Joplin Rice - Hurricane Alaska (2015)

The new album by Lexington, Kentucky songwriter Joplin Rice. Some of you might remember his prior release, Low Hum, of which I've been especially fond (go back in listen to "Perfect Coils" if you haven't). Both releases share the Elliott Smith-esque indie singer-songwriter core, yet with Hurricane Alaska Rice has gotten more bold, moving from the rather folksy sound of Low Hum. Retaining the sweet lyrics and softly fuzzed out tone, there's more loud electric guitar and an overall quicker pace to be felt in these new songs. Tracks like "No New U (stop chasing)" and more psychedelic song "Rocket" demonstrate this louder style well. All of it still lies within the realm of bedroom pop, though some of the most finely recorded I've heard in a long time. The real genius behind what Joplin Rice has done with this new album is carry on his sound but continuing to progress simultaneously. It wasn't hard for a moment for me to imagine any of these tunes as his, but they are quite distinctive from Low Hum. Rice's ability to recreate a mood and carry it throughout an album, here is the lightly fuzzed out guitars and drums gently tapping along. I know there are several songs that'll become favorites  of mine for the coming months, and only many enjoyable repeated listenings will solidify them. I'm looking forward to it.

To be had here:
Joplin Rice - Hurricane Alaska

Dommel Mosel - Crybaby (2015)

There's been times in the past I've espoused theories that my mental health waxes and wanes to some degree with how much and what sort of music I'm listening to. Usually it is an exceedingly gluttonous amount, only justifiable by having a blog wherein I praise the albums I enjoy and act as if I am contributing to a discourse. Yet this still can become a taxing and destabilizing effort in and of itself, causing me to pull back. This is what last month was for me. Disorientating and blurry overall, and a profound sense of unproductiveness.... Then the unavoidable evening where I'm going stir crazy while being mildly agoraphobic all at once and I rediscover music. This time the harbinger was Dommel Mosel.

Despite seeming like the name of an individual artist, Dommel Mosel is actually a band from Birmingham, Alabama that plays the songs of a fella called Adam Measel. I'm not sure what to make of them, really they've thrown me for a bit of a loop. I keep listening to them and enjoying the songs each time and all the time finding their sound charmingly perplexing. It's like they're doing two things at once, playing lo-fi garage-like rock music and making sweet singer-songwriter pop. Like Mark Sultan and Sondre Lerche all mixed together, or whatever examples work best for you. There album, Crybaby, is a lengthy effort and has many permutations of this combined sound. However, some tracks really nail it exceptionally well. Firstly, "I'm Afraid I Can't Stay" is a shimmery masterpiece with a unforgettably pleasing reframe of 'wahhh-wahhh-wahhh.' Then there's "Easy Come" wherein he sings the word 'greasy' in a way that's remarkable and my older brother would appreciate very much as it's how he says it. Finally, I can't shake the feeling that "Oh, Whoa" is a sweet rock anthem. Of course with even more continued listening I'm sure I'll out more songs I adore.

The album has been issued in cassette format by Happenin' Records, from which you can purchase it for a paltry $5, or naturally via bandcamp digitally.

To be had here:

Dommel Mosel - Crybaby

Scenes of a City, Vol. 11: Montevideo, Uruguay

Once again I found myself curious about the music by way of literature. I've been enjoying the short stories of Felisberto Hernández, who was not only a writer but an accomplished and self-taught pianist. Some of his songs can be heard online, and this experimental sort of literature prefigured many notable authors including the illustrious Italo Calvino, who I've mentioned several times before.

As for Montevideo as a city, it seems the sort of place I'd like to live. There's no secret that Detroit kinda sucks, even its most ardent boosters know it does even if they won't say it. Montevideo is most beautiful, has a higher level of development and cultural activity. It's way nicer, but whenever I bring it up here, people don't even know where it is. To see Montevideo in person in a wish of mine, but until I make better wages it's gonna be a dream I can only grasp in the form of ephemeral songs, the written words of dead authors and photographs taken by others. But there's no shortage of those, in fact there's so much music I found coming out of this city I'll have to spill some of it over into Grab Bags and consider an second part of this post at some point.

Also, I'd like to note that I have been compiling together releases for Scenes of a City posts and EP Grab Bags for years, done dozens and dozen of them, but this batch has the fucking best designed album art over all. Way to go Uruguayan graphic designers.

