UK – Page 5 – Fingertips

Free and legal MP3: Sundara Karma (young British band w/ expansive sound)

This swaggering, open-hearted song is not something I’m expecting from four teenagers in the year 2013.

“Freshbloom” – Sundara Karma

So the four guys in this band are 17 years old. Combine that with how expansive and assured and un-gimmicky a song this is and there is hardly anything more to say. It is a strange and beautiful world.

Or, in any case, this swaggering, open-hearted song is not something I’m expecting from four teenagers in the year 2013. I like how confidently “Freshbloom” bases itself in one chord, as the entire introduction and then nearly the entire verse unfolds without a chord change. This is easy to do in a bad song but difficult to do in a good song; melodic fortitude is required. When the chord change finally happens, at 0:50, we then get an extra lyrical line that is either an addendum to the verse or a precursor to the chorus but is in any case a cool thing—an unusual songwriting twist that manages to catch the ear and yet not draw undue attention to itself at the same time. Delivering everything to us in fine fettle is singer Oscar Pollock (alternatively listed online as Oscar Lulu), and while I really didn’t want to dwell on how not-17 he sounds, I can’t help myself—in tone, in phrasing, in sheer presence, the guy is a pro, already. And his bandmates are right with him—I am especially enjoying guitarist Ally Baty’s ringing tones, which straddle a nifty line between majestic and matter-of-fact. Bonus points for the dreamy instrumental break during which the song first comes to an almost complete stop at 2:17 before gathering around a lean and powerful new guitar riff, adding some compelling wordless vocals, and generally succeeding in impressing the hell out of me.

“Freshbloom” is the first song released into the world by Sundara Karma. I hope it is not the last. Originally available to download via SoundCloud, now you’ve got to get it here or nowhere.

Free and legal MP3: Suntrapp (simple/deep UK folk rock)

I can’t quite tell if “All the Seas” is a simple song that feels deep or a deep song that feels simple.

“All the Seas” – Suntrapp

I can’t quite tell if “All the Seas” is a simple song that feels deep or a deep song that feels simple. It is in any case a song that casts indirect aspersions, through both beauty and sturdiness, on many current efforts at so-called “indie folk rock.”

The simple/deep enigma is driven by a few factors. First, the lyrics strike a nice balance between personal reflection and grander philosophizing. Note that that latter kind of pondering, in a pop song, can easily become ponderous (pun intended). “All the Seas” hits the mark from the opening line, which asserts a universal truth from a first-person position:

I’d rather stare into an eye
Than into a sea or into a sky, my my

Simple words, personal declaration, but a rather substantive point being made at the same time. Next, the music itself, as straightforward as it seems, provides subtle richness in the interaction of the turbulent rhythm—established by the intricate finger-picking that opens the song—and the lovely, folk-like melody that is hung on top of it. That the song sways to an underlying one-two beat is partially hidden until the chorus, and is not fully felt until the second time the chorus visits, when it is fleshed out by three extra lines, all sung, unlike most of the verse, directly on the beat. I’m finding the song’s dramatic peak at the third line in the expanded chorus (1:55; “So pay no mind…”), not only for the crisp wording but for the thoughtful melodic turns the line takes as it descends.

And then, whether done consciously or not, the fact that front man Jacob Houlsby swallows the lyric that would be the song’s primary teaching moment is another, rather charming way we not only avoid pretentiousness but also cultivate depth. “All the seas, all the seas, have been”—what: “seen”? “sailed”? I can’t make it out. (Do feel free to let me know what you think he’s saying.) And yet clarity here not only doesn’t seem to matter, it somehow softens me to the song by sending me into my own imagination, accompanied by the churning, oceanic rhythm.

Houlsby is from Newcastle in the UK; Suntrapp is a project poised in a Bon Iver-like way between being a one-man project and a full-out band. “All the Seas” is the first release, and will be found on an upcoming EP called Yannina. Thanks to The Mad Mackeral for the head’s up.

Free and legal MP3: Magic Arm (string-enhanced pop from Manchester)

Singer/songwriter Marc Rigelsford plays all the instruments, and while our 21st-century ears are fine with that in a setting of layered electronics and guitars, a one-person project is somehow the last thing one suspects when hearing two stringed instruments playing together.

“Put Your Collar Up” – Magic Arm

As a violin and cello play a mournful duet for 30 seconds, we are lifted out of time and context: what type of music this may be and when in the last 120 years or so it was written both seem up for grabs. This is pretty charming in and of itself; here’s a musician willing either to trust that listeners can hang in there for a half-minute of uncertainty or to be uninterested in those who can’t—a friend of mine in either case. The other nifty thing this pre-introduction string duet does is deflect attention away from the reality that Magic Arm is a one-man band. Singer/songwriter Marc Rigelsford plays all the instruments, and while our 21st-century ears are fine with that in a setting of layered electronics and guitars, a one-person project is somehow the last thing one suspects when hearing two stringed instruments playing together.

