Your best new music 2016, what it is and why others might like it

Bruce Woodhouse posted:

...and now for something completely different. Some folky psych-rock

Heron Oblivion.

Eponymous album from a group of musicians including Meg Baird from Espers (who I had heard of) and a bunch of others I had not. Daft name for a group too.

What you get is a folky, almost medieval sounding female voice that is suddenly subsumed by crunching howling rock, with extended wigouts that may have you jumping across the room air guitar in hand. Or not. Shades of Low meets Fairport Convention meets Neil Young

Benign it is not, and probably one of those records that even if you like you may only want to listen to occasionally, and generally with the neighbours out. Fun though, and very well put together.

Reviews below, and you can listen in full on Bandcamp before making the plunge.

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/03...-opposites.html?_r=0

http://pitchfork.com/reviews/a...1622-heron-oblivion/

https://heronoblivion.bandcamp...album/heron-oblivion

Bruce

Thanks for an interesting review Bruce it  grabbed my attention and so I've added Heron Oblivion to my wishlist over on Bandcamp to be played anon.

Let me know what you think

It's rare that a track perfect for relaxation also ranks as a proper banger but "Don't Think About Me" by Letherette hits the spot. Chill and funky.

Naijeru posted:

It's rare that a track perfect for relaxation also ranks as a proper banger but "Don't Think About Me" by Letherette hits the spot. Chill and funky.

Presume this is from an as yet unreleased follow-up album to the 2013 debut LP? Great track. 

Bruce Woodhouse posted:

Let me know what you think

Jury's still out on this one for me Bruce. I won't be giving up easy, and will give it another couple of runs through. 

Bruce Woodhouse posted:

Let me know what you think

Hi Bruce I have really very much enjoyed this album thanks for flagging it up. I've written a few thoughts about it on the "what are you listening to thread". It reminds me so much of mid sixties West Coast America and the psychedelic scene going on in that era. In the process of buying and downloading it from Bandcamp right now. Thanks again!

Steve

Great.

I was listening to Mazzy Star yesterday and thought that was another reference point.

Bruce

Just wanted to say thanks to Bruce and Steve (who pointed me in this direction) for the Heron Oblivion recommendation. It's completely blown me away.

In return:

Chris Forsyth & The Solar Motel Band - The Rarity Of Experience

 This is s guitar rock album (there are a few vocals on it) that sits firmly in the 70s. Chris has a style and tone redolent of Tom Verlaine - melodic but quite prepared to let rip. It's all good, but I'd point you at two tracks - the instrumental High Castle Rock and their cover of Richard Thompson's The Calvary Cross (starts off disconcertingly with a Flash & The Pan spoken delivery but transforms into a lengthy classic guitar workout.

Bandcamp

The Dandelion - Strange Case Of The Dandelion

This is basically a solo album by Australian retro psych bloke Daniel Poulter (see also The Dolly Rocker Movement). It's pretty much straight out of 1967. And yes, it's a cheat as it's from 2014 but I only came across it this year).

Bandcamp

Cavern Of Anti-Matter - void beats/invocation trex

This is Tim Gane's (Stereolab) current outfit, and they play a combination of motorik, radiophonic and general electronic stuff. There's a selection of tracks from it on Soundcloud and I'd particularly recommend Tardis Cymbals and Melody In High Feedback Tones.

The Greg Foat Group - Girl And Robot With Flowers

OK, this is another cheat (being from late 2012, but again I only discovered it this year and it's so good (if you like this sort of thing). What sort of thing is it? Well, it's tricky to describe but they're a chamber jazz group and they play a mixture of gentler library style and a rockier sound that reminds me of the second side of Colisseum's Valentyne Suite

This track (and the preceding Part 3 - see Bandcamp link below) demonstrates the latter style:

And this the former (featuring Matthew Halsall on trumpet):

Bandcamp

Oh, and forgot!

Perge - Aural Coefficients Within A Fractal Plane

Perge are Matthew Stringer and Graham Getty, modern day Berlin School synthesists who, in this guise, simulate various periods of classic Tangerine Dream. Usually they're in the mode of the Schmoelling period, but here they're doing a wonderful job of emulating the 75-76 live sound (it includes authentic crowd noise from TD boots e.g. "Bataclan" starts off with the classic "Ahceeed" cry from the Reims boot) of the Baumann era (sans guitar). The tracks are long and just fantastic, particularly the two part Anfa. 

