FEATURE:
One for the Record Collection!
IN THIS PHOTO: Regina Spektor
Essential June Releases
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IT is that time of the month…
IN THIS PHOTO: Violet Skies/PHOTO CREDIT: Red Light Management
where I look ahead and select the albums that you need to pre-order. There are some great albums out next month. Starting with 3rd June, and there is one album that you need to check out. Angel Olsen’s Big Time is going to be terrific. Go and pre-order this album from one of the most extraordinary artists in the world:
“Fresh grief, like fresh love, has a way of sharpening our vision and bringing on painful clarifications. No matter how temporary we know these states to be, the vulnerability and transformation they demand can overpower the strongest among us. Then there are the rare, fertile moments when both occur, when mourning and limerence heighten, complicate and explain each other; the songs that comprise Angel Olsen’s Big Time were forged in such a whiplash.
Big Time is an album about the expansive power of new love, but this brightness and optimism is tempered by a profound and layered sense of loss. During Olsen’s process of coming to terms with her queerness and confronting the traumas that had been keeping her from fully accepting herself, she felt it was time to come out to her parents, a hurdle she’d been avoiding for some time. “Finally, at the ripe age of 34, I was free to be me,” she said. Three days later, her father died and shortly after her mother passed away. The shards of this grief—the shortening of her chance to finally be seen more fully by her parents— are scattered throughout the album.
Three weeks after her mother’s funeral she was in the studio, recording this incredibly wise and tender new album. Loss has long been a subject of Olsen’s elegiac songs, but few can write elegies with quite the reckless energy as she. If that bursting-at-the-seams, running downhill energy has come to seem intractable to her work, this album proves Olsen is now writing from a more rooted place of clarity. She’s working with an elastic, expansive mastery of her voice—both sonically and artistically. These are songs not just about transformational mourning, but of finding freedom and joy in the privations as they come”.
Skipping to 10th June, and there is a great album that I would point you in the direction of. The first is Kelly Lee Owens’ LP.8. It has already been released digitally, but the physical version is the one I want people to pre-order, as the vinyl is going to be terrific:
“After releasing her sophomore album Inner Song in the midst of the pandemic, Kelly Lee Owens was faced with the sudden realisation that her world tour could no longer go ahead. Keen to make use of this untapped creative energy, she made the spontaneous decision to go to Oslo instead. There was no overarching plan, it was simply a change of scenery and a chance for some undisturbed studio time. It just so happened that her flight from London was the last before borders were closed once again. The blank page project was underway.
Arriving to snowglobe conditions and sub-zero temperatures, she began spending time in the studio with Lasse Marhaug. An esteemed avant-noise artist, Marhaug envisioned making music that would fall loosely in line with Throbbing Gristle. Kelly, on the other hand, had planned to create something inspired by Enya, an artist who has had an enduring impact on her creative being. They met each other halfway, pairing tough, industrial sounds with ethereal celtic mysticism, and creating music that ebbs and flows between tension and release.
One month later, Kelly called her label to tell them she had created something of an outlier, her ‘eighth album’”.
June is pretty quiet in terms of big new releases. If course, things could change between here and the next few weeks. On 17th June, Foals’ Life Is Yours is released. A change of direction for the band, this is an album that you need to add to your shopping list:
“Foals take a fresh, thrilling new direction on with their latest album Life Is Yours. Life Is Yours is the follow-up to the triumphant, two-part Everything Not Saved Will Be Lost, which proved to be a pivotal pinnacle in the band’s story. Not only did it result in the band’s first ever UK #1 album, but the ambitious scale of the Mercury-nominated album saw Foals win their first BRIT Award for Best Group.
Life Is Yours feels like a natural evolution for Foals, its disco-tinged guitars, tight syncopated rhythms and punchy, insistent hooks echoing their roots as purveyors of rambunctious house party chaos. Thematically, it’s escapist, transportive and in rapture at life’s endless possibilities. It’s a record that’s perfectly in tune with the prevailing atmosphere of this moment in time – a life-affirming celebration as the world is reunited
‘Life Is Yours’ immediately establishes its tone with the bright beam of optimism provided by its title track, its ambience and exuberance showing no sign of slowing down as it is followed by the two recent singles. There’s a unity to the sound, whether Foals are bouncing into the Balearic beats of ‘Looking High’, experimenting with West African guitar grooves on ‘Flutter’, or simply savouring the prospect of playing live together again within the dance dynamics of ‘The Sound’.
It’s also a consistently transportive experience, at times conjuring images of the Pacific Northwest or St. Lucia, at others directly set in the peppy nostalgia of the recent past. It all comes full circle with ‘Wild Green’, which simultaneously celebrates the rebirth of summer with an existential tinge that all beautiful moments are inevitably fleeting”.
