September 06 - Noteworthy New Releases
Our favourite releases of the week.
WAKE IN FRIGHT – ‘YOU DESERVE’
Wake In Fright’s ‘You Deserve’ is folk sleight-of-hand. Its first half – built around a violin melody that feels like it could float up onto your porch one foggy morning – struts by with a shrug and a wry grin. It suggests that Sam Wilson and co. ply their craft with an effortlessness that borders on indifference. But here’s the trick: in its second half, ‘You Deserve’ blossoms into something else entirely. As the refrain ‘dish it out / take it in’ dissolves into ambience, the song becomes a composite world of disparate genres that interact like a natural ecosystem. This is all to say that Wake In Fright are not indifferent; indifference is never usually this delightful to behold.
Sounds like: Bluegrass for the green seasons.
By Jack Paech
HARD RUBBISH – ‘16 WALLS’
If ‘16 Walls’ were a time and place, it’d be 3pm on a Sunday when questions about what you’re doing with your life start to curdle in your stomach. Sometimes, it’s hard not to let the brain fuzz, the aimlessness and the repetitive feelings get to you. But this five-minute track lets you sit with the emotions of not wanting to see the point in it all.
Jason Katsaras’ honesty is why Hard Rubbish tracks cause heart pangs. And in the case of ‘16 Walls’, the warm alt-country guitars and repetitive refrains let the floodgates break. It feels like sharing your thoughts with a friend and rotting on a living room floor in company: gentle and comforting. It also blows the cobwebs off whatever ambition you’ve probably neglected. Life only happens if you let it. Sit with that. Play ‘16 Walls’. Move forward.
Sounds like: A long drive through the suburbs.
By Zara Richards
TWINE – ‘FUTURE EXHALES’
Twine are a hard band to categorise. With stunning songwriting capabilities, a ferocious performance style and the innate ability to let a melody rise above the mesmerising cacophony they create, it’s hard to know where exactly Twine fit. But that’s part of their beauty and appeal.
Their latest single ‘Future Exhales’ is a celebration of what makes the alt-noise quintet great. Between the blistering din of angular guitars, the intense vocals of Tom Katsaras and the swirling violin of Thea Martin, there’s an immense sense of catharsis that emerges from its jagged form. Twine understands that, like all great art, music exists to make you feel something – and ‘Future Exhales’ leaves you gasping for air.
Sounds like: A needed adrenaline rush and its ensuing euphoria.
By Tyler Jenke
SUNSICK DAISY – ‘OVER & OVER’
Grief is a powerful emotion that can be channelled in many different mediums. For Sunsick Daisy, it’s through song, with their latest hazy shoegaze single, ‘Over & Over’, a meditation on anguish. An ambient vessel of melancholy, the track is a dreamy, reverb-heavy wall of noise driven by fuzzy guitars and vocalist Sarah’s soothing delivery.
Sarah originally wrote the track after her childhood pet passed. However, the song’s haunting sound and emotive lyrics that pinpoint sorrow and pain pull heavily at your heartstrings. Anyone who has experienced some form of loss – no matter how big or small – will relate.
Sounds like: Melancholy.
By Tobias Handke
DESTINEZIA – ‘11:58’
Destinezia’s ‘11:58’ is a dreamy escape. Spinetingling vocals transport you to a whimsical realm while an indie grunge guitar ebbs and flows, adding depth to the track’s underlying electricity.
From the very first note, Destinezia’s blend of playful exuberance and sweet temper will have your toes tapping and body shimmying around the room, singing the catchy refrain ‘eleven fiftyeight’ with pure abandon. This track is an anthem for those magical moments just before midnight – when life brims with endless opportunities that beg to be seized. We can’t get enough.
Sounds like: What Cinderella would be singing on her way home from the ball.
By Hannah Louise
Stressed – ‘End’
“So many people suffer from abuse, and suffer alone.” – Pamela Stephenson.
This actress-cum-psychologist pointed out a devastating truth about the world in her above statement. But what can we do to stop extensive suffering?
For straight-edge hardcore quintet Stressed, their answer is to scream intensely and expose this appalling evil. This, at least, drives their newest single ‘End’ – a tight, two-minute-twenty track that communicates this higher message with striking brilliance. A metallic hardcore blast that Walls of Jericho would admire, the track flows flawlessly from circle-pit-inducing mania to neck-breaking riffage and a monstrous breakdown. Here is a hardcore anthem to shine necessary light on abuse. Let’s end the suffering.
Sounds like: GEL’s younger, enraged Aussie cousin.
By Will Oakeshott
