{"id":8590,"date":"2020-08-09T08:00:00","date_gmt":"2020-08-09T12:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/meadowparty.com\/blog\/?p=8590"},"modified":"2020-08-08T14:43:26","modified_gmt":"2020-08-08T18:43:26","slug":"music-update-july-2020","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/meadowparty.com\/blog\/2020\/08\/09\/music-update-july-2020\/","title":{"rendered":"Music update, July 2020."},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>It seems like new music releases might be slowing down now, perhaps a lagged effect of the pandemic, although I still see a half-dozen or more albums coming out in the rest of 2020 that I&#8217;m excited to hear. As always, you can <a href=\"https:\/\/open.spotify.com\/playlist\/3llEiA4pD4nhoo9ELYD1JI?si=J5bt7-h1RkCvUVZxcGRJlw\">listen to the playlist here<\/a> if you can&#8217;t see the Spotify widget below.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed-spotify wp-block-embed is-type-rich is-provider-spotify wp-embed-aspect-9-16 wp-has-aspect-ratio\"><div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<iframe title=\"Spotify Embed: Klaw&amp;apos;s July 2020 music update\" style=\"border-radius: 12px\" width=\"100%\" height=\"352\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen allow=\"autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; fullscreen; picture-in-picture\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/open.spotify.com\/embed\/playlist\/3llEiA4pD4nhoo9ELYD1JI?si=EHoG0EMHTG6Wo-3A6AuPLA&#038;utm_source=oembed\"><\/iframe>\n<\/div><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>The Beths \u2013 Dying to Believe. <\/strong>The praise for the Beths&#8217; new album <em>Jump Rope Gazers<\/em> is a bit ahead of my opinion of the album, which I liked, but wouldn&#8217;t say I loved it; they&#8217;re so much better when they use their energy and go uptempo.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Doves \u2013 Prisoners.<\/strong> That&#8217;s two strong tracks of the three singles they&#8217;ve released so far off their comeback album, <em>The Universal Want<\/em>, due out on September 20<sup>th<\/sup>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Space Above featuring Boyboy \u2013 Movements.<\/strong> Aaron Short, who records as Space Above, may sound more like early The Naked and Famous, the band Short left, than TNAF does today \u2013 and I&#8217;m here for it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>The Naked and Famous \u2013 Everybody Knows.<\/strong> And here&#8217;s the remaining duo, with one of their most melodic songs since their debut album in 2010. Their latest album <em>Recover<\/em>, features this, last year&#8217;s &#8220;Sunseeker,&#8221; &#8220;Death,&#8221; and &#8220;Bury Us.&#8221;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Everything Everything \u2013 Violent Sun<\/strong>. This latest single from these British avant-garde rockers definitely grew on me over multiple listens, further reason to be eager for their fifth album, <em>Re-Animator<\/em>, which drops on September 11<sup>th<\/sup>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Nation of Language \u2013 The Wall &amp; I. <\/strong>Nation of Language&#8217;s latest album <em>Introduction, Presence<\/em> came out on May 24<sup>th<\/sup>, and closes out with this track, which feels heavily influenced by peak New Order.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Jorja Smith \u2013 By Any Means. <\/strong>This was the singer\/songwriter&#8217;s first single on her own since last year&#8217;s hit &#8220;Be Honest,&#8221; and I hope it signals her sophomore album will come soon.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Black Honey \u2013 Beaches<\/strong>. More indie-pop goodness from one of my favorite bands of 2018.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>San Cisco \u2013 Messages<\/strong>. Scarlett Stevens takes on lead vocals on this very sunny pop track, although I think her lack of vocal depth shows here when she doesn&#8217;t have Jordi Davieson to share singing duties.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>PAINT \u2013 Strange World<\/strong>. This really sounds like a lost Badly Drawn Boy track from 2000. PAINT is Pedrum Siadatian, formerly of the Allah-Las; this is the best track from his first album under the name, <em>Spiritual Vegas<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Inhaler \u2013 Fade Into You<\/strong>. It&#8217;s tough to cover a song like Mazzy Star&#8217;s &#8220;Fade Into You,&#8221; but Inhaler, led by Elijah Hewson (son of Bono), does a very credible job here.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Hinds \u2013 Spanish Bombs<\/strong>. A bit of a different sound for the Spanish quartet, maybe a little more polished than their previous output, although that&#8217;s kind of a low bar.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Glass Animals \u2013 It&#8217;s All So Incredibly Loud<\/strong>. This song is wonderfully weird, and has Glass Animals&#8217; trademark use of unusual percussion sounds, and the more I listen to it the more I like it. The synth lines here are relentless.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Serpiko \u2013 Sleep State<\/strong>. Nobody seems to know who Serpiko is, but his debut EP, also called <em>Sleep State<\/em>, has garnered some positive press for its unusual blend of electronic, funk, and jazz elements. This title track is by far the best on the record, meandering in a purposeful way thanks to a persistent percussion line.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>The Go-Go&#8217;s \u2013 Club Zero<\/strong>. Showtime has a new documentary out on the pioneering all-girl pop\/rock group, and the quintet recorded this new track to go along with it \u2026 and it&#8217;s great. Other than Belinda Carlisle&#8217;s vocals, you might guess this was something from their peak years.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Ihsahn \u2013 Spectre at the Feast<\/strong>. Ihsahn is one of the founding members of the Norwegian black metal band Emperor, probably as well remembered for their involvement in church burnings and for their drummer&#8217;s conviction of the murder of a man who solicited him for sex than for their four albums, the last of which came out in 2001. That&#8217;s a long way of saying that this track is nothing like Emperor&#8217;s music \u2013 it&#8217;s progressive rock, not really even metal, with clean vocals and some intriguing guitar work.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Pallbearer \u2013 Forgotten Days<\/strong>. The champions of American doom metal are back with this title track from their new album, due out October 23<sup>rd<\/sup>. This track was labeled (Edit) so I presume a longer version will appear on the full-length LP.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Ensiferum \u2013 The Defence of the Sampo<\/strong>. I really enjoy Ensiferum when they stick to the thrash elements more common in Viking metal and go light on the death growls; it&#8217;s like listening to strange Norse metal drinking songs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Mastodon \u2013 Fallen Torches<\/strong>. This is on the heavier side for Mastodon, a previously unreleased track that will appear on the band&#8217;s forthcoming B-sides and miscellany collection <em>Medium Rarities<\/em>, which will also include the band&#8217;s cover of Metallica&#8217;s &#8220;Orion.&#8221;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>It seems like new music releases might be slowing down now, perhaps a lagged effect of the pandemic, although I still see a half-dozen or more albums coming out in the rest of 2020 that I&#8217;m excited to hear. As always, you can listen to the playlist here if you can&#8217;t see the Spotify widget [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[359,167,757,852,787],"class_list":["post-8590","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-alternative","tag-indie","tag-metal","tag-music","tag-progressive-metal","entry"],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/meadowparty.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8590","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/meadowparty.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/meadowparty.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/meadowparty.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/meadowparty.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8590"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/meadowparty.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8590\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8591,"href":"https:\/\/meadowparty.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8590\/revisions\/8591"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/meadowparty.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8590"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/meadowparty.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8590"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/meadowparty.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8590"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}