Category: New Music Reviews

Don’t know if I’ve heard many things that have been as lush and heartrending as “Sacrifice” this year. From the cascading piano chords, to the plaintive Brian Wilson looking at a rainy beach vocal ( swear that’s what it sounds like), both the mood and construction of this song are something else: no hyperbole, it really is transcendent. It brought to mind one of the absolute diamonds of the 21st century, the Ed Harcourt song “From Every Sphere”, itself a blueprint for grand, evocative, melodic epics to ponder the universe to, and is equally as beautiful.

Morose and handsome, tearjerking and tuneful, “The City Holds My Heart” is an electro wash with a delicate beat that comes over like a wistful, modern and melancholy cousin to the Eurythmics classic “Here Comes the Rain Again”. Ghostly Kisses is Margaux Sauvé and her vocal here rings with the gorgeously austere clarity of UK folk rock legends Sandy Denny and June Tabor which is indisputably wonderful company to be in. Basically it’s sad, and is a perfect soundtrack for staring out of rain dappled train windows, which is to say it’s pretty great.

Last year Praa graced us with the otherworldly minimalist soul ballad “Modeling Clay”, a song so fine, Prince would surely have tipped his hat in unabashed approval of it. Well guess what,”Y”, her latest single, is even better. A lamentation on human facades in the form of straight up 90’s style R & B, it’s a modern day cousin soundwise to a couple of classics from that royal era of soul, “Kissin’ You” by Total, and “Love’s Taken Over” by Chante Moore, both of which are absolute perfection. And know what, can’t pay higher compliment than that: it’s just magical.

There is something kind of wonderful about “Good When I’m Done” the new single from Hull’s Hubbards. Featuring a semi-strangulated vocal full of anxiety and passion (not a million miles away from those of Suede’s Brett Anderson) and counterbalanced by a very neat and tidy bit of harmonizing, it spits desperation and flays itself open from the start, literally serving up it’s heart ( “on a plate for you”). God is a girl and this is shiny, bright and Britpop in all the right places.

Katherine Paul aka Black Belt Eagle Scout’s just released debut album is a beauty and “Sam…” is it’s most beauteous track of all. What’s surprising is how something so subtle could be such an insidious ear worm: it’s literally one sung verse followed by a lengthy, repetitive, hypnotic guitar line. Heartbreakingly special.

It’s not easy to sneer with sadness but “Jungle” somehow manages it in the most gorgeous, echoey, anthemic way possible. It’s a little Garbage, a little Breeders and just ass kickingly good. This one features on Jeen’s forthcoming album, due for release this very week and all signs indicate it will be loud and really damn good.

Okay bear with me for a minute here, ready ? The title of Jennifer Lopez’s 1999 debut album was “On the 6” which at the time probably, or at least initially, only made sense to New York City residents with its reference to, you know, the 6 train. With that kind of title it’d be cool to say the album intrinsically captured the feeling, and unpredictable energy of NYC but, of course, it did not. It was typical dance pop circa 1999, the title merely an autobiographical wink from J-Lo to her hometown. The end. Whatever. Okay, come now and meet it’s polar opposite in every way, “On the 5”. Yeah, that’s the 5, as in the West Coast’s ubiquitous freeway/highway/endless road. This thing’s blood is literally made of California, and reeks of suntan lotion, gasoline, blue skies, flowers, and the breeze rushing through the windows of a ’92 Subaru . It longingly dreams about the legendary Summer of Love ( 1967) and references both Revolver, and Pet Sounds in the most romantic and wistful way possible. This isn’t hyperbole I swear, all this stuff is in the actual song which is as sweet and swell as can be.

“The sun has never loved me”…now that’s a line. Tales is the new moniker of Australian duo The Winter Gypsy, and this, their first single under the new name, is transcendently good. Gorgeous harmonizing, layers and layers of vocals, full of sundown and resignation, sounding like a dreampop Brian Wilson (at his most gorgeously morose), “So Blue” is absolutely stunning, filled to the gills with melody, and is a life affirming tearjerker of the highest order.

“Blurry Now” is fat, plush pop, all swirling carnivalesque synth, desperation and self-realization. It sits somewhere between an emo Ladyhawke and a less austere Goldfrapp tune, which is a pretty cool place to be, and features an especially fine, breathy, and warm vocal. Dizzyingly good it is.

A little ELO, a little Scissor Sisters, a little Sgt. Pepper, “Landmine” is old school AM radio-friendly synthetic candy, both utterly earnest and entirely handsome and undoubtedly the # 1 song in a parallel universe.