Still continuing with their “song a month” project, it’s Viola! And to brighten up the cold February, here’s a doo-do-do-do-doo-riffic piece of sunshiney pop rock about the joys of love and how your heart seems to as if burst into a song when the big crush happens. The song is called “Heart Breaks Into a Song” and it’s all kinds of awesome – awesome sounds, catchy choruses, brilliantly self-aware-of-inherent-silliness lyrics (”what the hell is going on?”), and all that! It’s a must listen.

Download it from here.

And in case you missed it last month, because I wasn’t here to post it, Viola welcomed us to the new decade with a song called “2010s (Maybe the World Won’t End)” that opened up the new year with a suitably groovy synthpop feel. Check out that awesome string sample!

MP3 here.

If The Trials of Van Occupanther was a snapshot look at the lives of 1800’s frontiermen, The Courage of Others has those same men sat around a fire on a cold night after retreating from a great disaster that’s completely destroyed their lives, with their only hope being a glimpse of dying quickly but full well knowing that painful and long starvation is ahead of them.

Read the rest of this entry »

Back down. Calm down. Change your expectations or, better yet, remove them completely. Fyfe Dangerfield might be the frontman of Guillemots who are experts on making life-affirming and gloriously grand pop songs. His debut solo album Fly Yellow Moon also piqued our interests with whopping three songs of similar kin: the radio preview “Faster Than the Setting Sun”, the download freebie “When You Walk in the Room” and lead single “She Needs Me”, each one showing Fyfe mastering his natural element. But if you were to go to Fly Yellow Moon expecting more of all that, the first listen will be hell of a confusing, and most likely somewhat disappointing ride. Outside the three tracks given as a preview, Fly Yellow Moon lacks giant choruses, huge orchestras and big melodies. Instead Fyfe sits down, picks up his acoustic guitar and starts strumming it gently and slowly.

As the album progresses the clearer it gets why he decided to push out a solo album. He may have a sizeable chunk of backing musicians helping him flesh out the songs, but Fly Yellow Moon is all about intimate Fyfe troubadouring in peace.

Read the rest of this entry »

Hello and welcome to THE NEW YEAR! Everything cool? Cool. Let’s get the IP train back a-starting.

And because I simply know that you’re all desperately waiting for the release day of Fyfe Dangerfield’s debut solo album, only a few days to go, here’s a little something to bide the time over – an acoustic guitar + strings session featuring three songs from the album as well as a cover of some song by an obscure boy band or something.

Clicky!

In other news, all the studio cuts heard so far are still pretty awesome. Roll on release!

And continuing from where we left off, our great TL;DR adventure continues with five more albums.

Read the rest of this entry »

Last time this year I was worrying about writing an annual top 10 albums list. There simply wasn’t enough albums that I felt happy about including on the list, causing several entries to appear in the final list that wouldn’t have even dreamed of making it on any other year. In other words, 2008 was disappointing.

I’m worrying slightly again, wondering what on earth to include on this list and in what order. This time however it’s for the completely opposite reason. 2009 has been a brilliant, brilliant year in music and as I choose to see which 10 make it to the Chosen Pile, I have to look at all the ones that are left outside that group and feel sad over not allowing them a chance in the spotlight as well. There’s too much good stuff to choose and rank from!

But here we go.

A quick overall word about 09. A really intriguing thing is that this could be called the year of lyrics. Now I’m a person who does love his lyrics but I’m not a huge geek – I can safely enjoy and sing along to e.g. Red Hot Chili Peppers without having to hold back tears on what Kiedis is shrieking. However, 2009 has been packed with albums where the lyrics are an integral part of the entire thing. Albums where my personal enjoyment leaped tenfold when I stopped still and listened to what was being said, albums where the lyrics are tied to a concept integral to the album’s creation, albums where the lyrics actually became one of the main focus points and one reason why I kept on playing the albums. Even albums where I didn’t fall in love with the lyrics were still made with lyrics as a focal point: concept albums and so forth.

But the music is the main focal point. And here we go, the music. First (or last?) five are here, the next presented tomorrow. There’s absolutely no reason involving ‘keeping tension’ or any other such tripe, it’s more just the fact that my entries tend to be a bit TLDR and therefore cutting it up makes it more readable.

Read the rest of this entry »

Jason Lytle, he of previously Grandaddy and now of a brand new solo career, wants to wish each and every one of you (even you grumpy cynical sods) a merry Christmas through the medium of a 7-track instrumental piano EP full of songs with nothing to do with Christmas.

You can download it here and it is indeed very lovely, very beautiful and very wonderful.

In other news, Lytle is also in the process of writing material for his next solo album and he guarantees that “[it] will be the weirdest, most wonderful mayhem” he has made. Should be worth a gander.

2010 is approaching soon. Twelve new months full of brand new music, from old veterans, young bands and complete upcomers. Just to go up-to-date on what’s happening with the artists that pleasure Flint’s tastebuds, it’s time to give a little checkaround to 2010’s possible offers by artists I’m intrigued about. Rumours, confirmed news, it’s all here.

Not keen on the artists I display? Give a sly prod at the other writers, maybe they’ll reveal their musical stalking results as well?

After the cut, a big list of various names.

Read the rest of this entry »

Merry early Christmas!

Viola’s December giveaway, a self-proclaimed sequel to their 2004 Christmas single, oozes the sort of wonderful warmth and magical happiness only Christmastime can bring. When the depressed verses switch to the ridiculously, almost tongue-in-cheek lovely choruses where soft drum machines tap-tap-tap along and bells and sprinkles fill the air, the duo manages to perfectly capture the wonderful fluffy feeling of the gorgeous season.

This Year Will Be Different also marks the end of Viola’s 2009 music club. Come January 2010 and we’ll be treated to a whole new year of wonderful little Violabits. I’ll remind you!

MP3: This Year It Will Be Different