Throughout the week, we update our Best New Songs playlist with the new releases that caught our attention the most, be it a single leading up to the release of an album or a newly unveiled deep cut. And each Monday, we round up the best new songs released over the past week (the eligibility period begins on Monday and ends Sunday night) in this segment.
There’s quite a few tracks worth highlighting this week: Baltimore-based hardcore outfit Turnstile returned with their first new music in over three years, showcasing their innovative blend of atmospheric textures and blistering riffs on ‘MYSTERY’; Lightning Bug previewed their third record with the last song they wrote for it, the ethereal ‘Song of the Bell’, while Cold Cave released a video for the hypnotic, ominous ‘Psalm 23’. In the singer-songwriter realm, Squirrel Flower shared the introspective ‘Flames and Flat Tires’ from her forthcoming album Planet (i); Ellis unveiled a gorgeously evocative single titled ‘what if love isn’t enough’ from her upcoming EP; Maple Glider offered the hauntingly beautiful ‘Baby Tiger’ from her debut full-length, and Half Waif’s ‘Sodium & Cigarettes’ is another striking offering from her new album Mythopoetics. If you’re in need of something a little more upbeat, though, Norwegian pop star Sigrid delivered the infectious disco jam ‘Mirror’, her first new music since her 2019 debut Sucker Punch, while the title track from Yola’s Dan Auerbach-produced album Stand for Myself is a swaggering, celebratory blues rock cut.
Zoe Mead, the London-based singer-songwriter who writes and records under the moniker Wyldest, released her debut full-length, Dream Chaos, in 2018. Following a coupleof EPs, the album served as an introduction to Wyldest’s ethereal, swirling brand of dream pop, and was reworked for the gorgeously stripped-back Redream Chaos last March. Her sophomore LP, Monthly Friend (out now via Hand in Hive), melds the ambient textures of that version and the indie pop sensibilities of the original, drawing inspiration from the likes of Elliott Smith and Soccer Mommy to create a more intimate soundscape suffused in layers of crystalline guitars and tender, introspective vocals.
More importantly, the record positions Mead as a self-sufficient artist, as it finds her taking the helm on production and mixing duties for the first time on one of her own projects – an idea she initially laughed off – while exploring themes of womanhood and femininity. A testament to Mead’s growing self-confidence and focus as a songwriter and producer, Monthly Friend radiates joy and honesty as it reaches, however tactfully, for moments of romantic beauty and transcendence. On ‘Arrow’, she paints an unusually surreal scene that lights up the rest of the album: “Heavenly embrace/ I travelled through time/ To make sense of this life/ We are divine.”
We caught up with Wyldest’s Zoe Mead for this edition of our Artist Spotlight interview series to talk about her musical journey, the process of making Monthly Friend, and more.
When did you realize that music was a passion of yours?
I think it routes back to early childhood with my parents playing all kinds of ‘60s and ‘70s music. My dad had Pink Floyd’s Dark Side of the Moon constantly in his record player, so it kind of was the soundtrack to my childhood in a way. And then I got into thinking about sound design and how things are made. I never really had lessons or anything – my parents bought me a little keyboard when I was a kid, and I used to put on beats and do bedroom lo-fi stuff that I would love to be able to do now, but I was in a different trail of thought back then. Now it’s very calculated and planned, whereas back then it was just pressing buttons. But it was just a natural thing, being interested in sound design and then trying things and not being able to necessarily just play with toys – I had to be doing something with the toys, like I had to be making a video out of the toys, or I had to be making the Barbies do like a pop star kind of music festival thing. I was a very weird child. I would always be stealing my parents’ clothes, and my dad had this big video camera that we’d take on holiday and it would just disappear out of the cupboard, and I would be in my room filming something or making something. I love looking back at those memories and thinking how I was just finding ways of doing things.
Do you still have any recordings from that time?
I think I do, yeah. I had this little song in particular – I have a close friend who I’ve known since I was about four and we went to primary school together, and she always jokes about how pushy I was as a child and how I used to kind of force her to do all the singing because she was way better at singing than me. She was so good at everything, but she just didn’t want to be in the limelight or be in front of people singing. But we’ve actually got this tape that we laugh about – I need to make copies, actually, because I’m terrified it’s gonna die – and we have this little song on it. It’s actually a decent song, I’m thinking about bringing that back. I mean, she wrote it, I just pretended I wrote it at the time because I was all about the glory. But I’ve definitely got some bits and bobs. Maybe they’ll make an appearance one day, maybe I’ll sample them or something.
That would be really cool. How did you start getting more into the songwriting side of it yourself?
I remember my brother went traveling and he had a guitar in his room and he left it behind. God knows I couldn’t go in his room whilst he was living there, but then he went traveling so I went and ransacked all of his CDs and played his little classical guitar started playing, just finding my way on the strings. I started learning a few songs online, and then I quickly realized that I wasn’t really about learning songs, I needed to write something myself. So it was just a matter of putting some chords that I’d just learned together and then writing some lyrics. I think when I started playing guitar I was about 15, and I guess a couple years later I went out to open mic nights and started putting myself out there, playing my own stuff.
When did the idea for Wyldest start to form?
It started in my bedroom in 2015 as a kind of – because I’d been in bands before mainly where I was surrounded by friends, and they were taking the lead on the writing a lot more, and I was just like the girl up front singing. And that’s cool, it was a great way to cut my teeth in a band. But then with Wyldest, I decided I wanted to do it on my own and I wanted to empower myself to produce. Because I had watched my friend before, he was few years older than me and he studied music technology and sound engineering, and all of the songs that we used to record back in the old band, he used to sit there and do the EQing and stuff and I’d just be fascinated and sit on a sofa behind him watching it doing it. And I think that’s quite common, especially for females in this industry. And it’s changing, but it’s still the sort of “sat on the sofa watching someone do all technological stuff” – we’re obviously lending our voice and sometimes our musical skills, and then they’re capturing it. But with Wyldest, I decided I wanted to capture it, because I knew the only way to really get what I wanted across was to learn that art, be a part of that world, talk the language of the studio and production.
