Kacey Johansing - Jérémie & The Delicious Hounds - LOW-RES

Kacey Johansing - Daffodils.

Today Kacey Johansing announces the upcoming release of her new album Year Away. The LA-based songwriter has also shared a new video for “Daffodils,” the first single and a stunning centerpiece to the album, built from a pastiche of looping samples, swirling Mellotron and dazzling vibraphone. Year Away will be released on July 28th via Night Bloom records.

An elegiac tribute to someone facing death with grace and curiosity, “Daffodils” finds Johansing confronting own mortality by observing the brief lifespan of a flower. “Keep your heart open wide, you never know your time / Keep your heart wild, true flower child”, Johansing sings as she says goodbye to an elder, while the band reaches a grief-stricken crescendo of woodwinds and chiming bells.

Johansing writes, “Daffodils are one of the first flowers to bloom as the earth begins to thaw, coming even before spring and often emerging from the snow. The vibrant yellow is a sign that a seasonal shift is on the horizon, a gesture of hope and light, even in the darkest of times.”

Throughout Year Away Johansing traverses similarly uncharted emotional landscapes brought upon by the changes occurring all around her. When the world came to an abrupt standstill in 2020, she found herself simultaneously processing this recent personal loss while trying to make sense of a new global reality. She began to fear her Los Angeles musical community was vanishing, as friends and collaborators continually announced they were leaving the city. Across the ensuing months, Johansing found herself increasingly untethered by a world of isolation and political upheaval.

It was in returning to her piano nightly that she found the greatest solace, feverishly writing the songs for a new album. This new sense of time and focus served to help deepen her songwriting. As Johansing recalls, “I felt like a metamorphosis happened during that time. There was a lot of personal growth and healing.” 

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Jérémie & The Delicious Hounds - 'We Haven't Met Yet.

Jérémie & The Delicious Hounds are new-age fosterers of soul music with a uniquely Canadian twist. Hailing from St. Boniface, the old French quarter of Winnipeg, they have crafted their identity as bilingual artists with their first full-length album, Cruel. Infusing nine fun-loving songs about amour and heartbreak in a mixture of both English and French, the LP serves as an authentic representation of the languages they speak at home. With the support of seasoned producer Murray Pulver, Cruel was recorded "live off the floor" to capture their vintage soul aesthetic and vibrant live performance energy.

The record's focus track, "We Haven't Met Yet," came about when lead singer/guitarist Jérémie came up with some lyrics for a chorus and shared them with lead guitarist Ryan Toupin, who found them inspiring and wrote several verses. The lyrics reminded Ryan of his single days when he would feel too shy to approach any of the beautiful girls he encountered, whether on the bus, at a bar, or in this case, at the library. He had always fantasized about meeting an intelligent girl who shared his love of books.

The Delicious Hounds name is a play on words about their "delicious sound" of smooth melodies, juicy guitar riffs and tasty horn licks. Jérémie's smooth yet smoky voice is accented with a brilliant brass section to deliver round after round of phenomenal hits on golden platters. His staple friendliness, positive vibes and charismatic nature culminate into a profound presence that leaves listeners swooning for another bite of the eight-piece band's modern twist on old-school rhythm and beats.

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LOW-RES - Därför (Album).

Following on from the release of their highly praised four-track EP ‘Du å ja’ last year, Swedish duo LOW-RES now return for 2023 to deliver their explosive new album.

Right off the release of their most recent single ‘Stigma’, teaming up with seminal artist Johan Hinders of Audionom for the release, LOW-RES anticipates their album, ‘Däför’. The pair return with all the same power and captivating post-punk textures they are known for. Brimming with a raw and driven aesthetic that flows elegantly between their electronic and organic elements, their newest release cements them as one of the more riveting names on the scene today.

Stockholm based duo LOW-RES writes pulsating pop tunes influenced by 90s ambient guitars and analog synthesizers. They made their debut in 2021 with the full-length album ”Varför” featuring guest appearances by Jukka Rintamäki (Silverbullit) and Per Nordmark (Fireside) among others. A four-track EP "Du å ja" followed in 2022 with a refined sound of analog drum machines and Swedish lyrics.

The eleven songs on ‘Därför’ drag you in, one by one, to a parallel universe where music from bygone eras, like krautrock, early electronic pop/rock and psychedelia, are alive and well and sounding as fresh as ever in modern-day Sweden.

“Varför and Därför belong together,”says LOW-RES. “Both records were written in the same vein and with the same approach: fast, creative and with many collaborations that colour the expression. We have a lot of fun making music and it works as an antidepressant. We just heard the term Art Therapy and that pretty much sums up why we do this.”