Following the string pre-introduction, the song acquires a nostalgic pulse when the piano and percussion join in at 0:30 (you may hear some “Eleanor Rigby” in this, and maybe some “Alone Again Or”), and achieves liftoff with the arrival of the bass at 0:51 (a textbook example of how significant the bottom that the bass provides can be in a rock song). Rigelsford sings the verse with a thin, slightly processed voice, somewhere in that gray area pop singers have staked out between tenor and baritone. The melody moves at half the song’s rate and feels snippetty as it tracks generally downward. With the chorus (1:17), things change subtly but resolutely—the melody doubles its pace and Rigelsford’s voice, at a slightly higher register, seems rounder and warmer (as he sings “Is this the right way now?”). I can’t really describe it or explain it, can’t put my finger exactly on the hook, but it’s definitely in here; this is where the song fully sells itself to me. Listen to how the strings nuzzle their way back into the mix at this point; listen too to the synthesizer loops and see if you can figure out exactly how Rigelsford has so deftly combined acoustic and electronic sounds here. Hat tip also to the Herb Alpert-y trumpet lines (1:49), which take a turn towards the Bacharachian when they reemerge in the instrumental coda (4:00).

“Put Your Collar Up” originally came out on an EP Magic Arm released in August, but is making the rounds as a free and legal download now in advance of the album Images Rolling, Magic Arm’s second full-length release, due out in June. You can download it here, or go to the SoundCloud page and spare me a wee bit of bandwidth.

Free and legal MP3: The Veils

With a terrific, “surprise” hook

“Through the Deep, Dark Wood” – The Veils

“Through the Deep, Dark Wood” is one of those terrific, unusual songs in which the principal hook arrives, like an unannounced special guest, after you thought you’d heard everything the song has to offer. Given the way pop songs tend to be underwritten, combined with the song title’s implication, my ear was initially convinced, as the song unfolded, that the chorus would be nothing more than the phrase “Through the deep, dark wood,” repeated a couple of times, ending with that vigorous, ascending moment at 0:52. Such things pass for choruses all the time, and this one seemed properly dramatic, if minimal. I could all but hear the instrumental bit that would follow to bring the song back to the next verse.

How satisfying to find that this was just the prelude to the song’s true center, which turns out to be the actual chorus that launches from the last repetition of “deep, dark wood,” with its churning, classic-rock chord progression and ear-catching melodic turning point on the repeating phrase “I can’t go back.” And, see, if they had called the song “I Can’t Go Back”—which is the most-often heard phrase, as song titles typically are—I would first of all have been less surprised by the chorus, and maybe even less delighted? Music is a mysterious thing; mysteries, even unelaborate ones, always enhance the experience.

“Through the Deep, Dark Wood” is a song from the album Time Stays, We Go, set for release in April on the band’s own Pitch Beast Records label. The Veils formed in 2001 and recorded their first album in 2004. With Finn Andrews at the helm, band mates have come and gone; in its latest incarnation, The Veils are a quintet. MP3 via Magnet Magazine. You can read more about the band in previous entries here on February 2007 and April 2009.

Free and legal MP3: Polly Scattergood

Dark, swinging electro-ballad

“Wanderlust” – Polly Scattergood

A big dark swinging electro-ballad from a young British musician whose flair for the theatrical (“And when I shut my eyes, I can hear an orchestra playing,” she speaks) brings inevitable Kate Bush comparisons to the table. But dear Kate has rarely been inclined towards something quite so accessible and concise as “Wanderlust,” which offers its head-scratching moments (mostly spoken voice in this case) within the clipped confines of a three-and-a-half-minute pop song. Neither does Bush tend towards a sound as bottom-heavy as this, but there’s a sense of playfulness in the air that does nod towards KB—for all its deep force, that opening synthesizer line (in cahoots, I’m guessing, with a bass synthesizer) does have a frolicsome aspect, like maybe dancing elephants.

I find it interesting that a song called “Wanderlust” circumscribes itself so—listen carefully and you’ll see that the verse and the chorus, while coming across as distinct, are all but indistinguishable melodically. Could be this wanderlust is just as imaginary as that orchestra she hears with her eyes closed. What effectually differentiates the verse and chorus is production prowess: the verses are delivered with a whispery veneer, and without the gut-rumbling bottom of the synthesizer. I’m actually fascinated by the vocal effect that adds the breathy hiss of whispering to Scattergood’s singing voice. (See? I have nothing against vocal effects. At least not good ones.) I can probably find a metaphor that relates this effect to the song as well but I’ll spare you that (probable) stretch and just say I like it.

