Canadian trio Loving are releasing a new record next year, but for now listen to this calmingly infectious single “Only She Knows”. Ultra dreamy and gentle, it corrals any stress you might be letting roam free across your subconsciousness and puts it on the back burner with delicate, acoustic guitars, plush keys and distant, warm strings. This band lights it up in the streaming department and it’s easy to see why with such pleasing songs like this.
Mount Eerie is releasing a follow up we didn’t know we needed (but we really did) to Lost Wisdom, the album he recorded with Julie Doiron (of Eric’s Trip) back in 2008. It’s one of my favorite records of his (it even made it onto my recent revisit to the Best Albums of the 2000s). With no growing pains whatsoever, this new track “Love Without Possession” jumps us right back into the fold of the best Mount Eerie music. This is now my most-anticipated record of the year. Thank you very much.
The pair are also going on tour later this year and you KNOW I’m gonna try my darnedest to be at that Brooklyn show.
Read more for tour dates + tracklist:
After years of existing on bootlegs, an official version of Boards of Canada’s “XYZ” performed on John Peel’s show back in 1998 has been released from Warp. This song has always been on the outskirts of my listening for the band, but I now see the error in my ways. It’s a brilliant tune that throws new corkscrews in over its eight minute length. I still have yet to hear the band’s mix for WXAXRXP, but I’m assuming there’s more good gold in there too.
My favorite song (according to my mood right now – the whole thing is amazing) from the upcoming Jenny Hval album The Practice Of Love is out NOW with a great video as always from Hval’s frequent collaborator Zia Anger (+starring Anger’s mom!). The video even references the pair’s collaborations and their content they “produce and reproduce” together – the duo says about the video:
“With the release of this video we planned on publishing a dialogue between the two of us. Something that spoke about the kind of work we are doing, and that also referenced the theme of the video – the pairing of production and reproduction.
It’s a given that the product of some artistic work is worthless. You are therefore expected to ‘mother’ it instead of working and being compensated for it. And sometimes this is the best kind of work. Because it doesn’t feel valuable. Because not everybody will like it, or understand it. Because it won’t immediately be sucked up into the capitalist scroll. It has time and space to be conceived of, to sit in utero, to be birthed, to have its umbilical cord cut, and to live, to breathe.
The same is true of our collaboration. We are both seen and heard by each other, and often validated by our responses to each other. However big (with a video) or small (with an email.) Our collaboration validates each other’s right to breathe, to live, to speak. It’s the closest we get to magic.
This dialogue however, felt rushed. We will publish it at a later date. Until then.”
— Zia Anger and Jenny Hval
You may recognize Anger’s name from her videos for Zola Jesus, Maggie Rogers, Angel Olsen and Mitski, or her work as a dancer with Jenny Hval on her Blood Bitch tour.
The Practice of Love is out THIS FRIDAY (9/13) via Sacred Bones!
Welcome to August 2019’s iteration of Recommended Albums, which greets us with music like nails being hammered into your hands, with music that caresses our senses like an island breeze, with music that possesses our limbs and makes them swing wildly. In all seriousness, I greatly enjoyed the records I’ve plucked to highlight this month. Top standouts to me are Cross Record and Friendly Fires, whom by happenstance are both playing NYC on the same night. I bought Friendly Fires tickets before Cross Record show was announced, so there’s not much I can do. I’ll have a good time regardless. Onwards!
Blanck Mass – Animated Violence Mild [Sacred Bones]
A roller coaster gets longer and more chaotic as you ride it, distorting your sense of time, space and self.
Bodywash – Comforter [Luminelle]
A casual diving excursion in warm, shallow waters vibrant with sea life reveals a submerged metropolis, calcified from rising ocean temperatures.
Cross Record – Cross Record [Ba Da Bing!]
Grappling with life as a partially invisible person, taking pleasure in solitude & trusted friends only able to visually communicate with your shadow.
Esther Rose – You Made It This Far [Father/Daughter]
A tipsy, moonlit walk home with thoughts that wobble between abandoning companionship for good and holding your partner tight for the rest of your life.
Friendly Fires – Inflorescent [Interscope]
One of those extreme wingsuit POV videos, racing down mountainsides with various parties and other extreme stunts happen below.
HTRK – Venus In Leo [Ghostly International]
In stasis aboard a drifting spaceship, you dream of human contact from someone outside your sleep chamber.
Infinity Shred – Forever, A Fast Life [3DOT Recordings]
Assembling and launching rocket out of salvaged parts by yourself to escape Earth before it caves in on itself.