And that obviously informs the direction of the new record as well. I believe with the first album, the project was billed as a trio, whereas now it’s more of a solo endeavour. What was the reason behind that?
It’s not like an ego thing, and I’m aware that now I’m putting it out as “I” and not “we”. Initially it was this trio, and I guess it was down to my own self-confidence. I hated talking about myself and I kind of wanted to be like a silent person doing it; I wanted to pretend it was this band because it was easier for me to post about it and talk about it. And it always was kind of me in my bedroom, and then I’d bring the songs and I’d jam with my bandmates at the time, who are really good friends of mine, and they’d always be like, “You should own it, you need to own it more.” And then COVID happened, and that was a turning point where my bandmate, my beloved friend Mariin, had to move back to Estonia. I still talked to her basically every day and we were very close, but she was like, “You need to carry on,” because she’s there for the ongoing future and unfortunately she can’t really come back to tour. But it’s more of like, “I have to do this now, I have to own it, because it’s the only way I can drive the project forward.”
Before we talk about the new album, I wanted to bring up something that happened I think two years ago, when you got to play with Gary Lightbody from Snow Patrol. What was that experience like?
It was all such a quick, random thing. My publishing label asked if I would write a few covers for that lovely show that we all know, Love Island. And I didn’t think anything of it, I didn’t even know how big the show was, I didn’t even watch it. And then one got picked up, and before I knew it, my phone was just exploding with people sharing – I’ve never had that, I’ve released music for years and I’ve never had that kind of hype. And Gary had tweeted about it as well, and before I knew it I was being asked to play with him in this show, and it was insane. It was just on a scale that I never have experienced before. But he is the nicest man, he is so kind, and I’m so grateful. I love Snow Patrol so much. I used to sit in the back of my parents’ car growing up, and they’d have Snow Patrol on constantly. And I just know every word to every song, so I was backstage singing it.
I don’t know if you would’ve imagined this would ever happen back then.
Yeah, sometimes you do have those pinch-yourself moments. You beat yourself up sometimes, you’re like, “Oh, I’m not doing very well, what am I doing with my life,” and then now and again you’re like, “You know what, 10 years ago if I’d see myself now, I’d be like, ‘Yeah, that’s all right. Well done!’”
Have you had any moments like that recently?
I think the mixing of this album was maybe the most prominent one. Just having the final product and playing it on the record player. I’ve just got just got a batch through, and listening to it back, knowing that I did everything myself – it’s been years of learning and years of growing as a producer to get to the stage where I could actually do that. Even three years ago, the thought of producing and mixing my own album was just unfathomable, and now I’ve done it. So that was an emotional moment, listening to that back, because I’ve had so much turmoil over the last year when I’ve been doing it, so it hasn’t dawned on me what I’m actually doing. It’s all just been this anxiety trip of like, “Is this good? I don’t think this is good.” And then now listening to it back and actually sounding like a record, and actually sounding like something that I would play, is amazing.
You’ve described Monthly Friend as being about womanhood and femininity. Did you go into the album wanting to explore that as a running theme, or was it something that emerged later on as you were putting the songs together?
I didn’t initially, because I’d only written maybe 15 songs or so – at that point, when I’m writing, my process is like, I have a book of poetry and ideas, and I kind of sing a bunch of gobbledygook whilst I’m writing chords. So I had that, and then I was waiting for the opportunity to record them somewhere else or rewrite my lyrics, be inspired, go and watch some films, go and experience the world, you know. But that didn’t happen. So I ended up with writer’s block in terms of lyrics, I was like, “I’m not experiencing anything. Nothing’s going on. My biggest problem is that my Zoom app isn’t working.” There wasn’t much going on, so I guess I did delve into a lot of feminist literature for that reason. I wanted to write about something I cared about and that meant something to me. I went down a lot of rabbit holes and read a lot of feminist poetry, and one of my favorite poets, Rupi Kaur, her poetry book the sun and her flowers was maybe one of the first things I read, and I felt like this is what I kind of want to base the album on. A lot of my lyrics reference little bits of her poetry book. I just love the way she mixes nature with very deep and almost harrowing stories about herself, but in beautiful, poetic form.
There are also lot of references to sleeping or not being able to sleep on the album, and I read that ‘Beggar’ was written when you had bouts of insomnia. What state of mind are you usually in when you’re writing?
I do suffer from insomnia and I did while was writing this album. It’s great that you did notice all the sleeping references, because I guess that was kind of the setting, me in a late-night haze, in the midst of a global pandemic, writing these lyrics. I just remember the stillness of it, and that was quite unsettling because I’m so used to the city bustle and I kind of get comfort from that, so the fact that it was so stale and so silent was quite scary. And I guess it stirred up things which maybe otherwise I wouldn’t have found. There was a lot of existential thoughts, you know, lying in bed late at night, “What is the world, what is happening?” There was a lot of that – there always is a lot of that, but at that particular time that was in its extreme.
There’s a sense of loneliness to the final track, ‘The Void’, but there’s also this line, “Still the show goes on.” Why did you choose this song as the closing track?
