Molosser - Tape Waves - Wild Pink Feat. Samia
Swedish MOLOSSER paint an electrically vibrant soundscape with downtuned acoustic guitars, vocals and drums. Tess and Jahn of Molosser found each other in Gothenburg, Sweden’s second largest city and home of a lively music scene. There, both were playing in various bands and constellations, mainly of the loud and noisy variety. After a while, though, they moved to a small farm in the province of Småland, where they found themselves in the company of a couple of horses, an American bulldog, a gang of cats, some chickens and three sheep.
They started making music on their acoustic guitars, and lacking a bass player they tuned them down so they could share that duty between them. The music that emerged is colored by both their urban past and their current rural surroundings, a bit like when the blues moved from the delta to the city and got electrified, but the other way around. The nerve and drive remains, but have widened and grown to fill the windy woodlands and dusty, open fields as well as the deeper darkness beyond the edge of town.
Molosser’s music springs from a tight-knit, symbiotic relationship outside the music as well as inside it. It is built around the interplay between the two downtuned guitars, the intimate vocals, strong lyrics and meticulous, creative songwriting. Rather than using traditional acoustic guitar techniques of strumming or fingerpicking, Molosser weave deceptively simple and minimalistic lines and riffs into dancing, rolling patterns.
Tess’s vocals add one more voice and deliver strong, poetical and highly personal lyrics, and on the studio recordings her drums make this little unit into a complete band. Any virtuosity involved is less about dexterity or speed and more about composition, arrangement and balance. One of the foundations for Molosser’s music is having access to two rather different musical temperaments, intent on creating a common territory – not necessarily a middle ground but rather a wide, including landscape.
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We have the blissful dreampop single "Tired" from the South Carolina shoegaze duo Tape Waves starts. The band return with their fourth album Bright which comes out on their new label Emotional Response this June. I love this record and it made a bit of my chill time just hanging out in a hammock on the lake over the weekend just perfect. The exact music I wanted coming out my headphones while little bits of sun would break through the thick cover of the leaves above. The band debuted the first single at Austin Town Hall on Friday.
Tape Waves are Kim and Jarod Weldin, a dream pop duo from Charleston, SC. They have released 3 full length albums on San Diego’s Bleeding Gold Records, which have garnered comparisons to Mazzy Star, Cocteau Twins and Best Coast. SPIN described the bands’ sound as “wistful, lens-blurred dream pop to soundtrack nostalgia daydreams and sleepy weekend afternoons.”
Their two most recent albums were also released on 2670 records in Japan, where they toured in support of 2018’s Distant Light. Their new album, Bright, combines the bands’ previously established sun-drenched pop with the fuzzed out indie rock influence of bands like My Bloody Valentine, Slowdive, and Teenage Fanclub. Bright was mixed and mastered by Kevin McMahon (Real Estate, Titus Andronicus, Widowspeak) at his studio, Marcata Recording, in Upstate New York, elevating the production and adding the sonic depth that the songs deserve.
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Hot on the heels of releasing one of the years most critically revered albums in A Billion Little Lights back in February, Wild Pink are today sharing their new single, "Ohio". Teaming up with Samia, it is the first track from the band's new EP 3 Songs, out June 25th on Royal Mountain Records, and follows last month's 6 Cover Songs.
Lush and expansive, Samia's and Wild Pink vocalist John Ross' intertwining vocals sit atop a stirring and beautiful sonic backdrop as Ross ruminates on the small moments of calm and glimpses of peace that occur when you take a second to breathe. On the track, Ross explains: "This song is about feeling isolated but then the relief that comes from seeing family/friends. It's about getting some comfort from some of the mundane things I took for granted growing up, like daily summer storms and the hum from an oscillating fan at night. I wrote a lot of it during soundchecks on a tour with Adam Torres in 2018."
A Billion Little Lights was released back in February to widespread acclaim, with Stereogum declaring it as "one of the most exquisitely pretty rock albums in recent memory" while Ny Mag/Vulture declared it "2021's best rock album," alongside praise from outlets like NPR, New York Magazine, Pitchfork, The AV Club, Uproxx, Paste, MTV, FADER, Consequence, BrooklynVegan and many more. The follow up 6 Cover Songs saw admiration from both Billboard and the r/indieheads community, as well as landing Ross a KEXP Live At Home Session, which is out now to coincide with the release of "Ohio".
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