To be had here:

Oso Polar - Arktur (2015)

This is the first of the albums I listened to from Montevideo to strike a chord with me. Must have listened to it a dozen times the day I found it. A relatively minimal album for the most part, being folk-pop containing slow guitar and lovely Spanish singing. However, in the middle Arktur gets bolder, adding some indie pop flare with keyboards and vocal effects. While it bears [unintentional pun] a more subdued tone, I would liken it to my favorite Brazilian musician, Bonifrate. This is meant as high praise, pilgrims.

Franny Glass - Planes (2014)

Not straying too far from the folk-pop of the last album, here we have another indie pop release, though one that is decidedly more highly produced pop music. Another singer-songwriter I found absolutely delightful and quite cheerful in addition. Planes is packed full of earworms you'll find yourself humming along to without even needing to understand a word of it. Catchy tunes are catchy tunes across culture and language boundaries as well all know, and this dude really knows how to craft them. I sincerely recommend "En Libertad y Obligado" as a simple introduction.

The Blueberries - The West (2012)

I knew if I poked around I would find garage rock in Montevideo. I didn't know what sort of garage rock I might find though. The Blueberries are a very well put together, polished sounding outfit. Now, I know I really go off about distorted, loose sounding lo-fi garage rock, but I also have a great fondness for a finely produced guitar-driven rock band. And while most of the tracks are sung in English, I truly believe the few in Spanish really demonstrate the abilities of this band excellently, thinking of "Newby" in particular here.

Los Prolijos - Pasto Azul (2014)

This album is something I was amazed to find. It is a series of covers of popular Uruguayan songs reimagined as bluegrass and country music. A brilliant plan, right? Yes. The songs are light and upbeat, very good summertime jaunts. The musicians sound impeccable, showing off twangy guitar and banjo-picking skills Moreover, the album art on this is so incredibly cool I have already suggested it as a possible new tattoo from my friend, so don't crib his style.

Ataque Chino - Archivo 1 (2014)

An experimental ambient album in which poetry is recited. He doesn't sing his poems, definitely recites it, but much decent poetry will seem lyrical even with a language barrier. Beautiful to my ears, though I haven't the foggiest notion what he's on about. The music itself is astoundingly interesting, making use of a great multitude of instruments, effects and ambient sounds in a way I found to be quite novel. In someways it reminds of Felisberto Hernández's music, but I might be imagining that in a desire to connect some dots in my mind.

Pez Electrico - Gaza (2015)

An album that roughly could be called experimental psychedelia, yet that doesn't explain at the scope it undertakes. The tone and tempo of the songs range widely throughout, being slow and somber at moments and then launching into swirling guitar parts with abundant percussion. The album is chaotic but beautiful. I can see why they'd chose to associate it with the Palestinian city of Gaza, where chaos, resilience and beauty often intermingle.

Oh K - Yes, Naked Empire (2015)

Long have I been a fan of bedroom pop, weird folk and other manner of eccentric songwriters. They send in music from all over the place, all different and strange in their own ways. It can't help but have a personal imprint, not requiring more than an inspired individual with a guitar, computer and whatever other instruments one has around to begin recording.

Yet nothing exists in a void and the human mind is programmed to seek patterns. Other than the clear debt to prior singer-songwriters and the internet being able to spread music that would likely have been limited to homemade cassettes passed out to friends, there's a changing aesthetic all this access to technology and music sharing has created.  The ease of adding effects and layering techniques has made psychedelic and spacey sounds near ubiquitous. However, it's not deployed with universal skill, but luckily the selections I'm sent tend to show exceptional well.

Enter Oh K, a Perth resident whose own description of his music is "Screwed up folk laptop tape machine lo-fi acoustic-y echo-y bottle top buzzsaw magpie dreams." I couldn't improve upon that if I wanted to. Yes, Naked Empire is a short album but Oh K manages to fit a lot in without overcomplicating the songs. At there core the tracks are acoustic guitar and soft singing, going to show the additional life a bedroom engineer is capable breathing into songs. The briefness of the album is something of an asset, it makes re-listening easy and prevents any of the many small lovely things tucked into the songs from being overlooked.