I wanted to close the album with something that left everything open, I guess a big void. I didn’t want it to be like a completion and that’s it, like a happy ending. Because as we know, there isn’t really a happy ending as such in life. And ‘The Void’ was reflective of having, you know, an emptiness inside of me that need fulfilling, and the only way of doing that is to keep working and keep trying to make something work. We’ve referenced it, it could be a relationship, with my particular thing it was with… everything. I mean, politically, everything I constantly think about when I’m lying awake at night, and how the world can be better and should be better. And also, I was borrowing feelings from how I felt in past relationships, and kind of using a person or a thing – in this particular occasion, a person – to fill a void that is there. I read a poem by Rupi Kaur, and it was about not wanting to have this person fill the empty parts of me. She wants to be full on her own. And that really struck a note with me.
And ‘The Void’ is about that, really, the whole kind of “doing it on your own” and constantly working for it, because it’s not something that fills up and then that’s it. It’s something that will constantly fluctuate throughout life, you know, anxiety, everything – like, happiness, I was reading about the actual definition of happiness and how to be happy, and we can only get true happiness when we’re in flow, which is when we’re creating something or doing something or spending time with someone.
When was the last time you felt you got into that flow?
I guess the time when I really felt like the most at flow in the last year was when I was writing a song for a film soundtrack, which is outside of doing my album. That was when I felt suddenly the weight was lifted off my shoulders, because with the album, there’s a certain element of expectation to it, whereas with this soundtrack, I didn’t even realize I was doing it but it was so fun and so chilled out. I just wrote it and it just flowed out of me. It was literally over the space of a week where I was laying down textures and making some music, and then before I knew it I had something, and it was almost like this process of being under a trance. And I think that was maybe flow. I don’t know what it is and I don’t know how to define it, but it’s kind of when you don’t put any pressure on yourself or you don’t have expectations, and unfortunately we live in a world where that’s not really possible.
When I first started Wyldest, I remember experiencing that same feeling, and I have done a couple of times when I’ve collaborated with a friend and there’s been no reason necessarily to be writing something. It’s just been, “We’re gonna write something for a laugh,” and then something great happens a lot of the time. Something shit happens sometimes, but that’s just the nature of it. But then it’s like, you almost don’t know what’s happening and it’s just building and then and then a day or two or a week or a month or however long you’re lucky to be in flow for goes by, and then you have something and you’re like, “Wow.” And you can barely even remember it.
This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity and length.
There used to be a time when tattooing was seen as not only an undesirable profession but an unskilled one too. This was because people didn’t know much about it, tattoos themselves were seen as “bad” or a symbol of the dangerous underbelly of society.
Not anymore.
Whether people like tattoos or not, most would now acknowledge that tattooing is a kind of artistry. It takes skill, patience, and precision to become a great tattoo artist, and it takes hard work to break into the profession and create a stable career. But with U.S. citizens spending USD$1.65 billion a year on tattoos, if done the right way, it can be a lucrative and dependable career too. (1)
If you’re interested in starting a path to becoming a tattoo artist, here are some foundational steps you can take:
Develop skills
Not all artists can tattoo, but tattoo artists need to be able to draw. You don’t have to go to art school or take an expensive professional course—although there are some good ones out there—but you do have to hone your skills and develop your drawing abilities.
Whether at school, at home, or somewhere else, you should take the time to learn the basics before perfecting your shading, line work, composition, and so on. Tattooing is not just tracing designs from a book. Statista reported that 43% of individuals decided to get their tattoos to honor a loved one and some 29% do so for self-identification. It’s clear from this that most people want unique designs developed for them by an artist. So, before you even think about getting supplies like tattoo machines or body ink, you first need to master how to design with a pen and paper. (2)
The art skills you develop overtime will help you not only with the basics, but also with becoming a great tattoo artist.
Build a portfolio
This is an important step, and much like learning the basics, it’s something you can’t rush. Even before you approach studios for an apprenticeship, you need to have a solid portfolio. This will take time and effort, perhaps more than you might imagine.
When creating your portfolio, you want to demonstrate not just your skills but your individuality and innovation too. At this stage in the game, you might’ve dabbled in at-home tattooing, but your portfolio will be made up of your designs. A professional will need to see if your skills can be transferred from paper to skin. A good tip is to always include a few non-tattoo pieces, but really try and include drawings that could clearly be seen on someone’s body.
Find an apprenticeship
Here is where you’ll really learn the trade, because ultimately the best way to learn anything is by actually doing it. Take your skills, and your portfolio, to different licensed tattoo artists. It can be hard to find the right mentor or studio to take you in, but the trick is to find a place where you could see yourself working and a mentor who really wants to teach. With tattooing being the sixth fastest growing industry in the US, you’re sure to find a mentor somewhere. (3)
During an apprenticeship, you will work with artists who can show you the ropes, give you insight into the profession, and give you a chance to grow and learn. Apprenticeships can take a long time, sometimes even a few years, and oftentimes are unpaid, but you’ll be getting something money can’t buy—experience.
Network
During your apprenticeship you will work with different people and meet different tattoo artists. It’s important to make contacts for the future. Where you apprentice might not be where you end up working, regardless it’s always good to set up a support network for design tips, history and insight into the profession, job prospects, and client referrals.
License and certifications
Now that you’ve got the skills and you’ve got the experience, it’s time to get licensed. It’s required for all tattoo artists to have a tattoo license to practice professionally. It’s not too difficult to get one but it does depend on the state you live in.
Mostly, you’ll need an ID, to undergo a police check, and to give details about your previous and current employment. There is also usually an application fee and forms to fill out.
