by Dan Goldin (@post_trash_)
Welcome to FUZZY MEADOWS, our weekly recap of this week's new music. We're sharing our favorite releases of the week in the form of albums, singles, and music videos along with the "further listening" section of new and notable releases from around the web. It's generally written in the early hours of the morning and semi-unedited... but full of love and heart. The number rankings are arbitrary and we sincerely recommend checking out all the music included. There's a lot of great new music being released. Support the bands you love. Spread the word and buy some new music.
*Disclaimer: We are making a conscious effort not to include any artist in our countdown on back-to-back weeks in order to diversify the feature, so be sure to check the "further listening" as well because it's often of "countdown" quality too.
NOVEMBER 13TH TO NOVEMBER 19TH
1. BAD HISTORY MONTH | "A Warm Recollection"
Bad History Month's "A Warm Recollection" is one of the most stunning lyrical performances on a record that's filled with them. The partially animated video, directed by Adric Giles, captures our familiar cowboy as he ventures through his own existence, the rapid clips portraying the song's visual lyrics with quick succession. As Sean Bean's lyrics turn toward an absurdist approach to a lifetime of existential dread and a future of bodiless rich that can never die, our protagonist finds himself looking into the premiere, a vision of celestial lights amid the otherwise mundane occurrences of his existence.
2. BIRTHING HIPS | "Urge To Merge" LP
it's hard to believe this is the end for Birthing Hips. Urge To Merge is one of the best albums we've heard this year, a demented and depraved record of experimental post-punk and noise pop perfection. While last year's No Sorry was an exceptional debut, Urge To Merge's unpredictable blend of avant-garde and brilliantly damaged art-pop is stunning in execution. Unique and highly capable musicians, their sophomore record is manic and free, both more spastic and polished than it's predecessor. A timeless statement of structural freedom, incredible musicianship, and omnipresent personality. Birthing Hips forever.
3. THE ROYAL THEY | "Sludgefucker"
Opening with a fuzzy riff and Michelle Hutt's dizzying vocal melody, she sardonically sings "I'm so happy to be happy, I don't even know what I'm happy for". Then, the sludge comes. The Royal They dive into violent distortion and a brutal downbeat amid a primal onslaught of drums. momentarily abandoning all hope and simply ripping with glorious intensity. Just as everything threatens to spiral out of control, the band lurk back into a hypnotic groove and a false sense of calm. Spoiler alert: it doesn't last. As Hutt and Darrell Dumas' guitars begin to stab through the jittery riffs, drummer Rick Martinez goes brilliantly berserk, pounding out crashing polyrhythms that would make Lightning Bolt's Brian Chippendale proud. The band snap back into the verse before swelling into a crescendo, finally erupting into a rapid succession of everything that came before in a calculated mess of noise and anxious energy.
4. DOVE LADY | "E" EP
Andrew Thawley (drums/vocals) and Jeremy Ray (guitar/vocals) really shine in the light of unpredictability. From the jazzy chamber-pop introduction of "DZ Theme" to the song's explosive outpour of jagged fury, the band weave back and forth between distraught melodies and loose time shifts. There's an undeniable chemistry between them, an impressive ability to sputter and spazz in perfect synchronicity. Dove Lady's songs rarely end in the same place they start ("Bonekeh" comes closest) but even as they hop genres and dismantle common structures, their brilliant sprawl feels exploratory and never self-indulgent. Dove Lady take us to extremes and back again, pulling our senses in every direction with the greatest of ease.
5. PALEHOUND | "Sea Of Blood"
"Sea Of Blood," the b-side to an upcoming Palehound 7" due out on Saddle Creek Records, is part lullaby repetition and part ominous ramshackle twee. The song's simplicity is really brilliant, wrapping itself in circular patterns as Ellen Kempner's vocal melodies lock into gorgeous loops, joyously singing, "I'm every bit as fragile as a baby bird, a baby bird, a baby bird. All I want is to unravel to a sea of blood, a sea of blood, a sea of blood". By the second verses repetition of the first, the vocals begin to layer, the guitars spike, there's whistling, and everything feels triumphantly haphazard.