Polly Scattergood is a 25-year-old musician from Colchester, in the UK (where else, with that name, which is real). “Wanderlust” is a song from Arrows, Scattergood’s forthcoming follow-up to her 2009 debut. The album is due out in June on Mute Records. ~~MP3 via the estimable Chromewaves, one of the pioneer music blogs that remains up and running.~~

Free and legal MP3: Bromheads (sharp, economic neo-post-punk)

Something in this song’s scrappy immediacy and complex simplicity brings me back to the post-punk glory days of the late ’70s.

“Holding the Gun” – Bromheads

With its tricky way of counting out 4/4 time, “Holding the Gun” grabs hold of the ears quickly and does not let up for two minutes and sixteen seconds. Something in its scrappy immediacy and complex simplicity—and yes also the itchy guitar sound—brings me back to the post-punk glory days of the late ’70s. But nothing about this song wallows in nostalgia. It’s too playful for that. Playfulness is incompatible with nostalgia. I just made that up but it sounds about right.

The beauty of Bromheads’ particular brand of light-heartedness is that it’s all between the lines, if not completely intangible. The words vocalist Tim Hampton is singing aren’t jokey or humorous and yet, in and around the words, something about his delivery makes me smile. Same with the odd rhythms, which allow the song’s most accentuated moments to happen halfway between beats—it isn’t funny but it makes me smile. That’s one of the best things music can do, in my book: make you smile but not because it’s funny. This whole song is kind of like that, and it’s so short that there’s no point in my going on any further about it.

Bromheads are two guys (Dan Potter is the other) who used to be called Bromheads Jacket when there were three of them. A duo since 2009, they are based in Sheffield. They released 12 free singles in 2010, which were then collected on a CD called The Lamp Sessions. “Holding the Gun” is the title track from their new EP, which was released at the end of October. You can download the song via the link above, as usual, or go to the band’s SoundCloud page for the download, and to hear more songs.

Free and legal MP3: Richard Hawley

Swirly, neo-psychedelic rocker

“Leave Your Body Behind You” – Richard Hawley

A swirly shot of neo-psychedelia, “Leave Your Body Behind You” drives an eddy of trebly noise across an assertive, “While My Guitar Gentle Weeps” bass line. And lives to tell about it. Hawley’s vocals happen somewhere in the middle of all this; he’s present more as a rich baritoney buzz than as a discernible storyteller. Which is no doubt purposeful, given the song’s much-repeated title lyric. He sounds halfway there. (To leaving his body behind, that is. I sometimes can’t tell if I’m being too subtle for my own good.)

So I will leave subtle behind now and say that “Leave Your Body Behind You” is a great song—inexplicably moving, with a sturdy, satisfying momentum that is felt in the stomach. I was won over in particular, on first listen, by the melisma that Hawley employs on the word “leave” at the beginning of the chorus (first heard beginning at 0:40). To begin, he holds the note while the familiar bass line guides us through those persuasive chord changes. But then, staying on the one word/syllable, he slips in an elegant twist that resembles nothing so much as an artfully deflected pass setting up a perfect strike on goal (and perhaps you can tell I’ve been watching a bit too much of Euro 2012). Where he ends up at 0:43 is wondrous and lovely even in the midst of the general psychedelic churn. This moment seems to me to be the song’s wily fulcrum, upon which its multi-faceted greatness rests and/or depends. As befitting the psychedelic soundscape, we get a slow, spacey break in the middle, during which the chorus is turned into a ghostly chant. Lots of fun follows, including a certain amount of freak-out instrumental goodness, and a bit more chanting to boot.

“Leave Your Body Behind You” is from Standing at the Sky’s Edge, Hawley’s seventh studio album, which was released on Mute Records in the UK last month, and then digitally in the US this month. Thanks again to Largehearted Boy for the lead. MP3 via Indie Rock Cafe. Oh, and while it is awesome with all its expansive, psychedelic instrumentals intact, the song functions nicely in hit-single mode too, without sacrificing its spacey middle break, as you can see from the version performed on Later…with Jools Holland last month, below.

Free and legal MP3: Virals (three-chord headbanger, at once dense & sleek)

I call this a must-listen for any Elastica fans who linger out there, and if that doesn’t mean anything to you, I ask you why not?

“Gloria” – Virals

Straight-ahead summertime rock’n’roll with a definite cool streak—a three-chord headbanger channeled through a soundscape at once dense and sleek. (I’m tempted to call it “fudgy,” for some reason). Bonus points for the unflappable vocals which sound like boy-girl but are front man Shaun Hencher singing in various registers with himself. I call this a must-listen for any Elastica fans who linger out there, and if that doesn’t mean anything to you, I ask you why not? Like that late, great British band, Virals offers up an irresistible blend of punk-ish power and effortless self-possession.

