Forgive me, dear reader, for I am still willfully stuck in "2020 Year In Review" mode and refuse to believe that 2021 has even begun yet. Not without reason obviously. So let’s agree to decree the past week as the messy afterbirth of 2020 and now officially move on to the actual start of 2021 if nobody minds. And let’s pray we’re not dealing with evil twin years because a conjoined 2020/2021 would no doubt make those creepy twins from the Overlook Hotel look like nothing more than adorable "cousins…identical cousins." And on that note we recommend you listen to "2020," a song released by Fiona Silver near the end of the year, to help us usher it out the door and into oblivion: 

Fittingly for its subject, the song is a blooze-rockin’ gutbucket punch to the gut but just think what it’s doing for your abs. Fiona’s lyrics liken the year just past…whoops I mean about to pass…to a petty thief (maybe a slumlord too judging by imagery in the video) and then to a leather daddy who likes to play rough. It all builds to a frenetic guitar solo and a sound collage of news reports laying out some of the lowlights of the year before thankfully wrapping up with a final rousing chorus.

Speaking of all things fit for a masochist, back in the halcyon days of January 2020 Ms. Silver released what turned out to be an oracular track for January of this year called "Violence" whose lyrics describe abuse and its aftermath ("My sweet Lord, you bring me down / swinging low sweet chariot of sound / violence, I hit the ground […] will you come and dig me out / six feet under no voice left to shout / pushing daisies I’m home sweet home") but this song comes swaddled in a funky uptown arrangement with a strong Daptone vibe which creates quite the interesting juxtaposition. Check out the live rendition below with full-on horn section and wah-wah pedal in full effect.  

"Violence" could soon also be found on Fiona’s Hostage of Love EP released on Valentine’s Day appropriately enough. These five songs are plenty enough for our guitarist-songwriter-chanteuse to show off her range–the slow burning title track being one example and the mid-tempo groover "Hot Tears" being another. Now, this may be wishful thinking and at the risk of jinxing it, here’s hoping 2021 shows us some of its range soon by getting as far the f*** away from 2020 as humanly and humanely possible. (Jason Lee)

This writer is still stuck in "2020 Year In Review" mode because this writer refuses to believe that 2021 has even begun yet. Let’s agree this past week was merely the afterbirth of 2020 and move on to the real start of the year next week mmm’kay? And let’s pray we’re not dealing with evil 2020/2021 twins because I’m guessing they’d make those twins from The Shining look like nothing more than the "cousins…identical cousins" from The Patty Duke Show. Anyway, here’s one of my fave rekkids from last year I mean this year:

Artist: Death Valley Girls
Record: Under the Spell of Joy

Imagine if the Manson Girls had talked Charlie out of that whole Tate-LaBianca nonsense and instead wrote a bunch of cool songs and talked Mr. Helter Skelter into murdering his guitar parts instead of writing drivel like “Look At Your Game Girl” and then enrolled as a group in some EST seminars and you may have ended up with something like this album rather than a bunch of dead bodies. On the Death Valley Girls’s fourth full-length, frontwoman Bonnie Bloomgarden and company subtly expand their sonic palette with a mix of funhouse organ and guitar, fevered sax squalls, motivational mantras (a children’s choir is even brought into service!) and a clutch of songs that put the “mesmerism” back into “mesmerizing.”

Opening track “Hypnagogia” sets the tone with its cascading layers of sound enveloping the listener in the liminal state of its title–a word for the twilight consciousness between wakefulness and sleep–a state that holds sway more or less to the last track with its declaration that “life is but a dream / that is really happening.” A kinda concept album about joy made by a gothy garage-psych band previously drawn to all things dark and spooky it’s unsurprising that DVG doesn’t offer up too many bromides here–”You will survive / while you’re alive” is pragmatic uplift–but the joy on offer *is* unhesitating and unadulterated. Best of all UTSOJ manages to capture something akin to the blissful state I’ve experienced alongside many others at DVG’s incredible live shows. And that’s a joyous thing indeed. (Jason Lee)

photo credit: Abby Banks

Band Name: Egg Drop Soup

Vital stats: EDS is an inyourface, unapologetic, all-womxn alt-punk trio…preparing for the end of the patriarchy (source: official bio)

Latest release: Five-track “Eat Snacks and Bleed” EP released on Christmas Day, no doubt sending Hallmark movies everywhere scuttling into the shadows and hiding for the rest of the winter

One sentence EP review: EDS have taken their scrappy punk tunes into new territory with injections of doom metal, power pop, and psych rock which should provide listeners with years of immunity to all things lame and oppressive

Two songs & music videos that a generation ago would be all over college radio and 120 Minutes and Alternative Nation and probably would have the band opening for L7 by now: “Hard To Hold On” and the non-EP single “Subdivision”

First track of the new EP described in real time in one long run-on sentence: The opening minute of “Rank Heavy Metal Parking Lot” certainly lives up to its name, or maybe it’s more like the sound of rifling through an older brother’s or cool uncle’s record collection: starting with some lighter-waving Eddie-esque Eruptions and soon switching over to some Paranoidish head-banging power chords before settling into a more typical mid-tempo Sabbath stomp, but then when the vocals enter the song goes a little bit sideways into spacey psych-rocklandia with lyrics about hands and eyes and heads and beds shuffled into unlikely configurations ending with a repeated refrain about “waiting a lifetime” and seriously this song is starting to remind me of the Breeders’ “Safari” with its righteous riffage and brief bout of shreddage (Tanya D!) and hypnotic reverb-laden Deal sister harmonizing (a song whose music video is an homage to Black Sabbath’s “Paranoid” hmm…) and then finally we’re back to the faster second riff and it’s all done in less than three minutes—all of which reminds me of the brace-faced redhead with the red cup in the actual movie “Heavy Metal Parking Lot” (go out and track down a bootleg copy on VHS if you haven’t seen it already) who says she wants to jump Rob Halford’s bones—purr purr sweetly deluded and extremely wasted feathered redheaded girl—and really when you think about it this song seems like it should be her soundtrack what with its frenzied hormonal drive and addled thoughts and unfulfilled longings, with our hero bravely making her way in the boyzone of the rank heavy metal hesher parking lot on her own terms and with unrestrained agency; I’ll bet that the red cup girl turned out just fine even if it took a lifetime. (Jason Lee)

Alex Shera places a soft touch on the hurt: his new single “Fire” is cool and soothing, reminding us that self-love is the first step towards loving others. With emotional vocals that sway to a background of immersive introductory clean guitar chords, a futuristic beat, and sizzling effects that add an edge to a love piece, it all is easy to take in. Shera may be playing with modern pop elements, but it is his emotion that carries his music above the fray and allows a connection with the listener that is the mark of a great upcoming artist. “Fire” is a declaration of love no matter the circumstances, always on its way to triumph; stream “Fire” below. –   René Cobar

You would not say that there is much of 2020 one should bring into the new year, but few exceptions exist, among them is the year-end single by L.A.’s The Dumes titled “Ok.” The new track is power rock at its best: reverb-soaked guitar solos, a trashing drum beat, and distorted bass-powered breakdowns led somewhere heavenly by the confident-elegant vocal delivery of front-woman Elodie Tomlinson. The title expresses something simple, but upon examination, and in the context of the year behind and the work ahead, lyrics like “Can you try to find your hand in mine/And you’ll be ok when you find a match in the dark” there is a depth so relatable. As we move forward, The Dumes invite us to rock on, with a head held high, shaking to a quaking beat. – René Cobar, photo by Emma Cole