Indie Rock

An incomparable world of bug-eyed, harmony-rich folk-pop-psych-alt-country-rock lies in wait for intrepid listeners as the best Welsh band the world nearly forgot, El Goodo, return with only their fourth album in a 20-year career, Zombie. The first track to be revealed, The Grey Tower, teased via Strangetown Records on Mon 29 June 2020, is an expansive, five-minute trip through the 60s heat of Lauren Canyon and Haight-Ashbury via the picturesque Vale of Neath. The result of a rapid-fire period of easy-come recording at the legendary Rockfield Studios in the company of experimental producer, Tim Lewis (aka Thighpaulsandra, a Julian Cope collaborator and former member of Spiritualized), El Goodo's 13-track long player gathers loose ends from the band's stop-start lifespan, as well as brand new songs exploring parenthood, losing parents and - tangentially - Spanish surrealist film.

Cults have embarked on a radical reimagining, both of the band's sound and its dynamic, and the result is the NYC indie duo's utterly mesmerizing fourth album, Host. Written more collaboratively than ever before and recorded primarily with live instruments for the first time, the collection marks the start of a bold new chapter for the band, one fueled by an ever-deepening trust and a boundless appetite for growth and experimentation. The songs here are deceptively charming, with lush, airy arrangements that belie their dark, weighty lyrics. The production is rich and multifaceted to match, blending retro and futuristic palettes into a spellbinding swirl of high-def indie rock and lo-fi bedroom pop. As its title suggests, Host is an exploration of the sinister dynamics at play in a parasitic relationship, but rather than dwell in the discomfort, the record charts a cathartic journey towards freedom and self-reliance, reveling in the power that comes from standing your ground and declaring independence in the face of exploitation and manipulation. Formed while Follin and Oblivion were still just students in college, Cults first emerged in 2010 with their breakout single, "Go Outside," which the New York Times hailed as "one of the indie rock highlights" of the year. Both a commercial and critical smash, the track would go on to rack up more than 40 million streams on Spotify, land in soundtracks everywhere from Broad City to Gossip Girl, and help the band score a major label deal for their self-titled debut, released the following year on Columbia Records. The duo followed it up with the similarly celebrated Static in 2013, and they returned in peak form four years later with Offering, building up a devoted audience along the way through relentless headline touring and festival appearances at Bonnaroo, Lollapalooza, Coachella, Austin City Limits, and more.

On Giver Taker, the gorgeous debut album by Anjimile, death and life are always entwined, wrapping around each other in a dance of reverence, reciprocity, and, ultimately, rebirth. Giver Taker is confident, intentional and introspective. Anjimile Chithambo (they/them, he/him) wrote much of the album while in treatment for drug and alcohol abuse, as well as while in the process of living more fully as a nonbinary trans person. Loss hovers over the album, whose songs grieve for lost friends ("Giver Taker") and family members ("1978") along with lost selves ("Maker," "Baby No More," "In Your Eyes.") But here, grief yields an opening: a chance for new growth. Each song on the album is its own micro-journey, adding up to a transformative epic cycle created in collaboration with bandmate Justine Bowe of Photocomfort and New-York based artist/producer Gabe Goodman. "1978" and "Maker" both begin as Sufjan Stevens-esque pastoral ballads with Chithambo's mesmerizing voice foregrounded against minimal instrumentation and swell into the realm of the majestic through the addition of warm, steady instrumentation (informed by the mix of 80's pop and African music Chithambo's Malawi-born parents played around the house) and harmonies by Bowe. "In Your Eyes" starts out hushed and builds to a crescendo via a mighty chorus inspired by none other than the Lion King. The allusion is fitting: each song encapsulates a heroic voyage, walked alone until accompanied by kindred souls. The choirs present throughout are equally deliberate. Chithambo grew up as a choir boy himself, and several songs (notably "Maker") grasp not only towards reconciliation between his trans identity and his parents' strong religious beliefs, but towards reclaiming his trans identity as an essential part of his own spirituality.