“Gloria” features either three simple but insistent hooks or three variations of one simple but insistent hook; it’s difficult to say. There are heavy-duty power chords and incisive lead lines. There’s unrelenting cymbal. And the most defining element, to my ears, is how each melodic line ends with a veer towards a place that isn’t unresolved as much as, somehow, ironic. This has a lot to do with the harmonies Hencher selects, in all cases a beguiling blend of his upper and lower register, the melody elusively flowing from one to the other.

Virals is a new project for Hencher, previously known (perhaps) as front man for the band Lovvers. It began as a studio-only, one-man-band kind of thing but Hencher has since formed a live band to take Virals on the road. “Gloria” is from the debut EP Coming Up With the Sun, released in May, on London-based Tough Love Records. MP3 via Austin Town Hall.

Free and legal MP3: Two Wounded Birds (brisk, unironic rock’n’roll, w/ pure pop appeal)

No electronic trickery, thematic gimmickry, or theatrical tomfoolery; rock’n’roll with an unironic heart of pure pop.

“To Be Young” – Two Wounded Birds

“To Be Young” is so insidiously appealing that anything that might cause some possible trouble here (copping half a melody from the Pretenders “Don’t Get Me Wrong”; intermittently affected vocal style) is neutralized by the soaring success of its pure pop songiness.

A deep-noted guitar lick both launches and anchors the piece. Note how swiftly the music moves even as the lyrics take their time; both in the verse and the chorus there are at least two brisk measures of music between every single lyrical line. This creates a built-in anticipation for each subsequent line—as listeners, we kind of lean in, waiting. This kind of structural delayed gratification is reinforced by melodies that deliver their payoff on the back end. For instance, the verse hook (or, maybe, not so much a hook as a “moment”) is the repeated melody at the end of the line (in the first verse (0:34), it’s the same lyric too: “My head don’t feel right”). In the chorus, as much as the ear is lured in by the opening salvo (“It’s too early”), the song, to my ears, triumphs by nailing the landing, as it were—with the lines “‘Cause we were young/And hopeless,” with that slightly hesitant melisma on the word “young,” the notes of which repeat on “hopeless,” and the music separating them out while we wait, and wait, for the resolution. This comes, actually, only with the transition back to the verse. The song moves on, briskly.

Two Wounded Birds are a quartet from Margate, in the UK. They have previously released an EP and a couple of singles. “To Be Young” is from the band’s self-titled debut album, set for release in June on the Holiday Friends Recording Co., a label co-founded by Jacob Graham of the Drums and now part of the French Kiss Records family. MP3 via Austin Town Hall.

Free and legal MP3: Sophie Barker (downtempo loveliness)

“Say Goodbye” weaves a knowing spell, breaking no new territory but doing what it does with great bittersweet panache.

“Say Goodbye” – Sophie Barker

Sophie Barker is not a name you’re likely to recognize but you may well recognize her voice—she sang a number of songs fronting the musical outfit Zero 7, which helped popularize the so-called downtempo (or chillout, or downbeat) genre early in the millennium. (She co-wrote and sang, for one, the widely-heard song “In The Waiting Line.”) Personally, I never warmed to Zero 7, and I think it was because of my irrational prejudice against “producer music.” Zero 7 was/is the brainchild of two British producer/remixer types, and to me that eliminates the main thing I get out of music, which is a sense of personal connection to a musician who is playing an instrument and/or singing a song. This is just me, I will note. You are entitled and even encouraged to feel otherwise.

Anyway, so if Sophie Barker now comes along with a similarly chilled-out sound but is singing and performing her own material, rather than as a hired hand on a musical “project,” I find my heart much more open to it than I was to her Zero 7 performances. “Say Goodbye” weaves a knowing spell, breaking no new territory but doing what it does with great bittersweet panache. (New territory, as I’ve said many times, is way overrated.) Barker has a lovely voice, at once plainspoken and rich, with a thrilling upper register that she unleashes largely in the chorus (although don’t miss how she sometimes flits into it briefly, as for instance when she sings the words “Will you” in the line “Will you be standing by me?” at 0:45). With its offhand melodies and melancholy bursts of harmony, “Say Goodbye” shimmers with feeling, and, to me, shows the potential power of this kind of composition when sung truly from the heart.

“Say Goodbye” is from the album Seagull, Barker’s third solo album, released last year in the UK. She is currently playing in the US. No word yet on whether the album is slated for a US release, but the promotional MP3 suggests something might be in the works. Thanks to Largehearted Boy for the lead.