Years: 2016

Glockabelle shreds two Casio VL-Tones, a lyre-shaped glockenspiel with eight thimbles and sings in both French and English while racing against her drum machine, Monsieur Dix. Her wild sound stems from a combination of inspiration and circumstance. Born to Francophone parents, Glockabelle received an education both stateside and in France. After being introduced to the sound of the Casio VL-Tone by a neighbor in Paris, Glockabelle began blending her classical piano techniques with vintage synth-pop sounds resulting in a hyperactive mixture of rhythm and tone. She also developed a unique approach to playing the glockenspiel: not with mallets but with eight sewing thimbles.

This new sound lead Glockabelle to a U.S. tour as a member of the Fiery Furnaces. She has performed at The Toronto Film Festival, Bonnaroo, Miami Art Basel, SXSW, The Montreux Jazz Festival, and WFMU. She has opened for Lightning Bolt, Marnie Stern, James Chance and the Contortions, Kaki King, and The Go! Team. She released her first EP in May 2015, which was hailed by SPIN as “Anarchic Enchantment.”

Her journey and performance at SXSW 2017 were filmed as part of a documentary by the NHK Network of Japan which premiered in April 2017.

In April 2018, she completed a solo tour of the northeastern U.S. opening for Lightning Bolt and is currently completing a new album to be released later this year.

www.glockabelle.com

“This trio out of Brooklyn casts an ample shade of gloom over their sound on their new album “Vail”. This is not another run of the mill post-punk revivalist band; they do not plug in a single six string and instead hit you with a hypnotic swirl of two basses. Vocally they weave their melodies in between a dizzy entanglement of bass lines that warble in echoing waves. Male and female vocals dance around one another sometimes harmonizing at other times creating counter points. The male vocals are a dead pan baritone that sometimes reaches more of a croon. The female vocals are an indifferent indie rock alto. The bridge coming out of the verses is disjointed and gray, but it works for the sound they are going for. This is the perfect sound track for a rainy afternoon drive into an abandoned urban area.” – Abysmal Hymns

www.decorum.nyc

https://vimeo.com/159156292

A music collective from Portland, Oregon, Loch Lomond began life in 2003 as the solo project of Ritchie Young. Admittedly, most solo projects don’t involve a carousel of contributions from upwards of 30 musicians, but that’s an indication of just how amorphous Loch Lomond’s line-up was until 2007 (when their second album, Paper The Walls, was released). Having coalesced into a more settled, six-piece incarnation, Loch Lomond finished recording ‘Little Me Will Start A Storm’ back in 2008 before the material was temporarily shelved due to mixing issues and the small matter of a sell-out US tour with fellow Portlanders ‘The Decemberists’. The mixing issues were eventually ironed out by a small army of mixers and producers: Tucker Martine (REM/The Decemberists), Tony Lash (Elliot Smith/Dandy Warhols), Kevin Robinson (Viva Voce), Adam Selzer (M Ward/Norfolk & Western) and Jeff Stuart Saltzman (Stephen Malkmus/Sleater Kinney). From all of this creative input emerged not only the album, but material for the EP that preceded it (the ‘Night Bats EP’ released on the another Scottish label, the wonderful Song, By Toad): a release that, thanks to a street trials pro rider from the Isle of Skye named Danny MacAskill, would see Loch Lomond’s profile boosted significantly. Already something of an internet phenomenon, Danny decided he wanted to use Loch Lomond’s track ‘Wax And Wire’ for a new film he was making and reached out via the internet…

www.lochlomondmusic.com

https://soundcloud.com/loch_lomond/07-pens-from-spain

Earl Grey is a project led by drummer and composer and 845 native Kyle Hutchins. The group performs a balance of originals and compositions by great American composers such as Thelonious Monk, Ornette Coleman, and Eric Dolphy. The Earl Grey Trio is about the interaction between the three instrumentalists, using the intimate acoustic format to achieve a unique approach in improvisation and composition.

