Vitalizing tunes that work faster than a stream of caffeine
9 June 2026
Band: CELL GAMES Who: 4-piece who are the proud torch carriers for Irish Nu-Metal since
their inception in 2021. The band rip up the rule book, avoiding the pitfalls
of any troupes and preconceived notions of the genre, spitting back their
own inimitable sound.
Pop culture references are a red thread that run throughout the Cell Games
catalogue so it’s unsurprising that their name came from the humble beginnings
of Dragon Ball Z marathon.
TUTV: From the kick-off, your head gets crushed by a thunderous sonic force of nature empowered by schizo guitars and a fanatical drummer. Demonian howls accentuate this bursting belter’s ominous theme. Doomsday is just around the corner. No exit way. We’re trapped.
It’s the end of the world as we know it, and it feels cell games fine.
Band: HARD-FI Who: English pop/rock veterans, who scored three successful albums
between 2003 and 2014. Then they called it a day but returned in 2022
for some live action and now new music.
Track: DIGO NADA Spanish for ‘I Say Nothing’. Newest single from their upcoming first album
in 15 years. It’s named Sweating Someone’s Fever. It’s out June 19th.
New album artwork
Richard Archer:“My wife’s from Central America and I got into Cumbia music
because of Joe Strummer, then going out to El Salvador with her and hearing more
tunes and getting into stuff like Manu Chao – I liked it and it felt quite punk rock.”
TUTV: This smells like summer, like piña colada.
Latin vibes. Hard-Fi surprise. You’ll love it, like I do.
Band: TAXI GIRLS Who: Outspoken Canadian punk daredevils from Montreal formed in 2022.
They produce a sharp mix of blown-out guitars, dual-vocal tension, and hook-heavy urgency, for fans of The Distillers, Amyl and the Sniffers, The Donnas, Bikini Kill, and Joan Jett & The Blackhearts.
Track: SECRET HANDSHAKE
Their 2nd single from upcoming debut full-length called Static, out on June 26th. Tracklist and order info here
“The song is written from a place of love and longing, the song captures the feeling
of wanting a summer fling to last a bit longer than the fading season. Even when
summer is over, you’ll always have your secret handshake.”
TUTV: Full steam forward from the get-go with avid harmonies, and pepped up by greedy guitars, and rushing drum/bass buzz. These Amazons know how to get your head-spinning 360°. They don’t slow down one second on this racing riff-ripper.
Artist: AMY BELL Who: English songstress who started writing at 14 and playing live at 17,
is inspired by big names such as Billy Bragg, John Cooper Clark, Badly Drawn
Boy, PJ Harvey and Nirvana.
Track: MILLHOUSE.
A song that touches on themes that a lot of people my age struggle with.
Highlight from her brand new, 2nd EP, called Want Me.
TUTV: With the first seconds kicking in, I thought a country song was about to evolve.
A solid cool one that is. From there on Millhouse progresses in a lazy Courtney Barnett groove modus, evoking swaying body moves while Amy Bell‘s laid-back slacker vocals
glide over it. It’s a funky tune that sticks promptly in your head.
The lyrics operate through images and statements rather than narrative, “you know what I know”, “fight the real enemy”, “what goes around keeps turning”.
When the full chorus finally comes – “who wants it, who wants it” – it feels
both inevitable and earned.
The song earns every section. Nothing overstays, nothing is wasted. The middle eight
shifts the track’s center of gravity before the final chorus brings everything back, fuller.
TUTV: Hypnotic is gingered up by shiny synth-waves, some rollin’ bass force and its melodic verve. Gutsy vocals inject this strong steamroller with intense impetuosity. Indie punk rock ‘n’ roll for your itchy ears and hankering mind. Magnetic stuff.
In 2012, the band abruptly finished their journey following
the untimely death of co-vocalist and bassist Adam MCA Yauch
due to cancer.
Now 14 years later, as previously reported, co-vocalist/songwriter MIKE D (né Michael Louis Diamond, 60 years ago in NYC) returns solo.
He’ll share his debut LP THANK YOU on August 28th. More details here.
Album artwork
Mike D: “It’s been so much fun making this music with people I love and I have grown to
really appreciate in our collaboration. And I just hope it’s fun for others and not overly serious, because let’s be real, I’m releasing this music into a very strange and dark and power-fixated world that really devalues art and feelings and compassion and empathy and equality.”
“We so much loved all three of us being in a band with each other for Beastie Boys. When Yauch died, it was an extremely sad time for me so making music was just not on the table. Then being a dad was something I put myself into and eventually I worked on the ‘Beastie Boys Book’ with Adam (‘Ad-Rock’ Horovitz] and that really helped both of us as we were really able to shine a light on our past together.”
Hip-rap-hop trio FUGEES, fronted by masterful voice Lauryn Hill
were at the top seat of the American Singles Chart with their cover
of KILLING ME SOFTLY.