To be had here:
Oh K - Yes, Naked Empire

Max Gowan - Big People (2015)

There's a great many of submitted albums incoming to me lately. This is normally the case yet it never ceases to amaze me. Moreover, the timing of it all. How do they all know to send it in the same week? Enter my life as a Sisyphean completist. Yet this guy gets a pass on this particular issue as he's new to SRM, though no less worthy of mentioning.

Max Gowan is a singer-songwriter from Raleigh, North Carolina with a charming album. His music doesn't fall neatly into an category, as is the case for many good singer-songwriters. It rides close to folk-pop most often, though at other times the production levels pick up, especially in the vocals, creating a morose pop feeling not unlike Elliott Smith. The man knows how to make an emotional appeal without being overly sappy, something that is all too uncommon for songwriters. He plays around with the guitar as well, showing off his skills, even in a few instrumental bits that I am fully enthused by (listen to "The Stumble"). But he really shows his shit off in tunes like "Here, (Part 1)," "Snow" and "Open Letter to Heaven ." Naturally this is all subjective and in the moment, yet the album should considered as a whole. Undoubtedly, Gowan is very capable and these songs are incredibly enjoyable to hear. I do believe he's the possibility to produce something really epic and I want to be the first to hear it. 

To be had here:
Max Gowan - Big People

Patient Barney Penrose - Kirilov (2014)

Not sure what it is but I've felt myself slowing down just a bit lately. That goes for most everything except what I'm forcing myself to keep up with for work. But I am getting out of bed later, drinking less beer and wine (you know, leaving some for another day), and enjoying slower, lyrical songs more than I had in the past. Knowing myself this is a brief stop on a cycle that'll keep spinning until I stop living, I've taken strides to take it all in. Thusly, Patient Barney Penrose's harmonious folk songs showed up at exactly the right time for me.

Kirilov has some genuinely beautiful folk songs. Rather stripped down sort of folk music, the type that seem like it was shyly thought up in a bedroom only later to be fleshed out into the melodic pieces presented here. The singer-songwriter is a Virginian living in Richmond and this is far from his first release but hardly the least notable. Indeed he appeared back in 2013 in a Grab Bag written by Elvis. There's no sugarcoating it, pilgrims, this is sentimental, one could even say sappy, folk. Yet, as I have always thought, anything but ska can be good if done well and this dude is real good. "Orchid's Song" has got to be my favorite, with the ambient sounds sprinkled in there that remind me of Mickey Newbury. Furthermore, the fiddle on "Wishbone" is capable of stealing the show. Check it out, it won't bum you out too much, rather to the just right bummed out mood.

To be had here:
Patient Barney Penrose - Kirilov

Blue Diamond - It's A Puppy's World (2015)

Every now and again there's this strange sort of album that comes the Spacerockmountainway. A weird bedroom project that's hard to describe and is dissimilar to most other things on the blog but are at the unified in that aspect. Blue Diamond has fallen into this category nicely. It is most definitely the work of a dude with eccentric tastes made tinkering away alone only sharing it with us all now that he's completed the strange tunes. As usual, I'm eating this shit up.

Blue Diamond is a guy from La Quinta, California and he's taken some old, warped 80s new age/new wave sounds and mixed it up with some truly bizarre vocal stylings, including some answering machine message recordings. The whole album gives a sort of vaporwave vibe, striking similarities to SODA lite in the instrumental parts. For as strangely and purposefully awkward it seems at times, there are some songs on this album that transcend it all really shine as great pop gems, such as delight tune "Boatful Of Weed Crashes Onto Nude Beach."

To be had here:
Blue Diamond - It's A Puppy's World

The Red Rogue - Phoenicia (2015)

Some of you might recall when I wrote up the very talented Tim Cushing back in the summer. And boy howdy does his album hold up over time, still think it is a gem. However, what is even better than getting to hear a folk musician you think is wildly great? Perhaps it's getting to hear him playing with his college buddies as his backing band in a reunion in a wooden cottage in upstate New York. Luck for us all that is exactly what the Red Rogue happens to be.

Phoenicia is folk and like most folk isn't too complex. It shouldn't be, for overly complex folk ceases to be folk and becomes something else. Nevertheless, this doesn't mean there's not a lot going on. There's accordion, drums, mandolin, clarinet, and guitar of the bass, electric and acoustic varieties featured on this album yet they do a splendid job a blending their sounds into ultimately cohesive and charming songs. I recommend listening to the album in order, as it made it all the more beautiful for me. This way you're ears will have acquired the correct folksy palate and get the very most out of the final tracks, "Eveline" and "I Went Looking." They're excellent examples of the different and capability of noisy, loud folk compared to stripped down folk tunes. A pleasure to hear and hopefully not the last they put out.

