The first couple of songs in this part were actually April releases which I didn’t pick up on at the time and there are a few others from earlier in the year that I didn’t pick up on…
Based on the current state of the world and the behaviours of some sections of society I’m beginning to think that the name of this next band is something that really should be considered, anyway… Veto Humans debut single Belong to Glasgow, is a moody brooding track with low key vocals that deliver the refrain of the song’s title repeatedly throughout, the vocal soundtracked by darkly glitchy driving dance beats interspersed with some sonorous guitar riffs.
A band who until recently I didn’t realise are local to me in Simshill. Forming just up the road in Castlemilk, Rufus Case Stone followed up their January single, Forlorn, with The Wind and the Rain in April. Opening up with insistent distorted guitars before the formidable vocals and rhythm section crash in in with a sense of urgency, the song then switches to a slow and deliberate sections finally opening up into a grungy no-wave anthem with Sonic Youth style guitar parts.
There is a certain serendipity in the title of the new f.o. machete single, the band having taken a long hiatus during which they must have been germinating ideas during their inactive period before receiving the signal to activate and returning with their perfect new single Confetti Crown in 2024 and going on to release a career defining new album in 2025 in the shape Mother of a Thousand. Clearly now back in the groove, the time was right for them to continue their operations and, not resting on their laurels or disappearing from the eyes often public, the band didn’t rest in their laurels releasing the brilliant I’m Fine, Are You? at the end of last year. Now as the band are deep into recording and mixing the follow up album, the single Sleeper Cell lands another killer blow as they build up the sense of enthusiastic anticipation for a new album. Paul delivers some warning shots before Natasha’s bass joins the fray and the slow burn intro with Natasha’s familiar smouldering vocal crackles with an underlying electrically charged force before the blue touch paper is lit and the chorus ignites with a furious vigour and ferocity that feels like a euphoric release of pent up energy. F.o. Machete are here to stay.
I love to see and hear the sound of a band or artist developing and growing as they find their groove. Katherine Aly, who has been quoted before in interviews in describing her sound as genre-agnostic is a case in point, my first experience of her music was with the single The Skin I’m Made Of, a gentle piano led ballad, and swing her live as a solo artist and with a full band, she went on to release her debut album Shacows are Made of Light Too, and in the last couple of years found her current niche with a vibe with that echoes Self Esteem in song themes and her close gang of back up dancers and vocalists. Her recent releases all have a distinct themed imagery, with the colour orange prominent, which is reflected in her look. The package is completed with the sound which has been demonstrated on singles from 1024 until now starting with Freud (for the mama’s boy) and landing now with This is Not a Drill (for the player) with other singles including Edinburgh (for the narcissist), I’m sure you can all see another theme linking these songs too. The song is what would commonly be known as a banger – blending bold and brash synth lines with crunching guitar riffs and pulverising beats topped off with Katherine’s rowdy upfront lyrics.
Overload is the majestically sublime debut single from Glasgow 5 piece Thaladela. There is a reassuringly soothing dreamlike quality to the song that creates a gratifying poignancy in it’s entrancingly luxuriant shoegaze style guitars, paired with a stirring, heartwarming angelic vocal and replete with a blissful soaring chorus that recalls the ethereal sounds of Grangemouth’s finest, The Cocteau Twins. Gimme more…
The new single from Slowdance, Going Nowhere Fast is a rousing and rhapsodic indie anthem about wishing your life would change, with an exuberant arrangement packed with an emotional intensity which is bolstered by a suitably impassioned lead vocal that blends the earnest sound of Sam Fender with elements of Hector Gannet.
I Don’t Want to Sleepwalk to My Grave, Dark Hearts follow up to I Fell in Love With a Rockstar, is a broodingly atmospheric gothic creeper, a moody slow burn groove with the thrum of alt country guitars that comes across like the bastard offspring of the country punk of Fur Dixon and the voodoo vaudeville of Jo Carley and the Old Dry Skulls.
Kevin Rowland could sing the contents of the phone book and make it engaging. His smooth and suave vocal, with shades of unique eccentricity thrown in for good measure, exudes an elegant charm and sophistication on the new, re-recorded, version of the autobiographical single, Life in England Pt 1. The single comes from the new Dexys Midnight Runners album Love, the first recorded under the full Midnight Runners moniker since 1985’s Don’t Stand Me Down.
Following up the addictive Ciggy Burns was going to be a challenge, but one which Dubinski have risen to with effortless ease on Information Overload. The single kicks off with a sound the older amongst us will remember all too well as they tackle the thorny subject of a world overtaken by tech and keeping your head above water, swamped with instant information as online victims of whatever algorithms the online giants deem suitable. It may be a warning for future generations but it is delivered in suitably hook laden style, instant gratification to the eardrums giving you a welcome dopamine rush. Step away from those phones and enjoy the music…
Irvine Welsh has teamed up with Mull Historical Society on the soulful groove of Dopamine Eyes, the latest song to be lifted from their new album In My Mind There’s a Photograph. Their collaboration has created a song that exudes a feeling of calm and wellbeing with an air of an invigorating celestial experience on what is ultimately a soaring feel good single.
Up next, the joyful vibe continues with Scum of the Sea, from Newquay’s Kobi Joe aka Tooth Gore, an exuberantly effervescent slice of fuzzed up surf punk with infectious hooks that borrow from 1950’s rock n roll, and a real ramping up the energy with a surge of crashing animated vigour in the buoyant chorus.
In the previous part of May’s singles I included Xiu Xiu’s version of the In Heaven (Lady in the Radiator song) from Eraserhead and I alluded to my slight obsession with David Lynch and in particular Twin Peaks. I mentioned listening to new music and imagining some songs being a perfect fit for a soundtrack. And by fortunate happenstance, a regular artist in these pages has released just one of those songs. Tulsaqueen, who I’m sure is fed up with my fervent determination that her music has Lynchian qualities, but I’m going there anyway. Catriona has done it again with her swoonsome new single Evening. The song may be short and sweet, but it packs an emotional punch with it’s evocative dreamlike quality, the atmospheric twang of wistful country style guitars and a hauntingly affecting vocal that makes you feel like you’re having an out of body experience.
Brenda were the last band I follow to have released a song called High Horse, and a synth pop banger it was too. Following in their footsteps, Lightnin’ Truck have also created a single underlined with a hypnotic synth line. Their retro synth intro, which forms the backbone of the single, that takes me back to the early 80’s channelling the spirit of Jona Lewis’s You’ll Always Find Me in the Kitchen at Parties. The sub-reggae synth hook is joined by a dub reggae bass line as the scathing lyrics drip acerbically from Hettie’s familiar sultry delivery, while scything indie-psych guitars twist, turn and zig-zag languidly, before the layers are stripped back again as the solitary synth line draws the song to its conclusion.
Blunt Knives from Edinburgh’s Wrest is a passionately expressive single, the ardently heartfelt vocal from Stewart Douglas really shines atop a delicately elegant and emotionally wrought melody. This song stands shoulder to shoulder with other luminaries of this genre in Frightened Rabbit and Admiral Fallow.
Opus Kink continue to delight, astound and capture the imagination as they continue to plough their own darkly majestic furrow. The Sweet Goodbye, like their preceding singles, carries with it a somewhat sinister undercurrent, with a synth intro that 80’s Depeche Mode would be proud of, a disco backbeat, with jazzy blues tinged brass parts, pseudo-goth riffs and what I can only describe as a choral section that sounds like an Eastern Block take on a Welsh male voice choir. Gloriously nefarious and foreboding.