Oh the endless parade of bands and their music and their need to share their music and where were we? Asked that the time before last time, do we need a new editorial yet? Enough of that and on with this and the music and the what we said last time or last week or last year or many years ago. You’ve read all this already, never mind the damn editorial, cut to the chase and never mind the biscuits or the catfish, jump down past this bit, who needs a damn editorial? Let the actual music do the actual walking and the actual talking. Exact same thing again, another five (or so) slices of musical things that have passed our way recently and however you like to slice it and of course it was the price of apples and here comes the intro, Don’t be flippant she said, how could it ever be flippant? I can’t remember why she said that now, in one ear, out the other, we have a bad attitude here apparently, no respect for those who work in the music industry, well no poop Sherlock, have you only just worked that one out?

Five? There’s something rather compelling about five. Cross-pollination? Five more? Is there another way? A better way? A cure for pulling flying rabbits out of the clouds? Is there a rhyme? Is there a reason? Was there ever a reason? What do reasons make? Five more? Snake oil? Everything must go and no, we never do and the proof of the pudding is in that proof reading. When we started this thing, oh never mind, it doesn’t matter why we started this damn thing and like we asked last time, does anyone bother reading the editorial? Does anyone ever actually look down the rabbit hole or is it all just method acting? We do really try to listen to everything that comes in, we do it so you don’t have to, we are very (very) very very picky about what we actually post on these fractured pages or about what gets played on the radio or indeed what we hang in a gallery. Cut to the chase, never mind the editorial, there’s loads of music further down the page, well five or so pieces of music that have come our way in the last few days and what’s Wordsworth? Just the basic facts and links and those sounds (and visuals), that’s surely all you need…

Here we go, five more slices of music that have recently come our way, this time we start in Hudson, New York with a taste of the rather beautiful Lea Thomas album

1: Lea Thomas has just gifted us by sharing a rather beautiful piece of music called The Gift as she announces a new album, Cosmos Forever, via Triple Dolphin Records. The album is out on September 20th, I expect we’ll be along with more about it in a few weeks. Find more on the album via Bandcamp, we have the album here, it is a rather delicately strong collection of beautifully slow moving warm compositions. more soon.

2: Squid Pisser and a slight change of pace after the beauty of Lea Thomas. Squid Pisser have a new video, they’re releasing rather a lot right now, kind of hard to keep track on them, SkinGraft will fill you in though, they’re releasing this glorious noise, this is from an album that came out a month ago

3: The Jesus Lizard and Alexis Feels Sick, the second single from the upcoming album, RACK (out on September 13th via Ipecac). Inspired by Girls Against Boys/Soulside drummer Alexis Fleisig’s guarded opinion of modern life, “the four-and-a-half-minute track is met with an esoteric, David Yow created video. Yow shares insight into the concept behind the clip: “The ‘Alexis Feels Sick’ video is a disgusting and comically impressionistic portrait of American Late Stage Capitalism… with some doggies.” Duane Denison adds that it’s a “study in greed, gluttony, and… dogs.” Here’s a Linktree that will take you to the places you need to go should you feel the need to go anywhere…

And here’s the Bandcamp page with details of the new Jesus Lizard album and well, so far so good in terms of what they and their label have let loose so far.

4: The Albinos, all the way from Texas, in fact, “The Albinos are a noisy garage Psych band formed in August 2023 in the woods outside Houston, Texas”.

More in a bit when we’ve explored a bit more, well maybe, this is our first taste…

Bandcamp / Website

5: WHY? From the new album, The Well I Fell Into, out August 2nd, 2024 via Waterlines and well, if someone knows something, then they’re probably not telling it right or soemthing like that. Great video, more about it underneath the video itself..

