her in the 90s, later music somewhat. My advise? Just dive into Manhood head first and let yourself be surprised. I have and lived to tell.
Where in 2023 I wrote about CIEL that it would follow into the Brighton shoes of former local band Blood Red Shoes, in 2025 there's little left of that reference. At least in Swallowing Your Pride. Another name I mentioned at the time was Kim Wilde. That early 80s vibe is what can be heard on CIEL's new single. But more like a tea bag that has been reused again and again. At least compared to the sound of e.g. 'Kids In America'. Swallowing Your Pride does offer a naive kind of new wave pop that makes for dancing and singing. In 2025 CIEL is a duo, singer-songwriter Michelle Hindriks and drummer Tim Spencer. Producer, and now it becomes interesting remembering the first sentence of this review, is Steven Ansell of Blood Red Shoes. Together they have set this song apart, not only from his own band but also from the old days, while providing it with an energy that does make it stick out. We have some time to go before the album is released late in October.
The second new name this week is the Southern slowcore band Teethe. Working towards the release of the same titled album on 8 August, the band introduces itself to me with a track that is as solid as it is mysterious. This has everything to do with the atmosphere of the song. There are clear and present instruments and there's vaguer ones and then atmospheric ones. Add a singer that seems to simply float on the music and you get the picture. Teethe is or used to be from Denton, Texas and released an eponymous album in 2020. The members, who all write songs, collaborated with a host of other musicians of whom MJ Lenderman and his Wednesday colleague Xandy Chelmis are known to me. Magic Of The Sale, not to mix up with 'The Art Of The Deal' and for a good reason, takes the listener on a musical trip that brings him/her to a few unexpected destinations. Intriguing single, with more to come soon.
Pop aficionados will recognise the name Duncan Lloyd immediately. As guitarist of Mäximo Park he has made my life a lot more pleasant and with 'Apply Some Pressure' co-wrote one of the ultimate singles of the 00s decade. A lot of that energy and freedom of expression, as in no rules, can be heard on his solo single Laugh So Loud. In fact, I think it a better song than most I've heard from his mothership for some years now. No, he's not the best singer, but his soft voice works quite well on his own single. The layers of guitars do the main work, also played by Cloud Nothing's Joe Boyer, not in a little supported by a great rhythm section. Bass and drums are very drivingly present. Above all Laugh So Loud is an adventurous song, that wants to take the listener along. In that it is quite steering. The quality makes you go along for the ride without protest.
The good thing about the singles blog post is that they are so diverse (besides that I seldom have an idea what to expect next on this endless list of singles). With Bookends I enter a totally different sort of music. U.S. Girls, the moniker of singer-songwriter Meg Remy, presents a ballad tempo song that is as U.S. as it comes. I think some people call this roots music, let me just pose that it's going a long way towards beauty. Remy has a voice that is well-worn in. It has plenty of mileage on it and she doesn't mind showing it to the world. Charlie McCoy's harmonica gives the song even more desolation the Springsteen's 'The River'. The way it interacts with the Hammond organ gives Bookends an almost desolate feel. One big question remains, can you call a 12 minutes something long song a single? The change later on in the song comes as a huge surprise. It is pure funky. I will let you find out for yourself. Album 'Scratch It' is released on 20 June.
This is more straight forward country. It may be a song filled with other elements, the way of singing, the pedal steel and structure all spell country, somewhere between tradition and a band like Slobberbone. That is a nice mix to listen to. With Ryan Davis & The Roadhouse Band we have another debut artist on this blog and well deserved. Davis and band know how to play on a thin line and keeping a perfect balance. The intro is already so nice, with a few unusual instruments joining in. Again, like 'Bookends' right above here, Ryan Davis presents himself with a long song. This one well over nine minutes. And I do not mind one second of it. The addition of Catherine Irwin as guest vocalist works really well. Beauty and the beast duets often do. Album 'New Threats From the Soul' will be released on 25 July.
It's three years ago that The Chelsea Curve from Boston was on this blog with the album 'All The Things'. Before that the band debuted with a string of singles, one a month of which several made the cut. Today the band returns with the digital version of what will be a 7" single somewhere in the summer. Listening to the b-side, a cover version of Mickey Lee Lane’s Northern Soul track Hey Sah-Lo-Ney from 1965, it will be well worth the buy. The Chelsea Curve is on fire here, leaning into the rock and moving with the roll just it is meant to be. It's all but unbelievable this song used to be a soul track. The a-side is a remix of the lead single from the afore mentioned album from 2022. Hear the horns and all and Northern Soul is far closer than on Hey Sah-Lo-Nay. Together the two songs make a golden, if not pure steaming combination. The Chelsea Curve is back alright.
Dan Fogelberg? I faintly remember an advert for several album on the inner sleeve of 1970s albums, perhaps even my favourite Zappa album, 'One Size Fits All', promoting a Fogelberg album. A man with a blow wave in his hair and a moustache? I will have to check. Perhaps I even know a single that was played on the radio somewhere in the latter half of the 70s. That's as far as my knowledge goes. Why is all this relevant? Because Illinois is a cover of the Dan Fogelberg song. Joe Bourdet takes the man out of obscurity and judging by this version, rightly so. It's a true country song, the kind that makes me imagine riding though the desert somewhere, with an endless stretch of road ahead of me and dust all around me. The flavour of the song is enhanced by the pedal steel sound played by "Catfish" Connor Gallaher. The song could have been on an earlier Eagles album. The vocal harmonies are spot on. Bourdet does a really, really good job here. Fogelberg died at the age of 56 in 2007, leaving behind a long stretch of albums of which some were million sellers in the U.S. Somehow this does not surprise me but I had no idea. Also not that he has had two songs in our yearly music fest in the last week of December, the Top 2000. Not since 2014 though.
It's not possible to go much slower and still maintain a stable melody in a voice. Alan Sparhawk, formerly of Low and by sad necessity a solo artist since a few years, teams up with blue grass band Trampled By Turtles. You can find one album by both on this blog, written by Erwin Zijleman. Not Broken is taken on by me. The song is a duet between Sparhawk and his daughter Hollis. It is impossible to not think that the topic is about the death of their wife/mother. Instrumentation by the band is as delicate as the singing is. Together they bring each other to ever higher levels of emotions. While pretending to contain them, I should add. It is almost painful to listen to Sparhawk singing, where daughter Hollis continuously tries to bring it all back to earthly proportions. When her father joins her for the chorus, things do land back on solid ground. In the end, when all has been said and done, things remain in one piece.
We end with another new name, the band Pile from Boston, working towards the release of its ninth album. A band from Boston that was never brought to my attention? I'd have thought that to be impossible but here I am. Born At Night is a single with a few faces that all together make for very interesting listening. Pile is advertised as a DIY band, that for its upcoming album 'Sunshine And Balance Beams', 15 August, called in the assistance of some technical support in the after recording process. (DIY? That explains me not having heard of Pile before.) I can not compare, but Born At Night has a mighty sound as soon as the band lets go of the reigns it has put itself in at the start of the song. Two guitars playing arpeggios respectively two notes from a chord over which Rick Maguire sings. When the band joins in, also a few violins join. and Maguire builds up the tension and start to vent some anger as well. When the song truly explodes Pile takes no prisoners, this is full out musical war. In a phenomenal way. The whole is brought down for a short rest, before we go off again for the second half of the rollercoaster Born At Night is. What an introduction to a band this single is.
Wout de Natris - van der Borght
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