6. TERA MELOS | "Audiotree Live"
Tera Melos' lastest album Trash Generator finds the band heading deeper into prog territory than ever before on a profound record that really tests their limits. The songs are still tangled and disjointed, never settling into one place for too long, locking into disorienting grooves and dismantling them just as quickly. Their recent Audiotree session has the band flawlessly digging into five of that record's songs (and one older track), squiggling through every twist and turn of colorful distortion, shifting rhythms, and the plodding feedback that make them the legendary band they are.
NOVEMBER 20TH TO NOVEMBER 26TH
1. GLASSJAW | "Shira"
Glassjaw have returned. It's been fifteen years since the band released their last full length, Worship & Tribute, and it was beginning to seem as though we may never get another one. Following a few EPs and stand-alone singles over the past decade, the Long Island post-hardcore luminaries are set to release Material Control this coming Friday, December 1st and if lead single "Shira" is anything to go by, the band sound as brutal and vibrant as ever. Sounding like classic Glassjaw (with a hint of Deftones influence), the song digs in, grinds through detached distortion and a crushing low end churn, led by Daryl Palumbo's ever acrobatic vocals. It's a welcome return with the band in fine form.
2. SLIP DISCO | "Same Day Delivery"
Slip Disco, the duo of Two Inch Astronaut's Sam Goblin and Matt Gatwood, like to keep things on the softer side. Their blend of grandiose indie rock, pop, and folk music is more straight forward than their main project, but no less stunning. "Same Day Delivery," a new single from the duo is warm and lush, a nuanced ballad that captures their yearning melodies and gentle layers without aggression. As guitars bubble and soar with intricately picked bliss, the song becomes increasingly dense, retaining it's beauty with gorgeous harmonies as the song expands and the tension builds.
3. RUNT | "Mazes" + "DWP"
Featuring members of Good Throb, Runt, a new London based punk band capture much of the same furious energy. Residing somewhere between hardcore and snotty punk abandon, their songs are relentless and bursting with animosity. First two singles "Mazes" and "DWP" are as great an introduction as they come, two quick blasts of scorn and shouted rave-ups that sound as frantic as they are immediate. Real fucking punk rock, full of angst, bile, and tempos that shift with an explosive looseness.
4. KRALLICE | "Go Be Forgotten" LP
Following their recent collaborative LP with Neurosis' Dave Edwardson, Brooklyn's own experimental black metal quartet Krallice are back with another new album, the demonic Go Be Forgotten. With elements of shoegaze, doom metal, noise rock, and math rock, there's a lot going on here, a specialty of Krallice's that well have you listening on repeat as you try to process their calculated destruction. It's rigid in a near progressive way, nearly orchestral at times, but the unpredictable nature of their howling menace is constantly captivating, grinding with movements of unspeakable metal cacophony from the depths of hell.
Further Listening:
NOVEMBER 13TH TO NOVEMBER 19TH
BEVERLY TENDER "What Have You Done To My Water?" EP | OPERATOR MUSIC BAND "Alarmed" | DATE STUFF "Long Con" (Audiotree Session) | BEE BEE SEA "D.I. Why Why Why" | FITS "All Belief Is Paradise" LP | LITTLEFOOT "Lavender" EP | DEATHSNACK "Homes" EP | FURNSSS "Furnsss" EP | SCREAMING FEMALES "Deeply" | YOUNG JESUS "Feeling" | FIRE HEADS "Park Walker" | HIS ELECTRO BLUE VOICE "Onieut" | HOVVDY "Late" | HIGH PONY "Forever Since The Sky" | CALVIN LECOMPTE "Love Is Something We Give Away For Free" | THE SHE'S "All Female Rock And Roll Quartet" LP | ANNA BURCH "Asking 4 A Friend" | BJÖRK "Blissing Me" | HEATERS "Black Bolt" | FIRE IS MOTION "Still, I Try" EP | GODFLESH "Be God"
NOVEMBER 20TH TO NOVEMBER 26TH
PILE "Dogs" | PRETTIEST EYES "Pools" LP | HARMONY TIVIDAD "You Feel It More That Way" EP | NEW HOLLAND "Alligator" | HIS ELECTRO BLUE VOICE "Mental Hoop" LP | SALAD BOYS "Psych Slasher" | LARS FINBERG "Born Shopping" | MIND SPIDERS "Outside" | BIG K.R.I.T. "Ready For The Next" | OPEN CITY "City Of Ash" EP | NAP "Clean Energy" | GROOMS "Softer Now" | ROBERT EARL THOMAS "Another Age" | GINGERLYS "Turtledoves"