“WHY? shared the hauntingly dreamlike track Jump, the latest single previewing the band’s forthcoming new album, The Well I Fell Into, due August 2nd (Waterlines). The heart-rending song floats over a mournful piano arrangement and lyrically reflects the poignant themes of the LP: losing oneself, and the pursuant attempts to recapture it. “Jump was written at various times (starting around 2014 and finished in 2022) from the same hopeless, desperate feeling,” says WHY?’s Yoni Wolf about the track that is out now and (just up there) alongside a fittingly off kilter Scott Fredette-directed video. “It’s a pessimistic song for sure but it’s at least a reaching out. It asks for help. It’s written from deep in trough state, but the songs around it on the album carry the hope and walk it home–so hang on (haha). I feel like our music is for people who’ve been through some shit and are still here trying to be better. Some songs– like ‘Jump’–are written from deep within that shit. But there’s always a sunrise after. There’s always someone around you who will call.”

Director Fredette explains the visual: “Coming off a more technical video for ‘G-dzillah G’dolah,’ and a compromising bout of sickness for Yoni, he wanted to go DIY and raw and fast. We filmed this in 3 evenings, using one toy lens with one light, and edited it in several days (thank you Evan Cutler Wattles). The only thing we did before we started filming was a motion test to see what type of walk looked best backwards. Very little planning, and made things up as we filmed. It wasn’t precious and that I think is good for WHY?.”

“Jump” follows album singles “G’dzillah G’Dolah” and “The Letters, etc.,” which earned praise and support from Stereogum, Brooklyn Vegan, Paste (‘Notable Best Songs of Week’), Treblezine, and more. WHY? will celebrate the LP with an extensive North American tour, which includes stops at NYC’s Bowery Ballroom (August 23rd) and LA’s Lodge Room (September 14th). A full itinerary is listed below with tickets on-sale HERE.

Though every WHY? album since 2012’s Mumps, Etc. was recorded at various home studios, Wolf and his bandmates Josiah Wolf, Doug McDiarmid, and Andrew Broder tracked The Well I Fell Into with Brian Joseph (Sufjan Stevens, Bon Iver) at Eau Claire, Wisconsin’s Hive Studio. The move resulted in compelling and accessible arrangements that not only grounded the album’s songs but also enhanced their already strong hooks. “On this album, I’m very interested in classic songwriting,” explains Wolf, who also enlisted a cast of collaborators to flesh out these recordings, including Gia Margaret, Finom’s Macie Stewart, Lala Lala’s Lillie West, Serengeti, and Ada Lea. “I want my songs to be able to be played unadorned by just one person and still hold up. Any production frills should only serve to elevate the song further without being relied upon to tell the story.”

No matter the genre experiments and thematic departures, WHY?’s discography is remarkably consistent, anchored by Wolf’s disarming lyrical transparency. His writing is provocative, self-lacerating, and always considered, coming from a place of blunt emotional openness. Though the dissolution of a years-long relationship inspired Wolf to start writing, he considers The Well I Fell Into autofiction, a chance to interrogate his grief and his journey to acceptance rather than to air out the real-life details of a painful loss or pick at emotional scabs. “This is not a bitter kiss off,” he says. “While the songwriting was cathartic, I can see my life beyond some story or mythology I’ve cornered myself into artistically. I’m not getting stuck in sentiment like I might have in my 20s.”

The Well I Fell Into is an ultimately hopeful record. While it deals with messy emotions, it tackles them with a disarmingly lucid candor and a profound grace. There are no external villains or wallowing, just a frank dissection of the past and a diligence to move forward. For that, the album stands near the top of the WHY? catalog as a document of an artist pushing through and finding some sense of peace.

And while we’re here, the Royal Jelly…

“Happy Apollo 11 day, planet Earth. You did a cool thing once about half a century ago. Written by Iggy and Ron and Sonic Boom, with help from Dave Alexander and additional material and concepts by Zero Gzuz, Tube-Head Van Spacerabbit, The Velvet Underground, Gil Scott Heron, Jimi Hendrix, and a lot of heavy lifting from Neil Armstrong and the fine folks over at NASA. The Royal Jelly is Vgynyl Records’ house band. Consisting of Deadbeatles, Dehumanoids and anybody else who happens to be lurking about”.