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An Alternative History of "Pop" Music: Part 3, 2004 -

Started by jamiefairlie, October 25, 2021, 04:39:14 AM

Previous topic - Next topic

Bently Sheds

Young Galaxy - Little Wave

Taken from their 5th album Falsework, Little Wave digs deeper into the band's love of 90s dance music, like a love letter to New Order.

In an interview at the time, the band expressed the opinion that thought they had the potential to break through to the Canadian mainstream and Falsework was their big push for that to happen. Stephen Ramsay stated that the tour for this record was kind of 'a shit or bust" proposition.

They self released their following album and went on indefinite hiatus soon after.

Norton Canes

#1321
Ooh, 2015. Nice

Hands up who likes big choruses? Damn, baby!

Alpine - Damn Baby


From their 2015 album Yuck


Norton Canes

By some bizarre and unnatural chain of circumstances this somehow contrived not to be a UK number one for twelve weeks

Unfathomable

Marina and the Diamonds - Froot


From their 2015 album of the same name

Norton Canes

#1323
What's that you say? You want a Kurdish Swede playing Kim Kardashian on acid in a post-apocalyptic environment where mankind's actions continue to tremble the power of the earth?

Go on, then

Zhala - Holy Bubbles


From her eponymously-titled 2015 album

There are those who would claim this video isn't entirely safe for work. Frankly I'm inclined to agree, so those of a prudish inclination who want a Zhala fix should head for Prince In The Jungle


Butchers Blind

The Lunar Laugh - Apollo


"Jared Lekites teams up with Connor Anderson forming the band The Lunar Laugh and tees up a "must-have" masterwork. Although this album is short, each song is instantly catchy and timeless pop that uses inspiration from the '60s and '70s without sounding too retro or imitative."

Ballad of Ballard Berkley

There's a nice cover of Michael Nesmith's Some of Shelly's Blues on that album too.


Ballad of Ballard Berkley

Ryley Walker - Primrose Green




Pastoral shades of Tim Buckley in swirling folk-jazz mode from this American singer-songwriter. Primrose Green is the title track of his second album, which features contributions from several noted Chicago jazz and experimental musicians.

jamiefairlie

Hintermass - Apple Tree

https://youtu.be/b5T0yWAopqc



Duo comprised of Jon Brooks (The Advisory Circle) and Tim Felton (formerly of Broadcast and Seeland).

From "In A Moment... Ghost Box "

"Electronic but also multi-instrumentally organic in the way that a hook-up between Popol Vuh or Ash Ra Tempel and acid-folk dons The Incredible String Band might be if both those acts were current; but then washed with a poised, contemporary sheen of interpretive, skilfully referenced analogue futurism."

jamiefairlie

Israel Nash - Willow

https://youtu.be/CzUKslu7L7I



Country rock singer-songwriter, originally from Missouri

From "Israel Nash's Silver Season"

"Last year Sturgill Simpson combined psychedelia and country music to great success. Israel Nash takes that idea to a tangential place, with results equally successful yet more likely attuned to those who reject anything with a twang."

jamiefairlie

Jessica Pratt - Greycedes

https://youtu.be/acI_oP07RIU



From "On Your Own Love Again"

"On Your Own Love Again is a poignant and melancholy listen; one filled with gentle warmth that rings just as appropriate for both a slowly rising morning or an unwinding evening with a glass or two of wine."

Butchers Blind

Greg Pope - Fanboy


Nashville's Greg Pope's been on a roll since Pop Monster in 2008, followed by Pete and Pop Motion Animation. Fanboy is another tour de force showcasing Pope's superb dynamics, one guitar pop classic after another with a unique melodic sense, always hitting the unexpected hook or chord.


Ballad of Ballard Berkley

Chromatics - Shadow




I've nominated these ghostly American dream-poppers before, so I won't regurgiate the biog. Originally released in 2015, this song was used to great effect in the TV sensation of 2017, Twin Peaks: The Return.

jamiefairlie

Killing Joke - Euphoria

https://youtu.be/LxCJQ4yHErM




From "Pylon "

"Pylon is sweet 16 for these 50-somethings, and honestly, it couldn't be sweeter; Killing Joke are still promoting the driving dynamics of post-punk, and still doing it better than the rest."

jamiefairlie

Lorna - Wayne Mills

https://youtu.be/JqvPJbwbjOo



6 piece indie/dreampop band stationed in Nottingham

From "London's Leaving Me"

"Gentle, warming and sun-lit, there's an endearing kind of sparseness to the nine tracks which is surprising, really, given that the band's made up of six multi-instrumental members. Violas, violins, bells, trumpets, flutes and the occasional electronics float in and out, with all the urgency of a lazy summer Sunday."

jamiefairlie

Low - What Part Of Me

https://youtu.be/exxRz-iVBlc



From "Ones And Sixes"

"It is arguable that Ones And Sixes is their most fully integrated album to date--a richly satisfying and coherent work drawing together many of the different strands of their career so far."

Ballad of Ballard Berkley

Quote from: jamiefairlie on May 15, 2022, 03:48:54 AMLorna - Wayne Mills

https://youtu.be/JqvPJbwbjOo

Some nice Belle & Sebastian vibes there. Speaking of whom...

Belle & Sebastian - Nobody's Empire




The undoubted highlight from their otherwise disappointing Girls in Peacetime Want to Dance album, this is Stuart Murdoch at his most nakedly autobiographical. I find it very moving.

QuoteWhile at university at the end of the 1980s, Murdoch became ill with myalgic encephalomyelitis, or chronic fatigue syndrome, and was unable to work for seven years. Murdoch said that the isolation of these years led to his becoming a songwriter: "That was a big desert at the time, a kind of vacuum in my life. From that, these songs started coming out, these melodies where I could express what I was feeling."

