NYC

Emcee/producer MIKE invites you to the psych-soul “Disco!”

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It takes some cajones to use one of the most common names in the English language as your single-named moniker and then to spell it out in ALL CAPS no less, But MIKE owns it so convincingly that if your name is Michael now you’d best contact your local justice of the peace and apply for a new appellation at your earliest convenience.

Speaking of “ALL CAPS” if you happen to be into MF DOOM (RIP)—or Madlib or J Dilla or Ghostface or Action Bronson or Earl Sweatshirt or other emcees who spit virtuosic breathless bars over dusty soul samples and smooth grooves and hard beats alike—then you’ve in luck because MIKE’s most recent full-length LP (redundant, I know) called “Disco!” has got you covered with seventeen tracks chock full of these very qualities but still totally distinctive in its MIKEness.

Released one year to the date since his last album Weight of the World with production once again by DJ blackpower (rumored to be MIKE himself in alter-ego disguise but I’m not here to spread rumours) this is deeply felt psychedelic soul for Gen Z hip hop heads (plus broke-ass-but-not-broken Millennials and grateful Gen X old heads) full of spiritual blunted ecstatic vibes that’ll have you floating on cloud nine like a runaway child running wild in route to the psychedelic shack, well-articulated mumble rap for the 2021 boom-bap set. (Jason Lee)

Chicago

Tomu “富む”

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Ambient music composer Tomu has released visuals for "富む" from his debut album, Lonesome Valley, which is due out tomorrow, June 25th, via American Dreams.

The video is beautifully directed by Clay Mills, and follows Tomu and hit baseball on a dramatic adventure.

L.A.

VIDEO: In “Burning The Ground,” Justus Proffit Keeps The Candle Burning

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image courtesy of the artist 

Bar/None Records Artist Justus Proffit has released “Burning The Ground,” a single from his upcoming sophomore album, Speedstar, coming out August 20th, along with an accompanying music video, and his low-key indie folk-rock vibes are formidable.

The track opens with lazily-strummed acoustic guitar sharing space with gently chorused lead guitar lines. A placid bass faithfully hits the root note, establishing a solid rhythmic foundation. The tom-forward drum kit begin to tumble dizzily during the chorus, giving the song an added sense of dimension and avoiding the possibility of sounding repetitive. Meanwhile, Proffit’s lead vocal mirrors the laconic lyrics in his offhand delivery, as if you were listening to him in a chair across the bed from which he’s performing. The package as a whole is as meditative as it is catchy. 

As a whole, the track gives off strong Elliott Smith vibes, combined with a bit of the stoned effortlessness of Kurt Vile. The video, meanwhile, finds Proffit alternately ambling around a cemetery in daylight, relaxing in a very candle-lit bath tub, and dripping red wax over glass heads and religious statuettes. Shot with a VHS look, its amateur look evokes the visual work of alternative artists from the 80s and 90s, and subtly fills in the more gloomy blanks of the music. Hopefully the album will similarly ride the line between depression and dynamism. Gabe Hernandez

 

 

 

Austin

New Joy Oladokun is Indignant and Infectious

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 sorry isn’t good enough is one of the lead singles off of Joy Oladokun’s in defense of my own happiness. The track focuses on thinning patience and growing resentment towards an unnamed partner. Instrumentally, it is reminiscent of Gotye’s Somebody That I Used To Know, but is a more brooding and incensed cut than the 2011 mega hit.


sorry isn’t good enough builds up with Joy’s vocals over a plucked, muted guitar, leading to a chorus that is emotionally explosive but not overwrought. It’s exasperated, shaded with a mild bitterness. On the choruses, the unique timbre of Joy’s voice makes itself known. It is in turns smoky and delicate, but rich with urgency. The track smolders.

The accompanying video is simple and stylish, utilizing a mostly black-and-white color palate.  Singing to the lyrics, Joy paces through a darkened, spartan set in the shape of a domestic scene. The mood is dejected as Joy absently stretches on the two-person bed, wanders about, puts on a coat and takes it off and smokes a joint. The ennui is sure to resonate with anyone who’s faced bouts of depression.


The chorus is infectious, the production is tight, and the performance is impassioned. If emotionally intense singer-songwriter music is something you seek, this track is one to put on the radar.

 

 

— Tín Rodriguez


 

Austin

Paula Maya Stays True To Her Roots in “Corcovado”

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Brazilian music standout Paula Maya stays true to her roots in her new single “Corcovado- Ao Vivo.” Her dynamic vocals are accompanied perfectly by light percussion and jazzy, acoustic guitar. In the world of contemporary music, there’s so much pressure to be “modern” and assimilated to current trends, yet Maya proves that you can still be grounded in tradition while displaying originality and uniqueness. 

Given the quality and nearly flawless execution of the recording, it’s hard to believe that Paula Maya’s latest release is actually a live performance. This decision ultimately enhances the listening experience of “Corcovado.” The faintly audible sounds of chatter amongst the audience makes the listener feel like they are at some hip, Jazz cafe on the streets of São Paulo. Releasing this single as a live performance is admirable not only because of the impeccable vocal delivery and tone, but also because of the overall ambience that enables you to be transported into an alternate reality. 

One of the ways in which Maya straddles the line between contemporary and traditional is by singing half of the song in Portugese and the other half in English. It would be easy for her to be a purist and only sing in Portugese to satisfy cultural norms, but singing in English as well makes her music more accessible to a wider audience. Not to mention, she sings in both 

languages quite beautifully. 