A vibrant stage adaptation of Louis Calaferte's book by Virginie Despentes accompanied by the rock band Zëro. Virginie Despentes (born 1969 in Nancy) is a French novelist, also director and translator, with a powerful and subversive voice and writing, author notably of Baise-moi (1994), King Kong Théorie (2006) and the Vernon Subutex trilogy (2015-2017). Zëro is a French rock band from Lyon, composed of Éric Aldéa (guitar, bass, vocals), Franck Laurino (drums) and Ivan Chiossone (keyboards, guitar), formed in 2006 on the ashes of Bästard and Deity Guns (1989-1993). After the undisputed success of Virginie Despentes' performances with the group Zëro for the reading of Louis Calaferte's "Requiem des Innocents", we are pleased to offer a studio recorded version. It features Zëro in great shape and Virginie Despentes with her characteristic voice, a perfect combo for a great and quirky writer

A compilation of unreleased material from the Light Sleep and Voice Hardcore sessions alongside specially recorded new material, including a cover of “The Void” by The Raincoats. Both formats include a 20 page zine designed by Studio Tape Echo featuring photography from Masayuki Shioda and writing from both Disciples and Phew. It follows on from a limited edition cassette and digital release of Phew’s music on Disicples called Vertical Jamming, which compiled some of the cult Japanese artist’s longform drone works. “This album is an unconscious sound sketch. It was recorded in Japan from 2017 to 2019, a closed and obstructive time. It is not a presentation of a worldview, but a personal documentary music of the late 2010s. The hidden message of this album is: What a terrible world we live in, but let's survive.” - Phew Phew is a legendary figure in Japanese underground music. Starting out in 1978 fronting one of Osaka's earliest punk groups, Aunt Sally, and going on to collaborate with a whole host of notable names as a solo artist in the 80s, including Ryuichi Sakamoto, Conny Plank, Holger Czukay and Jaki Liebezeit of Can, Alex Hacke of Einstürzende Neubauten, and Chrislo Haas of DAF. In recent years she's made music on record or live with Ana da Silva of The Raincoats, Jim O'Rourke, Oren Ambarchi, Ikue Mori, and Yoshimi of OOIOO / Boredoms / Saicobab. For Disciples however, the most interesting aspect of Phew's work is the fact she has made her strongest musical work in the last few years, working entirely on her own. There's a lot of interest from crate-digger type labels in her early 80s new wave oriented work, and the names she's worked with are impressive, but there's no doubt in our minds that her two most recent records, Light Sleep and Voice Hardcore, are modern classics. It’s this period of her work that we were keen to explore with these releases, a contemporary archive of incredible and unique music. - Specs: 6 panel double disc digipak with 20 page photo + album essay bookle

Immaterial Possession was conceived by Atlanta natives, Cooper Holmes and Madeline Polites, whom share a history of the underground DIY Atlanta music, theater, and arts scene. The duo moved to Athens, GA and was soon granted the seasoned drummer, John Spiegel, and eventually fulfilled with Kiran Jeremy Fernandes (keyboards, clarinets, flutes), descendant of Elephant 6's beloved John Fernandes (Circulatory System, Olivia Tremor Control, Cloud Recordings). "Immaterial Possession", the debut LP to be released on Cloud Recordings, is as much a visual journey as auditory. With Holmes, Polites, and Fernandes all sharing ties to surreal and abstract theater, each song on the album creates a distinct `world' of impression and mystery. The album commences with the apocalyptic fury of "Midnight Wander" to "See Through Stares"- the catching pop tale of altering the past through the present. It takes you through the psychedelic landscapes of "In the Loom", the hallucinatory darkness of "Accidental Summoning", towards the final `Night Cap' - a soft, but inescapable ushering into the depths of the ancestral dream state.

