Am I allowed to do a Susan Miller and rationalize being late by pointing out my extra-generous word count? I was a busy beaver in April, but please enjoy this cochlear cornucopia…
Montrealer Joni Void (née Jean Cousin, AKA Johnny Ripper) has been knocking around since 2017, but finally pierced the slowgraffitti membrane with Every Life Is a Light — why it’s positively smothered in a gravy of “Liked Songs” checkmarks on my Spotify. Our Joni‘s sound is hypnotic, lysergic and melodic; ELIaL opens with “Everyday – A Sequel,” a lovely bit of ambient trance, and fades into “Du Parc” which conjures sour pastel clouds in the general neighborhood of the mighty Seefeel, followed by the teasing foreplay of “Time Zone,” which, had it a chorus, could pass for something like pop. The warped piano sweetness of “Muffin – A Song for My Cat,” featuring real meows, is awfully charming. But why don’t we take the très gorgeous “Vertigo” (feat. Sook-Yin Lee) — the most real-song-like thing on the album — for a spin.
Set a dial around
(And I love you)
Better take ‘em down
(Never rip it up)
Say it like they tell you to
America
Sell your light
Waning life sing low
So many SG consecrated favorites have been dropping in with little sachets of ear-joy lately. Local LA lads and laddesses Goon just dropped “Closer to,” a scrummy dream-pop-rock teaser (with an especially dreamy coda) for their upcoming Dream 3 album.
Right now in the sunshine
Form a vowel
Then bite
Feel around
And pick up something off the ground
Enter the fog
Then the warning comes
Something wrong
Glistening in her jaw
Seraphim are all along and around
Japanese ascended introvert goddess Satomimagae has some buried treasure on her new one Taba — don’t get lazy and just play the tracks with high numbers; the sickest cherry blossoms here are deep cuts like “Wakaranai,” “Tonbo” and ooh especially “Mushi Dance.”
TV’s best indie rock export Djo recently delivered The Crux, another collection of brilliantly repurposed 70s easy listening, in which, again, with a bit of digging, you’ll come across a truly touching one called “Potion“: “I’ll try for all of my life / Just to find someone who leaves on the light for me.” You and me both, Joe.
Not too many artists can deliver the numminess reliably across decades, but Zach Condon is still at it after nearly two of ’em. Beirut never obsolesces because, quite cleverly, they started out sounded like something from a hundred years ago. “Tuanaki Atoll,” named after an anecdotal vanished group of islets in the South Pacific, is slowgraffitti’s Editor’s Choice off A Study of Losses. That boy sure knows when to bring in a horn or two.
Letting the whole world down
How will I be sure this time around
What if the sun came ’round?
What if I drowned? What if I drowned?
And what were you safe from?
Did you roll a heartbeat but wrong?
I found a new island
What do we do if they don’t run?
But nothing melts this old heart of mine more than an unexpected new Organ Tapes song (actually a collab with Jetty). “Life After” is Tim Zha at his end credits tearjerker best, a long, resigned litany of disbeliefs crooned over minor key piano, including “What about we won’t starve?… What about it’ll get better?… What about feel the scar?… What about fearing no lessons?” that works its way toward the finality of “What about love… forever?“
Mamalarky are originally from Austin (–> Los Angeles –> Atlanta) and share with Being Dead a kind of retro pop experimentalism that collages itself and settles into fresh and free and delight-dealing forms. Not a million miles from the odd time signatures and bright hues of Palm. You’ll find some Texas-size motivation on “#1 Best of All Time” from their charming Hex Key album.
Don’t think you could guess
My next move in
Chess and checkers, double deckers
I always win
Even when I fall
Got no cuts at
All in wager, in my favor
Marathon runner I place last
However I felt just as fast
And if that rings your bell you might wanna check out some more avant-indie from Grumpy, fronted by the evocatively-named Heaven Schmitt, whose unique tri-city trajectory has been Nashville–> Chicago–> Brooklyn. I’m digging the Flying Nun vibe of their “Lonesome Ride.” The band is famously comprised of three of the alluring Heaven‘s exes — two female and one male, plus a lonely guitar player who somehow resisted getting hoovered up by Heaven‘s fishy siren booty calls.
You got me out here walking backwards
Into walls, it ain’t my fault
A lonesome aching’s all that I’ve heard
A short straw, I’m taking calls
Two bites taken out of an onion
Leaves a bad taste, ruins my day
Makes you cry over this soufflé
Can’t be bored, hope you get what you’re cooking for
Raisa K has quite the pedigree as an alum of Mica Levi‘s indie bands, but her work mines more of a Dean Blunt sense of alt.melodies, slightly off-key, leaving doubts hanging in the air. The showstopper is “Stay,” a duet with Coby Sey, a direct and heartfelt declaration of love marbled with insecurity.
You always stay
Stay by my side
When I don’t feel right
And when I do feel it to
I want to do
The same for you
To treat you right
To have that sight
I love the way you love me yeah
I don’t want to hold you back
Leave before you see me
Otherwise I’ll hold you back
I’ll hold you back…
I love the way you love me yeah…
You won’t hold me back
You won’t hold me back
Perfume Genius is just hard for me to talk about. His first two albums were perfect, timeless distillations of emotion rooted in radical caring. I had a magical experience of walking up to his SXSW gig and getting tickets like minutes before showtime; it was in a church, and I literally sat in the second pew. Four hand piano piece “Learning” is one of the great theater of pain songs and seeing it live was just mwah. But starting with Too Bright he veered off into kinda-obvious identity stuff and Morrissey-esque irony (“No family is safe / When I sashay“) and later a fair amount of self-indulgence. Like PJ Harvey, he emerged fully-formed, got me to adore him, then evolved into something that was probably a natural progression for him, and to be fair earned him a lot of praise, but to me it all felt mannered and just off. It left me forlorn and bitter. All that to say that I struggle to listen to his new stuff with an open heart, but I have to admit the bitch can still write a tune, and yes there are bangers on his new one Glory, not least of which is “No Front Teeth” for which the clever boy bagged that enlightened otherworldly being Aldous Harding to do backing vocals. But again, the deep cuts. Twisted sub-locked-in-a-trunk fantasy “In a Row” delights with its rousing chorus. Best of all is “Left for Tomorrow,” a total return to swoony melodic form with a tumble of Pre-Raphaelite imagery. I think I can let it go.