Additionally, Paula Maya’s band deserves a huge round of applause for their utilization of dynamics, subtlety, and flat-out skill. The percussionist plays soft and smooth, without missing a beat. The bass and keyboard players know when to take a back seat to the vocals and when to showcase their talent. And the guitar playing is a perfect example of why Brazil is home to some of the most underrated guitarists in the world. The jazzy chords and mesmerizing guitar solo are reminiscent of Brazilian greats, such as Yamandu Costa and João Gilberto, the latter being the original songwriter of “Corcovado.” The musicianship surrounding Maya undoubtedly accentuates her talent even more so. 

Paula Maya’s spin on “Corcovado” embodies the classic saying, “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.” Clearly, traditional Brazilian music is an exceptional form of art as is. Maya and her band know that they don’t need to overly modernize the music that represents their culture, yet she uncannily conveys a sound that is fresh and worthy of being played on contemporary streaming outlets, even in the United States. Paula Maya knows exactly what type of artist she is and she absolutely owns it.

 

— Quinn Donoghue

Chicago

Static In Verona “Let Us Be Reckless”

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Static In Verona (aka Rob Merz) is preparing to release his latest full-length album, Let Us Be Reckless, on June 25th. This is Rob’s third album in the last four years, and he claims it may be his last for a while.

The album’s most recent single is called "Savages" and it is slow rocker focused on the various forces that impact relationships.

Chicago

Beige on Beige “Cut”

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Kirk Rawlings of Courtesy has begun to release music as a solo project called Beige on Beige. His most recent single, "Cut", was released this week, June 21st, and features John Sutton on double bass.

Last month he released his first single, "won’t be what they’re coming for", and both tracks can be streamed below.

Chicago

Dried Spider “Trees”

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Dried Spiders have released their debut full-length album, Everything Is Touching. The group had not released any music since their 2015 debut EP, "Wounded City", but in 2020 began releasing a series of singles, the first being "Everybody Wins".

The most recent single is called "Trees" and is accompanied by the stop motion video below.

This is the work of Matty Witney (Vox, Guitar), Nika Nemirovsky (Vox), Francesca C Giannis (Vox), Blase Settecase (Drums), and Kellen Beanzma (Bass).

Chicago

Mirabilia “Tough Talk”

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Mirabilia has released a new single called "Tough Talk". This is the group’s second single of 2021 following up last month’s "Kind Lion".

This is the work of Austin Korth (Drums), Clay Sibley (Bass), Collin Wolf (Guitar), Evan Atherton (Guitar), and Levi Jones (Keys).

NYC

Cookie Tongue bequeath a “Soggy Miracle”

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I can’t claim to know why Cookie Tongue are called Cookie Tongue. But in my imagination they took it from the title to an ancient fable, or a long lost Grimms’ Fairy Tale, about a child granted three wishes with her first wish being for her tongue to be turned into a cookie because how great would that be. Except her wish backfires horribly because having a cookie in your mouth that you can’t swallow would be torture. Needless to say the girl nearly goes mad and ends up biting off her own tongue off to end the torment. So she can’t communicate her next wish (“I’d like to have my old tongue back”) which is a pretty harsh way to learn a basic lesson like “be careful what you wish for.”

This is no doubt completely off base but much like a Grimms’ fairy tales the Brooklyn-based combo are made up of equal parts playful/fanciful and twisted/demented. And it’s not an easy balancing act to pull off which is why not many people write good fairy tales and not many people are in Cookie Tongue. Another parallel is that Cookie Tongue clearly appeals to children and adults alike, a fact I can verify first-hand having just seen them perform live on the opening date of their upcoming (now ongoing tour) summer tour—SEE HERE for dates—because the adults at the show were rapt and the kids were losing their minds they were so into it.

The show was held outdoors on a perfect equinox evening with plenty of little rug rats running amok as their parents drank beer and cocktails no doubt happy to be given a break thanks to the Cookie Tonguers and their exquisitely ramshackle songs playing on a Ren Faire style stage decked out with flowers and mannequins and an array of glockenspiels and puppets and Casio keyboards and other implements of their trade. Rest assured Cookie Tongue know how to put the “freak” in freak folk with an extra helping of dollop of freak on top while providing suitable entertainment for the whole family.

A Cookie Tongue performance feels like if the roustabouts tied up the clowns and took over the circus; and then went on an afternoon-long drinking binge and raided the wardrobe/makeup cabinet and put on a crazy pastiche of stuff; and then went on stage and performed a surprisingly coherent set of calliope-inspired music with bizarrely poetic lyrics sung by a male-female combo in warbling, breathy tones that you’re not sure if it’s funny or disturbing or just different. But really that’s too easy an explanation, better to just go listen to their music like their last full length, Dream Seed Ceremony (2020), on which Omer Gal and Jacquelyn Marie Shannon inhabit a rogue’s gallery of vocal personas. So you can see why these two would be into puppetry with all the voices they clearly have trapped inside.

On their new EP from earlier this month, Soggy Miracle, Cookie Tongue continue to refine their quaint yet ornate junk store aesthetic forming a bed a sonic fertilizer for the lyrics and their sinuous twisty trains of thought and mantra-like repetitions–like the one sung from the perspective of a ten-year-old child tempted to eat his own baby teeth out of a cereal bowl with milk on them along with his friend but they don’t know if they’ll be soggy or crunchy.

Soggy Miracle closes with “Orange Sky” which is centered around a rousing yet doom-laden melody that’ll make you wanna raise your mug in the air and toast the impending end–a song about taking “the back road out of here / away from the orange sky” which certainly sounds more than a little apocalyptic–especially at the end when the song turns into a swirling miasma of breathy vocalizing and megaphone man ranting and rat-a-tat snare drumming before concluding with a dramatic almost a cappella epigram or epitaph take your pick. (Jason Lee)

n.b. Credit must be given to Michele With One ‘L’ whose weekly Tuesday afternoon WFMU radio show called "Feelings" first turned this writer on to Cookie Tongue and to several other artists featured on this blog.