To be had here:
The Red Rogue - Phoenicia

Happy Sadness - The Long Play LP (2015)

Happy Sadness is maybe my favorite name for a musical project that I've heard in a long time. Two words that are a whole philosophy, albeit one that many don't get and those they embrace it still have questions about.

The Long Play LP is not just a cutely redundant name, it is an accurate description of the length of the album. It is a lengthy listen with sixteen tracks, plenty that are over five minutes. This means there's a bunch of material through which to acquaint oneself with Happy Sadness. Far from the worst thing I can imagine, in fact seeing as I am writing it up I was fond of the experience. A very varied experience at that. The songs do not adhere to a style across the album, rather the songwriter tries his hand at many folky acoustic, warped psychedelic, and others shimmering pop songs. While I recommend the whole album, the songs that truly stood out for me were "We Fall As We Rise" and "The Night Has Woken" as wonderful examples of surreal folk dreamscapes. Finally, Happy Sadness reminds me of Pete Dello, which is great quality in anything, though more serious in some ways. Not too serious however, for who need that shit?

To be had here:
Happy Saddness - The Long Play LP

EP Grab Bag vol. 90

An all North American Grab Bag this time. That is what was in the cards I suppose, but we aren't lacking in any glamor, mystic or bravado without our other-continental brethren today. Garage, country and otherwise for the auditory consumer.

To be had here:

Leon Patriz - Better Luck Next Fall (2014)

This here is from Vancouver, submitted by a dude called Enzio who has got his hands in several musical project out on Canada's Pacific coast. He's even played as part of Slight Birching. As for this EP, it's got only four songs yet manages to be incredibly diverse and consistently experimental. Electronic tones and affects, plenty of droning bass, and lo-fi buzz. Intriguing and hypnotic as anything with looping, droning parts should be. Then the last track throws that all out for a New Weird America-esque singer-songwriter number. Leave it up to a Canadian to make New Weird America even weirder.

Grenades in the Archives - Tokyo (2014)

Garage punk, the hard drinking, smashing into one another sort. Ive a theory there's no where on earth that once experiencing punk rock doesn't have young people eager to make their own fast, loud and intense music. Not sure how young the Bostonians that made these three songs are, but I am sure they didn't just start embracing the lo-fi garage punk style recently. It sounds like they've spent many an evening in tiny venues getting sweaty, drunk and sore all for the chance hear some rock. A promising start and I hope it leads to an awesome LP. Also check out their live set from WMBR.

Los Demolirs - EP.1 (2015)

Garage rock from Florida this time. Los Demolirs reminds me more of the sort of garage rock that was popular when I was a high schooler, the kind that MTV and everything gave two shits about for a second and then dropped like a hot rock for dubstep or whatever bullshit television plays now. It was a golden year for me, and that these dudes sound somewhat like mean entirely complimentary. I still dig on those albums, as I bet at least a few members of Los Demolirs did. Furthermore, for an EP from a garage rock outfit you've never heard of, the production in these songs is outstanding. A finely polished roughness.

Caleb Groh - Down, Dakota! (2011)

This is another EP I found by falling down various rabbit holes on this vast internet. Caleb Groh is a singer-songwriter from Nashville, making remarkably charming country-folk tunes. There is a full-length that followed this EP, but I felt this to be the best way to introduce someone new to his music. Three of the most delightful alt-country songs I've heard in some time and a spoken word poem that's sweetly strange. There's something I can't explain about how cheerful a full sounding country-folk song makes me. Modern and old all at once, I guess that is what they mean by timelessness.

baby dog - adult dog (2015)

Our pal Garrett Linck is back with a new single, "traffic cones," that is part of what should be an upcoming EP. Normally I don't write up singles nor imcomplete EPs, but Garrett isn't a new face on SRM. In fact I was writing him up routinely last year, both under his own name and with the group called baby dog. Always fine indie rock, with an earnest tone, and fine instrumentation that shows an understanding of power pop. I cannot wait for the other two tracks of this soon-to-be EP to drop, but you shouldn't hold up and dive in with what's available now.