http://www.kylehutchinsdrums.com

earlgreytrio.bandcamp.com

https://soundcloud.com/kylehutchinsdrums/sets/team_watermelon

Heroes of Toolik is strangely original, old-school art rock–“deceptively catchy, hypnotically growling, post-Velvets grooves.” (NY Music Daily). Comparisons range widely from the Velvets to Captain Beefheart ‘Shiny Beast’, even to the Grateful Dead. (NY Taper) NY Music Daily says of the 7” Aquarium School, “it wouldn’t be out of place on REM’s Chronic Town but with a more lush interesting arrangement than anything on that album.” “Strong guitar riffs, a chill drumbeat and that boisterous brass section . . . ” (The Aquarian). The players are “a who’s who of underground rock”. (Big Takeover). The NY Times has praised Arad Evans’ (Glenn Branca, Rhys Chatham) “soaring guitar” and as one of “an index of creative or experimental electric-guitar-based music in America — young lords of the wild in the post-rock tradition.” Rolling Stone calls Robert Poss’s (Band of Susans) guitar playing “adamantly arty, brainy, visceral and bracing.” Billy Ficca, drums, is an original member of the foundational CBGB’s band, Television. Ernie Brooks (bass) shaped punk rock as a member of The Modern Lovers, and later with David Johansen, Jerry Harrison, and Arthur Russell among others. John Speck on trombone is one of the busiest latin session players in the New York area and Jennifer Coates (violin/vocals) is a widely-recognized painter and proponent of old-time fiddle music. Bills have included Antietam, The Fleshtones, The Figgs, The Scene is Now, Speed the Plough and many others. A second, full-length release “Like Night” is set for August 2016, produced by Wharton Tiers.

www.heroesoftoolik.com

Twisty BonBon was formed in March 2016 by Japanese females, Twisty and BonBon. Twisty is a music producer, BonBon is a singer. Twisty has contributed songs for movies and fashion shows, and produces mainly electronic music. BonBon used to sing in a jazz big band. Their two different backgrounds blended well, and now they make interesting new pop sounds together.

twistybonbon.com

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IL1k-G1stjM

Four years after “though it were the kiss of death” raised the band’s profile in upstate New York, earning critical raves and extensive airplay on independent radio, the New Paltz , NY quintet The Sweet Clementines have released the sprawling “Lake Victoria.” Graceful and quirky, sweet and sour, overstuffed with melody lyrical imagination, the record is enlivened by the band’s traditional weapons of choice: vibraphones, violins, baroque vocal harmonies, and a dash of the electronic. In eight years of eccentric rocking, this band has cultured its own way of playing together: start with the experimental pop sense of The Beatles (or The Zombies, or XTC), color it with cabaret and circus, ala Tom Waits or Andrew Bird, and, now more than ever, venture into long forms, unafraid of either “J” word: jazz or jam, all in support of the literate, weird, and melancholic songs. The Sweet Clementines are principal songwriter and guitarist John Burdick, bassist Jason Sarubbi, drummer Matt Senzatimore, vocalist/violinist Marianne Tasick, and vibraphonist/keyboardist Paul Carroll

https://thesweetclementines.bandcamp.com

Emily ritz has been a fixture in the Bay Area music scene since she moved there in 2006. The native New Yorker left for California right after high school to study painting and film making at California College of the Arts. Embraced by the music community in SF, Emily found her place there as a performer. She continued to tour and put out albums with the Bay as her home base long after graduating from college. You may recognize her from bands Honeycomb, DRMS, or her more recent project with Kacey Johansing, Yesway. Since her recent move back East to Hudson NY, Emily has been performing under her own name for the first time. Refreshed and energized by her new environment, Emily’s music is constantly evolving. With less odd metered fingerpicking and more rhythmic strumming, her songs are moving in a new direction though her sound is still very much influenced by her time in California. With a heavy delay on her electric guitar and dreamy vocals, you can expect a lush and powerful live performance.

www.emilyritz.com