By early 1995 Murdoch had largely recovered from his illness and began to look for fellow musicians to form a band, which became Belle & Sebastian. Murdoch's struggle with chronic fatigue syndrome is the subject of the song Nobody's Empire on Belle & Sebastian's album Girls in Peacetime Want to Dance.


Meanwhile back in 2015...

Matthew E. White - Rock and Roll is Cold


From Fresh Blood, the second album of languid gospel and soul-tinged pop from Virginian musician Matthew E. White.

Natalie Prass - Bird of Prey


Matthew E. White also co-produced the self-titled debut album of dulcet-voiced singer/songwriter Natalie Prass (with whom he'd once formed a band in their schooldays), released in 2015.

Michael Rault - Lost Something


Michael Rault's poppy take on psych rock mines a similar seam of off-kilter wobbly sounds as his fellow Canadian Mac DeMarco. From his debut album Living Daylight.

jamiefairlie

Mercury Rev - Autumn's In The Air

https://youtu.be/HvLwVlxnnls




From "The Light In You "

"It's intimate enough to let you see the cold breath coming from the mouth of Donahue's park-prowling protagonist, while expansive enough to conjure the glow of the skyscrapers surrounding him. But The Light in You eventually lets go of urban tensions to revel in the psychedelia of nature."

jamiefairlie

Milky Wimpshake - Putting Things Right

https://youtu.be/AUQe08FGgbg



Lo-fi indie punk three-piece from Newcastle

From "Encore, Un Effort! "

"Milky Wimpshake's wry brand of acerbic, melodic indie-pop hits all the right notes "

jamiefairlie

Motorama - Lottery

https://youtu.be/tOYk7ArSg1Q




From "Poverty "

"subtle and bouncy as jangly guitars merge with dark brooding vocals like a meeting between Johnny Marr and Ian Curtis as occasional keyboard interludes add to the party creating one of those great Indie sounding ditty's that once filled the airwaves."

Ballad of Ballard Berkley

Cat's Eyes - The Duke of Burgundy




In 2014, writer/director Peter Strickland of Berberian Sound Studio renown asked the alt-pop duo Cat's Eyes to compose the soundtrack for his film The Duke of Burgundy. The soundtrack gained a commercial release in 2015.

Cat's Eyes are Faris Baldwin from the Horrors, and the soprano, composer and multi-instrumentalist Rachel Zeffira.

Gwenno - Calon Peiriant


From Y Dydd Olaf, the first solo album by Gwenno Saunders, formerly of The Pipettes. The album was inspired in part by a 1976 dystopian science fiction book of the same name by Owain Owain, and features vintage keyboard sounds, often to eerie and ethereal effect. The album had a limited release at the end of 2014, but a full-scale release in 2015, so I'm having this track here! The album is largely sung in Welsh, with one track in Cornish. According to noted Welsh language authority Wikipedia, this song's title translates to English as 'Heart of the Machine'.

Brundle-Fly

Lonesome Street - Blur  Released on Parlophone in 2015.





Mint (and choc chip flavoured) comeback single from Colchester's finest. Even fookin' Liam Gallagher admitted he loved it at the time.

The Magic Whip (stylised in Chinese text) is the eighth studio album by English rock band Blur. It was recorded in Hong Kong and London, and released by Parlophone on 27 April 2015 and Warner Bros. Records on 28 April 2015. It was the band's first studio album in 12 years since Think Tank (2003), marking the longest gap between studio albums in Blur's career, and the first in 16 years since 13 (1999) to have featured the original line-up (Coxon featuring on only one song on Think Tank). The album also marks the return of the band's longtime producer Stephen Street following Blur (1997).

The album received acclaim from music critics. It debuted at number one on the UK Albums Chart, marking Blur's sixth UK number-one album. It has been certified Gold by the British Phonographic Industry (BPI) for sales of over 100,000 copies. It is the first album by the band in North America under Warner Bros., after Blur were transferred from Virgin Records in 2013, following the purchase of EMI and its assets by the Universal Music Group in 2012.



Sharon Van Etten - I Don't Want to Let You Down


The title track of a five-track EP released in 2015, featuring material that didn't make the previous year's Are We There album, and something of a return to her earlier slightly less fussed-over style.

jamiefairlie

Nite Fields - You I Never Knew

https://youtu.be/lDqJrsQx7T4



Experimental / art-rock / electronic / post-punk / shoegaze band originally from Brisbane

From "Depersonalisation "

"The debut from Australia's Nite Fields conjures a nearly seamless union of vintage New Order, Clan of Xymox, and early Cure. Aligning foggy atmospherics with a basic rock setup, Depersonalisation is both somber and beautiful."

jamiefairlie

Prinzhorn Dance School - Education

https://youtu.be/yxy6SdOKlGc



English post punk duo founded around 2005 in Portsmouth

From "Home Economics"

"Prinzhorn Dance School 's third LP Home Economics is an even more spartan album than its predecessors, and on some levels it's a far richer listen. While the duo have been surgically removing elements from their music, a very human kind of warmth has crept in."

jamiefairlie

Public Service Broadcasting - Go!

https://youtu.be/BHIo6qwJarI



a London-based duo consisting of J. Willgoose, Esq. on guitar, banjo, other stringed instruments, samplings and electronic instruments; and Wrigglesworth on drums, piano and electronic instruments.

From "The Race For Space"

"Rich and evocative, The Race For Space is the sound of two young men gazing heavenwards and dreaming."