Adrian Recordings · LOW-RES - Därför

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ANGHARAD - Natalie Gray - The Bablers - Georgia Mooney

ANGHARAD - Because I Am A Woman.

ANGHARAD is an artist and songwriter with fire, passion and unflinching honesty at the core of all her music. The first single from her debut solo album had to be ‘Because I Am A Woman’, a confident and positive ‘call to arms’.

As ANGHARAD explains: “‘Because I Am A Woman’ was written as a response to the widely accepted beliefs in the music industry that it’s not possible to be a mother and have a successful career.

I received some hostile reactions myself when I announced that I was pregnant. I was told that I was unambitious and that I was no longer serious about following a career in music. These outdated, sexist attitudes need to change.

This is a call to arms to any woman who has experienced similar attitudes and expressing the need to stand up for change. Rather than getting angry about it, this song says “yes we can!” And “yes, we are capable of anything!” I believe it is possible to have both, and do both well, when society will allow us.

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Natalie Gray - The Me I Pretend To Be.

The Me I Pretend To Be is the latest single from Synth-Pop artist Natalie Gray. Grabbing inspiration from some of Natalie’s favourite artists such as Cyndi Lauper and Madonna, as well as more recent artists such as Paramore, Kings Elliot and Lawrence, this song embodies the desperation of losing yourself and hiding behind a smile and a cliche whilst it feels that your world could crumble at any second.

Following the success of Natalie’s previous single “Fire” supported by BBC introducing, The Me I Pretend To Be steps away from her usual upbeat and colourful sound and brings a more honest and nostalgic feel, touching on the reality of living with mental health issues such as anxiety and depression, a theme that a lot of us can relate to.  This latest track is Natalie’s first time opening up about her own personal experience with living with PTSD and struggling to find her old self.

Instead of reaching for your hairbrush and throwing your best 80s dance moves infront of the mirror, The Me I Pretend To Be will have you opening your old photo albums and coming face to face with your own demons.

Natalie has teamed up once again with childhood friend and personal agony aunt Jack Craig, (the producer behind “Dance Floor” and “One In A Million”) to create this vulnerable and heart string grabbing song.

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The Bablers - Mr King.

Bablers founder, singer-songwriter and multi-instrumentalist Arto Tamminen – who's led the band, now alongside Janne Haavisto (drums, vocals), Pekka Gröhn (bass, keyboards, vocals), and Hannu Pikkarainen (guitar, vocals) since its late '70s genesis – tells us about the track and how it difers from the boisterous guitar pop of the two prior single. “It's built to be a classic big piano pop ballad, the kind you've rarely heard since the golden days of pop.” And that's exactly what “Mr. King” delivers: intimate, intense, bold, confdent, and powerful, the tune has a million dollar melody that sticks in your mind, and a timeless message. As with all of the tracks from the LIKE THE FIRST TIME sessions, the song is played 100% live with original instruments: upright piano, electric guitar, bass and drums. The band’s sound is glued together, tight yet fexible, and the take heard here has a magic and a mood you can almost touch. It makes you listen, demanding attention that will be rewarded.

Tamminen lays out the backstory behind the emotive lyrics, ofering insight into the choice to release the song as the English monarchy – and so much of the world – enters a new era. “It’s been a long day. A lot of public activities. Horses and soldiers. Roaring audiences. Applause. Flags. Smiling faces,” explains Arto. “Finally, at the castle, someone is knocking at the door. It's troubadour asking permission to sing a song, crafted especially for the occasion. Permission is granted. He starts to sing, and in the chorus asks the most important question...”

Both the deft handling of the subject matter and the richness of the music mark a true change of pace after the previous two singles from The Bablers. That versatility won't surprise longtime fans or anyone who's heard the band's thrillingly eclectic and lovingly crafted 2021 Big Stir Records album PSYCHADILLY CIRCUS. But it's all too rare to hear a new work of this depth and purity of sound on the radio these days, and that alone is reason to celebrate another triumph from THE BABLERS, who are rapidly ascending to the throne they have long deserved: the Kings of Finnish Guitar Pop, and royalty on the global stage as well.

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Georgia Mooney - Break It Off.

Pulling inspiration from the theatrical sounds of ABBA and Rufus Wainwright, ‘Break It Off’ is pure high drama, a melodramatic and shamelessly camp take on infatuation ending in pain, fuelled by desperate yearning and stubborn sentimentality.