Perfume Genius’ new project, Ugly Season, is a fascinating one. Go and pre-order the album. It may not be for everyone, but I think that people need to hear this. I am definitely going to keep an ear open on 17th June:
“Perfume Genius (Mike Hadreas) with his new album, Ugly Season, and announced via a clip by artist and director Jacolby Satterwhite. The clip is taken from a short film featuring Hadreas and music from Ugly Season that is a visual companion to the project. Satterwhite is known for his immersive multidisciplinary technique that fuses live video, 3-D animation, drawing and print-making. His work has appeared at MoMa, The Smithsonian, The Whitney and the Studio Museum of Harlem.
The music of Ugly Season was written for Perfume Genius and choreographer Kate Wallich’s immersive dance piece, The Sun Still Burns Here. The work was commissioned by the Seattle Theatre Group and Mass MoCA and was performed via residencies in Seattle, Minneapolis, New York City and Boston throughout 2019. During this time, Perfume Genius shared two of the dance project’s compositions – ‘Pop Song’ and ‘Eye in the Wall’. “It’s the sound of dancefloor euphoria,” said Pitchfork. “The colour of lights flashing as you move through a crowd, the touch of skin damp and warm against everyone else’s.” Now the entirety of the project’s original music can be heard in Ugly Season. The album was produced by Perfume Genius and producer, and long-time collaborator Blake Mills, and was created in collaboration with Hadreas’ long-time partner Alan Wyffels”.
IN THIS PHOTO: Perfume Genius/PHOTO CREDIT: Camille Vivier
Prior to moving to a few albums from 24th June that are worth some pennies, there is one more from 17th. TV Priest’s My Other People is shaping up to be an album that everyone needs to hear. Go and pre-order this gem from a band that have put so much into this album:
“Without a brutal evaluation of their own becoming, TV Priest might have never made their second album. Heralded as the next big thing in post-punk, they were established as a bolshy, sharp-witted outfit, the kind that starts movements with their political ire. There was of course truth in that, but it was a suit that quickly felt heavy on its wearer’s shoulders, leaving little room for true vulnerability. “A lot of it did feel like I was being really careful and a bit at arm's length,” says vocalist Charlie Drinkwater. “I think maybe I was not fully aware of the role I was taking. I had to take a step back and realize that what we were presenting was quite far away from the opinion of myself that I had. Now, I just want to be honest.”
My Other People maintains a strong sense of earth-rooted emotion, taking advantage of the opportunity to physically connect. Using “Saintless” (the closing song from Uppers) as something of a starting point, Drinkwater set about crafting lyrics that allowed him to articulate a deeper sense of personal truth, using music as a vessel to communicate with his bandmates about his depleting mental health. “Speaking very candidly, it was written at a time and a place where I was not, I would say, particularly well,” he says. “There was a lot of things that had happened to myself and my family that were quite troubling moments.Despite that I do think the record has our most hopeful moments too; a lot of me trying to set myself reminders for living, just everyday sentiments to try and get myself out of the space I was in.”
“It was a bit of a moment for all of us where we realised that we can make something that, to us at least, feels truly beautiful,” agrees Bueth. “Brutality and frustration are only a part of that puzzle, and despite a lot of us feeling quite disconnected at the time, overwhelmingly beautiful things were also still happening.”
This tension between existential fear born from the constant uncertainties of life, and an affirmative, cathartic urge to seize the moment, is central to My Other People, a record that heals by providing space for recognition, a ground zero in which you’re welcome to stay awhile but which ultimately only leads up and out. For TV Priest, it is a follow-up that feels truly, properly them; free of bravado, unnecessary bluster or any audience pressure to commit solely to their original sound”.
There is actually one more album from 17th June; among the most anticipated releases of 2022. Nova Twins’ second album, Supernova, is one that people definitely need to pre-order. There is some great information and insight about Supernova and Nova Twins in this Kerrang! interview from February:
“It’s also their turn, they realise, to carry the baton for those who’ve come before and dedicated their lives to enacting real change – for women, for people of colour, for women of colour. Because while the duo undoubtedly march to the beat of their own drum, they do so accompanied by ‘the sound of the dead choir’s roar’, as Antagonist puts it. “In my head, I was seeing the people who have been and have passed on,” says Amy. “But they’re still chanting, our ancestors, the people who have fought for civil rights and fought for women’s rights, which has passed on to us, so we keep fighting for what we think is right.”