Apply for work
Now that you have these foundations you can start to apply for real, paid work. This is where your mentor for your apprenticeship and the network you have built up can come in handy. With all the necessary boxes checked, you can put yourself out there to get hired, or you could even start your own studio if you have the means! Either way you have the skills, the experience, the professional insight, and the license to practice tattooing and make it your career.
MUBI, the streaming service behind some of the most exciting cinema, unveiled their film schedule for the month of June. The list include’s a list of must watch exclusives including I Was at Home, But…by Angela Schanelec, and Shiva Baby by Emma Seligman.
To celebrate Pride Month, MUBI will exhibit a selection of films representing the multifaceted nature of LGBTQ+ cinema. The highlighted Shiva Baby and Lemebel will be part of this programming, as well as Kim So Yong’s Lovesong (2016), Stephen Cone’s Princess Cyd (2017) Henry Gamble’s Birthday Party (2015), Clarisa Navas’s One in a Thousand (2020), Barbara Hammer’s The Female Closet (1998), and more.
The current list of films on MUBI in June 2021.
1 June | Yella | Christian Petzold | Phantoms Among Us: The Films of Christian Petzold
2 June | Kala Azar | Janis Rafa | A MUBI Release / Debuts | Exclusive
3 June | I Was at Home, But… | Angela Schanelec | MUBI Spotlight | Exclusive
4 June | TBC
5 June | Lovesong | Kim So Yong | Pride Unprejudiced
6 June | Piercing | Nicolas Pesce
7 June | Lemebel | Joanna Reposi Garibaldi | Portrait of the Artist | Exclusive
8 June | PVT Chat | Ben Hozie | MUBI Spotlight | Exclusive
9 June | Where To? | Georges Nasser | A MUBI Release / Rediscovered | Exclusive
10 June | Delphine & Carole | Callisto McNulty | French Feminist Activism in the Age of Video
11 June | Shiva Baby | Emma Seligman | A MUBI Release / Debuts | Exclusive
12 June | TBC
13 June | Invasión | Hugo Santiago | Dystopia
14 June | Correspondence | Carla Simón, Dominga Sotomayor | A MUBI Release / Brief Encounters | Exclusive
15 June | Barbara | Christian Petzold | Phantoms Among Us: The Films of Christian Petzold
16 June | Munyurangabo | Lee Isaac Chung | Exclusive
17 June | TBC
18 June | One in a Thousand | Clarisa Navas | A MUBI Release / The New Auteurs | Exclusive
19 June | TBC
20 June | The Son’s Room | Nanni Moretti | Father’s Day
21 June | Be Pretty and Shut Up! | Delphine Seyrig | French Feminist Activism in the Age of Video
22 June | Phoenix | Christian Petzold | Phantoms Among Us: The Films of Christian Petzold
23 June | Circumstantial Pleasures | Lewis Klahr | A MUBI Release / Undiscovered | Exclusive
24 June | Female Closet | Barbara Hammer | Pride Unprejudiced
25 June | TBC
26 June | The Congress | Ari Folman | Dystopia
27 June | Princess Cyd | Stephen Cone | Pride Unprejudiced
28 June | TBC
29 June | Recorder: The Marion Stokes Project | Matt Wolf | MUBI Spotlight | Exclusive
30 June | White on White | Théo Court | A MUBI Release / Debuts | Exclusive
Mdou Moctar’s music burns with the kind of intensity that can hardly be contained by arbitrary distinctions. “I don’t know what rock is exactly,” the Tuareg guitarist has previously said, though it wasn’t so much a comment on the genre itself as an unpretentious attempt at drawing attention to the style he actually plays, which can be described as a fresh take on North African assouf, or desert blues; guitar music built on repetitive chord structures, frenetic energy, and psychedelic textures that, through Moctar’s framing, won’t sound entirely unfamiliar to Western ears, even if it shares few of rock n’ roll’s symbolic traits. Raised in a small village in central Niger, Moctar assembled his first guitar out of wood and bicycle cables, and his recent material is influenced both by guitar legends like ZZ Top and Eddie Van Halen – whose tapping style he only recently became acquainted with – as well as the African artists he grew up listening to, including Abdallah Ag Oumbadougou, whose infectious, electric performances originally inspired him to pick up the instrument.
It’s no surprise, then, that his music seeks essentially to achieve the same effect Oumbadougou had on him when he first attended one of his concerts as a child. For all its electrifying, sometimes chaotic energy, it’s above all fuelled by the communal forces of joy, hope, and love, designed to make people dance and chant along, or at least stare in awe at Moctar’s fiery guitar heroics. But whichever tradition you choose to trace it back to, it’s clear Moctar is offering his own spin on it, continuously reinventing himself with each release. His music was originally distributed through Bluetooth swaps between cell phones; one of his songs landed on the Sahel Sounds compilation Music From Saharan Cellphones, and after a series of releases for the Portland, Oregon label – including 2019’s breakout Illanana (The Creator) – Afrique Victime is his sixth full-length album and first for famed indie label Matador.
Moctar’s growing international audience has never been a cause for distraction, though, and he and his band – comprised of rhythm guitarist Ahmoudou Madassane, drummer Souleymane Ibrahim, and Brooklyn-based bassist and producer Mikey Coltun, who travels days just to rehearse with the others – continue to refine their approach on Afrique Victime, tightening its predecessor’s full-band sound without scarifying its spontaneity and live dynamics. The result is raw yet accessible, tapping into something primal and elemental while sounding quite unlike anything you’ve probably heard in a while. Its main strength is not originality as much as a heightened sense of control: while previous Mdou Moctar albums have pushed boundaries, Afrique Victime brings a new dimensionality to the band’s explosive sound, fusing the guitarist’s various sonic touchpoints while allowing other elements to take more space in the mix. The juxtaposition of organic and electronic textures in particular – atmospheric field recordings on one hand, drum machines and AutoTuned vocals on the other – simultaneously gives the album an earthly and surreal quality.
