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.
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. ‘Eat It And Beat It’ by SHEER MAG (Philadelphia)
Philly‘s garage punks SHEER MAG launch their 4th album, titled Playing Favorites on March 1. And they keep on throwing new tracks
off it around. The 4th one is named EAT IT AND BEAT IT, a raw rocker
that rattles and rolls all the way. Hail hail.
Sheer Mag: “‘Eat And Beat It’ is an anthem for the next generation. The legacy acts that we grew up admiring and styling ourselves after aren’t going to be around forever, and nor should they be. It’s high time for a new cohort to take over and carry the torch for rock and roll in the 21st century.”
Oliver Hohlbrugger is a Norwegian singer-songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, and
producer who carves out his own high energy 60’s pronto-punk/psychedelic pop.
He obviously has a very hot spot for the jangly side of legends The Velvet Underground.
His velveteen VU tribute is part of his new, upcoming album ‘Nothing’s Changed Everything Is New’ to be released digitally and on vinyl on 19 April 2024 via REVIR / Moon Flower Music.
The track is an intoxicating psych jam that goes on like forever. High-energetic electricity.
‘Mindcave’ was heavily inspired by FrodoBagg ins’ harrowing escape through the labyrinthine tunnels of Shelob’s Lair, home to the giant spider in ‘Lord of the Rings’.
Its frantic tempo mirrors the panic of the chase, underscored by the haunting lines”
Gravity apparates, and breaks in the depths of the cavity.”
These steamrolling Brits go fast-forward with no brakes nor breaks. It’s like if
a whole army of guitars try to crush your ears, assisted by distressed vocals.
Glorious. Striking stroke.
The brothers Robinson return with their 9th LP, called Happiness Bastards on March 15.
They still do what they did their whole career, playing vintage old-school blues-rock with flaming brio.
Stefski & Hutch is a rock band founded in 2016 by a songwriter born in Paris and
a guitarist, composer and producer from Warsaw. New cooking Selling Lies, is a protest song addressing the confusion resulting from the flood of information and disinformation.
No, they’re not the legendary glamorous detective duo. They’re a high-voltage
tandem that combines hard-rock riffs with garage-punk gusto. And the candescent telling lies chorus completes the sharp-cutting fake news message.
Lisbet Fritze and Louise Foo have shared artistic trajectories for half of their lives. As Glas, the duo reveals a patchwork of everyday observations rooted in significant life changes while their alternative pop sounds convey a quest for balance, riding the line between doomy drama and playing it cool.
New piece Hungry Moon“raises the impossible questions about the well-being of our planet, addressing big-scale frustrations while simultaneously delving into human feelings of big dreams, loss and insufficiency. Musically, we also wanted to create a duality with two distinct vocal parts. Almost like a duet between night and day. In one, dreamy vocals are interwoven into a fabric of layered guitars, creating a chant. In contrast, the other features a groovy, spacious arrangement with dry vocals.”
Hungry Moon mesmerizes and magnetizes with its part ghostly, part crystalline vocals,
its shoegazy dreamy feel and its moony atmosphere. Beguiling and compelling.
Hudson Valley-based singer-songwriter Jack Manley gears up for his upcoming
debut EP Unmeasurable Terms, out on May 10. Pre-order info here.
Smack Water is a “relaxed yet aggressive vibe—I wanted this song to have
a lot of space and attitude with moments of distortion, swells and feedback,
so that it raises the stakes as the tune progresses.”
I hear echoes of the late great Alex Chilton. Jangly and rousing, soothing and
entrancing with commanding vocals. An electrical and melancholic thrill.
10. ‘New’ by LUNAR PATHS feat. Ben Keaton (Chicago)
Veterans of the original UK northern goth scene, Lunar Paths are a transatlantic musical duo. With memorable hooks woven through intricate, powerful percussion, laced together with haunting vocals, their eclectic sound shares traits with goth & alternative indie artistes.
New is a psychedelic and darkwavish slo-mo trip with a trancy effect.
Its glowing, shadowy The Cure-like guitar radiance and its hallucinatory
female/male vocals lead to an eerie experience. Intriguing stuff.
