Press info: The album title is lifted directly from the album artwork, which is a photo
taken from a Subway graveyard in New Jersey in 1988 by photographer Steven Siegel.
Only God Was Above Us includes universal themes ranging from the urge to question
the world in which we live, and the quest for peace that can only be found through acceptance. The album is equal parts as direct yet complex as anything the band has
ever released, as beautiful and melodic as they’ve ever sounded but also at their
grittiest.
Press photo
Pitchfork says: “On their masterfully knotty fifth album, Vampire Weekend go on a self-mythological journey into old sounds, old haunts, and old cities to find something new within. Vampire Weekend itself is the focus of Only God Was Above Us. It is the band’s most overtly self-referential release, a collage of signature sounds and motifs dotted with allusions. It feels new and comfortable, regularly elegant and charming, calm and comforting, and, at times, foreboding. And just a bit worried.” Score: 8.5/10.
TUTV: VV have become pop experts by now. Orchestrator Ezra Koenig – who
turns 40 today – creates tantalizing tunes with different rhythms, different dynamics, different tones. He constructs songs like an architect designs artful statues. Piece by
piece, melody by melody, story by story. His songs have a sonic diversity, from catchy to capricious, from symphonic to euphonic, but always riveting and engrossing spiced with vocal melodrama. It’s called versatility. Happy birthday, Ezra Koenig, you did it again.
VV come up with the 4th new track (stream them all below). MARY BOONE resonates like a glowing pop symphony with an
angelic church choir, trippy percussion and merry piano fragments.
Magnificent composition.
In order to not miss a beat Turn Up The Volume scans the musical
horizon daily (doing it for years now, actually) to stay in touch with
all new things sonically great and shares the results on a weekly
basis.
Check the 10 new rad cuts just
added to this rad 2024 playlist.
ALL TOGETHER
. TRACK BY TRACK
1. ‘Allergic Food’ by MELVINS (Montesano, Washington)
The veteran noiseniks are still hungry. On April 19 the band
unleash their 27th album, titled TARANTULA HEART.
Allergic For Food is vintage rowdy punk-rock Melvins
Post-punk indies based in Leeds, where they are active movers in the DIY scene that currently thrives in the North of England. They recorded a Marc Riley session in 2016, released their first album Mind Yr Manners in 2017.
‘You’re Just Jealous’ is the splendid title track from their
upcoming, 2nd album. Out on May 10. Pre-order info here.
5. ‘Gone Forever by GREAT HARE (Gothenburg, Sweden)
Swedish pop songsmiths describe themselves as “dreaming to stay awake.”
This new single is a sparkling mid-tempo guitar-driven meditation
with a psych resonance.
The psych rockers from down under launch their 10th LP, baptized Stung! on 21 June.
About new single (I’m Strung): “It’s about being totally pathetically stung by someone
and just having to be cool with it being unrequited. Being resilient, accepting that you
are a bit of a goose, but life goes on.”
“A new chapter in the personal journey of singer Cecilia Miradoli and guitarist/producer Max Tarenzi. An intense, contemplative, and dark work, yet not resigned, navigating through trip-hop, dream-pop, dark-wave, and electronica.”
By the Waves are a dynamic 4-piece band based in Manchester. A uniquely eclectic sprinkle of soul, dream-pop, reggae, rock & indie make their sound exciting and unforgettable in equal measure.
They bring beautifully constructed lyrics, delivered with a signature blend of falsetto melody lines and anthemic choruses, which are layered over driving rhythmic beats and groove-ridden baselines, all topped off with sun-drenched, reverb-soaked guitar lines and a pinch of synth.
This Swiss poppy shoegazers have an new EP, titled Hide and Seek, out on 19 April.
Marcie (vocalist) about the single: “Someday’ nearly didn’t make it onto the EP.
When we first played it as a band, we turned it into a dancey indie track. When it
came to recording the tune, we realised it didn’t work and left it on the sidelines.
After I first heard Mitski’s ‘Bug Like An Angel’ last summer, I picked up
my guitar and played ‘Someday’ again for the first time in months.
I realised it needed to stay the way it sounded when I first wrote it, intimate
and fragile. We recorded the song a few days later and decided to release it
after all.”
Crystalline vocals, endearing acoustic sonority, tender and romantic pearl.