Samuel Boat - Tasting Like A Broken Fence (2014)

This is the second album that Samuel Boat has released this year. Some of you might recall Soda Pop Rock that was put out back in May and written up my yours truly as well as covered on the podcast. Stylistically, this new album hasn't strayed too far from the prior, however it does seem to have a bit more melancholy mood. You know that sweet bedroom pop melancholy were sadness is mixed up with cheerful instruments and it makes for a contradictory feeling that hard to express in words alone yet music excels at. Tasting Like A Broken Fence has several fine examples of this capacity with tracks like "walkin'" and forlorn love song "rain day."

The album is short, with a playtime of only 20 minutes, hardly longer than many EPs we share. The brevity is an asset as soon as you get to listening the final track, "from the best," you'll find yourself wanting to right back to the beginning and hear it all over again. The songs are among the best earworms I've heard come from the submissions to the blog. Basically, I am gushing because I can't get these damn tunes out of my head, with the catchy keys and soft guitar and what-have-you. Also check out the two tracks that he put out back in November, Thanksgiving Sampler.

To be had here:
Samuel Boat - Tasting Like A Broken Fence 

EP Grab Bag vol. 83

The EPs keep flowing in, hard to keep on top of them all. So perhaps not in the order they were submitted nor even the order I listened to them, here's what I have spent some time with and believe it is time to share.

To be had here:

Simplicio Neto & Os Nefelibatas - Fuscas & Dirigíveis (2014)

Mighty fine Brazilian indie rock. It has a laid back  psychedelic and folk-like feeling that'll be familiar to those that've heard my favorite modern Brazilian band Supercordas, as a member of that group the great solo artist Bonifrate produced this EP. Simpilicio is a songwriter and documentarian that Bonifrate ranks among his favorites and I can understand why. They songs are full, a bit washed out and lazily relaxed in the same way a good tune by the Kinks is for a blissful 8 minutes plus. The title track "Fuscas & Dirigíveis" is tops, a very good album for us in the northern hemisphere remember is it summertime somewhere else and have a moment of respite.

Lull - Dead or Alive (2014)

Lull are from London, England but they could very easily be mistaken for an American band from the 90s from their sound. Doubtlessly they've got some transatlantic influences that're bearing fruits in the three songs of this EP. The other SRM guys just had me want a documentary on 90s music, and I can say after the sour feeling that left in my mouth, Lull comes out looking rather sweet. I genuinely liked the dazed indie rock sound they're making, with the title song again being the stand out example of the release.

UNQUALIFIED NURSE - The Weird (2014)

A second installment is what is shaping up to be a series of micro-EPs from Britain's UNQUALIFIED NURSE. The songs are incredibly short as was the case for Medicine Music, and likewise they are loud and hugely distorted. This band is onto a hardcore garage punk sound that could really yield a great album if they keep at it like this. It sound like it couldn't get rougher or more raw at this point in the infancy of playing, but there's absolutely no place better to start than that.

Sean Patton - Scatterbrain (2014)

Sean Patton is a folk singer-songwriter from Vancouver Island, British Columbia. Scatterbrain is what he described as his first "real EP" but from it's polished and sophisticated sound it'd be easy to imagine him having been making folk albums for years. These folk songs are no small feats of composition that just a bit of country flare in them, with a skillful band behind him complete with back-up singers. Tender lyrics and sweet singing, I must be getting more mature or whatever because I found this EP charming in a way that a younger me would have been confused by.

Ry Smith - REXROTH (2014)

Another album from the guys over at February Records. Ry Smith is a songwriter that was a member of the New York band Eastern Phobes, but has since gone on to make this solo effort. I won't lie, I was worried about listening to it at first as the press release on stated, "self-proclaimed 'record about sadness,' tackling so many of the twists and turns of life." While I do find a gloomy album a fine thing at many times I was worried to sink to deep into that as I've just returned to my natural state of semi-isolation by living alone. However, I was pleasantly surprised, in fact enthused, to find that the mood of the album was more upbeat than one could reasonable hope from that blurb. Like a Beulah or countless other groups I've made reference to Rexroth contains those sneaky melancholy pieces of music that sound sweetly happy while maintaining the depressingly stark lyrics disappointment and hardship. This is all done in with a lovely jaunty organ sound and effected lyrics that reminds me of the band Quasi, only reinforced by the fantastic songwriting talent Ry Smith brings that I think even surpasses Sam Coomes and Janet Weiss, though I am not prepared to fight over it.