The problem buyers face is that the Bandcamp site only gives relatively short samples, which for this kind of work - Anfa, for example, is over 37 minutes long - and it's hard to judge. A certain amount has to be taken on trust, and I'd strongly recommend this to any Tangs fan of the Baumann era. It's got all the dreamy mellotron bits (admittedly fake) and sequencer breaks you could wish for and good tunes to boot.

This is a promo video

Bandcamp

It's good to see you posting again Nick and thanks for the recommendations you have added I will be checking them all out. As you say, the Heron Oblivion album is really very good indeed and has been blowing me away too. A nostalgic late sixties style, West Coast, psychedelic bolt from the blue.

Edit* I should add that I had previously checked out Perge's Aural Coefficient album and bought it straight away, superb take off and tribute to TD in their pomp, yet in their own powerful Perge style. Thanks!

Black Mountain - IV

For those unfamiliar with them, they're Canadian, this is their fourth album (no way!) and they generally play a brand of rock that's firmly rooted in the 70s.

Apart from a soundtrack album, this is their first for 6 years and is a bit different, in that it incorporates differing styles.  So, for example the opener Mothers Of The Sun has proggy overtones:

But the next track, Florian Saucer Attack, could almost be a Rezillos song:

The rest of the album's the usual great Black Mountain stuff, but special mention to the dreamy closer Space To Bakersfield, a slow burner that is already of of my favourite tracks of theirs.

Available from Bandcamp as a 24/96 Flac

Thanks for Heron Oblivion recommendations. Just bought the vinyl and thoroughly enjoyed it.

I know Ethan Miller from Howlin Rain and Comets on Fire but had not heard of Heron Oblivion.

prem.

All Them Witches - Dying Surfer Meets His Maker

Um. Another cheat - this came out at the back end of 2015, but they're so good...

This is the latest studio album by a Nashville quartet (guitar, bass <he sings, strums, finger-picks> , drums, Hohner piano) who straddle genres to an extent. Their fans and their Bandcamp tags will have you believe they're a stoner band (and they could be), but they're more than that - their roots are in a traditional bluesy rock but with good tunes. At times they can sound like the Doors (try the second song in the second, live, video I post later - Funeral for a Great Drunken Bird) and Drive-By Truckers, but the overriding feeling, for me at least, is if J.J. Cale had formed a rock band. And no, there's nothing here to challenge Cocaine etc., but they're damn good.

The studio album is very good indeed, a mixture of light and shade, as exemplified by this track, Talisman:

Live, they're huge, and predictably heavier, but still with that Southern twang to them. The band released a series of 24 bit downloads on Bandcamp from their recent European tour and I was lucky enough to catch the Brussels gig before their record label made them take them down. However, the official video of that gig is still available, and I'd heartily recommend a listen as well as investigating their other (older) live albums that still remain on Bandcamp.

Hi Bruce,

Thanks for a good thread ...I will be diving into some of these.

I agree that threads with album/movie covers is of little interest to me, I want to hear what the poster thought and why.

M

Here is an album that has been gradually worming its way into my affections for a few weeks. My Bubba 'Big Bad good'

Could not be more different to the howling feedback of Heron Oblivion! My and Bubba are two young Scandinavian women who produce minimal, homespun folk tunes with a bit of close harmony and very simple accompaniment. It is full of charm but perhaps a bit too lightweight for some. The songs are delicate and only just 'there' yet I think have enough I think to sustain the interest, and after a month I've kept coming back and listening in the quiet of an evening. Their 2 previous releases are similar, the second one closest to this in style.

The website has a sample of the title track, check out the videos and in particular the NPR All Songs Tiny Desk performance (which is how I found them). I think you'd have to be hard hearted not to like the first song of this set.

http://www.ohmybubba.com/

Bruce

Ok folks, I'll chug on with something else

Mary Chapin Carpenter 'The Things That We Are Made Of'

MCC has hardly broken the mould with this but she has moved away from the AOR/country rock of 10 years ago to an album of mid/slow spaced tracks and fairly simple production all sung with her lovely honeyed voice. The lyrics are full of her usual warmth and gentle melancholy.The album could be trimmed by one or two songs maybe but there are several that stand up with some of her best. My wife has it on repeat play, and each time I listen I get more out of it too.

Unspectacular but high quality American country folk

http://www.marychapincarpenter.com/home/

http://pitchfork.com/reviews/a...that-we-are-made-of/

Bruce

Purson - Desire's Magic Theatre

Now I know this lot have been mentioned in passing before, and I accept that they may not be to everyone's taste, but this latest album is such great fun.

Imagine Shocking Pink with Rosie Vela as vocalist with a touch of Glam and Psych and that's this. I find it hard not to listen to this without a smile.