Georgia Mooney shares “it is about being powerless to somebody’s charms. When a relationship is terribly bad for you, but the infatuation is overwhelming. When you’re not receiving enough in return, there is a desperation that the person will have a miraculous epiphany and realise they’re actually madly in love. There is an inability to let go of that hope, to the extent where the only option is to be dumped ruthlessly!” Mooney’s celestial vocals dance above luscious layers of instrumentation: gentle piano, a 70s-esque synth, and shimmering strings, all buoyed by bass and shuffling drums reminiscent of classic 60s pop.

 The ‘Break It Off’ video sees a dazzling 80s-worthy collaboration with Eora-founded aerobics queens Retrosweat. Devised as “if Pat Benatar made an instructional workout video”, Georgia Mooney sings as a portrait on the wall of a beautiful, surreal set that the trio of dancers perform in. As well as being wonderfully theatrical, it’s also the avenue through which Mooney presents an ode to one of her greatest loves - Benedict Cumberbach. She shares, “It is no secret that I have something of a celebrity crush on Benedict Cumberbatch. I do not suffer from celebrity worship syndrome in general, nor do I ever get star struck, I cannot explain the spell that was cast on me when first I clapped eyes and ears on Cumberbatch. Surely something to do with the rather lovely, clever-sounding accent and the period costume attire…When I wrote the lyric “you’re not a patch on Benedict Cumberbatch”, I gave myself the rest of the day off.”

Georgia Mooney's upcoming debut album ‘Full Of Moon’ features previously released singles ‘War Romance’ and ‘I Am Not In A Hurry’. The record is a meticulously crafted sonic universe that tells stories of the beauty and potency of vulnerability, and the complexities of connection and perception, carried by Mooney’s soaring ethereal voice over lush, cinematic soundscapes.

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Panic Pocket - Jeanines - The Strange Dream - Jo Caseley

Panic Pocket - Get Me.

London-based Sophie Peacock and Natalie Healey have been friends since childhood, know each other’s secrets - and probably know a few of yours too. Panic Pocket are sassy, sardonic and bursting with amazing songs.

Fuelled by claustrophobia and frustration, new single Get Me is consumed by the desire to push the escape button. Lyrically, the song grapples with a fear of commitment and a determination to defy life expectations.

This sense of cathartic destruction is mirrored in the music. Get Me sees the band stomping on the distortion pedal, building a life-affirming anthem from layers of chunky riffs. The deliberately lo-fi video, shot on an old digital camera Sophie found in the attic, is delightfully deadpan – all snarls and eye rolls against candyfloss backdrops.

Get Me was the obvious choice for the opening track on debut album Mad Half Hour, where Panic Pocket set out their intentions and give you a safe space to scream it all out with them. If you want punkpop exuberance, lyrics that are so truthful they hurt, plus some very infectious tunes - then Mad Half Hour is the soundtrack you need, right down to the minute.

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Jeanines - Each Day.

Over the course of two well-received albums and numerous singles and compilation appearances, Jeanines have captured the ears of discerning listeners with a sound that recalls a diverse swathe of pop history, from 60s folk-pop and girl-group tunes to 80s DIY pop to solid gold 90s touchstones like The Aislers Set, The Cat's Miaow and the post-Black Tambourine bands of Pam Berry.

Now they're back with their first new tunes since 2022's Don't Wait For A Sign and the hits just keep on coming. "Each Day" is moody jangler that delivers melodic and emotional heft that belies its brief 1:43 length. Destined for 1,000 indiepop mixtapes, it's exactly the kind of song that the 7" was invented for.

"What The Echoes Say" is a strummy delight, showcasing Alicia Jeanine's lovely vocal harmonies to maximum effect. "Tilt In Your Eye" wraps up this ace single -- it was Jeanines' contribution to Where It's At Is Where You Are's ace 2019 compilation "The Moon And Back" and appears here on vinyl for the first time.

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The Strange Dream - Miss Annie.

As psych rock goes this is very good. Capturing the vibes of days gone by there is enough originality here to make the song stand out and the gorgeous vibes really do resonate so well. Ive got to say I kind of love this one, anyway about the band.

Hailing from the dark corners of some of Manchesters dingiest bars, Strange Dream are the cities most exciting new two piece psych-rock experience. Off the back of their instrumental debut ‘Orange’ the band release ‘Miss Annie’, a soaring guitar track with melodic riffs and driving vocals packed with jangly guitars and shimmering beats just in time for the coming summer.

