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 list is in alphabetical order and we sincerely recommend checking out all the music we've 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 top-notch quality too.
JESSICA PRATT | “World On A String”
Jessica Pratt recently announced Here In The Pitch, her highly anticipated new album, would be out in May via Mexican Summer Records (L’Rain, Mega Bog, No Joy), led by “Life Is,” a beautiful song that was sparked with a rare inclusion of drums. While that might be an outlier on the upcoming record, Pratt’s stunning paisley psych sounds just as intriguing on second single, “World On A String”. Warm acoustics and breezy folk music blend together with the dreamy essence that seems to come so naturally to the Los Angeles based songwriter, creating something gentle but mysterious. Pratt’s voice warbles between her lower register and a floating croon to create the perfect lullaby of wistful reflections, sunny visions, and sweeping strings.
MELKBELLY | “KMS Express b/w Precious Cargo”
Chicago’s Melkbelly have returned! Three years after the band’s last single, the quartet are back with two new songs, a pairing that leans into both their chaotic noise rock tendencies and their knack for ultra-catchy rippers. While both songs stand immaculately on their own, it’s the combination of the two that points toward the depth and complexity of their music - rhythms gone berserk only to drop out and stampede back into sight, guitar riffs that melt and warp, and the range of Miranda Winters’ always captivating vocals. Melkbelly remain in a league their own, a band capable of paint peeling shredding, blunted hypnotic repetition, primal force, stadium sized hooks, and brilliantly deranged structures. “KMS Express” is another mind-altering addition to a perfect catalog, two songs that evolve upon repeat listens.
ROC MARCIANO | “Marciology” LP
Roc Marciano has positioned himself over the years as both an acquired taste for some and one of the best to ever do it to everyone else. The Hempstead based MC is a living legend, a rapper that carved his own path, with raw unflinching lyrics, equal parts poetic and menacing, the grace and the dirt. Roc Marciano is cut from the same cloth as Ghostface Killah, Rakim, and Pimp C, an MC that feels larger than life, his tales of the streets only balanced by his sense of humor. Marciology, produced by Marci, The Alchemist, and Animoss, is full of tight loops and hard rhymes. The bar for bar punches take some unpacking (as do all the best Marci records), he’s talking with shit with artistic elegance and patience, his intricate rhyme schemes delivered with both a sinister sneer and a braggadocios smirk.
VESSEL | “Blonde”
Atlanta’s Vessel took their time with Wrapped In Cellophane, a marvelous record of immersive songs and vibrant grooves. Their music is dynamic, bouncing through disjointed skronk one moment and intertwined in dense melodies the next. Led by Alex Tuisku, who handles vocals and drums, it makes sense that the rhythms and hooks are tangled, bright spots with a locked-in pulse. “Blonde” offers a grave lyrical heaviness, a song about “a lesbian love affair unfolding in a psych ward and ending in tragedy”. While a somber tale of life and love lost, Vessel create an engaging and up-beat structure, the tempo slightly pulled back from their more exuberant songs. The saxophone glides into a mesmerizing groove with both the bass and drums, as the band swirl into an extended instrumental, reflection in motorik abandon.
YOUBET | “Nurture”
As we eagerly await the release of youbet’s second album, Way To Be, out via Hardly Art (Lala Lala, Shana Cleveland, Caution) on May 10th, it would seem that each successive single is destined to outshine the last. It’s a near impossible task that’s proving to be all too true with the slinking art pop disorientation of “Nurture,” the album’s third single. A staple of the band’s live sets, there’s a hazy groove to it that sits deep in the pocket, a tumbling backbone for Nick Llobet’s profound songwriting, layered guitars, and the gorgeously knotted hooks. “Nurture” is an undeniable earworm, a song that jangles and sputters in equal measure, the warm tones bent and pitch shifted into syrupy escapist melodies. It’s weirdly accessible and accessibly weird.
Further Listening:
ADVERSARIAL “Merging Within The Destroyer” | AKIRA KOSEMURA & LAWRENCE ENGLISH “Thela” | ASEETHE “Last Time I Do Anything For A Fucking Friend Ever” | ATRAE BILIS “Inward To Abraxas” | BAD BREEDING “Discipline” | BIG|BRAVE "canon : in canon" | BNNY “Something Blue” | CAVALIER “Custard Spoon” | CHASTITY BELT “Laugh” | CRUMB “Amama” | CULT LEADER “Learn To Love It” | D.SABLU “Scandalous” | DR SURE’S UNUSUAL PRACTICE “Keeps Ya Head Up” | FLORAL PRINT “Ecco/Flipper” | FULL OF HELL “Gasping Dusk” | GEO “You Are All Strange” | MARINA ALLEN “Red Cloud” | MOOCH & DJ MUGGS “Roc Star” LP | MORTAL WOUND “Found Dead In A Bush” | OLD IRON “Fractal Storm EP” | SEQUESTRUM / SNET “Split” | SIX ORGANS OF ADMITTANCE “New Year’s Song” | SLEATER-KINNEY “Live on KEXP” | SOUL GLO “Tiny Desk Concert” | SUN JUNE “Live on KEXP” | TAXIDERMISTS “KO EP” | TZOMPANTLI “Tlayohualli” | VARIETY “Pooling Rain” | WOODSTOCK ’99 “Hotter than a Half-Fucked Fox in a Forest Fire” | WRETCHED BLESSING “Spurious Ovation” | WRITHING SQUARES “LEM” | ZERO POINT ENERGY “Closer To You”