Further Listening:

5. Daneshevskaya Takes Flight

Daneshevskaya, the project of New York-based musician and preschool social worker Anna Beckerman, appeared on these pages back in June when she shared her excellent single, Somewhere In The Middle. Raised in a family of musicians, with the understanding that, “the fun part of music is connecting with people”, Anna will get the opportunity to connect with a whole lot more people with the week’s announcement of her upcoming album, Long Is The Tunnel, due in November via Winspear. Ahead of the release, this week Anna shared the second track to be lifted from the record, Big Bird.

Discussing Big Bird, Anna is keen to point out the most literal interpretation of the lyrics, suggesting the song is about, “when a big bird swoops down and everyone in the area stops to look at it together“. Drilling further, she notes the power of a moment like that to spark a crowd into collective glee, “I like moments like that where everyone is childlike and curious“. Musically, the track started life as a demo Anna made on Garageband on her phone, and many of the qualities of that initial creative streak remain, the track exists in a loop, the lyrics and melodies repeating in an endless spiral. Within that loop, the production and instrumentation are ever-changing. From the initial arpeggiated piano chord, the track explodes into moments of shoegaze-like noise, then like a wave breaks down to almost nothing, before building and crashing, again and again, building and crashing. It has an almost hypnotic quality, burrowing its way into your mind, creating a song that at times feels like it joyously may never end, even though it is barely two and half a minute long. While there are enough familiar ideas here to draw you, there’s also something distinct about the music Daneshevskaya is making, her musical vision seems to exist just to one side of the norm and as a result is subtly intriguing enough to suggest Long Is The Tunnel can’t come soon enough.

Long Is The Tunnel is out November 10th via Winspear. For more information on Daneshevskaya visit https://bio.to/daneshevskaya.

4. Steph Green Tears Are Raining Down From The Sky

It was back at the start of 2022 that the world last heard from Steph Green, that was around the release of her debut album, Thanks for That, a record she suggested would, “make you both laugh and feel the good kind of crappy”. For her next move, Steph borrowed a 16-track reel-to-reel, set it up in her home studio, and alongside regular collaborator Duff Thompson got to work. The result is Steph’s second album, Lore, “a series of vignettes that immerse the listener in dreams and nightmares of the West”, which will see the light of day in October. Ahead of the release, this week Steph shared the first taster of the record, in the shape of her new single, Teardrop Skies.

Described by Steph as, “a short horror story”, Teardrop Skies takes place under stormy skies, starting with a thunderclap, before our protagonist heads out into the dark damp night, pursued by the ghosts of her past, destined to walk the streets forever, “under wailing teardrop skies”. The tall tale is set to a backing that itself has a certain noir quality, the shuffling drum-beat has a gothic-Americana feel as if it was lifted from a down-on-its-luck Diner that should have closed decades ago but somehow just about keeps its door open as the dust gathers. The musical sands are constantly shifting, but in that subtle way you barely notice as they enter and leave. We’re greeted by a wavering organ and joined along the way by the pensive howl of lap steel, a shuffling shaker, and a nagging guitar line that wouldn’t sound out of place on a record by Cass McCombs or Vera Sola. A record that blurs the lines between fiction and reality Lore is in the lineage as much of Edgar Allan Poe and Stephen King as it is its diverse musical forebears, a ghost story put to music that’s every bit as unnerving as it is thrilling.

Lore is out October 20th via Mashed Potato Records. For more information on Steph Green visit https://www.stephgreensongs.com/.

3. Tapir! Get The Party Satied

Back in May, Tapir! shared their intriguing, and intriguingly titled EP, Act 1 (The Pilgrim). The first chapter of their debut “multidisciplinary narrative album”, The Pilgrim introduced us to the band’s central character, The Pilgrim, and their adventures into a mysterious land as they seek to unearth the land’s history. So far, so fabulously prog-rock – this week the band shared the album’s second slice, Act 2 (Their God). Described as the most, “melodramatic and theatrical“, Tapir! celebrated the release by sharing their new Erik Satie referencing single, Gymnopédie.

