Listening Post – April 2024

Words: Andy Hughes

I can’t quite Adam-and-beliEve-it that we’re already easing into spring. No, this isn’t an April Fools (particularly as that was a few days ago), but rather the year zooming ahead as per. 

Alongside our bumper playlist for the year (cataloguing everything we’ve been loving from January through to now), the ‘Listening Post’ returns this month and it’s full of choice cuts, 20 of them – old and new!

It’s a crisp 60 minutes, so you can bosh this one out in snappy fashion – be sure to tell your friends / family / pets too!

Whilst you’re here, can we quickly draw your attention to the new podcast that we launched at the start of the year? ’60 Minutes or less’ has been up and running for over three months now, featuring interesting chats with Joe Casey (Protomartyr), Paul Hanley (The Fall), Philip Frobos (Omni), Jonathan Higgs (Everything Everything), Peter Brewis (Field Music) and Steve Davis OBE (The Utopia Strong)! When you’re done here, get yourself listening to the new episodes and give it a rating on your favourite streaming service!

Patio – Inheritance
(Collection)

Cooler than the other side of the pillow stuff here from NYC formed trio Patio. From their second album ‘Collection’, out September last year on tastemaker label Fire Talk, ‘Inheritance’ is as groovy as it is moody and calls to mind the brilliant Lithics. Love those machine-gun fire drum bursts.

Parsnip – The Light
(Behold)

On our radar ever since their 2017 EP ‘Health’, Aussie lot Parsnip return in 2024 with their forthcoming second album (on the way this month via Upset The Rhythm). Kicking things off with bright and breezy lead single ‘The Light’, it’s an offering that sounds like it’s been zapped forward in time from the swinging sixties. 

Bench Press – Respite
(Not The Past, Can’t Be The Future)

From their 2019 album ‘Not The Past, Can’t Be The Future’, Melbourne’s Bench Press have a motto we can get behind – ‘don’t bore us, get to the chorus’. Mastered by Mikey Young, naturally, this is a snarling post-punk number that sinks its teeth in from the off.

Bingo Fury – Leather Sky
(Bats Feet For A Widow)

It was a trip seeing Bingo Fury at hipster hotspot YES in Manchester recently, given that the cover photo for his new album ‘Bats Feet For A Widow’ captures the songwriter in the restaurant across the street, literally taken from the very same room we were stood. ‘Leather Sky’ is something else, a proper stop you in your tracks affair from the young crooner, one that’s drawn comparisons to songwriting greats like Scott Walker.

Saint Saviour – Be Gentle
(Sunseeker)

It’s fitting that we move into spring with this sun-soaked delight from London based singer-songwriter Becky Jones a.k.a. Saint Saviour (though it is pissing it down in Manchester as I write this…) From a new album out now – the aptly titled ‘Sunseeker’ – elsewhere on the record you’ll find a guest collaboration from Bill Ryder Jones.

Non La – Hurtful
(Like Before)

Mega S/T ‘blue’ album Weezer vibes aplenty on the fist-pumping ‘Hurtful’, one of the big hitters from ‘Like Before’, the new record from queer Chinese-Vietnamese multi-instrumentalist Non La (whose name sounds like what a scouser might say when you’ve asked them for something they’ve just run out of…) Dig that fuzz!

Ting Tang Tina – Hair
(Honeybee)

Texan quartet Ting Tang Tina first started playing shows in 2017, but listening to the infectious ‘Hair’, you’d think they’d have been at it for decades. Hardly letting up across its near three minutes, this from their debut album ‘Honeybee’ sounds like it’d be sitting pretty on the soundtrack of any coming of age teen film. 

Grazia – Stupid Paradise
(In Poor Taste)

Featuring ex-Sauna Youth bod Lindsay Corstorphine, London based duo Grazia put out a killer EP at the start of the year (another winning release from the team at Feel It Records). ‘Stupid Paradise’ is a total ear worm of the slacker variety.

VR Sex – Real Doll Time
(Hard Copy)

I’ve been flirting with disaster of late, listening to loads of VR Sex on my work laptop (that name!), but I can’t help it – I’m hooked on their new record, ’Hard Copy’! Spearheaded by Noel Skum (a.k.a. Andrew Clinco of Drab Majesty), ‘Real Doll Time’ is a mega infectious bit of moody post-punk from a record that well and truly has its hooks in us.

The Chico Hamilton Quintet – The Morning After
(Chico Hamilton Quintet featuring Buddy Collette)

An absolutely delightful piece here from American jazz drummer and bandleader, Chico Hamilton, a completely cinematic jazz affair that would perfectly soundtrack any time of day (not just ‘The Morning After‘…)

Folly Group – East Flat Crows
(Down There!)

Sometimes seeing a band live can really take their record to another level. Following an appearance in Manchester last month, I’ve been hammering the debut album from Londoners Folly Group. ‘East Flat Crows’ is a particularly cool number from the quartet, the dual vocal and hypnotising rhythm section taking hold.

Modema – Running Back

A regular in The Orielles live band (as well as behind the counter of Manchester institution Piccadilly Records), last year saw the release of a debut single from Scottish artist Modema, a slick pop number that doesn’t sound too dissimilar to the synth-pop stylings found on the latest Everything Everything record.  

