Background - The North West’s very own Sittin Pretty come confidently striding out on to the streets to deliver you their thumping slab of defiance ‘ Then You Break’, the new single to be released on Gas Music 24th November.
This band capture a sound, an attitude, that can only be delivered by an authentic group of musicians embracing their youth and love of life in this modern age of rock, blending classic rock, blues and touches of psychedelia.
Front man Conor Wilde explains ‘When Lewis and I first started playing together it was in a bedroom smaller than the average boiler closet in Lewis’s Mother’s 2 up 2 down in Breightmet. I was a pretty angry kid who’d always used lyrics and songs to express myself, and Lewis played some pretty heavy riffs so it immediately worked very well, we didn’t give a fuck about where it was going. It was just for us and just for the absolute love of playing.’
The band is working now on their debut album due for release next year and have been earning a reputation with shows across the UK sharing stages with Primal Scream, Black Grape, Reverend and The Makers and Foals, plus a tour supporting Ian Hunter of Mott The Hoople fame.
Conor Wilde from the band explains how ‘Then You Break’ was born: ‘we started messing around with the riff and melodies for this single, ‘Then You Break’. Lyrically for me the song is about struggling to understand all the shit I see every day and the feelings that come along with it, and the bulk of this song is about being confused and trapped which ironically is what makes everything seem normal for a twenty something year old these days. It has taken us months to get this track off the ground but we had some good advice from Ian Hunter, who invited us out with him last year and he told me that ; “You should always strive to write about something that means a lot to you”. So I did’, website here, Facebook here.
There is plenty of rock'n'roll swagger to 'Then You Break' a powerful no nonsense mixture of blues rock & potently pleasing vocals that add a level of psychedelic feeling to this wonderful rocker.
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Background - British indie band The Loft Club release their new single “Flicker”, featuring Grammy-nominated recording artist Lisa Loeb. “Flicker,” available now via Lightyear/Caroline/Universal Music, is a double A-side single, which comes bundled with an original version of the track.
A melodic and ardent ballad. "Flicker," showcases lead singer Daniel Schamroth and Lisa Loeb's vocal talents, perfectly blended in a seamless and fluid manner; heartfelt with soaring melodies, alongside harmonious arrangements of guitar, bass and drums. The Exeter-based, Sixties-tinged band, consisting of Daniel Schamroth, Jamie Whyte, Kieran Chalmers, Amy O’Loughlin and Dan Wright, drafted in US singer-songwriter Lisa Loeb to collaborate on the official single edit of "Flicker", a brand new version of the track that was originally released on the band’s debut EP 'Heart's Desire', last fall.
Lisa Loeb started her career with the platinum-selling hit single “Stay (I Missed You)”, it spent 3 weeks at Number 1 on the US Billboard charts in 1994. The song was also a Top-10 hit in the UK, where it spent 15 weeks in the UK Singles chart. Loeb is the first and only artist in history, to top the American charts before signing to a label. Ironically, “Flicker” is released (August 25), exactly 23 years to the day, that “Stay (I Missed You)” was spending it's 3rd week at Number 1.
The Loft Club are playing festivals throughout the summer, such as Beautiful Days and Smoked & Uncut. The band have achieved over 250,000 streams since their debut release last fall. They have been featured on Spotify’s Discover Weekly playlist since February, amassing over 70,000 monthly listeners in March, drawing listeners from all over the world, including countries like Lithuania where they charted on Spotify’s Viral-50 chart. “Flicker”, produced by Jolyon Holroyd, was mixed and mastered at Magic Garden Studios by Gavin Monaghan, whose credits include Editors, Ryan Adams, Kings of Leon, and Paolo Nutini. “Flicker” by The Loft Club featuring Lisa Loeb, is available now at all digital retailers. Facebook here.
'Flicker' is a bright indie rock song where the interchange of vocals are fabulous and the band provide a rich tapestry of sounds that gives this superb song some real edge.
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Michael Jablonka - Peacefully.Background - Michael Jablonka is a musician so prolific that you may think he devotes every waking hour to his art and, if the fantastical nature of many of his songs are anything to go by, several hours of his dreams as well. In addition to performing as Michael Kiwanuka’s chosen guitarist – a role that has found him touring arenas and festivals worldwide this summer – Jablonka has been fine-tuning his own powerful 21st-century take on bluesy alt-funk and soulful indie-rock. Proof that there’s still nothing to tingle the spine like soul-soused mastery of raw electric six-string, Jablonka’s gifted, intricate guitar skills bely the no-frills anthemic intent of his rootsy songcraft – sonic elevation designed to liberate the listener from the confines of their reality.