‘Miss Annie’ started as a word game for guitarist and vocalist Vincent Strange, seeing how many coded narcotics he could fit into the songs verses, “So miss Annie and her pet are fiends (amphetamines) coco & dean lost in their dreams (codeine) St.Mary’s at the harbour (marijuana) Like she does (LSD) there’s no harm in her”. This second single was also the bands first real song writing collaboration, “Virgil already had the instrumental & never really intended to make anything more of it but I thought it could be a full song so I wrote three different versions and we picked them apart used the bits we liked. The chorus was from a song I wrote years ago but it seemed to fit right. For ages we really didn’t like how it turned out but we tweaked the music and words until we cracked the code.”

Strange Dream are a newly formed Manchester duo that fuse an array influences and energies to create imaginative and exciting sound-scapes resulting in dreamy and energetic psych-rock with garage roots and an indie edge. The track was written, recorded and produced by the bands two members, Vincent Strange and Virgil Strange using anything from ash trays and shoes in the recording process to create the tracks unique sound. ‘Miss Annie’ is the just a taste of the bands dreamy yet sometimes sleazy sound.

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Jo Caseley - Houseless Never Homeless.

Jo Caseley cut her teeth busking the streets of Kings Cross, landing her first real gig in a smoky blues bar next to a strip club. While miles away from where her humble and authentic stylings have landed, it served as a character-building exercise that honed Jo’s ability to write and perform songs about real life, people, places and experiences.

Her forthcoming album, “High On Heartstrings”, is full of such songs – highlighting her ability to place the listener in the moment and narrate a story in its purest form. “Houseless Never Homeless” is the first single lifted from the release and inspired whilst reading her late American Grandmother’s memoir where she was drawn to a chapter called Houseless Never Homeless. It was post World War I during The Great Depression, Caseley’s Grandmother was a child, times were tough, and the family of six were living out of their Model T Ford, desperate for work and a better life.

The song talks about how a child can be houseless, but whilst surrounded by love and hope, never feel homeless. It was a beautiful sentiment that Caseley felt compelled to share especially in the wake of the rise in homelessness in Australia within the past four years. She felt the message was as significant now as ever and took the idea to her friend and mentor, Bill Chambers.

“Bill was the perfect person to write this special song with. He has a great appreciation for the old times and hard times and was so genuinely invested in helping me share my heritage and the stories of my American family”, says Caseley. “Houseless Never Homeless” was brought to life in The Rabbit Hole Recording Studio by Kasey Chambers’ band featuring Brandon Dodd on guitars, Jeff McCormack on bass, Syd Green on drums and the swelling heart strings of Bill Chambers’ lap steel guitar; the perfect pairing in production for Caseley to share this special song of hope and dreams which was co-produced by Brandon Dodd and Syd Green.

“The comfort I find from feeling close and connected to my grandmother, singing her story years after her passing is immeasurable. I hope it can bring comfort to others knowing that with love and hope, anything is possible”.

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Meagre Martin - The Lemon Twigs - Ivan Moult - Tom Emlyn

Meagre Martin - All My Thoughts

Berlin via Boston up-and-coming indie project Meagre Martin share their gripping and intimate new single, "All My Thoughts." The track is out now on Mansions and Millions.

On the track, the lead-member Sarah Martin offers: "All My Thoughts' is about the pervasive feelings of grief and how we internalize it. How we continue to reference grief and the ones we've lost for the entirety of our lives. It describes how grief can shape the way we move through the world after those people are no longer here to advise us. It talks about this afterlife connection and also the ultimate fear of mortality and failure."

Meagre Martin is a Berlin-based indie music project founded by African-American musician/songwriter Sarah Martin (she/her) in the summer of 2021. Sarah is originally from Boston MA, but moved to Berlin Germany in the fall of 2017. Searching for meaning in a crumbling global climate, this project was created as a means of survival, and catharsis through uncertain times. A few months into the project's culmination, Freddy and Max joined the band to make a solid trio.

Blending together elements of lo-fi and new-Americana, Meagre Martin is a culmination of experience rooted in healing, through lyricism that gives nostalgia new layers and expands grief’s potential. Although Meagre Martin is a relatively new presence in the Berlin indie scene, they've already made a big impact, performing at shows all over the city. The band is now poised to broaden their reach beyond Berlin, having been hard at work on new music, including their newest single out now via Mansions and Millions.

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The Lemon Twigs - Everything Harmony (Album).

On Everything Harmony, the fourth full-length studio release from New York’s The Lemon Twigs, the prodigiously talented brothers Brian and Michael D’Addario offer 13 original servings of beauty that showcase an emotional depth and musical sophistication far beyond their years as a band, let alone as young men. While they eagerly devour musical influences from everything and everywhere, they have somehow arrived at a cohesive and dynamic sound that speaks to our troubled times.