Real change is, thankfully, taking place when it comes to representation in rock. The day before this interview, Ho99o9, a POC duo taking their art in less accessible, more incendiary directions, are revealed as the stars of K!’s Cover Story. Meet Me @ The Altar, who graced the cover last summer, are changing the traditionally white, male face of pop-punk. Meanwhile, on this side of the Atlantic the likes of Big Joanie, The Tuts, SPEW, Handle and Best Praxis provide us with not just reassurance of a more diverse and inclusive scene, but viable role models for a new generation of aspiring stars.
“When we see kids like that, we literally look at each other and say, ‘We need to go mental today,’” grins Georgia of the prospect of playing in front of young individuals of colour, who may be seeing people who look like them performing in a rock context for the first time. “It might be the one chance they get to see themselves in a punky setting.”
PHOTO CREDIT: Esmé Surfleet
Nova Twins have led by example on this front too, having curated a bill for their UK and Ireland headline tour (starting this week) featuring DJ/On Wednesdays We Wear Black podcast co-host Alyx Holcombe, Irish/Ivorian rapper Celavied Mai, singer-songwriter Connie Constance, and rapper Kid Bookie. Many of these artists featured on Nova Twins’ Voices Of The Unheard, a project started as a platform for underrepresented artists, initially as a vinyl release, and later as a continually updated Spotify playlist.
Ask the headliners what they think of representation in 2022, however, and they cast their minds back to standing backstage at rock festivals pre-pandemic, while suggesting the need for change to be reflected in all areas of the site. After all, people of colour don’t just want to be in bands; they want to manage them, broadcast about them, book them, write about them, take their photos – the list goes on. “It’s about seeing a real mixed bag of people,” suggests Georgia. “So many times we’d literally be the only people of colour [at a festival], unless there was a security guard too. You want to be able to see yourself everywhere, including in the audience.
“We’ve been doing the rap rock-infused melting pot for a while,” says Amy of the real way to tell if the dial is moving in the right direction. “And now we can see it’s become ‘trendy’. So when that trend starts to move away, I want to see what’s left. Can these artists still exist in this space? Can they still have a career? Can they still move forward? Arctic Monkeys can be on the indie scene and carry on being Arctic Monkeys and it’s fine, but with all these amazing [POC] artists coming through, I want it to be more than just a trend. I think there’s enough of us now to make it happen, but that’s the real test.”
And the real test for Supernova? “I hope it gets into the right hands,” suggests Amy. “The album will only go so far, we’re not the biggest band in the world, but I hope it reaches the young alt. kids who don’t fit in, just like us. Even if they don’t like it, I just hope they get to hear it”.
Before moving to a new week, there is another album. Violet Skies’ debut album, If I Saw You Again, is out on 17th June. The vinyl is not available until later in the year – because of high demand and some shipping issues -, but the C.D. is available to pre-order with some nice bundles. A fascinating Welsh artist who I interviewed five years ago, I have been following her progress ever since. I cannot find any pretty recent interviews, but The Taragraph spoke with her in 2020:
“Firstly, for those who are new to you, how would you describe the music you typically create?
Honest — always — perhaps a little too honest. I’m drawn to ballads and story telling, and often my songs are sad. But no apologies there, I like sad songs.
This is probably something that you’re very frequently asked, but how did you come to choose the stage name Violet Skies?
Haha always. Violet is my great grandmother’s name. And Skies was my Mam’s idea, I think? It just felt like me.
You’ve written a lot of music for other artists like Mabel and have co-written with big singer-songwriters like Finneas, but when did you first start writing music?
When I was 13 or so, and then really understood songs and finished them when I was about 16/17.
Where do you get your inspiration from when writing new music? Do you have a process or is it just a sort of natural flow of things?
My process is always different (always!!) but I will more often than not, start with chords and melodies often follow. I tend to have an idea or concept in mind when I start singing and that guides the mood. When I write for artists though, I let them lead or prompt them, it’s their vision and I’m there to facilitate that”.
Onto 24th June, POLIÇA’s Madness is available on vinyl. One that you definitely need to get, this album arrives ten years after their debut. It sounds like Madness is going to be among 2022’s very best and most impactful releases – that nobody should be without:
“Madness is Polica's 7th release since 2012’s ground breaking debut LP Give You The Ghost. It's an album that's dark, emotionally raw with floating yet intense songs. It's absolutely wonderful and demands repeat listens. Recorded mostly from 2020 - 2021 in Ryan Olson’s Minneapolis studio with lyrics written and recorded by Channy Leaneagh in her room, Madness is an experimental expansion of the 4 piece family band of Chris Bierden (bass), Drew Christopherson and Ben Ivascu ( drums) to include the anthropomorphic production tool “ AllOvers(c) ”, designed by Olson and fellow producer and sound - artist Seth Rosetter. This latest release continues within the collaborative enclave in which Polica resides and includes co - production by Dustin Zahn (“Alive” and “Away”), Alex Ridha and Alex Nutter (“Violence” )”.