The songs are done in a way that takes repeated hearings to get out what they're really about, as the instrumentation with absorb most of the listener's attention for the first couple of go-arounds. But as one keeps at enjoying it they lyrics and the overall mood with set in and shift the album and make it more than something happy and sweet to play in the background and becomes a much more substantial album. There's some excellent storytelling woven into the songs, not that following them closely is necessary or extremely advisable as it is still indie pop and supposed to be enjoyed. I get hundreds of albums sent in every year and I have gotten pretty good at figuring them out on context clues, not that I don't spend a ton of time listening to them anyway, but this one through me for more of the more wonderful loops I've gotten thrown my way lately.

To be had here:
Ry Smith - REXROTH

Samuel Boat - Soda Pop Rock (2014)

I don't have any background information on Samuel Boat or his full-length album, Soda Pop Rock, beyond what I've been able to deduce or guess at from the songs themselves. He didn't furnish me with details, and his bandcamp page tagged the release as "rock" and "United States" so either intentionally or not he's played this one close to the vest. Fine with me, I've written up shit that I clearly know nothing about before and I'm sure I will again.

The album is a collection of what sound like lo-fi bedroom pop musings, and that's a very sweet thing. Samuel Boat is likely a multi-instrumentalist and rather good at synthesizing on the computer that has got a load of catchy beats rolling around in his head that needed a quirky, entertaining and just a bit creepy outlet. The songs are full of snyth sounds and together with his singing and whistling the songs seem aimed at juvenile memories. Eccentrically nostalgic songwriting that can be happy and a bit sad or whimsical at the same time, like a good Stephin Merritt tune. "The one for me" and "roses from peru" both show what I am trying to get at exceptionally well, not that I am sure it is what he was angling for. That's art for you, out of your hands and into ours right? Anyhow, I found Soda Pop Rock to be very adorable and highly delightful to listen to.

To be had here:
Samuel Boat - Soda Pop Rock

Arvid - Old Factory Living (2014)

What we have here is a good old fashioned eccentrically irreverent, weird rock album. A solo project of a fella from Rochester, NY has spawned the series of bizarre but undeniably charming tracks called Old Factory Living. I've set a bit a precedent for enjoying this sort of lo-fi and far-out singer-songwriter style of music, as I have friends who make tunes like these including Paully Moonbean and my boy Jason that is the mind behind Forest Porridge and Twin Man. Regardless of your familiarity to those deep recollections to SRM history, this is a finely done 4-track attic record hat rapidly shift in tones from each track, with some being catchy rock tunes and others being elongated psychedelic infused trips, and yet others smacking of E6 falsetto heavy tunes. It comes off as exactly what it is meant to be, a somewhat immature version of a songwriter possessing a good deal of talent. He's fleshing out his sound and doing a great job at it already. Finally, I'd like to point out that I could dig in and a take a cozy rest in this sort of early version of artist expression. It is more than getting in at the ground floor of something that could be big, for it never need be a big deal. However, you shared a roughly contemporariness connection with a musician that might not be necessarily saying anything heavy or deep than you choose to read that into it, but reflected feeling of your time so very coherently, despite its messiness and because of it.

To be had here:
Arvid - Old Factory Living

Car Seat Headrest - Nervous Young Man (2013)

I've long been a fan of this artist believing his lo-fi songwriting to be some of the best that ever got submitted to the blog. Last time I noticed that he didn't notify me that he had a release I wrongfully chastised him, but this time I am glad he is still out there making music at all. His name is William Toledo but Car Seat Headrest is his moniker for his music. And that music is a warm, mildly psychedelic indie singer-songwriter that structured fantastically for my lo-fi loving ears. He doesn't shy away from long tracks, routinely going over 5 minutes but a few times exceeding 15. All this allows for a song to shift throughout as any listener to post-tock will know, but this isn't post-rock, rather it's lo-fi rock and roll that is at moments garage, others shoegazey, and still others pop but throughout it is a wonderful application of relatively few instruments into an amazingly cohesively sound. Moreover, like I recently praised the Secret Motorbikes for, these songs beg you to paid attention to the lyrics and absorb a message beyond the song, and this especially true because of the often sparse use of noisy instrumentation that makes a void to be filled, and is done so effectively. This is a rather long album, just so you all know, but totally worth it should you allow yourself the time. Additionally, if you like this you'll love his other releases including the previously posted Twin Fantasy and Monomania.