SLAP RASH – Photo Fit
(Catherine Special)

Local lot SLAP RASH put out their debut EP ‘Catherine Special’ at the tail end of last year and from it, ‘Photo Fit’ is a frantic post punk shoulder-shuffler of the Drahla variety. Thumping drums, killer bass and a captivating vocal attack that keeps you on your toes, this is solid!

Holiday Ghosts – Big Congratulations
(Coat Of Arms)

The ever prolific Holiday Ghosts swiftly follow up their 2023 record ‘Absolute Reality’ with yet another slab of wax to be devoured. Latest single ‘Big Congratulations’ is a total pop treat – a joyous, breezy single to welcome in the brighter months of the year.

(Photo Credit: Atiba Jefferson)

Dehd – Mood Ring
(Poetry)

Starting off as a thumping, Nine Inch Nails type industrial assault, ‘Mood Ring’ switches gears dramatically and becomes such a pop bop. From a new record out this May, ‘Mood Ring’ is insanely catchy and a total heart-sweller from the Chicago trio.

Mannequin Pussy – Aching
(I Got Heaven)

You know we love a 90 second ripper at Birthday Cake For Breakfast, so we were stoked when we heard this on the latest Mannequin Pussy record. A hardcore rush that sounds like the gnarliness of early Turnstile, you’ll want to stick ‘Aching’ on again and again.

Lambrini Girls – God’s Country

Very much in the vein of early Sleaford Mods – dog-dirt bass and engrossing, corner-you-in-the-pub stream of consciousness vocals (both a compliment, trust us) – ‘God’s Country’ is the latest attack from killer trio Lambrini Girls. Known for a notorious live show and with records to match, they can’t seem to put a foot wrong!

Rosali – Bite Down
(Bite Down)

From a new record out last month via Merge Records, North Carolina’s Rosali conjures up a real vibe on title track ‘Bite Down’. Guided by the warmth of the vocals and the instrumentation, it’s the type of track you can completely lose yourself in, allowing your mind to float off along a lazy river. 

Alison Cotton – The Letter Burning
(Engelchen)

From a new record out this year on Rocket Recordings and Feeding Tube Records, ‘The Letter Burning’ is a haunting, thought provoking piece from London based viola player / vocalist Alison Cotton. The record ‘Engelchen’ – meaning “little angel” in German – is a tribute to Ida & Louise Cook, two opera fans who rescued 29 Jewish people from Nazi-occupied Europe in the 30s.

Cowtown – Thru Being Zuul
(Fear Of…)

A commemorative pen in the post for Leeds formed Cowtown, the trio now celebrating twenty years in the game! To mark the occasion, the trio have just announced a new album is on the way this May via Gringo Records – their first new album in eight years! New single ‘Thru Being Zuul’ is the Cowtown sound we’ve come to love, an energetic burst of DEVO styled synth-punk to get the body moving.

(Photo Credit: Vincent-Lee)

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This One Song… Saint Saviour on Be Gentle

Tell you what – we love hearing from artists when things go right. We equally love hearing from artists when things go dreadfully wrong. A song that was a piece of piss, written in 20 minutes? Or years in the making and a bastard to write?

Whether it’s a song that came together through great duress or one that was smashed out in a short amount of time, we’re getting the lowdown from some of our favourites on the one song that they can’t stop thinking about – in their own words.

Becky Jones, a.k.a. Saint Saviour, talks us through the track ‘Be Gentle’ from her forthcoming new album ‘Sunseeker‘ (out March 22nd 2024 via VLF). Take it away, Becky…

Words: Andy Hughes

“I wrote ‘Sunseeker‘ using my new technique of only ever writing lyrics whilst walking / wandering around places. I have come to find that I’m more likely to become stuck and creatively lost for words, stories, lines of inquiry when I’m sitting still, so I started to record myself singing gibberish on melody and chord structures I really liked and then going out walking while listening to them.

Around the very start of ‘Sunseeker‘ I had become really interested in the Plantagenets, Wars of the Roses and all that stuff, and I’d been devouring all the Philippa Gregory books. I’d fallen in love with the sharp witted women in the stories and how people like Elizabeth Woodville had crossed loyalties from red to white rose to become queen, then her daughter did the very same thing in becoming the first Tudor queen.

I had the ‘please be gentle with me baby’ line from the very beginning, but I wanted to avoid going down a conventional route with the concept. On my walks I often go around and through the Tower of London which is near me, and I started thinking about the last surviving Plantagenet, Margaret Pole. When you google her, all you get is stories of her ‘botched’ execution within the walls of the tower, when her life story is actually quite remarkable. Her body (and head) is buried under the floor of the church in the grounds of the tower. ‘Be Gentle‘ imagines her asking us to be gentle with her memory, maybe look beyond the gory tales and learn about her amazing survival into old age in the face of constant existential threat from childhood to her death at age 67.

In the second half of the song, I start to imagine her haunting Henry VIII in revenge, her ghost willing some of the roses of the tower to climb and loop ‘like a braid around your throat, baby I’m the song you wrote, the melody; poison fruit’.”

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