Crafted in collaboration with Brazilian singer Josh Paulino, Only Pretend is both fierce and delicate, and evolves gorgeously throughout its three-minute lifespan.
Rock
UK music is fiercely impressive when it needs to be. This year feels important for live music and creativity, and Fierce Friend is firmly a part of that.
Funky basslines and live rock energy carves out a band-sound that’s hopefully making a huge comeback this year. The Lucky Angels deliver the distortion, depth and soul required to light up the space, with the solid rock stomp and tone of The world’s for sale.
Personification, metaphor, and all-round powerful songwriting elevate the appeal of an indie band well and truly paving their own way. Glasgow’s Revelation 23 have that something fresh and fascinating to their sound, something topical and piercing about their sense of purpose, their rebellious intrigue, and Veal is a fine dedication to the craft.
This classic indie rock anthem is both gentle and impassioned, thoughtful and uplifting, and that natural connection to the songwriting and playing process, along with the band’s extensive years of experience on the scene, is what effortlessly sets The Monumentals apart from most of the indie acts you’ll scroll past during this week’s algorithmic downpour.
The spider, the web, the build up, the choreography, the drum playing – Ok Goodnight are great then sensational with this release, and the latter half is unmissable as the song evolves and ultimately peaks; noting a kind of hard rock crescendo at the finish that’s no doubt phenomenal in the live setting.
Brilliant punk-rock writing and a passionate all-together-now recording introduces the timeless and aptly-titled volume of French band GRINFAITH’s intoxicating anthem RIOT.
Indie’s Hemingway of the Highway returns with a fiercely poetic Americana rock single this month – the mighty Mat D brings through his most raspy and impassioned vocal presence, amidst a soaring arrangement of distorted guitars and quicker, softer indie riffs to counter underneath. Something like Springsteen with a faster-pace and deeply provocative, even profound … Continued
DownTown Mystic have long-since been a rock and roll force for a good, and their latest EP features the iconic rock’n’roll hall of fame rhythm section from Bruce Springsteen’s own legendary E Street Band.
“The backlash against AI music is real, and we don’t care. Every era of music has had its purists and its pioneers, and The Weight Between is planting a flag on the side of what’s next. This isn’t a gimmick, it’s a blueprint.” – The Weight Between. Haunting riffs, powerful juxtaposed moments of softness, intimacy, … Continued
“I definitely enjoy a momentary escape of the weighty burdens that being a person who is least in the society in which they live carries with it.”
“It takes place in a dystopian empire, where an insurrection and revolution are taking place after the killing of a child, as seen in the song “Dancing In The Fallout,” which I took inspiration from the people of Iran who would die just to be free, who fantasize of being themselves and ridding their societies of oppression.”