Category: New Music Reviews

Robert Palmer, the late, suave UK singer of resonant and elastic voice was bit of a Jekyll & Hyde when it came to his recorded output. Prior to his mega trashy and garish hit “Addicted to Love” he straddled the line between several genres, never landing completely on one in particular. He went from funky New Orleans Soul, to Pub Rock and then in 1980 took a peculiar left turn into an intriguing brand of electronic pop music (even going so far as to collaborate with Gary Numan, one of the true fathers of the genre). Tracks like “Johnny and Mary”, and “I Dream of Wires” from this electro period still sound as weird, and memorable as they did the day they were thrust into the world. Which brings us to Dan D’Lion’s spacey and gorgeous “Dislocate”. There are distinct traces of the aforementioned Palmer’s electro side as well as the tunefulness of early The-Dream within it…but make no mistake, Dan is his own man and this is as distinct and wonderfully insidious as any pop thing this year.

There’s some really clever arranging and handsome harmonizing happening within the chorus of Mt. Mura: it sounds like the progeny of The Monroes 1982 new wave classic “What Do All the People Know” though the sentiment is infinitely darker despite the positive beat ( the eternal damage of proselytizing upon youthful minds). It is really, really fine. With that in mind take a listen to their epic, over the top, prog-pop last single “Coma’ too, link below, because it is also pretty exceptional.

“Let Me Show You” is sophisticated and fully formed retro-fine soul, marrying a seventies singer-songwriter vibe in the vein of Carole King or Roberta Flack, with some Stevie Wonder-esque instrumental flourishes, to the more modern day R & B excursions of Floetry and Marsha Ambrosius. It’s all tempo changes, melodic twists, real guitar, and spaced out keys and features a myriad of singular instrumental spotlight moments. It’s then topped with Lydia’s quietly powerful and supremely lovely vocal. It just works in every way.

Good lord. This song is absolutely insidious. It’s crafty. It’s electronic and warm. And once it’s set foot into your mind, it is nearly impossible to evict. It’s both simple and complex, a stream of consciousness nursery rhyme moving back and forth between descriptions of what someone is doing and what someone is thinking which is to say it perfectly mimics how the brain works every waking moment of the day. It’s like some glorious Pet Shop Boys deep cut and features words like “dappling”, “overborne”, “billowing” and “squinting” and is the devil in the best way.

Spacey, spinning, tuneful,”Fever Dream” perfectly captures the otherworldly, out of body feeling of it’s title. It’s the sound of waking up in the middle of the night when you are burning up and wondering where the hell you are and that sometimes disorienting feeling you get when you walk out of a movie theater onto the street back into the real world after sitting in the dark for 2 hours. Most of Dog Trainer’s stuff travels down that same avenue , all lost, lush, and lo-fi and innately melodic and it’s all kinda fine.

Clocking in at nearly 6 minutes, “Winters” might well give you the sensation of taking a journey. It’s otherworldly, epic and over the top, featuring Taft Mashburn’s gigantic, wavering and emotive voice over a post rock backdrop. Yet even with all the widescreen beauty on display here, there is still something innately lonely and solitary at the core of the song. It’s really something.

Schizophrenic and lush, “Sun Skin Air” is a melodic mix of krautrock and pop and features a straight up prog bridge that sounds like it wandered in from an early Genesis album. Basically it’s a bit of a whirling dervish, completely infectious and extremely difficult to avoid getting completely charmed by and sucked into.

Them Leopards are back with another wonderful and criminally sticky pop tune, this one a message for “Heather” whom they’re fed up with being mistreated by, but who still rules their life. “Call me when you get your shit together”, and “hope it’s not the way you’ll be forever”. Jaunty and blue and just too true.

There is something oddly familiar about this song, so much so you may feel as if you’ve heard it before even after being exposed to only 30 seconds of it. This is because it’s what you might call “classically constructed” with a marked, definitive hook, and a real lyrical clarity…so yeah, it may well feel like you’ve been here before. Even the vocal possesses a “don’t I know you?” quality with it’s evocation of a world weary Laura Nyro, a ridiculously dark Carole King, and a keening Fiona Apple.  It all adds up to something mighty fine, fully formed and out of time, that’s as sadly beautiful as can be. And that crying guitar solo is also pretty exquisite.