Joan Shelley – Like The River Loves The Sea [No Quarter]
Memories of peaceful times spent in a small home near the water with friends, family and lovers inspire a series of paintings.
Salami Rose Joe Louis – Zdenka 2080 [Brainfeeder]
A semi-educational, definitely homemade VHS tape about how galaxies and molecules are the same thing plays to a high school science class.
Various Artists – Chill Pill [Public Possession]
Disconnecting from social media, you take a trip to a mountainous coast for a week of hiking, meditation, going to dance functions and gently psychedelic guided self-reflection.
Listen to all these songs + more on my building Best of 2019 PLAYLIST!
The icon of 10s rap Danny Brown is back to cap off the decade with a new album coming 10/4 via Warp. The most notable nugget on press kits was that the record is executive produced by Q-Tip of A Tribe Called Quest. How will the old school pioneer translate into Danny Brown’s world? We last saw Brown on 2016’s Atrocity Exhibition, which reveled in harsh and unwelcoming textures with a dark, futuristic edge.
Just from this first single, we can still hear that to a certain degree, but it’s got bounce and a soulful, city-dwelling vibe. I love it and can’t wait to hear more, especially the JPEGMAFIA track!
Sudan Archives is FINALLY releasing her debut album sometime later this year via Stones Throw, and in the meantime we’re getting this great new single “Confessions”, which thankfully features her blessed violin playing. Can’t wait for this record!
Haven’t been posting that much lately and I apologize! Been SUPER busy at my main job and really hunkering down for my best of the decade prep. Not too many things have been really striking me as NEEDING to be featured on the blog, but that might be chocked up to laziness. Hoping to turn that around soon!
However, one record that’s been on pretty constant rotation since its release is Friendly Fires’ first album in eight years, Inflorescent. I’ve been highly anticipating it ever since I realized that those dudes hadn’t put out a record in a mad long time and lead singer Ed Macfarlane had some bomb vocal features on a few great records in the meantime. The lead up singles “Heaven Let Me In” and “Love Like Waves” in 2018 made me a fan again and I’m so happy to say that this album lives up to expectations. Thank goodness. Tons of super fun dance slammers.
This song in particular, “Almost Midnight”, is especially special to me and has been the subject of numerous replays. On my first listen I thought the chorus was kinda cheesy, which it is, but man: the electric groove on this song, the silly-putty-like synths, the volleys of bass being shot across the soundscape are just TOO. GOOD. The similar sounds that come to mind are like Currents-era Tame Impala (in the heavy synth psychedelia), Menos Del Oso / Planet of Ice Minus the Bear (in the sonic texture of the guitar and the melody of the chorus) and some classic dance cuts that I find on Youtube or something. The whole album is cheesy, dance pop songs that don’t take themselves too seriously. It’s SO much fun and I can’t recommend it enough if you’re looking for a good time to finish off your summer vacation.
Getting this out in the world took me way too long. July was a weird month where some truly remarkable records like Purple Mountains’ and Lingua Ignota’s, but not tooooo many more. I found plenty of pleasure in other releases, but not enough to really lock me in for good. July always seems like a quiet month, looking back on how the past four years have gone. Either way, hope you enjoy my selections here.
Drab Majesty – Modern Mirror [Dais Records]
A computer programmer is being pursued by a virus that has infiltrated a human’s body and is planning on digitizing the Earth.
KOKOKO! – Fongola [Transgressive]
A beamed in message of jubilation and revolution from a turbulent future timeline.
Lingua Ignota – CALIGULA [Profound Lore]
The blood of a sacrifice coagulates into an amorphous creature possessed by revenge.
Oli XL – Rogue Intruder, Soul Enhancer [BLOOM]
A series of therapy sessions in which an experimental fluid solution is filtered in through your brain, literally washing away detritus collected on your cerebrum, however some abnormalities may occur.
Penelope Isles – Until The Tide Creeps In [Bella Union]
Finding an amoebic shoegaze and watching them flatten out under a microscope after putting a glass slide on top of them.
Purple Mountains – Purple Mountains [Drag City]
The solemn, self-indulgent, yet accommodating final transmission from an unparalleled lyrical mind.
Jenny Hval’s upcoming album has now taken a giant leap in my “most-anticipated albums of 2019” race with new single “High Alice”, which continues her trend of shifting, hazy and intoxicating songs off this new album. I cannot wait.
Warm Visions 