Vinyl includes mp3 coupon. Initial run of vinyl will be on Dark Green vinyl. Burning deep in Girl Friday's music is an unquenchable will to survive. The LA-based band don't blunt the impact of the themes they work through in their ferocious, knotty rock songs, but they don't let the more harrowing aspects of being alive and young in the 21st century daunt them, either. Dystopian shades of post-punk and noise rock abound alongside abundant optimism on Girl Friday's arresting debut LP, Androgynous Mary. The world is a hellscape, but the four of them are in it together. With bold, dramatic guitar lines and tightly wound vocal harmonies, Girl Friday - guitarist Vera Ellen, bassist Libby Hsieh, guitarist Sierra Scott, drummer Virginia Pettis - negotiate the stress and alienation of being sidelined by society. "Does the average man feel like he's on the outside?" goes the beginning of "Public Bodies," a wistful jangle-pop gem that shudders open into a snarling punk coda. Taking cues from boundary-pushers Sonic Youth, Girl Friday favor the rush of jarring turns over the safety of well-defined pop taxonomy. Looking to queer provocateurs like Placebo, they cherish the frisson of incongruous musical elements: "really dark, heavy things mashed up with quite beautiful things, whether that be a distorted guitar line and a sentimental vocal or vice versa," as Ellen puts it. That duality dovetails with the thematic friction running through the album, the alternating despair and hope that intertwine in the fight to survive as disenfranchised people in the US. Written during a year of personal struggle for all four band members, Androgynous Mary reflects the solace they took in each other -- as a band, but also as a microcommunity and a chosen family. On the record's final song, "I Hope Jason Is Happy," Girl Friday sing in unison: "My head is on your chest / In the end I'll be happy if you do your best / You've got to fight to keep your breath in this world." It's a testament to the power of their bond, and a gesture of solidarity with those listening. Alone, we suffer under the weight of everything designed to keep us down. Together, we stand a fighting chance. Girl Friday place their hope squarely on that chance

Very Limited 180g LP pressing (500). Mastered for vinyl at Abbey Road. Mark Eitzel's 'The Ugly American' Now Available On Vinyl For The First Time. A lull after the electronically ambient album 'The Invisible Man ' (2001) MARK EITZEL'S recording output was followed by two releases: a covers album 'Music For Courage And Confidence' (2002) and an album of solo and AMERICAN MUSIC CLUB songs re-interpretations 'The Ugly American' (2003) performed by a band with traditional Greek musicians. 'The Ugly American 'was originally mooted as an EP after an invitation to Athens, Greece to reinterpret certain songs under the guidance of respected local musician MANOLIS FAMELLOS. The trip to Athens (Greece) materialized in November 2001 and a full-blown 10 track album was agreed. The subsequent album was recorded and released in 2003 on cd only. Seventeen years later, with a rejigged artwork and an Abbey Road cut, 'The Ugly American 'is unveiled for the first time on vinyl. The ten tracks cover a varied period of MARK EITZEL'S solo output, the cult band AMERICAN MUSIC CLUB albums, and a sole composition from MANOLIS FAMELLOS ('Love's Humming')

A limited run of 750 copies c/w a Trevor Johnson designed sleeve on crystal clear vinyl. The first stand-alone vinyl single to be released by The Durutti Column this century released on Vini Reilly's Birthday early August 2020. 'Free From All The Chaos', was originally on the CD release 'Chronicle' and is presented here with the unreleased track 'Number Three', from the same sessions, also includes the voice of singer/songwriter Caoilfhionn Rose. A series of releases originally on the KOOKY imprint will be re-issued for the first time on vinyl, including the very limited 'Chronicle' album. 'Chronicle' is a body of work commissioned from Vini Reilly as an autobiographical project concluding with a series of live shows. It will be released for the first time on vinyl format later this year.

First time vinyl issue of key works from the Belgian artist-musician Moniek Darge. Following a deep-excavation of the Logos archives London's Horn of Plenty presents 'Bratschebraut' - four works utilising prepared violin, electronics, tapes, and voice. These recordings are from the same era as Moniek's classic 'Sounds of Sacred Places' LP. 'Bratschebraut' extends the story of Moniek's work during this period: playful, intimate, raw, and quite unique. Although they were recorded across a seven year period and were not intended to sit together, the music on 'Bratschebraut', seen retrospectively, captures a pivotal era in Moniek's artistic development. A period that saw her challenge, destroy, then create anew. 'Bratschebraut' both a significant addition to Moniek's catalogue and an essential historical document. 'Bratschebraut' comes in an edition of 300 on beautiful red vinyl, housed in a full-colour sleeve with a 28-page booklet containing artist's notes, previously unpublished photos, and details from the original graphic score for ManMo.