If the word “incandescent” can be used to describe most of Mdou Moctar’s catalog, Afrique Victime takes things a step further as it reaches moments of transcendence. ‘Chismiten’ is a striking introduction to the album, showcasing both the immediate, propulsive nature of Moctar’s music and the fluidity of his guitar playing. Not many tracks on the album build the way this song does – cuts like ‘Tala Tannam’ and ‘Layla’ are romantic, stripped-back meditations by comparison – though the epic title track is an obvious exception. Stretching out over 7 minutes, the album’s clear centerpiece finds the band at their most raucous while delivering a potent condemnation of colonialist violence: “Africa is a victim of so many crimes/ If we stay silent, it will be the end of us.” Even when he isn’t addressing these issues directly, there is a palpable sense of urgency and aliveness to Mdou Moctar’s music that not only speaks to the spirit of the people behind it but resonates far beyond.
Nick Rattigan, it often feels like, is a filmmaker trapped in the body of a musician. Formerly a production assistant in the film industry, his songs under the Current Joys moniker often reference films: on his latest album Voyager, there are songs named after the works of Lars von Trier (‘Dancer in the Dark’, ‘Breaking the Waves’), Agnès Varda (‘Vagabond’), Ken Russell (‘Altered States’), and Andrea Arnold (‘American Honey’).
As both Current Joys and his other project Surf Curse, much of Rattigan’s recordings are decidedly lo-fi, belonging to that style of bedroom pop that so permeated the previous decade. He always sounded like he yearned to explode out of this trapping though, and Voyager brims with a fuller sound to satiate his widescreen cinematic tendencies. The songs are often layered as if they’re ready to soundtrack an independent film: swooning accompanying strings here (‘Altered States’), melancholic piano lines there (‘Amateur’).
‘Dancer in the Dark’ is just a few letters removed from a famous Bruce Springsteen song, and Rattigan sounds like he’s aiming for a Springsteenian relentless momentousness in the track. Much of Voyager recalls indie rock that flourished in the early noughties, with Rattigan’s warbling and sincere vocals sounding like an impression of Arcade Fire’s Win Butler, particularly on the dance-punk of ‘Money Making Machine’.
Some songs are unflinching in their gaze inwards at Rattigan’s mental precarity. He sounds distressed and overwhelmed on ‘Naked’, backed by a necessitated rushed rhythm, his voice full of panic as he screams “Don’t let go of me”; he’s similarly anguished on ‘Altered States’, seemingly discussing self-harm. ‘The Spirit or the Curse’ seems to be about the inner battles with anxiety, and the sparse acoustic instrumentation allows the emotions to flow out uncontrollably.
Elsewhere, though, he comes off as slightly creepy. “Miss my Valentine/ I can’t breathe when you’re not mine,” sounds like the last words of a stalker; the line, “I wear her photograph against my heart/ For in my life she plays a starring part/ Of alcohol and cigarettes,” is equally alarming when he says it on ‘Shivers’. When it descends into sappy sentimentality, the album gives the impression of Rattigan as a quintessential ‘softboi’; the type who invites you over to his house to view his Criterion film collection because “you’ve probably never heard of Varda or Tarkovsky before.” Indeed, many of the songs, particularly ‘Rebecca’, ‘Vagabond’, and ‘Amateur’, are suffocatingly lovelorn (“You’re every song I love, can’t get away from,” he sings on the latter.) (It should be noted that there have been multiple allegations of sexual misconduct against Rattigan in the past; that Secretly Canadian still decided to sign him for Voyager leaves one questioning their veracity.)
Rattigan evidently wants this album to feel grand and epic, but with over 16 tracks, it wears thin. It’s ‘Voyager Pt. 1’ and ‘Pt. 2’ that are the essence of Current Joys: solemn and melancholic, sad and melodic; the emphasis is on emotion above technical matters. Just look at the album cover, Rattigan standing seriously on the beach at night, staring longingly at the rolling waves stretching into the pitch-black darkness; if anyone were to be convinced by the myth of the tortured artist, it would be him. His brand of rock might be overtly sentimental, but it doesn’t always come off as a bad thing: There’s still enough exemplary existential narratives, sincere lyrical vulnerability, and light nostalgic touches within Voyager to give merit to Rattigan’s music.
Although Dan Auerbach and Patrick Carney have known each other since childhood, what we know as the formidable Black Keys outfit was formed in 2001. In the following two decades, the pair have been prolific with their blues rock: Delta Kream, their latest album, is their 10th, an average of one every two years. As they’ve grown older, their songwriting has been marked by a noticeable shift into the personal. After the four-album run with Danger Mouse that brought them commercial success and fame, 2019’s ‘Let’s Rock’ was a rawer and rustic self-produced record. They’ve gone even further on Delta Kream, a collection of covers of hill country blues artists that continue to inspire them; two decades in, it’s impossible to begrudge the Black Keys this moment.
The whole thing is, above all, deeply felt. They took just 10 hours to record the album across two days in December 2019, with little planning or rehearsals. Consisting often of first takes, it’s why the tracks feel appealingly loose and limber. Mainly covers of the works of R.L. Burnside and Junior Kimbrough, a sweet link to those fine bluesmen past is provided with the presence of their sidemen here, in Burnside’s slide guitarist Kenny Brown and Kimbrough’s bassist Eric Deaton.
