Tirzah and Mica Levi have been besties since forever, and the records released under Tirzah‘s name have all been collaborations. While Mica is quite the karma chameleon, recording delightful new wave-influenced racket as Michachu and the Shapes and Good Bad Happy Sad and scoring toney art-house auteur films, Tirzah tends toward the minimal, taking fragments of melody and mining them for maximum intensity. On “Tectonic,” from 2021’s Colourgrade, we got a dizzying taste of getting-laid Tirzah, with her mantra “When you touch me, I’m out my body instinct takes place.” On her new trip9love…??? she dives back into a familiar, chocolatey despair and self-hatred that brings to mind 90s goddesses PJ Harvey and Alison Shaw of Cranes. “Promises” perhaps expresses the aftermath of all that 2021 body instinct: “Spent time / Was time I didn’t need / Was time I didn’t need / Was time I needed to head / Went far / At a time when I was weak / At a time when it was deep … / And my head is spinnin’ round / And I’m lyin’ by myself / Chose this / ‘Cause it’s all I’ve ever known …”
There’s a new smoky, velvety, troubled British crooner haunting my pillows and sheets — Jacob Allen AKA Puma Blue just released his second album Holy Waters, a heroiny infusion of dreamy beats, liquid basslines, purrs and falsettos. You could certainly describe the genre as J-word, but it trends toward the oversaturated 90s drama of Tindersticks and Jeff Buckley. “Awake in this hell-space / I can barely hold my tongue,” he emotes on “Hounds,” “Try for my life to be someone / Who could never come undone / Feels like no angels / Follow where I tread / Made to make a home, but it burns to the ground instead…” In the moody, black and white video, he recreates the famous shot of Jean Marais from Orpheus that the Smiths used on the cover of “This Charming Man“.
Two of the biggest stars of the ’10s in the slowgraffitti world were James Blake and Daniel Lopatin (better known by his laborious nom de plume Oneohtrix Point Never), both of whom started out incubating abstract, sculptural approaches to sound, and eventually found themselves conjuring up veritable monsoons of deeply resonant, emotionally compelling alt-electronica. And in James Blake‘s case a lot of R&B crooning. As the vivacious last decade drew to a close, they both seemed burdened by the heavy, Björkish crown of Very Important Artist, and listening to their latest output began to feel joylessly “good for you.” But 2023 is magical, and suddenly Jim and Dan both have shoots of new growth poking out from their weathered bark. “Big Hammer” from our James‘ new Playing Robots Into Heaven album starts out sounding like a couple of Adidas-clad Dutch guys headbanging over their laptops, then gets haunted by angry dancehall samples, progresses into tween on sugar madness, and leaves you sated and satisfied with the shock of the new.
On “Tell Me” he stages his tarnished silver vocals against a Crystal Castles-esque terror alarm electro riff: “Tell me if it’s worth waking up for me,” he intones, “When there are so many reasons to lie / Tell me when it’s darker than nightfall / Tell me when you’re all done…”
Last time I heard from Lopatin he was fucking around with Liz Fraser on “Tales from the Trash Stratum” and showing signs of being reinvigorated. His new opus “Barely Lit Path” is sprawling and cinematic, a heartstring-plucking mini-symphony with autotuned chorus and some trashy 80s elements that make me suspect our Dan has a sense of humor to go with all that genius.
Cameroonian-American New Yorker Vagabon has a new one out and, as seen on the album cover, has certainly claimed hairstyle of the year. Opening track “Can I Talk My Shit?” is a thing of beauty, a classic pop ballad about love and addiction with porous, impressionist lyrics: “But I can’t resist / I, I’m ready to leave with you / I, I’ve been gettin’ way too bold / Never found myself through the smoke, me up / You’re professin’, I’m undressin’ / And instead, why’re you scared? It’s not precious / I know what you like, it’s impressive, right? / Only way you forgot is if you lost your m-…”
Simo Cell is a young DJ, he’s from Paris, and he travels the world delighting fashionable people with fractured, borderless derivations of dance music. On his debut album Cuspide Des Sirènes his expansive palette rambles from the hyperactive future-chipmunking of “polite rudeboi” to the slow, emphatic digital melancholy of “erotica.”
