Further Listening:

5. Listen To Something Wholly New This Spring

The New Spring is the musical project of Copenhagen-based songwriter Bastian Kallesøe. For the first time on his upcoming album, Wholly Wholly, Bastian has recruited a band to perform live with him, an enlightening idea, as he explains, “The New Spring will probably always have some form of moronic loneliness attached to it, but it has a way of lighting up when other people get involved.”

Ahead of Wholly Wholly’s release next month, Bastian has this week shared the latest single from it, Gershwin’s Invisible Year. The opening track to the album, the song is based around Gershwin’s birth and is part of what Bastian describes as a, “loose circular movement”, throughout the album. Musically, the track blends a Bill Callahan like baritone with gently off-key guitars Sparklehorse would be proud of and distant wheezing electronics. Ambitious, intelligent and increasingly accessible, The New Spring might just have made one of this Spring’s finest albums.

Wholly Wholly is out February 2nd via Tambourhinoceros. Click HERE for more information on The New Spring.

4. Kraków Loves The Rapture

Having previously premiered the stunning American Boy, we’re huge fans of Hamburg-duo Kraków Loves Adana. The band are set to release their forthcoming album, Songs After The Blue, in April, and have this week shared the second taste of that record in the shape of new single, Rapture.

The song is a tribute to the enduring romance of the cassette player, as Deniz explains, “with the walkman making music a private experience, with the mixtape reflecting romance, with its shabby sound embodying a somehow misplaced nostalgia.” Like the romanticism of the cassette itself, the track seems to hark back to a simpler time, the teenage escapism, throwing headphones on and drowning out the difficult emotions of reality. The sense of freedom is embraced into Deniz’s very core as she repeatedly sings of, “the rapture of my heart, of my rebel heart”. With its simplistic rhythms and gentle drifting melodies, Rapture is a perfect soundtrack to throwing on a pair of headphones and wandering aimlessly into the star-lit night, for three and a half minutes, all the troubles of the world will simply have to wait.

Songs After The Blue is out April 6th via Better Call Rob. Click HERE for more information on Kraków Loves Adana.

3. Night Flowers Are Losing It

One day we really hope we’ll be able to bring you the news that Night Flowers’ debut album has a release date: this however is sadly not that day. On the plus side, the band have this week shared their excellent new single, Losing The Light, alongside the promise that they are, “putting the finishing touches to their debut album”, which is certainly worthy of some mild rejoicing.

Clever buggers that they are, just as we’re about to give up and move on, Night Flowers seem to always release a heartbreakingly brilliant single, and we’re hooked all over again; Losing The Light is no different. With its metronomic snare drum, rolling bass lines and rapid-fire guitar jangle, it’s a gorgeous slice of dream-pop. Vocally they’ve never sounded better Sophia’s vocal soaring and diving as she recounts tails of desire and despair, topped by the cutting chorus line, “darling, I see you falling and I do nothing”.  The accompanying video is equally charming, a slow motion exploration as singer Sophia Pettit re-discovers the city she lives in. As the band put it, “a video that celebrates the importance of living in the moment”: maybe a bit less of that and we might have that album already!

Night Flowers are readying their debut album, out this year on Dirty Bingo Records. Click HERE for more information on Night Flowers.

2. Très Oui Est Très Bonne

Philadelphia jangle-popper Literature released one of our favourite records of 2015, and then we didn’t really hear much else from them. Thankfully filling that hole in our hearts this year will be Très Oui, the new project from Literature singer Nate Cardaci, who are set to release their debut album, Poised To Flourish, next month and have this week shared new single, Red Wine & Dry Ice.

Red Wine & Dry Ice is a fascinatingly frenetic piece of songwriting; guitar-lines rush out of the speakers, matched in Nate’s tumbling, lithe vocal style. The track has something of the collegiate stylings of Vampire Weekend, melded with the urgent jangle-pop of Expert Alterations of Sea Pinks. Like so much of the best indie-pop, here Très Oui’s urgency and energy plays off against a quiet melancholy, showcased in the closing line as the music fades out and Nate concludes, “I wanted you too.”  An exciting new chapter for this ever intriguing songwriter, Poised To Flourish? We wouldn’t bet against it.

Poised To Flourish is out February 9th via Shrimper/Revolver. Click HERE for more information on Très Oui.

1. Pillow Queens Are Your New Favourite 

It was in the inimitable setting of a train shed in Derbyshire that we first stumbled across the music of queer, Irish, indie-types, Pillow Queens. Now signed to Specialist Subject, the band are set to release their new EP, State Of The State, in March and have this week shared new single, Favourite.

Described by the band as, “a maniacal composition about self-delusion”, Favourite is a fine example of the Pillow Queens sound, comprising of stunning over-lapping vocal lines, fizzing hook laden guitar lines and quietly complex rhythmic ideas. The product of a year spent touring and crafting their sound, State Of The States looks like it’s going to be a giant step-forward for Pillow Queens; a band discovering their sound and learning that with their music, there truly is no limit to what can be achieved.

State Of The State is out March 16th via Specialist Subject Records. Click HERE for more information on Pillow Queens.

Header photo by Paul Gerrard – https://www.flickr.com/photos/paulgerrard/