It begins, though, with John Lee Hooker’s hazy and long epic ‘Crawling Kingsnake’, the blues rising above the smoke over the delta. Songs like ‘Louise’, ‘Do the Romp’, and ‘Walk with Me’ are slow and steady, all built on innate timing and repetition. The same can be said of the closing track ‘Come On and Go With Me’, a stretched-out piece mesmeric in its control. ‘Going Down South’ – complete with a surprising falsetto from Auerbach – and ‘Coal Black Mattie’ simmer with pace and panache, more melodic than the other songs. Auerbach does his best with the vocals throughout, keeping his delivery low and smoky, although, understandably, the blues emanating from his mouth rather than someone like Kimbrough was always going to lack the power and meaning of the original.
Not much differentiates the songs here: All are composed of the same cool delivery, the same crisp instrumentals. Chord progression is limited, the emphasis firmly on precise timing and inherent groove; as they cycle through each repetitious track, the result is intimidatingly authentic. Delta Kream is, in every sense, a musician’s album. There’s no hint of looking for commercial viability, although as this is The Black Keys, they still managed to find it (the album reached number six on the Billboard 200 and five on the UK album charts). Casual observers looking for the zest and raucousness of hits like ‘Gold On The Ceiling’ or ‘Lonely Boy’ will be found wanting on Delta Kream, but they are simply not the target audience. The way the songs of their idols flow out of Auerbach and Carney is genuine and joyful; full of unhurried rhythm and electric talent, their power lies in the personal.
In the eponymous opening track of her sophomore album, Ready Is Always Too Late, Sinéad Harnett commits to action. Among swirling harmonies and patterns of twinkling keys, she renounces hesitation, declaring, “Waiting in this fear is impossible to me.” The song announces a leap of faith, and yet Harnett’s plunge from the precipice seems only to bring her closer to herself.
The album’s lush, soul-tinged R&B is the sonic embodiment of Harnett’s growing confidence. The chorus of the second track, ‘Stay’, consists entirely of the drawn-out vowel of this single world, mirroring the sense of blossoming trust that is laid out lyrically. Harnett’s vocals are elevated to perfection by a blend of classical production and electronic R&B, with strings rising gently to meet the drum track as the song fades out. Such tranquil grandeur is reinstated by the beachy funk of ‘Take Me Away’ as Harnett sketches a desire for escape alongside hip-hop pair EARTHGANG. After a decade in the music industry, Harnett’s discography boasts multiple collaborations, and she is joined by a number of features on this record. Notably, the irresistible groove of ‘Stickin’’ is bolstered by the talents of R&B duo VanJess and singer Masego; Harnett’s assertion of faith on the track is made all the more bold by a shifting landscape of electronic elements, as synth, keys, and snapping drums erupt and recede. Meanwhile, R&B maestro Lucky Daye enters to mine the ruins of a past relationship on ‘Anymore’. Among fluttering acoustic melodies, Harnett’s falsetto reaches celestial heights as she murmurs, “I miss the way it hurts.”
This sense of longing shimmers in the next track, ‘Hard 4 Me 2 Love You’, one of the album’s first singles. “If this is you on a bad day/ It must have been a hell of a year,” Harnett laments. Her own devotion is countered by a nameless lover who seems to linger far behind: “It’s almost like you want me to give up,” she reflects on the pre-chorus. The production here is sparing, with scatterings of sparkling piano melodies and a delicate blend of harmonies. Harnett may know herself, but her vulnerability still casts shadows that linger throughout the record.
It is vulnerability, indeed, that permeates both Harnett’s first full-length project, 2017’s Chapter One, and her follow-up, Lessons in Love, released in 2019. The latter closes with the avowal, “You ain’t nothing if you give into your fears,” and this sentiment stands at the heart of her new release as she excavates strength from instances of fragility. ‘Like This’ is certainly emblematic of Harnett’s newfound confidence, as she intones, “After the rain is when you see the sunshine/ They was a set up, but baby I’m the punchline.” Her sultry vocals mesh with bouncing drums and a jubilant brass section to generate an effortless, soul-saturated groove. This is R&B so smooth that it seems almost to draw out time; for all of Harnett’s self-declared alacrity, her music exudes a kind of inexorable languorousness, an ability both to advance and to pause and reflect. If she is diving from a cliff, she is taking the opportunity to savour the descent.
The album’s final tracks demonstrate a curious mix of introspection and playfulness. ‘Obvious’ is an exercise in self-restraint, though there is, thankfully, nothing restrained in the infectious, reggae-tinted funk that accompanies Harnett’s musings. “I only want you when I’m lonely/ Promise not to chase you when I get so/ Lonely,” she sings, adding, “It’s just so hard to feel all the things that I wish I could feel.” On ‘Distraction’, however, she is engaging in just the right amount of feeling: “Take you there where I know you wanna go/ More high than you ever been before,” she hums, and snatches of pitched-up vocals create a breezy, old-school feel that rounds off the record with perfect coolness.
Whether swooping from a great height or finding quiet intermission, it seems Harnett is an artist who possesses an enviable command of time. No matter where she chooses to go next, she has succeeded in crafting a luxuriant sophomore album that expertly captures her own journey.
A lot of upcoming artists have more chances and opportunities as compared to before when it comes to promoting and launching their own music albums and tracks, especially when they are on a budget. Due to budget restraints or whatever may be the reason, a lot of artists with a huge amount of potential do not know where to start or begin when it comes to promoting their music on various platforms, especially when it comes to Spotify. One of the most important things to be kept in mind is that your music should be your top most focus and if your track, album and EP is not written well or even professionally produced, you are going to face a lot of problems when you start promoting your music on Spotify.
So, which are the five effective ways to promote your music on Spotify?
