Shall we? Shall we? Well shall we? Back to back being back to the five things thing and the fractured music portal yet again (and again and again) and yeah, we did say all this last week and in the weeks before and blah blah blah while the whole world window and no, we never do and the proof of the pudding and all that. It doesn’t really matter if it was a television fizzing and going off and things back then when we first heard of the Window. and like we did ask last time, does anyone bother reading the editorial? Do anyone ever actually look down the rabbit hole or is it all just method acting?

This five musical things thing is mostly about just that, five musical things that have passed by in the last few days, five sound bites, five slices of musical information along with those oh so vital vital links and signposts staring back and making that hissing noise. You do read all this right? You did read that bit about Bandcamp Friday last time? Enough of this, cut the crap you say, wah, I know, on with the music, here comes whatever we have for you this time around, the low spark of high healed boys or something like that…

1: The Leaf Library – Now why is this so so good, so refreshing, so uplifting, they’re not doing anything radically different, we hear lots ofthings kind of like this, they just have it so so right, they just hit the spot in just the right way. Simple, refined, bright, fragile, strong, felicate, – “Drone pop from NE London. Songs about buildings/the weather played by Kate, Matt, Gareth, Lewis, Simon, Matt”, well I always thought songs needed lyrics but thy’s picking at things these are beautiful instrumental pieces, pop? Well yes, why not? Not that this is throwaway or shallow ir any of the things pop tends to be….

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2: Gazelle Twin – More Gazelle Twin, we can’t have too much Gazelle Twin right now, A new piece taken from the forthcoming soundtrack to “The Power” by Gazelle Twin and Max de Wardener. The Power will be available on Shudder 8th April 2021, more Gazelle Twin here and of course here – Can you tell me where my country lies? The new Gazelle Twin and NYX album is here, Deep England’s electronic-choral expansion is, as expected, a triumph… – if you haven’t already you really really need to reward yourself and soak up everything Gazelle Twin.

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2: Holiday Ghosts – more from the delightful Ghosts, the Brighton-based band’s last single was excellent – “where the album’s opening single Mr. Herandi – a song about the band’s landlord – assessed capitalism’s impact on creative cultures, new track “Off Grid” focusses on feelings of disconnection from the day-to-day. Guitarist Sam Stacpoole expands: “The song is made up of snap shots of city life, and of being alone with summer moods and feelings that makes it hard to go back to regular life. The music shares that same kind of excitement and fast paced feeling and flits between real every-day routines and imagined reactions to them.” Their upcoming album ‘North Street Air’ is out on May 21st 2021, the first couple of tastes have been rather agreeable, so far so good…

3: James Heather has just let loose a new piece of music, Passing Soul is “taken from the album ‘Modulations: EP2’, released 28 May on Ahead Of Our Time”, although a smartarse might ask why is it called EP2 if it is an album? All the usual links and details are here. And for the sake of clear as mud clarity, it apparently, whatever it might say elsewhere (including the artist’s own official YouTube page) an EP and not an album, don’t be shooting at me now, I’m just the messenger repeating the official word of the prophet written on the studio wall. Whatever it is it is rather fine…

‘Modulations: EP2’ is a collection of original compositions, Heather’s first in 4 years, which documents his deeply personal connection to the piano. The release follows a journey from the tragic loss of his father through learning to cope, overwhelming existential rumination and ultimately, optimism; a journey which started back in 2017 and during which the piano has been ever-present.    Recorded in his homebuilt studio during lockdown, each track on ‘Modulations: EP2’ was performed in a single take and each has its roots in live improvisations. The tracks were originally conceived while touring and performing over the past few years and Heather has memorised each movement then subtly adapted adding more complexities and compositional dexterity over time. His approach to the new compositions, that he dubs ‘Pulse Music’, finds him playing freely, with no metronome or official notation to recall or dictate the piece but instead using just his muscle memory, feel and instinct to decide where each track will go.   

Putting it into his own words Heather states:

“The EP is executed with the use of only solo piano and is a love story to the instrument that was my first passion, now that I finally have the piano I dreamed of! I have resisted the temptation to enter and add to the electronic music world I so adore on this release; instead, my current music acts as a lived reaction to music that is more machine than human, but not in opposition to it. To be minimalist in an age where you can do everything so easily, can also hold power, to focus on our strengths. I am still obsessed with the compositional possibilities within a raw song.” 

4: Evolfo – Brooklyn, NY garage/psych seven-piece Evolfo today announced their new full-length, Site Out Of Mind, releasing June 18 on Royal Potato Family and shared lead single “Strange Lights”, which debuted today on some website or other, here it is right here, have a listen, like the urgency, have a liste nwhile we g oexpolre the rest of the album…

Recorded in a single take in the tiny, sweltering attic-turned-recording studio of band leader Matt Gibbs’ Brooklyn apartment, the  driving rhythm and fuzz drenched guitar of “Strange Lights” converge in hypnotic chaos to tell a non-linear story of frustration, helplessness, and multiphrenia in the face of rabid authoritarianism. “This song was never meant to be specifically about me and the time I was wrongfully arrested, we are loath to define the subject matter in such literal terms,” says member Gibbs. “However, it would be fair to say that this experience influenced my view of police and the judicial system, and that this particular set of lyrics would not have come to be without it.”

5: The Go! Team probably don’t need our support anymore but they do always lift the day. Directed by Michael Robinson – additional editing by Ian Parton. From the upcoming album The Get Up Sequences Part One out July 2nd, here’s something new… and as we’re here, here’s the release details

5: Man On Man – Roddy Bottum (Faith No More) & Joey Holman unveil Stohner both as a single and a beautifully coordinated video that they say “celebrates togetherness and an exit from isolation”. The debut self-titled Man on Man album is out on may 7th but as we do keep point out were not here to act as part of the marketing plan or the future dreams and shopping schemes of some label or band and especiallu the damn monster of a label this one is on, (we don’t forget these things), Love this video and this piece of music and we’re just here to share good music, good art, good things. If you do want more details then here you go, it just really is about liking the way everything flows, faith no more, we care a lot, nice on Roddy…

Sometimes five isn’t enough

5: Gynoid – And here comes a no messing self-proclaimed “noise rock/sludge metal trio” from Thessaloniki, Greece, “Loud shit” so they say, I guess everything is if you turn it up loud enough, you know what they mean though. The full album isn’t out until April 24th, the one track that’s up there on thier Bandcamp bodes rather well, and we can tell you the rest of it is as good as that first rather full-on track. They’re not quite a one dimensional as that first taste might have you believe and yes they are very much about grungy metalic noise rock and the kind of things you might have heard in the back rooms of the small venues of any given major city towards the end of the last century. There’s a track called Scissorman that is rather like those Scissormen who lit up Camden so well back there. Gynoid sound like a lit of those bands from back there, the Red Eye Expresses and the Anorak Lovechilds, the Homage Freaks and the rest, we’ve said all this of several bands recently, there’s surely always room for more of them, the old ones are long long gone now, bring on the new, same as the old, bring them on, bring them all on, someone has to go, Gynoid do it well….

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Was that five? Was it ever enough? The Emma Harvey paintings up there as well as the Peter A Leight piece are featuring in the curent on line art show Alright? Alright? – A carefully curated art exhibition brought to you by Cultivate and featuring the art of 39 invited artists from all over the land and indeed the globe, will open on these pages at 8pm on Tuesday March 16th. The show is now open via this link. More of this in a moment, probably? Would you miss us if there wasn’t?