Before coming to the final three albums due on 24th June that you need to pre-order, I would point people in the direction of Hollie Cook’s Happy Hour. With her own style and an incredible talent, there is no doubt that Happy Hour is an album that you need to pre-order. Cook is an incredible artist who is creating a sound that is impossible to ignore or dislike. She is a phenomenal talent for sure:
“With Happy Hour, her ravishing new LP, Hollie Cook matures into the queen of modern-day “lovers rock”—the lush girly harmony reggae style beloved in Britain since the 1970s. Evolution rings from the bittersweet opening title track; tender yet assertive, Hollie’s voice caresses evocative lyrics through the arrangement’s tumbling changes. Hollie dares to invite listeners into her true personality through these alluring songs, which she co-produced with her General Roots band members Ben Mckone and Luke Allwood, and executive producer Youth”.
MUNA’s MUNA is an album that I am excited about. An incredible group whose debut needs to be pre-ordered, if you do not know about them, then make sure you rectify that now and seek out their stunning forthcoming album:
“Muna is magic. What other band could have stamped the forsaken year of 2021 with spangles and pom-poms, could have made you sing (and maybe even believe) that “Life’s so fun, life’s so fun,” during what may well have been the most uneasy stretch of your life? “Silk Chiffon,” Muna’s instant-classic cult smash, featuring the band’s new label head Phoebe Bridgers, hit the gray skies of the pandemic’s year-and-a-half mark like a double rainbow. Since Muna — lead singer/songwriter Katie Gavin, guitarist/producer Naomi McPherson, guitarist Josette Maskin — began making music together in college, at USC, they’d always embraced pain as a bedrock of longing, a part of growing up, and an inherent factor of marginalized experience: the band’s members belong to queer and minority communities, and play for these fellow-travelers above all. But sometimes, for Muna, after nearly a decade of friendship and a long stretch of pandemic-induced self-reckoning, the most radical note possible is that of bliss.
Muna, the band’s self-titled third album, is a landmark — the forceful, deliberate, dimensional output of a band who has nothing to prove to anyone except themselves. The synth on “What I Want” scintillates like a Robyn dance-floor anthem; “Anything But Me,” galloping in 12/8, gives off Shania Twain in eighties neon; “Kind of Girl,” with its soaring, plaintive The Chicks chorus, begs to be sung at max volume with your best friends. It’s marked by a newfound creative assurance and technical ability, both in terms of McPherson and Maskin’s arrangements and production as well as Gavin’s songwriting, which is as propulsive as ever, but here opens up into new moments of perspective and grace. Here, more than ever, Muna musters their unique powers to break through the existential muck and transport you, suddenly, into a room where everything is possible — a place where the disco ball’s never stopped throwing sparkles on the walls, where you can sweat and cry and lie down on the floor and make out with whoever, where vulnerability in the presence of those who love you can make you feel momentarily bulletproof, and self- consciousness only sharpens the swell of joy”.
The penultimate album that I want to highlight is Regina Spektor’s Home, Before and After. I cannot find a link for a vinyl edition of the album, but you can get it on C.D. One of the most remarkable voices in all of music, this new album is an essential one that you need to order and enjoy when it arrives:
“Regina Spektor releases her highly anticipated eight studio album Home, Before and After on Warner Records. Home, Before and After is Spektor at her most inspired and opens with the recently released ‘Becoming All Alone’, a surrealist ballad with a majestically swelling arrangement that comes alive. The album possesses her most palpable New York atmosphere in years, which is fitting as it was recorded in upstate New York, where it was produced by John Congleton and co-produced by Spektor”.
The final June-due album that people need to pre-order is Soccer Mommy’s Sometimes, Forever. American songwriter Sophie Allison is gifting us a gem in the form of her third studio album. It follows the celebrated and acclaimed color theory of 2020. Make sure you pre-order your copy of Sometimes, Forever:
“Sometimes, Forever refers to the idea that the good and bad are both temporary and always returning. Feelings of sorrow and emptiness will pass but they will always come back around, as will feelings of joy. This album explores many ups and downs. It moves from the high of love to hopelessness and disconnect. A frustrated loss of control over life and a disconnect from the self reoccur throughout the record, only to circle back to a willingness to let go and be free, whether through love (shotgun, with u) or blissful ignorance (don’t ask me). It’s a coexistence of light and dark, not only lyrically but tonally. Dan once called it the angels and demons record lol”.
Those are the albums out next month that are well worth pre-ordering. There are other albums that you might be interested in and will want to order - but I feel the ones above are the essential releases. If you need some guidance as to which albums you should seek out next month, the above recommendations mean you have…
PLENTY to get your teeth into.