Burning deep in Girl Friday's music is an unquenchable will to survive. The LA-based band don't blunt the impact of the themes they work through in their ferocious, knotty rock songs, but they don't let the more harrowing aspects of being alive and young in the 21st century daunt them, either. Dystopian shades of post-punk and noise rock abound alongside abundant optimism on Girl Friday's arresting debut LP, Androgynous Mary. The world is a hellscape, but the four of them are in it together. With bold, dramatic guitar lines and tightly wound vocal harmonies, Girl Friday - guitarist Vera Ellen, bassist Libby Hsieh, guitarist Sierra Scott, drummer Virginia Pettis - negotiate the stress and alienation of being sidelined by society. "Does the average man feel like he's on the outside?" goes the beginning of "Public Bodies," a wistful jangle-pop gem that shudders open into a snarling punk coda. Taking cues from boundary-pushers Sonic Youth, Girl Friday favor the rush of jarring turns over the safety of well-defined pop taxonomy. Looking to queer provocateurs like Placebo, they cherish the frisson of incongruous musical elements: "really dark, heavy things mashed up with quite beautiful things, whether that be a distorted guitar line and a sentimental vocal or vice versa," as Ellen puts it. That duality dovetails with the thematic friction running through the album, the alternating despair and hope that intertwine in the fight to survive as disenfranchised people in the US. Written during a year of personal struggle for all four band members, Androgynous Mary reflects the solace they took in each other -- as a band, but also as a microcommunity and a chosen family. On the record's final song, "I Hope Jason Is Happy," Girl Friday sing in unison: "My head is on your chest / In the end I'll be happy if you do your best / You've got to fight to keep your breath in this world." It's a testament to the power of their bond, and a gesture of solidarity with those listening. Alone, we suffer under the weight of everything designed to keep us down. Together, we stand a fighting chance. Girl Friday place their hope squarely on that chance

From a View is the debut album from Melbourne’s Floodlights. From a View explores themes of identity, personal cross-roads and the misuse of power. The bands first exploration into proper studio recording with a well regarded sound engineer. It was recorded over two days onto a 24 track tape machine at Head Gap studios in Preston in November. Floodlights are made up of members Louis Parsons, Ashlee Kehoe, Joe Draffen and Archie Shannon. They present a distinctly Australian perspective, with a shambolic, catchy sound that melds 80s Indie-Rock rock with 90s New Zealand jangle-pop. Following a tour of Australia’s East Coast in October last year the band began working on From a View. The songs were arranged and performed as a band, but often began from Louis or Ash presenting ideas to the group and building on them from there. The songs themselves were written over various points in the bands short career, yet come together very fittingly to show their distinct sound. Lead single Thanks For Understanding is about two lives going in different directions. It describes the complicated process of growing apart from someone, even though you still care for them