Did it glow in the dark?
Was there a choir winding on
Can you hear me at all?
It’s only your name repeating green and wide
Bolts of white iris tenderize
Sobs from the silo
Hung, dried, lеft for tomorrow
The other end is just hеavy breathing
I bury the phone in clover
Back where the light is streaming
I carry it on my shoulders
My shoulders, my shoulders
Without her, without her…
If I can allow myself to get stuffy I’ll say Playboi Carti is one of the Great Voices of Today, literally and figuratively, with a polyphonic rasp and punk rock attitude that puts one in mind of Kurt Cobain. His new one I Am Music is a sprawling audio photo dump that charges out of the gates throwing angry voice paint at the canvas and delivers an early gunshot climax called “EVIL J0RDAN” in which he shares a bit about his lifestyle…
First I go whip out the boat
No, I can’t hit on no brakes
My life is out of control
I’m tellin’ you, nobody safe
I’ve been livin’ my life limbo
My ice, it came with a tray
It’s so hot, I gotta hide my face
This not a rockstar phase
I’m a emo, thuggin’ my phase
…and goes on to describe a special lady he hooked up with:
I think she’s a fling
I think she’s a playmaker, she should be on my team
She should get her a ring
Shit, it can’t be me, but she can be on the team
It’s all delicious tough-as-nails fun until The Weeknd drops in on Track 8 and things start getting kind of pop. I started tuning out around there, but Playboi has every right to dominate the arts and the charts. It’s a long album; I’ll find time to explore further.
Hey would it be OK if we go back to Montreal for a sec? Cause Population II, who — trigger warning — are actually a three-piece, have been serving up some very tasty psych en français. “Mariano (Jamais je ne t’oublirai)” is particularly booty groovy; it gives me Carnaby Street The Zombies vibes in the best way.
Nous quittâmes la pizzeria ensemble
Les doigts beurrés, nous léchâmes ceux de l’autre
Elle me dit
Jamais je ne t’oublierai
Jamais je ne t’oublierai
Ah ouin
I don’t know if you google translated those lyrics, but they’re not exactly Wordsworth, and it doesn’t matter. French is truly the sexiest language for song lyrics (even Quebecois and its unsavory nasal vowels). For example, actual Parisian Bagarre has been fully lighting up my imaginary nightlife with irresistible party starter “Ring Ring“…
…but the whole Nous Etions Cinq EP has been crushing me like a peeled tomato. Check out “Ya Qalbi:”
I was under the impression that Lust for Youth and Croatian Amor were more or less the same band, but apparently I was wrong, the wrongest girl in the world. Or was I??? According to my research Hannes Norrvide and Loke Rahbek are yes two separate humans, but they have now collaborated on the All Worlds album, which is end to end twisted, heartfelt, auto-tuned, synthy, pained worlds of pleasure. Do I sense notes of a certain ’90s rave anthem by Future Sound of London? I mentioned “Dummy” back in January, but there’s so much more to love, including the celebratory, human/post-human “Kokiri.“
I don’t know where I went
I just know that somethin’…
I just know that somethin’…
Well, there were children at the time…
I just know that somethin’…
I’m a sucker for the honeydripping melancholy and crystalline song craft of Free Range, but it’s taken me a minute to get into the new one, perhaps steeling myself for disappointment after the delirious highs of 2023’s Practice, plus that gorgeous duet Sophia did with Darryl Rahn on “Company” last year. I’ve been foolish; Lost and Found is quite the little masterpiece, delivering wave after wave of sweet-spot-probing folk-rock joy.
An artist named Vegyn has been blipping on my radar — first a collaboration with young sensation John Glacier on “A Dream Goes on Forever,” and now with a candied, hyperpop Loukeman remix of “Last Night I Dreamt I Was Alone.” Oh, apparently he produced two albums for in-and-out-of-closet-like-it’s-1999 gay artiste Frank Ocean — I mean just for context; it’s neither here nor there. Great tune.
I’ve straddled the fence for too long when it comes to Arthur Russell. He was always pretty much an underground artist; he died from AIDS in 1992 and his work gets passed around with reverence by music nerds like me. I think I jumped into fandom too quickly at one point and then questioned whether he actually had any songs I liked. But there’s a new live album out from a 1985 show and now I get it — he has me hanging on every half-whispered word, with a delicate intimacy that makes Nick Drake sound like Thin Lizzy. “That’s the Very Reason” as far as I can tell was previously unreleased.
He’s walking in
The exchange door
Was he dress on in his mind
Explaining to himself the thoughts of the day
But he leaves one thing out
And that’s the very reason
I have opened this
You reminded me
I responded in the other way
A sudden joke
Broke a dream he leans away from
And where he is he laughs or tries to laugh
And he thinks to himself
That’s the very reason I have opened this
You reminded me, I responded in the other way