Wednesday – Rat Saw God
Alternative Rock
54%
music
Album Review: The Paper Kites – At The Roadhouse
Album Review: Hozier – Unreal Unearth
Top Tracks: Mikhail Laxton – Leaving You With Less
Sometimes a heart can be so broken that the pain bleeds out through the cracks to poison the world around you. That level of grief and betrayal turns the things you once saw through rose tinted lenses into something that now makes you see red. Places that once held happy memories become bitter reminders of what’s been lost. Pain that deep takes a long time to heal, even without constant salt in the wound, so sometimes the best course is to leave in search of a fresh start and never look back. ‘Leaving You With Less’ sees Mikhail Laxton channel that sorrow into something beautiful. Taken from his eponymous debut album, this single is paired wonderfully with a video that captures the despair and anger in a truly cinematic fashion. Mikhail’s vocals reside at the improbable perfect intersect between gritty earthiness, and the warmest, smoothest soul – elevated to even greater heights thanks to the track’s soaring harmonies. The guitar work curves and winds like a country road, and whenever you feel like you’ve heard all it has to offer it just keeps pulling you along. It’s like that urge to keep chasing the horizon as long as you can, just to be sure the past is no longer in your rear view mirror.
Top Tracks: Rosie H Sullivan – Fragments
Home is where the heart is, that’s what they say. But we share our hearts with a lot of people and places over the course of our lives; sometimes, if we’re lucky, we can form a connection to a place that runs far deeper. Sometimes true home is something inseparably entwined with your very soul. No matter how far you roam you still feel a tether binding you, pulling you back. No matter how much you grow, it is the earth that your roots cling to. No matter how much life may try to weather you down, a part of you is forever cut from that same stone. The new single from Scottish singer/songwriter Rosie H Sullivan perfectly captures that sentiment. ‘Fragments’, a loving ode to the Isle of Lewis, relates how home isn’t something you give a piece of yourself to – rather you yourself are always a part of it. That love just radiates in every moment of the track, like her breath is one with the breeze and her heart beats in time with the waves upon the shore. The wistful, elegant arrangement, and Rosie’s dreamy vocals, ensure that this gorgeous single feels just as warm and comforting as a true home should.
Leave It Out!: In Defence of ‘Industry Plants’
The music industry is a bloody mess. From the absurdly broken state of modern charts, to artists’ obscenely miniscule rate of pay for Spotify streams, the modern music industry has a list of glaring issues as long as your arm. But, as human beings are want to do, we can’t help but keep adding new things to the list to complain about. The latest such talking point in music circles being buzzy up-and-coming bands such as Wet Leg and The Last Dinner Party being accused of being ‘industry plants’. Though the discourse I’ve seen online has raised some noteworthy points, I think the reductive label these bands have been assigned with ultimately fails to stand up to scrutiny. Continue reading
Top Tracks: Samantha Lindo – Little Songbird
Sometimes great things take time. A mighty oak doesn’t spring up overnight, if anything the lengthy journey it takes to grow only adds to its majesty. In an age of instant gratification, songs like ‘Little Songbird’ which take that message to heart are a rare and precious gift. Taken from rising star Samantha Lindo’s forthcoming album Ancestry, this track is a must listen for fans of Michael Kiwanuka. Its dreamy, soft-spoken intro shifts into expressive bass lines and warm soulful vocals, the arrangement gradually growing in scope and elegance before a stirring climax. A swell of strings gives way to a soaring sax solo, in a crescendo like a bird’s first flight; how I imagine that moment between falling and flying must feel. Every moment of the song seems to rise taller that the one that came before. Inspired by the story of her great uncle’s migration to Canada from Jamaica, it carries that same thread of growth in its message. How all fires start from a single spark. How a whole community may stem from one person showing solidarity, a shift in narrative can start with one story being told, and a wider chorus for change all begins with a single voice calling out.
Top Tracks: Durry – I’m Fine (No Really)
The most oft repeated lie is “I’m fine”. Usually it’s said as a quick deflection, having neither the time nor the energy to talk about how you really feel. Sometimes we’re lying to ourselves, hoping that if we say we’re fine often enough we’ll manifest it into becoming true. The new track from stellar sibling duo Durry isn’t either of those. Instead it’s the kind of “I’m fine” that slips out as a reflex – when thinking otherwise, even for a moment, would send a trail of mental dominoes all cascading down. A plaster on an open wound, a chain lock on a bike with missing wheels, a wet floor sign slowly floating away in rising flood water. It’s about as convincing as saying “I didn’t do it” when caught red handed at a crime scene, but it slips out all the same. This cathartic scream-along single is another relatable cut from Durry’s forthcoming debut Suburban Legend, out 8th September. The rollicking, foot-stomping, folk punk energy of ‘I’m Fine (No Really)’ hides the pair’s signature self-aware and self-deprecating lyricism beneath an electrifying and anthemic façade, like someone flashing a smile when they’re screaming behind the eyes.
Top Tracks: Isla – Better
“We accept the love we think we deserve” – sadly I think few truer words about love have ever been written. But what I’ve never really considered till now, and what this quote fails to capture, is how what we think we deserve isn’t set in stone. One eureka moment of self-reflection could be all it takes to see yourself in a different light. One instance of someone pushing you too far could be all that’s needed to remove the rose tinted lenses from your eyes, revealing for the first time the pattern of how you’ve been consistently taken for granted. As cathartic as that moment is, when you realise your own self-worth, it’s often accompanied by the thoughts of “why didn’t I realise sooner?”. With her new single ‘Better’, taken from her forthcoming EP Low, New Zealand based singer/songwriter Isla writes for her younger self. An uplifting embrace for her past self, laying a toxic relationship bare and trying to awaken the inner strength that lay dormant. While the past is one thing that is set in stone, ‘Better’ can still be a beacon of self-worth in the present, hopefully providing someone with their own eureka moment to help them towards the love they truly deserve.
Top Tracks: A Days Wait – Indelible (feat. LISA)
We like to think we’re rational creatures, basing our thoughts and actions on logic and reason, but we’re driven by instinct more often than we realise. We get a feeling in our gut that we just can’t shake or explain away. No matter how much you tell yourself there’s nothing lurking in the corner of a dark room, some part of you refuses to believe. There’s no real explanation as to why we fall in love with someone, why that one person in particular has our heart, but we feel it in our soul all the same. Sometimes words and reasons just falter in the face of sheer vibes. ‘Indelible’ is a song that operates in that same space. It’s the very blueprint of a carefree summer song, the kind instils both a sense of peace and of endless possibility, and yet words escape me as to what makes it so. Any sentence I string together about its driving rhythm, bright and airy guitar riffs, shimmering melodies and the sweeping dream pop haze of its chorus, somehow feels wholly inadequate. ‘Indelible’ isn’t a song you merely listen to, and certainly not something my words can do justice to; its something you feel.
Belwood Music 