Peter Rockingtail came bop bop bopping down the lane with these Easter weekend bops. Check out new music from Mike Vermeil, A Mess, John Revelle, T. Lopea, Twiin Daniels, Clea Anaïs, Christopher Green, Joe McGuire, They Might Be Zombies and Bloodslide.
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Mike Vermeil – “Lazy Thief”
There’s a confident, unhurried swagger to Mike Vermeil’s “Lazy Thief” that harkens back to the very best of songwriter focused alternative acts such as Michael Penn and Crowded House. Those are probably not acts you associate with the word swagger, but having a sound that lets the actual song itself shine through rather than wrapping it up in genre posturing and bells n’ whistles (sometimes literally) is swagger none the less.
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A Mess – “Aquarium”
Danish rocker A Mess brings a banger in “Aquarium” that mixes an electro-rock bass line and squashed n’ fuzzed guitars with cooing vocals. It’s grunge pop candy for your ears, and dare we say, your heart.
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John Revelle – “This Bird Has Flown”
It’s the little things that make this one. The spacious arrangement between the sparse drums and bass with the reverb soaked guitar, the gospel tinged backing vocals, the tinkling banjo, the subtle wah effect on the lead guitar. It’s all stitched together masterfully to make an Americana song that sounds both bigger and more intimate than that label can convey.
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T. Lopea – “See You Then”
Nobody likes a show off, but then here comes T. Lopea singing a chorus in Italian and making it sound so good you forget how they’re stunting. The bi-lingual nature of the song just adds to the charm, putting it at dangerously high charm levels. Somewhat similar to some of The Strokes mid-tempo work, this one straddles bedroom pop and garage rock to create what we’re calling Mud Room Pop / Kitchen Rock (because those are the rooms between our garage and bedroom – you get it.)
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Twiin Daniels – “Tallyman”
When you see that the band is a duo and their name is Twiin Daniels but then find out neither one of them is named Daniel? It hurts. That kind of deception is hard to get over, but then the song starts and it’s a perfect mix of classic dark wave influences and current indie rock dynamics and all is forgiven. Somewhere between Bauhaus and The Killers and recommended for fans of both.
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Clea Anaïs – “Powerful Women”
Opening slinky as hell before pivoting into dreamy, skittering indie pop territory, “Powerful Women” is a shifting, slippery number held together by the clear as a bell vocals of Anaïs. Lyrically the song acts as a bit of a “you got this” and recognition of the lineage of women persevering throughout time, but does so without drifting into cliche or one dimensional sloganeering. Anthems are rarely this mercurial, and that’s what makes this one stand out.
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Christopher Green – “Closer”
Wilco influenced indie rock is basically an entire genre unto itself these days, but few do it as well as Christopher Green does on “Closer.” The reason being is that unlike a lot of Tweedy-philes, Green has the songwriting chops to match the best of Jeff & Co. This is an absolutely perfect song, filled with the kind of restraint that lets genius shine through.
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Joe McGuire – “Follow”
Power pop songs given the noise rock treatment with the guitars cranked to Jesus will always have a special place in our heart, and in that special place rests a new resident – “Follow” by Joe McGuire. Simple, straight forward and absolutely glorious.
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They Might Be Zombies – “The Panic Culture”
Oh man does this rule. Combining four or five different types of metal into one tasty stew of headbanging awesomeness. This is most noticeable in the vocals, which switch from Phil Anselmo style yells to Ronnie James Dio / Bruce Dickinson style singing (and harmonizing between the two), and there’s even the occasional moments of Serj Tankian-ness thrown in. And yes we know the dynamic of “one guy yells, another guy sings” is a well established structure in modern metal, metalcore, emo and punk – but trust us when we say these guys are doing it differently. Musically it’s also pulling in some cool elements from all over the metal landscape – there’s fantasy metal synths running throughout, there’s chugga chugga guitars, and a few other surprises thrown into the mix.
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Bloodslide – “Pica”
Even though we are typically not that interested in music videos (occasionally they’re great but often they’re just kind of whatever) we will still post a video if we like the song and the artist wants us to push said video instead of an audio embed. However the video for “Pica” is pretty much just five minutes of flashing images and might not be a good idea for anyone with epilepsy, which is something the band should’ve had as a warning on the beginning of the video. But they didn’t so we’re not posting it. The song is cool though and you should check it out. Heavy and synthy, yet somehow still open and dreamy.
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