To be had here:

Car Seat Headrest - Nervous Young Man

Twin Man - Super Bowl 2 (2014)

What we've got here is a bizarre collection of improvised acoustic numbers done by a buddy of mine back in Michigan. I have posted up other work of his in the past, under a the name Forest Porridge. The songs are mostly sweet, very lo-fi recordings with whimsical lyrics that shows a real poetic if left-field artist. The first track does get racy (in more than one way), but one must expect the irreverent and tongue-in-cheek nature of such a song. Maybe it is my basis as a friend of his, but I find this sort of short-form composition very endearing and supremely easy to listen to repeatedly. I hope that some of you find it that way as well, because it really is a sort of an extreme of the outsider and under exposed sort of artwork that makes deep corners of the internet like this a real valuable asset.

To be had here:
Twin Man - Super Bowl 2

The Gentle Stunts - Beg The Question (2013)

The Gentle Stunts return here with a second full-length after last year's Life-Sized Deadbeats. The style is familiar psychedelic pop with a shimmery, soft delivery but executed with more what sounds to be a better production value. The increased crispness is apparent and allows tracks like "Censorship Dilemma" and "Eclipse Have Won the Race" to really stand out. A very solid follow up that gives exactly what I have hoped for from a new album by these guys, the style I liked about the first album but even more impressive songwriting. Seems like they might be playing shows in Connecticut if you're in that area, and who knows, if I find some money I might makes it to New Haven myself.

To be had here:
The Gentle Stunts - Beg The Question

Pete Dello - Into Your Ears (1971 [1989])

I was just turned onto the magnificence that is Pete Dello's Into Your Ears by Brinley Davies of The Moles in an email exchange. Imagining that if I hadn't realized it existed that there may be a goodly amount of pilgrims that haven't either. The album is a production of that late 60s/early 70s psychedelic folk that encompassed all variety of artists popular and obscure. After reading up on Dello I found out that he was the lead of a Beatlesque band called Honeybus, best known for their hit "I Can't Let Maggie Go" from 1968. Into Your Ears a quick follow up after departing the band and then leaving the music industry altogether later that decade. The song "Do I Still Figure in Your Life" is the most famous as it has been covered numerous times but not my personal favorite. "Harry the Earwig" is so oddly fantastic that I want to share it with all my friends. Plus it is the source of inspiration for the wild album art. However, "Uptight Basil" has got to be my favorite, and there are two versions as this is technically the reissue from 1989 that features additional tracks. There's no shortage of neat songs though; both "It's the Way" and I'm a Gambler" have been stuck in my head since I first heard them. A brilliant album and my thanks go to Mr. Davies for the recommendation.

To be had here:
Pete Dello - Into Your Ears [192 VBR kbps]

Neutral Milk Hotel - Demos

I imagine that everyone that knows anything about anything should be aware of Neutral Milk Hotel. In The Aeroplane Over The Sea is one of the best records ever. However, as many also know, the band didn't emerge from no where and was involved more or less on the ground floor with the formation of Elephant 6, back when it was an actual label. Several demo cassettes were produced when the band was beginning as a brainchild of Jeff Mangum, who had even been recording prior under the shorter moniker Milk. Basically, all this information is found easily on the internet, but I still like to listen to these three demo tapes. They're pretty simplistic as far as most of the songs go, with many tracks involving sound collage techniques and some spoken word. Some songs where fleshed out and improved upon to become tracks on the two official albums by Neutral Milk Hotel. Others such as one of my favorites, "Engine," wasn't ever released on either, although it can be found as the b-side to "Holland 1945" and on Mangum's live recorded at Jittery Joe's in Athens, GA. Multiple versions in demo-quality recording of songs might seem excessively nerdy, but appearances of Magnum's amazing talents became severely restricted after his desire to remove himself from the public eye following the success of In The Aeroplane Over The Sea. I do know there are more including some are unreleased material but this is was I have in decent bitrates. Moreover, there are few demos are quirky and interesting as these.

To be had here:




Invent Yourself A Shortcake [320 kbps] (1991)












Beauty [320 kbps] (1992)














Hype City Soundtrack [192 kbps] (1993)