A lone pair of footsteps meanders down a street in Omaha, into the neighborhood bar and then into a near-imperceptible tangle of conversations - about wars, sleepless nights - a surrealist din pushing against the sound of ragtime. Then, as the background quiets, a line rings out clearly: "I think about how much people need - what they need right now is to feel like there's something to look forward to. We have to hold on. We have to hold on." Thus we enter the fitting, cacophonic introduction to Bright Eyes' tenth studio album and first release since 2011. Down in the Weeds, Where the World Once Was is an enormous record caught in the profound in-between of grief and clarity - one arm wrestling its demons, the other gripping the hand of love, in spite of it. The end of Bright Eyes' unofficial hiatus came naturally. Conor Oberst pitched the idea of getting the band back together during a 2017 Christmas party at Bright Eyes bandmate Nathaniel Walcott's Los Angeles home. The two huddled in the bathroom and called Mike Mogis, who was Christmas shopping at an Omaha mall. Mogis immediately said yes. There was no specific catalyst for the trio, aside from finding comfort amidst a decade of brutal change. Sure, Why now? is the question, but for a project whose friendship is at the core, it was simply Why not? The resulting Bright Eyes album came together unlike any other of its predecessors. Down in the Weeds is Bright Eyes' most collaborative, stemming from only one demo and written in stints in Omaha and in bits and pieces in Walcott's Los Angeles home. Radically altering a writing process 25 years into a project seems daunting, but Oberst said there was no trepidation: "Our history and our friendship, and my trust level with them, is so complete and deep. And I wanted it to feel as much like a three-headed monster as possible." As a title, as a thesis, Down in the Weeds, Where the World Once Was functions on a global, apocalyptic level of anxiety that looms throughout the record. But on a personal level, it speaks to rooting around in the dirt of one's memories, trying to find the preciousness that's overgrown and unrecognizable. For Oberst, coming back to Bright Eyes was a bit of that. A symbol of simpler times, vaguely nostalgic. And even though it wasn't actually possible to go back to the way things were, even though there wasn't an easy happy ending, there was a new reality left to work with. And here, there is a bleary-eyed hopefulness - earnest, emotive recommitments to love appear on "Dance and Sing" and "Just Once in the World." And throughout, Down in the Weeds features snippets of Oberst's loved ones speaking, in late-night conversations. The fleeting loveliness of intimate moments punctuates the bleakness of the record's existential crisis, crackling like lightning bugs illuminating the long night. Down in the Weeds is a distillation of a prolific, enduring canon. It's immediate and urgent, the product of its creators' growth across a decade apart, as well as the need to make a record together to find solace from loss. Through deliberate, fearless experimentation in process, the trio made the truest Bright Eyes sound: the sound of a deep bond, of a band coming home, but also a seamless continuation, like Bright Eyes never went away. It's the impossible, sprawling mess of human experience that Bright Eyes has always sought to put to tape, since the beginning - the sound of holding on. Why now? Why not

Los Angeles-based musician, artist and DIY / queer icon Seth Bogart today has announced his forthcoming new album Men On The Verge Of Nothing , set to arrive digitally June 26th with physical copies coming later on August 21st via new label Wacky Wacko Recordings. It is a return to form for the artist with DIY-roots, entirely written and produced by Bogart himself with the exception of the reimagined cover of the X-Ray Spex's track "Oh Bondage Up Yours!" which features contributions from Kathleen Hanna and Kate Nash. MotVoN features additional playing from Roxanne Clifford (Patience / Veronica Falls), Tobi Vail (Bikini Kill / Frumpies) and Alana Amram (Hunx & His Punx/Habibi). Bogart has been a fixture in the West Coast queer and punk art scenes since the early 2000s when he arrived in Oakland and joined the electropop group Gravy Train!!!!. In 2008, Bogart founded the garage punk band Hunx & His Punx and went on to create two albums with the group and a singles compilation. In 2015, Bogart began releasing music under his own name, and in 2016, the eponymous debut solo album Seth Bogart arrived on Burger Records

"Making this record was a joy," says Steven Adams of his latest album with his band the French Drops. He even let the positive mood around the making of it influence its title. "I love making records but sometimes time, money, or people - including me - fuck up my enjoyment of the process. So this time I kept saying to myself 'keep it light' whenever I was making decisions." The buoyant and relaxed mood can be heard across the album in its gloriously skipping tones, as it traverses across indie, pop, alt-rock and more tender acoustic and folk-leaning moments. It's a craft that Adams has been honing for years as the lead figure in outfits such as The Broken Family Band and Singing Adams, so much so that by now it oozes out of him with a seamless grace. Adams' aim was clear with this record. "I wanted to make a super personal, light-hearted and upbeat record," he says. "I wanted to do the whole write about what you know thing and keep it as light as possible." The lightness of the album was a guiding principle but it wasn't a rule set in stone, as Adams soon found out the deeper he plunged into himself. "We had a running joke about how we were making an album called Keep it Light that is full of songs about racists and panic attacks and existential angst," he says. "But it does you good to get that stuff out. Writing songs and making records keeps me sane." The album is one as full of joy and beauty as it is ink black humour and caustic revelation. On the gorgeous shuffle of "Oh Dear" - recalling the kind of stripped back beauty of Yo La Tengo at their finest - Adams sings: "and true love will not find you in the end." A knowing nod and a wink to Daniel Johnston's earnest refrain that indeed true love will find you in the end. It's such moments that fill the album with equal parts weight and lightness, a smart touch delivered with a deft hand. Of the broad range of the album and its wide-spanning lyrical content Adams simply says: "the upbeat stuff is pretty upbeat and the darker stuff is pretty dark, but it's all still with some humour." Perhaps the song that best encapsulates this split between the light and the dark and the funny and the personal is "My Brother, the Racist" a self explanatory song that skips along with an infectious groove as Adams sings about, well, his racist brother. It unfurls in an intimate manner that recalls the kind of deeply personal allure of Sun Kill Moon's Benji. "It's an awkward thing to sing about, but it was the right thing to do," he reflects. "I've written about British racism before, but never this close to home." Recorded at Soup by Simon Trought and with band members Laurie Earle, Daniel Fordham, David Stewart and Michael Wood, this is the first time Adams has worked in such a harmonious and in sync way. "This is the first record I've made with the band all playing in one room, getting everything down at once," he says. "We played live with all of us on the floor, and it came together really quickly. But we still gave ourselves time to experiment and do fun stuff all over it. This combination of allowing things to be light, not overstressing, the harmony of the group, and the seamless knack of Adams' songwriting has resulted in a truly special record. "I'm usually sick of a record by the time it's mixed and I don't get much of a kick out of hearing my own stuff, but this one's different," he says. "I know I sound like a wanker saying this but this is the best record I've ever made."