Having bounded onto the music scene with their precocious 2016 debut Do Hollywood, they threw caution to the wind two years later on their followup Go to School. By the time of their third album, Songs for the General Public (2020) The Lemon Twigs had begun to pull from a wide range of multigenerational inspirations, expertly darting from twee chamber pop balladry to full on glam punk, mixing plaintive singer-songwriter confessionals with an almost Syd Barrett sense of outré pop. In an interview from the time, they expressed an interest in creating “something really beautiful sounding” based on vocal harmonies and developing their combined melodic sensibilities into a setting where “the sounds were as important as the songs” themselves.

On Everything Harmony, the brothers have fully realized that vision, with a unified “Lemon Twigs sound” that successfully blends their distinct personalities while giving voice to their diverse and eclectic influences. Opening the album with the unassuming acoustic folk of plaintive “When Winter Comes Around,” which echoes the sophisticated grandeur of classic Simon & Garfunkel recordings, they immediately switch things up to the sunny classic pop motif of “In My Head.” From that point on Everything Harmony makes it clear that the Lemon Twigs can’t be pinned down.

Having recently worked with friends like Natalie Mering, with whom they appeared on the latest Weyes Blood album, they also collaborated with classic rock hero Todd Rundgren on his most recent album, Space Force. Rundgren, himself no stranger to eclecticism, says he can relate to their time-tripping approach to contemporary pop.

“They started when they were five and six years old, doing TV and Broadway and things like that,” says Rundgren. “So, they have built-in appreciation for music that is of a couple of generations before theirs. I think they were bored by the music of their own generation, and since you can’t fast forward to the music of the future, you just start going backwards to music that was made before you were born. I can empathize with that impulse, because I did that too, back in the seventies.”

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Ivan Moult - Written On The Wall.

Cardiff-based singer-songwriter Ivan Moult announces the release of his new single 'Written On The Wall’, taken from his upcoming album 'Songs From Severn Grove'.

The single is released today May 5th. Following on from his last single, ‘Out Of Time’, Moult’s latest offering showcases hisunique blend of indie-folk, soulful vocals andpoignant lyrics that delve into themes of love,loss and hope.

Speaking about the single, Moult said: "Lyrically a song about having a conversation with a new partner about their previous lovelife/partners. Acknowledging their experience. Questioning whether or not you want to or need to know their romantic past. Trying to reassure them things wouldbe different.

Observing it’s apparent in other ways without needing to be discussed.” ‘Songs From Severn Grove’, which is due out on May 26th, showcases Ivan's voice front and centre, with layered harmonies and a soundscape of delay-soaked electric guitars, drums, and bass.

Ivan Moult is set to release his third album, 'Songs From Severn Grove', this Spring on independent Welsh record label, Bubblewrap Collective. His previous albums have received radio support from BBC Radio 6 Music and BBC Radio Wales, and have been featured on Folk Radio UK.

Ivan's second album, 'Longest Shadow', released in 2018, won him festival slots at Cornbury Festival, Folk on The Dock, and Festival of Voice, as well as support slots with This Is The Kit, Becca Mancari, and Willy Mason. For this new album, Ivan played, recorded, engineered, and mixed all of the instruments himself at his home studio in Cardiff. The album charts a journey of growth and change, beginning with the lockdown during the 2020 pandemic and continuing through Ivan's experiences of fatherhood and the development of his love and relationships.

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Tom Emlyn - It Doesn't Bother Me.

Prolific Swansea artist Tom Emlyn has shared the video for his latest single 'It Doesn't Bother Me'. It's the follow-up to ‘Broken Mirror’ and ‘Like a Cigarette', it's the last of three singles leading up to the album ‘Return Journey Revisited: Scaredycat Vol 1’ released today Friday the 5th of May 2023.

Engineered by Randell Denning, BBC studios Swansea in 2018 ‘It Doesn’t Bother Me’ rattles with introspection, as Emlyn sketches out nightmarish visions of characters who lose themselves in the pursuit of success. Amidst a scorched strum of fuzzy guitars, battered acoustics and skippy keys and synths. It’s a raw earworm that tries to throw off the shadow of doubt.

Emlyn says: “This song is from the mind of an unreliable narrator, trying to convince himself of his own aloofness as much as he is the listener. It paints a nightmare picture of self-doubt, anxiety, dead-end jobs, bad decisions, time running out. Schizophrenic images of audible lights in the engine yard. Losing your real self in the pursuit of money, recognition, anything. The masks we wear to convince ourselves and others of our resilience.”

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