Born and bred in the capital, 27-year-old Jablonka has been gigging since the tender age of 14 as an in-demand guitarist for hire. Those to have enjoyed his dextrous services include Charlie Brown, Stooshe, Shakka and Delta Maid before fellow North Londoner and Brit-soul sensation Michael Kiwanuka came calling. Around the same time, Jablonka decided it was time to blaze his own trail as a bandleader and songwriter, collating a set of crack musicians and intense yet universal alt-rock’n’soul tunes that scream for wider appreciation. ‘Peacefully’ is the first of a dynamite double-A to be released by Lost In The Manor Records and is sure to bring on the kind of praise and popularity now enjoyed by Michael’s namesake and regular bandmate.
True to its rousing sense of urgency, ‘Peacefully’ erupts with a crunching overdriven riff coming on like Jack White here, Matt Bellamy there and the ghost of Hendrix himself throughout. Michael Jablonka melds his enthralling guitar runs to a whip-crack rhythm and deep layers of double-tracked melody, while projecting his magisterial vocal across a stone-walled anthem of a chorus. Three minutes later, this steamy electric-soul belter is spent, leaving the listener to wonder just exactly what hit them as they reach for the repeat button.
“‘Peacefully’ is about separating yourself from a rough situation,” says Jablonka of the track produced by Ben ‘BJ’ Jackson at NXNE Studios in London. “Everyone is constantly in need of escapism.” Lucky then, that you’d be hard pressed to find a more immediate means of escape than this incendiary single. Facebook here.
The vocals and guitar lead music compete with each other for attention on 'Peacefully'. Both are powerful, high quality & passionately delivered, in what could be, a masterclass for modern day classic rock that's relevant.
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Background - The new LP from Peter Matthew Bauer has been confirmed. It is entitled 'Mount Qaf (Divine Love)' and it will be out 11/10 on Fortune Tellers/Kobalt Music. Along with the announcement the site also shared the first single "Khidr (American Drifter Music)". 'Mount Qaf (Divine Love)' is the follow-up to Peter's 2014 release 'Liberation!'.
Peter Matthew Bauer is an American singer and recording artist born in 1978 in Washington DC. He has had a strange, storied and original career. A founder of seminal New York art rock band the Walkmen, he released 6 full length albums with the band before his first solo LP Liberation! in 2014. Concurrently, Peter moved to Los Angeles and founded two organizations: the artist management/production label Fortune Tellers Music and the Laurel Canyon Center For Consciousness Studies, focusing on his esoteric work as a writer and astrologer and drawing influence from different schools of eastern philosophy along with the work of Carl Jung, Alejandro Jodorowsky and the western phenomenologist and Islamic scholar Henry Corbin.
Mount Qaf (Divine Love) an album of esoteric love songs. It is a singular cycle of music and a strangely primitive and direct rock & roll performance that goes beyond genre into something more contemporary and strange. Working with co-producer Nick Stumpf, Peter Matthew Bauer envisioned Mount Qaf as made up of 10 love songs, each filled with a desperate, skeptical and highly personal form of mysticism. Driven both by his own synchronistic outlook on life, as well as the discovery of a worn out copy of a Henry Corbin book on the Sufi master Ib’n Arabi, the songs arise from a central idea of human love and poetic insight seen as a literal shift from concrete objective reality into a further dimension, a transitory realm of light and imagination that supersedes all forms of fundamentalism and rationality. It is less the sound of a musical craftsman and more the sound of an artist trying to make sense of the world as it rises and falls all around him. On November 10, 2017, Peter Matthew Bauer will release Mount Qaf (Divine Love) and tour alongside it in America & Europe. He resides in Los Angeles. Website here, Facebook here.
'Khidr' opens with Matthew Bauer's vocals centre stage. They are gradually accompanied by a sweeping musical arrangement and the song continues to epic-ally build & after a short refrain the whole song majestically develops again.
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Sarah Hiltz - Without You.Background - Beauty in the Blue is a compilation of songs and stories culled from Sarah’s multiple journeys across Canada as a travelling musician on cross-country Via Rail passenger train, “The Canadian”.
Hot off a UK tour supporting Canadian darlings Running Red Lights, Beauty in the Blue is Sarah’s first studio project featuring long-term stage collaborators, drummer Jordan Michaelis and multi-instrumentalist David Puzak. The album is out November 7th.
Sarah's thoughts on first single: Without You is a song that talks about the effects of depression on a relationship or partnership. It’s my idea that, for better or worse, when one person in a relationship is suffering, it can bring them both down, whether they want it to or not; and that when you commit to living life side by side, it means living through all the peaks and valleys you both go through- together. Website here, Facebook here.
Gently melodic vocals that oozes sensitivity ensures 'Without You' opens in a refined manner. The music slowly develops into a top quality arrangement, and Sarah Hiltz demonstrates she also has power within her voice when required. Fabulous!
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