"Charles' record takes cues from movements all over the American map. There are hints of Southern folk and alt-country, Midwest Americana, and West Coast acid rock."

As Midnight Sister, multi-disciplinary LA artists Juliana Giraffe and Ari Balouzian make motion pictures. Yes, sometimes with moving images — but most often only with the music they create together. Balouzian’s serpentine, string compositions are movie scenes that allow Giraffe, a brilliant character actor, to cloak herself in a new roles and voices. A bit of Jon Brion’s score work; some old Hollywood strings; a solid dose of glam and outsider disco from 70s independent cinema.

As a young jazz singer and bassist, Kate Davis shared the stage with Herbie Hancock, Ben Folds, Alison Kraus and the actor-turned-musician Jeff Goldblum. But in 2018 she decided to switch lanes — she co-wrote Sharon Van Etten’s nostalgic indie rock hit ‘Seventeen,’ then in 2019 released her own highly celebrated indie-rock debut, Trophy. Yet even with her impressive resume, covering one of America’s most beloved singer-songwriters is tricky territory to wade into. Nonetheless, that’s exactly what the New York-based indie rock musician did this past summer by recording a cover version of Daniel Johnston’s 1984 album Retired Boxer.

8x GRAMMY Award nominees Death Cab for Cutie have today announced plans for The Georgia E.P. – a 5-track EP set for release. The tracklist for the EP includes never-before-heard new covers of TLC, R.E.M., Neutral Milk Hotel, Cat Power, and Vic Chesnutt and seeks to recognize and support the organization leading up to the Georgia runoffs and in honor of their work throughout the entire 2020 election cycle.

Whatever it is, it's welcome. This eclectic artist returns with just over 30 minutes of new music on "Tungsten." With Ethan Healy — who goes by his last name when performing — you have hip-hop, indie rock and acoustic elements all colliding in unpredictable and exciting ways.

The Wombats’ gift of making indie pop sound fresh and effortless continues unabated on its fourth album. Guitars shine like mirror balls, rhythms invite fresh dance-floor poses, and sky-high vocal melodies inspire the kind of sing-alongs that ensure you extra space on the bus. Their penchant for clever wordplay might cause head scratches—cue “Lemon to a Knife Fight” and “Out of My Head” for prime examples—but make perfect sense in The Wombats’ world.

Modern Kosmology sees Jane Weaver's melodic-protagonist channeling new depths of creative cosmic energy within. After the huge critical acclaim of 2012's “Fallen By Watchbird”, followed by 2015's exploratory "Silver Globe" LP winning her unanimous "record of the year accolades" and hefty measures of radio play-listing Jane Weaver's conceptual trajectory has sent her neo-kosmische penchants to the point of no-return.

In his return to performing, Glenn Morrow put together a group of talented musicians to form a band, Glenn Morrow’s Cry for Help. Out of that band comes a new album, 2. For anybody yearning for more rock and roll in their lives, 2 is the perfect place to turn. Filled to the brim with some answers to tough life predicaments and a way to move forward, the album is the perfect opport
unity to just sit and be cozy while enjoying important stories and comforting melodies.

Proof rings out with force and feeling on Hilang Child’s superlative second album, Every Mover, released on Bella Union. In 2018, Riman delivered a serene, textured debut album in Years, rich in sound and feeling. The “lonely, pressured” aftermath of Years found Riman grappling with “rough self-esteem and anxiety issues”, amplified in part by social media’s ‘fulfilment narratives’. Duly, he set out to navigate and overcome these mindsets, drawing deeply on his own insecurities and those he recognised in others.

Never one for easy categorisation, the on-going adventures of David Longstreth’s Dirty Projectors project are especially genre-agnostic on the 5 EPs released throughout 2020. The neatly-titled 5EPs collates these songs into a mammoth compilation. Each set of songs sees a different band-member taking over lead vocal duties, and indeed the flavours of these tracks stretch the breadth and width of the musical spectrum. The likes of ‘Self Design’ and ‘Empty Vessel’ deal in funk and house-inspired rhythms, while ‘Moon, If Ever’ and ‘I Get Carried Away’ are staunchly minimal in instrumentation, but undeniably 1960s pop in melodic sophistication.

Shore (Stems Edition) is available exclusively on Bandcamp. This release includes over eleven hours of Shore’s isolated tracks. While these aren’t royalty free, remixing and reimagining is encouraged. If you want to sample for commercial release, please get in touch first.

I tell you what - everything has its shelf life. Except these insatiable obsessive fragments of spirit that we cant shake and make us do stupid things like devote serious time to an unserious pursuit like amateur music making. I just try to not think and see what comes out, then you hear you are meant to be a fascist editor once the basic form is there, and, well, that part is a dog chewing on its own innards. But here it is, something kind of childish, angry but middle age frustrated too. Political but selfish and powerless. Before the editorial faculty arrived, it was meant to be about hidden power and about a protagonist i guess is someone i wish i had met, to help them make sense of things. But in the end, its just me.

I tell you what - everything has its shelf life. Except these insatiable obsessive fragments of spirit that we cant shake and make us do stupid things like devote serious time to an unserious pursuit like amateur music making. I just try to not think and see what comes out, then you hear you are meant to be a fascist editor once the basic form is there, and, well, that part is a dog chewing on its own innards. But here it is, something kind of childish, angry but middle age frustrated too. Political but selfish and powerless. Before the editorial faculty arrived, it was meant to be about hidden power and about a protagonist i guess is someone i wish i had met, to help them make sense of things. But in the end, its just me.

Just five years ago when he took a leave of absence from the acclaimed indie-folk band, The Head and the Heart, the question was less where Johnson’s star would take him and more whether his struggles with addiction would end his music career. But then, he wasn’t supposed to be there, either. Prior to co-founding the band, Johnson studied math and computer science in graduate school. But the magic of song led him to an open mic that changed his life. At Seattle’s Conor Byrne Pub, Johnson sparked collaborations with fellow musi- cians who would eventually form The Head and the Heart. The group’s rise was rapid.

‘Ghost City’ was written over the course of two years, between the bands tours in Europe, Japan and Mexico, before heading to Northern Italy to record it. “We figured it was the same price to record in Italy, so we brought our friend and producer Mark Roberts along for the ride,” says Devin Yuceil (vocals/guitar), “we booked a bunch of shows on the way down which pretty much covered our recording costs, which also meant that we had around a week of playing the new material everyday leading to the studio, a luxury we don’t often have.”