Don't get depressed over dumb terrorists and stupid Nazi rallies. Cheer yourself up with these tunes.
THE BEST:
‘Feels like Heaven’ –
Ariel Pink
Eccentric experimentalist Ariel Pink is sounding less noisy than he was on ‘Time To Live’, instead giving us some reverb-soaked lovesick
New Wave. The haze of rose-tinted guitars and sunny synths are so beautiful
that I’m willing to bask in the schmaltziness of the lyrics.
‘Fathers Day’ – NONA
BUT FATHER’S DAY WAS TWO MONTHS AGO??? Alright, keep your hair on, this isn’t a Father’s Day anthem per se, but more a reflection on fatherhood as the LA band’s frontman looks back at his own relationship with his dad. The pensive tone is backed by rose-tinted guitars, just in case you needed an extra fix of rose-tinted guitars this week. It's encouraging stuff from this new wistful indie act.
‘Junky’ –
Brockhampton
This Texas collective of oddball rappers, self-described as
the ‘internet’s first boy band’, has been releasing a steady stream of
ultra-cool visuals. The music itself has been fairly decent too, but I’ve been
waiting for them to wow me enough to jump aboard the hype train. Well, on this
single they’ve converted me – set to a tense beat, the members spend each verse
of this song digging up their insecurities. They’re all kooky characters and
here their kookiness is allowed to shine through.
‘There You Go’ – Saba
Introduced to us via Chance the rapper, fellow Chicago hip hop artist Saba has been working on his own brand of feelgood rap. His beats keep getting jazzier whilst his flow is smooth like butter - or to quote the opening line’s South Park reference: ‘I’m butter like Leopold’.
‘Scars’ - T H i S
I DiD THiNK ABOUT WRiTiNG A WHOLE REViEW LiKE THiS, but
thought better of it. Thankfully, the weirdly-stylised band name isn’t the only
thing unique about these Welsh rockers. The riffage in this menacing single is
pretty creative, particularly the schizopherenic section at the end.
THE WORST:
‘Empty Barn 3’ – Roro Perrot
This guy has three ‘empty barn’ songs on his channel of him
howling horribly whilst savagely strumming an out-of-tune acoustic guitar. It’s
not exactly a single, but I thought I ought to share my bafflement with the
world.