Start with the basics first.
Take a few courses on how to build a professional website or even find websites that would help you build one. This is important because this website will help the potential consumers of your music to know who you are and whether you are actually legitimate or not. It is extremely important to build a website, but what is more important is to build a community that would help you curate a dedicated mailing list. So, what exactly does your website need to have? A little bit about yourself, but mostly about your work, from the behind the scenes of making your music tracks and albums to the links to your music and a basic mailing list sign up form. This is a form of email marketing that will help you understand and know who all are actually interested in your music. This will also help people to come across your Spotify profile and it would be a wise idea to buy Spotify plays that will help in adding value to your work as well.
Design your Spotify profile well, and make sure that you are verified on Spotify.
Details play a huge role in designing your Spotify account which is why you have to make sure that everything from your header image to curating your concert calendar to updating your Spotify bio to customizing your playlists, you have to do it all, very intricately. The reason behind why you need to get verified with Spotify especially if you are an artist is because of the fact that you gain the trust of the followers and the fact that they will be convinced that you are not using someone else’s music tracks as yours. Which is why you have to buy Spotify plays if you do not see an increase in your Spotify plays. This will also play a key role in gaining more followers on Spotify and adding value to your Spotify account
Which brings us to the third point, which is to buy Spotify plays and research well on the best sites to buy Spotify plays from.
Which are the best sites to buy Spotify plays? Is it necessary to buy Spotify plays? There are some of the best sites to buy Spotify plays. There are a number of best sites to buy Spotify plays if you do enough research on the topic to know which ones suit your need and budget because you will be surprised at the availability of the content that is out there. In order to promote your music on Spotify, you need to gain a decent amount of Spotify plays, Spotify streams and followers on the artist’s Spotify account. Which is why you need to see which are the best sites to buy Spotify plays for you.
Use other social media platforms to promote your music on Spotify.
Your target audience is just not restricted to Spotify, you have to remember that your target audience is spanned all over various social media platforms which is why you have to promote and provide the links to your music albums and tracks on every social media platform that you are on. This will also increase the traction on your profile. You can also buy Spotify plays from various best sites to buy Spotify plays as this will help in increasing your Spotify followers as well. Using the social media Ads that are available will also allow you to gain the exposure that you need.
Collaborate with the people in your genre.
Collaborating with people who have a similar audience as yours will help you gain access to their audience and vice versa. This will help you to get more Spotify plays and followers as well.
While the numbers are extremely important and play a vital role when it comes to gaining exposure and the trust of your audience, with adequate research you will be able to find the best sites to buy Spotify plays that will help you buy Spotify plays and promote your music on Spotify.
Born in Portugal to Belgian and Cape Verdean parents, Erika de Casier grew up in the Lisbon suburb of Estoril until she moved to the tiny Danish village of Ribe at the age of 8. Having spent a year abroad in Vermont as part of an exchange program, she eventually settled in Copenhagen and taught herself music production in her bedroom. Though she had to learn to sing in a hushed tone so as not to disturb her flatmates, she’s since found ways to harness that intimacy to convey all manner of emotion, whether invoking the sensuality of ’90s and ’00s R&B or taking cues from the empowerment anthems of Destiny’s Child and TLC. She draws from both musical worlds on her new album, Sensational, her second following 2019’s Essentials and first since signing to 4AD; each subtle texture radiates warmth as well as newfound confidence, lending an air of playfulness to what is an otherwise stripped-back and relaxed affair. But more remarkable than de Casier’s self-assured presence is her ability to explore relationship dynamics with elegance and style, making her minimalist, confessional songs feel vivid and nuanced: not just palpably romantic, but full of possibility.
We caught up with Erika de Casier for this edition of our Artist Spotlight interview series to talk about how she discovered her creativity, her new album Essentials, and more.
What do you like about being in Denmark now that you didn’t appreciate as much when you first moved there?
I’m so used to it now because I was eight when I moved. And I think I’ve adapted really quick, for example, to the cold; I used to hate the cold, and now it comes as kind of a relief sometimes when winter starts, because it’s like there’s no pressure to go outside and enjoy the sun, you know. [laughs] Because I feel that a lot. There are many things that I still don’t appreciate, but that’s more to do with how the world is going now. One very specific thing I really like is our bike culture. Everybody’s biking around, from when you’re a little kid until you can’t anymore.
Do you feel more connected to a music scene or community now?
Yeah, now I’m part of a music community, but I think that’s also part of getting older and finding your interests and other people that have the same interests. When you go to school, you’re just put in a class with a bunch of random people, and then you have those common interests for the year that you go there, but when you get older, I think a lot of people find people that have the same interests that you can talk to about stuff. And I think I definitely got that here. I moved at one point, just sort of like six months, and when I came back, I missed it so much. I just missed my community and being able to go to like the café I usually go to where all my friends hang out. I also love that we don’t all make the same music – we really inspire each other with very different sonic realms.
Were you creative as a teenager? How did you discover your creativity?
When I was a kid, I was alone a lot, and I started drawing – I had to entertain myself a lot of the time, so I guess it came that way. I found that it was a great way of expressing your emotions without talking about them necessarily, but just making something – or even, you know, as a kid when you’re playing, you’re being creative because you have a great imagination. And I feel that even if I’m a part of the community here, when I’m making music I’m still by myself. I still have that space – I seldom sit with somebody and make music. And when I do, it’s people that I really know or like one person. For me, I’ve always connected being creative to something I do on my own, and where I can just shut the world off.
Was it a similar reason that drew you to writing in English specifically, that you felt you could express your emotions in a way that you couldn’t in another language?
