Last Friday saw the triumphant return of Leeds based trio Beige Palace, the band joining together with London’ Cassels for a new split 7”. Out via Human Worth and God Unknown Records, “Waterloo Sublet” breaks a four year absence for Beige Palace, their first new music since the gloriously unnerving Leg LP.
With his debut album Embarrassingly Hard due out April 20th via Tallahassee’s RIP Records, we meet Vincent Reese aka “Vicious Vinnie,” a project that’s as much sketch show as it is punk band. Drawing influences from Beastie Boys, Le Tigre, and Viagra Boys, there’s a sordid comedic sense to his stoned brand of anything goes charm.
Can’t Make Any Promises is Radiator Hospital’s first new record in four years. Their fifth album for Salinas Records (Quaker Wedding, Freezing Cold, Vacation) comes exactly twenty years to the day of the label’s first release, and if that ain’t reason to celebrate, the music is. Recorded in their Philly practice space, they’ve never sounded better.
Following a string of singles and EPs, Philadelphia’s Ruah are set to release Ruwa, the project’s brooding full length debut. “Synthesized Skies” is the record’s second single (following “Guidance”), a song that slinks and crawls along a creaky bed of analog carnage, grinding bass, and atmosphere so thick it threatens to strangle it all.
While the project’s last full length, Remember The Future? Vol. 2 & 1, was full of futuristic sheen, there’s something special about their upcoming “mixtape” BUBBLE, due out April 14th via Marthouse Records (Gut Health, Bench Press, Heir Traffic). Recorded solo by Dougal Shaw, the record leans on programmed drums and heavy synths.
The New Country Sounds of Ryan Wong really says it all with the title. Best known for Cool Ghouls and Supreme Joy, Wong has carved a niche in the world of garage psych, flipping between twang and fuzz. With his second solo effort, he’s embraced that twang and filtered out most everything else, opting for earnest DIY country tunes.
Chicago’s Ovef Ow have been making synth heavy art punk for the better part of the last ten years, pulling influences that seem to range from B-52s and Devo to The Raincoats and Sleater-Kinney. Agitations is met with upbeat party anthems, paired together to create a swarm of new wave jangle and rough but friendly post-punk.
Kian Sorouri has played in a lot of great bands, contributing as a member and collaborator through the years to Loose Tooth, Golden Apples, and Cave People. With Goshupon, the Philadelphia based musician is moving into a lead role, bringing to live his own songs, recorded piecemeal with friends at home and in studios around town.
Cincinnati’s Strobobean are the very definition of electricity. Since forming in 2018 by Katrina Eresman and Jake Langknecht, they’ve wasted no time in introducing the world to their unique sound. Now, they welcome Rae Fisher into the fold as their new bassist and are ready to conquer the dance floor with their new single “Kitchen”.
When a shift in Tetchy’s line-up led to an uncertain future, Maggie Denning decided to write and record home demos on her phone, a simple exercise to keep the creativity flowing. Those demos took on a life of their own, taking shape as the latest Tetchy record, the minimalist and psychedelic Smaller / Better EP.
Spiritual Pollution, due out April 7th via Erste Theke Tontraeger (Pinch Points, Crisis Man), takes everything that made the project’s debut an underground favorite and expands on the ideas with added muscle, live drums (courtesy of Andrew Oswald) and a refined sonic focus that adds clarity without stripping the raw tension.
For Kosmetika, true craftsmanship lies in the details. “House,” the second single from the Melbourne art-punks’ new album, Illustration (due April 21 on Spoilsport Records), feels instantly familiar and comfortable. It’s full of new wave signifiers, settling nicely in the middle of a Venn diagram that includes Charlie, Le Tigre’s, and ESG.
The solo project of John Toohill, Science Man is mutant experimentation gone awry, a transmission of disgust from the gutter, as enthusiastically weird as it is forever menacing. It’s a hardcore band, to be sure, but Science Man has become as much an art project, with a cinematic component that’s become increasingly engrained in Toohill’s work.
When the days begin to run you ragged, you can always turn to the music of Lisa/Liza for an escape parts gentle, understanding, and beautiful. Set to release her new album Breaking And Mending via Orindal Records on April 28th, it’s an album that feels one with nature, a record that shines like the sun cutting through the tallest of trees.