Act 2 finds The Pilgrim in a new setting as Tapir! explain, “water and the ocean take centre stage this time“, and this is evident in the waltzing rhythms of Gymnopédie, an idea that, “adds to that feeling of endlessly riding the waves on the sea”. Despite the grandiose Scott Walker-esque flourishes of strings and brass, Gymnopédie also has a certain intimate feeling to it, the tick of the drum machine and half-whispered vocals bringing to mind the likes of Sweet Baboo or Leonard Cohen in the 1980s. Some bands when they’re just getting going have a tendency to play it quite safe, yet Tapir! seem to have gone to the opposite extreme, they’ve created something vast and exciting, a world dripping with creativity and mystery and hinting at a band with no limit to where their ambitions could take them.

Act 2 (Their God) is out now via Heavenly Recordings. For more information on Tapir! visit https://tapir-exclamation-mark.bandcamp.com/.

2. Katy Kirby Looks Like A Real Diamond

It was back at the start of 2021 that the world last heard from Katy Kirby, when she teamed up with Keeled Scales to share the critically lauded Cool Dry Place, that landed in many publications’ Album of the Year lists, including my own. With high-profile festival slots at End Of The Road and Electric Picnic taking place this weekend, Katy marked the occasion by announcing she has signed with ANTI-Records as well as sharing her brand new single, Cubic Zirconia.

A song Katy has been trying to write, “for nearly four years”, Cubic Zirconia, “came into focus for me when I fell in love with a girl for the first time“. The song explores ideas of aesthetics and artifice, how we value naturalness and scorn the artificial, from makeup and clothing, through to mannerisms and giant fake diamonds! As Katy explains, “the line between authentic/fake, natural/unnatural, organic/synthetic artificial/genuine is hopelessly thin. Insofar as it’s a line that shifts constantly and doesn’t seem to be in anyone’s interest except the people who’ve decided that they’re the most qualified to draw that line…what a sanctimonious little scam!” Musically, the track is Katy’s usual genre-blurring take on indie-pop and Americana, bringing to mind the likes of Lomelda or Faye Webster as wiry guitars play off against steady driving drums and swooping vocal melodies. Throughout the track swells and breaks, at one point the percussive/melodic middle ground of a piano comes clattering before the whole thing breaks down to almost nothing to be pieced back together for a final crescendo equal parts Big Thief and Tracy Chapman. It might just be a snapshot of where Katy’s music might be headed next, yet Cubic Zirconia glistens like the real deal, a little glimpse that suggests this hugely talented songwriter might just sound better than ever.

Cubic Zirconia is out now via ANTI- Records. For more information on Katy Kirby visit https://kirbykaty.com/.

1. Cheekface Aren’t Going Plastic Free Anytime Soon

A trio based out of Los Angeles, Cheekface has been making quite the splash since releasing their acclaimed second record, 2021’s Emphatically No, and its equally excellent follow-up Too Much To Ask. Earlier this Summer they sold out two nights at London’s Moth Club, and with plans for what comes next well underway, this week they shared a brand new single, Plastic.

Described by the band as a song, “about being an implacable people pleaser and the miracle of 3D printing“, Plastic appears in a slightly more minimal form than vocalist Greg Katz first intended, “originally, when me and [bassist] Mandy wrote it, it had a lot more bongos in it. But cooler heads prevailed, for better or worse”. The track seems to exist at something of a flash point where the instinct of a generation that wants to be helpful meets the potentially harmful nature of mass production as they almost robotically sing, “everything is grey now, do you like it? You know I only want it if you want it, whatever you need now, we can make it out of plastic”. Paired with a bass line bouncier than a trampoline, there’s a deliriously unhinged quality to the song, like listening to a voice assistant that is slowly melting under the pressure of society’s ever-spiralling demands. There’s even room for a glitchy existential crisis, as Greg enquires about the availability of recycling and is met with a dead-pan response, “It’s sorted”, delivered as if to say, it’s not sorted, so stop asking. With their ostensibly light-hearted lyrics and rambunctious take on guitar-pop, Cheekface could easily seem like a pastiche, yet what grounds them is that behind the jokes, there’s a truth that we’re not always willing to face, a surprisingly joyful soundtrack to an uncertain future that’s quite unlike anyone else.

Plastic is out now. For more information on Cheekface visit https://linktr.ee/cheekface.

Header photo is Cheekface by Brittany Rose Queen.