This live album, here in its entirety, is my current favorite. I'm hesitant to recommend it because it's so different from the other stuff in this thread. I like it because it seems to tell a story. I'm not sure what the story is, but I keep thinking abut it. And I really wish I'd been at the concert.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?...uXKvDNjhJrz6Cnwl01j7

As quite a few of us on here like early Tangerine Dream, particularly the Froese/Franke/Baumann line up I nominate:

Peter Baumann - Machines of Desire

A brand new release which has enough references to those classic albums he featured on. There are moody soundscapes, sequencer runs and some decent melody lines on top. This release was stimulated by getting back in contact with Edgar Froese to discuss a collaboration. That idea came to nought with Edgar's untimely death so he put his energies into this solo work. 

Samples available on his website at

http://www.bureau-b.com/peterbaumann.php

I think this is superb after only one listen.

Richard S posted:

As quite a few of us on here like early Tangerine Dream, particularly the Froese/Franke/Baumann line up I nominate:

 

Peter Baumann - Machines of Desire

A brand new release which has enough references to those classic albums he featured on. There are moody soundscapes, sequencer runs and some decent melody lines on top. This release was stimulated by getting back in contact with Edgar Froese to discuss a collaboration. That idea came to nought with Edgar's untimely death so he put his energies into this solo work. 

 

Samples available on his website at

http://www.bureau-b.com/peterbaumann.php

I think this is superb after only one listen.

Thanks for this one Richard, I was totally unaware of it until your posting. I look forward to listening later on. 

Steve

Here is a cracking new album from old artists.

case/lang/veirs

As in Neko Case, KD Lang, Laura Veirs. I guess from those names you will know if you are interested or not. The collaboration works well, each bringing their distinctive style but it still sounds like a combined effort not a compilation and the song-writing is excellent. In a few places when they really harmonise they sound fantastic together.

From pitchforkmedia

What are the stakes with a collaborative record like this? It probably won’t yield a follow-up, but it’d be a gift if it did. None of the participants had suffered a lapse in her powers and needed reviving, though the newsworthiness of the collaboration should hopefully introduce a generation of listeners to their respective deep catalogues (particularly lang's). case/lang/veirs isn’t a springboard or a resting place—it's a tribute to connection, communion, and reflection on the things that bind us. And it feels particularly significant and sanctuary-like for the fractured times that we live in. “I just want, I wanna be here with you,” they sing in unison. “Not bracing for what comes next.”

Bruce

Thanks to J.N. & Nick From Suffolk for introducing me to Big Big Train. Definitely very Genesis/Floyd influences but with a nice "Englishness" about them. A bit old-fashioned I suppose but lovely melodies and thoughtful lyrics.  I downloaded their latest album, "folklore", from their site in HD - 

....and although it's very good, I prefer an earlier album, "The Underfall Yard", which has rather simpler, better focussed, less rambling tracks :-

Not sure this qualifies as "Best New Music of 2016", in fact I know it doesn't, but I could n't think of better place to share. 

Internet Archives has released approx 1000 hours of meticulously curated material by a chap called David W Niven. 

It's free to download (650GB) FLAC material. The recordings themselves are ropey, but his commentary is homely. I think it's like finding a time capsule. 

I'm absolutely thrilled with the find, and hope you are too. 

Link: https://archive.org/details/da...downloads&page=3

Rich

ps. Love the My Bubba album. 

Edit* 1000 hours of meticulously curated "Early Jazz" material

Bruce Woodhouse posted:

Here is a cracking new album from old artists.

case/lang/veirs

As in Neko Case, KD Lang, Laura Veirs. I guess from those names you will know if you are interested or not. The collaboration works well, each bringing their distinctive style but it still sounds like a combined effort not a compilation and the song-writing is excellent. In a few places when they really harmonise they sound fantastic together.

From pitchforkmedia

What are the stakes with a collaborative record like this? It probably won’t yield a follow-up, but it’d be a gift if it did. None of the participants had suffered a lapse in her powers and needed reviving, though the newsworthiness of the collaboration should hopefully introduce a generation of listeners to their respective deep catalogues (particularly lang's). case/lang/veirs isn’t a springboard or a resting place—it's a tribute to connection, communion, and reflection on the things that bind us. And it feels particularly significant and sanctuary-like for the fractured times that we live in. “I just want, I wanna be here with you,” they sing in unison. “Not bracing for what comes next.”

Bruce

If people are interested this is a link to Oregon Public Broadcasting video appearance by the ladies performing the new album.

 http://www.npr.org/event/music...erform-their-new-alb

regards, Jeff A