Marius Lauber aka Roosevelt burst on the scene in 2016 with a self-titled debut album that was heartbreaking, Germanically precise, and perfectly timed to soundtrack my breakup. On “Colours” he sang “When you left you took your colours with you / To make them last…” He catches you off guard, making what he does sound simple and even obvious, a kind of balearic indie-pop perfection, but then he’ll hit you with a perfectly unexpected and perfect chord change, or a seemingly tossed off lyric that lingers and resonates with emotion. His new one Embrace didn’t grab me at first; it struck me as more of the same, and in truth it is, but it’s a grower — he has an uncanny ability to craft sparkling new jewelry within a highly constrained idiom. Embrace is overflowing with bangers, but he saves the best for last — on “Alive,” which returns to his theme of seeing the passion of love rob your partner of their spirit: “Get me back to where I started out / Think it’s time to say / I won’t stay between the lines / Losin’ track without her by my side / Now she turns away / ‘Cause her light no longer shines…”
Egyptian Lover, the legendary icon of 80s future-freak electronica musica, has jumped on Sudan Archives‘ tasty track “Freakalizer,” drizzling lovely notes of robotic balsamic over Brittney Denise Parks‘ velveteen concoction.
So if the Velvet Underground isn’t your main influence I’m gonna be suspicious about whether you are a bona fide indie band, and fortunately Lewsberg don’t disappoint; in fact their spoken short story vignettes set to strummy and spiky guitar and/or gothy strings on new album Out and About are quite the sensation around my Silver Lake apartment in which I live alone. The star of the show is “An Ear to the Chest,” sung with an adorable Dutch accent by Arie Van Vliet: “Oh my heart keeps beatin’ faster / Will it ever stop / Will it just keep gettin faster? / I paid a visit to my doctor … She ran a couple of tests / She put her ear to my chest / She said you asked for it / You asked for so much…” Lots of rich and intriguing songs on the album, including “There’s a Poet in the Bushes,” in which a character has read the words “I am a poet. If I want the rose to bloom, the rose blooms,” so he waits in the titular bushes with pen and pad in hand. Is Holland the new Seattle? I think it’s my new Seattle, what with Altin Gün and… well, just Altin Gün and Lewsberg really but still.
Wait, why are my hands all sticky? Oh right, it’s sap from handling “Didn’t Know You Then” by Buck Meek, the Big Thief guitarist. And actually I take it back, it was the old Paul saying that; it’s better described as a radically sweet, open-hearted love song, to his wife no less! “I didn’t know you then / Though my lovе grew / My love knew everything / Our first kiss felt like home / With tears in our eyes / And now, one thousand kisses later / Each one feels like the first time…”
And yes, all that might be a bit much for jaded urban palates, in which case check out “Highway 72,” Mr. Buck‘s forlorn duet with Jolie Holland: “Follow my bleedin’ heels down the dusty road / Where the L.A. river is six inches wide / Trade on that TV for the full moon glowin’ / Watchin’ the stars roll every night / One foot in front of the other on the lost highway / I can’t make out the way…”
I have been taken to dubstep heaven by London’s Kevin McAuley aka Pangaea so many times since “Installation” dropped back in July and I’m simply mortified I’m only sharing it now. The lyrics go something like “Boat boat so so / get bolobolo bee sit dog you get ah.” Repeated quite a few times actually. His new album Changing Channels offers many more opportunities to move your botty England style.
No less of a jam is RM 1 by Ireland’s own Saoirse (pronounced sur•shuh apparently). “Feel the bass come down on ya” is the mantra (I think), and it pairs a 90s “Show Me Love” evoking keyboard riff with rusty, acidy textures that will transport you to your own private Ibiza.
Another luminous beacon of the teens was the venerable Woods, who lovingly carved organic, hippyish folk rock around Jeremy Earl‘s honeyed, high-pitched vocals and built a little indie empire that includes the Woodsist record label and music festival. “Little Black Flowers” off their new Perennial album is both intimate and anthemic, nicely punctuated with acidy, chirping tones, perhaps a newfangled effects pedal? “You might see, I might stare / You could be anywhere / Don’t Do no wrong, this road it takes you there / Take your time, take your fun / Turn your eye to your little world / And I’ll meet you there with lips all around the sun / A little black flower that grows in the sky…”
So, you know, much like any other sentient being I am deeply moved and humbled by the magnificence of the Rolling Stones. I also haven’t much followed what they’ve been up to in the last four decades. Imagine my delight at witnessing a new track that channels the energy and inspiration of the lads in their prime. “Sweet Sounds of Heaven” is anthemic and spectacular; it’s basically gospel; Mick‘s voice is insane; Lady Gaga and Stevie Wonder get a window to warble in toward the end. We’re not worthy!!!