12" vinyl with download code and lyrics insert. "Making this record was a joy," says Steven Adams of his latest album with his band the French Drops. He even let the positive mood around the making of it influence its title. "I love making records but sometimes time, money, or people - including me - fuck up my enjoyment of the process. So this time I kept saying to myself 'keep it light' whenever I was making decisions." The buoyant and relaxed mood can be heard across the album in its gloriously skipping tones, as it traverses across indie, pop, alt-rock and more tender acoustic and folk-leaning moments. It's a craft that Adams has been honing for years as the lead figure in outfits such as The Broken Family Band and Singing Adams, so much so that by now it oozes out of him with a seamless grace. Adams' aim was clear with this record. "I wanted to make a super personal, light-hearted and upbeat record," he says. "I wanted to do the whole write about what you know thing and keep it as light as possible." The lightness of the album was a guiding principle but it wasn't a rule set in stone, as Adams soon found out the deeper he plunged into himself. "We had a running joke about how we were making an album called Keep it Light that is full of songs about racists and panic attacks and existential angst," he says. "But it does you good to get that stuff out. Writing songs and making records keeps me sane." The album is one as full of joy and beauty as it is ink black humour and caustic revelation. On the gorgeous shuffle of "Oh Dear" - recalling the kind of stripped back beauty of Yo La Tengo at their finest - Adams sings: "and true love will not find you in the end." A knowing nod and a wink to Daniel Johnston's earnest refrain that indeed true love will find you in the end. It's such moments that fill the album with equal parts weight and lightness, a smart touch delivered with a deft hand. Of the broad range of the album and its wide-spanning lyrical content Adams simply says: "the upbeat stuff is pretty upbeat and the darker stuff is pretty dark, but it's all still with some humour." Perhaps the song that best encapsulates this split between the light and the dark and the funny and the personal is "My Brother, the Racist" a self explanatory song that skips along with an infectious groove as Adams sings about, well, his racist brother. It unfurls in an intimate manner that recalls the kind of deeply personal allure of Sun Kill Moon's Benji. "It's an awkward thing to sing about, but it was the right thing to do," he reflects. "I've written about British racism before, but never this close to home." Recorded at Soup by Simon Trought and with band members Laurie Earle, Daniel Fordham, David Stewart and Michael Wood, this is the first time Adams has worked in such a harmonious and in sync way. "This is the first record I've made with the band all playing in one room, getting everything down at once," he says. "We played live with all of us on the floor, and it came together really quickly. But we still gave ourselves time to experiment and do fun stuff all over it. This combination of allowing things to be light, not overstressing, the harmony of the group, and the seamless knack of Adams' songwriting has resulted in a truly special record. "I'm usually sick of a record by the time it's mixed and I don't get much of a kick out of hearing my own stuff, but this one's different," he says. "I know I sound like a wanker saying this but this is the best record I've ever made."

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Новый альбом американской инди-рок группы The Front Bottoms Издание на цветном виниле в гейтфолде