Composer Charles Fox put the lyrics to music. The song was named Killing Me Softly and Lieberman recorded and released it in 1972, but
it didn’t chart.
The following year, soul star Roberta Flack released her version.
It became a worldwide hit with the #1 seat in the US, Australia, Canada and New Zealand, and #6 in the UK.
Then in 1996, Fugees covered the tender ballad and scored
their first #1 UK hit. It topped the charts in no less than
20 countries.
Saying that Manchester‘s notorious post-punk icons THE FALL, the brainchild
of the late, controversial singer-songwriterMARK E. SMITH (1957-2018) had
a turbulent career is a huge understatement.
They hit the north in 1976 and broke up when Smith passed away,
8 years ago, after a long illness with lung and kidney cancer, aged 61.
Smith was an authoritarian bandleader who fired a long list of members.
But, yes, he was also a genial musician and storyteller who released 31 LPs
with an ever-changing group, which included his former Brix Smith for
two stints (1983–1989, and 1994–1996)
A posthumous called POST SCIPT should be out sometime this year.
Band: WHOLES Who:Belgian raucous noise outfit led by musical chameleon Wolf Vanwymeersch,
who played with several bands (pop, rock, sludge metal) and released a pure singer-songwriter pearl with solo debut album The Early Years back in 2022.
Wholes are “what remains after a soul has been detonated, what
struck those around it, what could no longer be contained”.
Last year, the band scored big time with their heart-wrenching debut album, named A Mass In The Water. One of the best 10 LPs of 2025 according to TUTV‘s ears: “It’s a
both scary and flabbergasting opus about Wolf’s father’s suicide. It takes a lot of courage to make and share this soul-crushing experience with the world.”
Track: EAZY FOR YOU
Newest single. A song about
frustration and liberation.
TUTV: Wholes still operate in a dark place where their demons feel at home.
Main man Wolf Vanwymeersch still wallows in self-torchering nightmares.
At times it feels as if somebody tries to rip his heart out with chainsaw riffs. Quite scary.
As Johnny Forgotten Rotten once sung, ‘this is not a love song‘, rather a gruesome dilemma meditation of choice, staying in the by now familiar darkness or fighting its way to the light at the end of the tunnel.
Another wholes-ly goosebumps juggernaut.
“easy for you
easy for you to cackle
these things don’t affect me
easy for you to let it all pass
easy for you to just roll your eyes
cause you’re above that
cause you’re on top of that
cause you’re better and smarter
and more flexible”
Artist: FREDDIE GIBS Who: The 43-year old
rap star from Indiana.
Album: YOU ONLY DIE 1CE
The 2024’s deluxe edition of that LP, his 5th solo one. Gibbs has also 4 collaborative full-lengths to his credit.
Clash Music said: “This new album seems to sum up where the rapper
finds himself, out there in the trenches, caught between two sides, working
out his own peculiar place in the world.”
Riff machine OSEES led by barnstormer in shorts John Dwyer dropped,
without foreplay or warning, new music. 5 tracks, 32 minutes, under
the caption OFF COURSE.
Is it an album, is it an EP?
According to Wikipedia and EP contains more tracks than a single but fewer
than an album (8-10). Contemporary EPs usually contain up to eight tracks
and have a playing time of 15 to 30 minutes.
I call it an EP, Osees‘ general calls it an album.
He’s the boss. So an album it is.
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Dwyer: “We went back to an older method of writing for this one. We jammed
and jammed and jammed. I took the tapes home and ironed out some mutant
tunes. We went back into the studio and burned them to tape live and then I
took it home and did the vocals. Spice is always nice.
Mixed it all up in the cauldron and thus we have a strange brew indeed Floating in
the smoke we have: A couple long jams, a couple short jams and a finale that’ll dump
a bucket of ear worms on you (reminiscent of “the axis”?) Dip your toe in organ rock
and roll.”
TUTV: Whatever format it is. I played Off Course 5 times in a row. Yes, to my
ears it’s one of the best things Osees did in recent years. No riff mania, but 60/70’s
psych prog rock inspired work-outs, a bit of Deep Purple in their symphonic phase.
Mind-bending and trance-inducing, coming close to the extravagant trips
of that other ultra-productive team King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard,
27 albums in 16 years.
The Trick is my fav track. An instrumental, Krautrock-like, motorik piece
that thrives on organ and hyperkinetic drumming. Flabbergasting. Mind
you, all 32 minutes have a dumbfounding effect.
The late great English singer-songwriter ROBERT PALMER (1949 – 2003) topped
the US Singles Chart on 8 June 1986, today 40 years ago, with ADDICTED TO LOVE.
A song from his 8th LP, Riptide.
The accompanying clip was a remarkable/memorable event in itself, with Palmer backed
by a group of sensually moving mannequins who look like robots with pale skin, red lips, layers of make-up, staring eyes, and a cold, yet utterly cool expression on their face, following the style of women in the paintings of the late American artist Patrick Nagel.