I’ve been wondering about that actually, why I write in English. And I think it’s just a language that comes more naturally to me when I’m creating. I’ve written maybe one Danish song, and it’s a whole different way of expressing yourself. First of all, the vocabulary is much smaller in Danish; there are different ways of saying something, but not as many words. And also, I’ve always listened to a lot of English music, and it took me some time before I listened to Danish music after I moved here as a child. I knew English music before I knew Danish music, so I think that’s why it comes more naturally to me.
You’ve talked about the importance of MTV early on in your life, but I’m curious how you were exposed to the more underground or contemporary influences that inform your music.
When I was a teenager I got more and more curious about music, and I felt it was also a way to shape your identity. I went to the library a lot and borrowed CDs and downloaded a lot of music. I don’t know – I guess I felt special, in a way, listening to something that not many people knew about.
In what way was it tied to a sense of identity?
I grew up with just my mom and my brother, and my mom’s from Belgium and I’ve never lived in Belgium. So I think I was very curious to find out who I was, and to find out – like, my dad is from Cape Verde, and I also listened to some Cape Verdean music. I looked up to artists on MTV that looked like myself. [laughs] And also, when I was 15, I think I was – like a lot of 15-year-olds are – you know, the music on the radio wasn’t doing it for me. I was so cynical at this time – I felt very much like a victim, like “nobody understands me,” you know. I remember I started listening to Radiohead and I felt like, “I’m the only one listening to this right now in the world.” [laughs] I think once I got older I loosened up a bit.
It was the same for me with Radiohead. You know, they have millions of fans and somehow I felt like I was the only one in the world who knew them.
It was also before social media, like you couldn’t go in and see Radiohead’s page and be like, “Wow, they’re actually pretty well-known.” Back then it was nothing, it was just like, you found a CD and you had no idea when people are listening to it. It gave space for maybe a little bit more mystique than we have now.
I wanted to ask you about your debut album, Essentials, which has been described as a kind of word-of-mouth success. Did it feel very organic to you?
I felt it was very organic. When I released the Essentials, people were like writing me like, “Oh, cool album,” but it wasn’t like all of a sudden I was on every magazine, [makes rhythmic sound], hype, hype, hype. I played a release show in London for like 10 people, you know. So it wasn’t like that at all, which was really nice because I got a chance to follow it without freaking out.
To what extent did any expectations affect your approach to the new record?
I tried not to let it influence me. I think it’s natural – whatever goes on in your life influences what you make, so of course there was an expectation to myself about wanting to make something that was good. But that was also the case with Essentials, I really wanted to put something out that I really liked. And I’ve also tried to think about, “It’s one record, I don’t want to put my all my worth and all my happiness – I don’t want Sensational to carry that, so if it goes well, that’s really nice, I’m glad people like it.” And some people won’t, you know, you can’t make everybody happy. I try not to let it take up too much space in my mind because it does affect me, of course. You spend maybe one two years making something, and then you’re just like, “This is what I made. What do you think?” But I try not to let it touch me when I’m making music – you know, if I’m sitting writing a song and I get that little ego voice going, “Is this good enough? Are you gonna put this out?” And I try to just like, “No no no, I can throw this in the garbage if I want.” There’s no pressure when I’m making the tracks, but I would lie if I said that it didn’t affect me.
You said before that you kind of loosened up as you were growing up, and that’s something I also feel is part of the shift from your first album to Sensational. Going into the album, I’m curious what kind of attitude and vibe you wanted to convey, especially with the album title.
When I was writing it, I had a lot of words like “sensual,” “sensational,” “sexy,” all these s-sounding words. When I wrote ‘Drama’, I was like, “This is so sensational,” and I also say it in the lyrics. And when I had to piece all the tracks together, I was like, “These are all pretty like sensational tracks,” because I do feel that I’ve experimented a little bit more with a more outgoing persona. And I like the exaggeration of the word, it’s almost like saying that it’s not by calling it that. You know, sensational. Like, “Okay, relax. Who do you think you are?”
It’s kind of tongue-in-cheek as well. You mentioned a more outgoing persona, and I know that you’ve invented a character called Bianka for your latest music videos. But I’m wondering to what extent in the album itself you’re inhabiting certain characters when you were writing the songs, as a way of being more free.
I think it’s characters that are within me, like when I say a persona, it’s still me. When you write, you can be anything, you can be who you want to be. And when you are in a certain situation, you have one thing that is what you say, and another thing is what you think. And another thing is what you think five hours later. And a lot of the songs are what I thought after I got to processes it, like, “Oh, I should have said this” or “I should have said that.” And in some of the situations, I’ve actually had the courage to say what I felt, but there’s so many things where you’re like, “What would the person say?” or “I don’t want to come off as mean or needy or whatever,” you know. I just felt it was empowering to write that way this time around.
One moment I love on the album is the song ‘Acceptance’. It’s kind of an interlude, but there’s this confidence that the previous tracks and the album as a whole has, and this feels almost like a moment of defeat, maybe hinting at the lonelier, more melancholy feelings that the album doesn’t show as much. What was the inspiration for it?
It was during lockdown, and I just felt like nothing was going my way. I was just fooling around with orchestral sounds and I made this little snippet, almost, and I thought it was just gonna be a fun little thing that I wasn’t gonna use. But then I thought it really gives a good image of that one moment where I was feeling… Yeah, kind of defeated, actually. You know, sitting in your room, isolated. I was trying to make something, and I went from making one beat that was useless, that doesn’t give me any feeling – that’s the worst when you’re making music, like, “Well, it’s a nice beat, but it’s not touching anything inside.” And then with ‘Acceptance’, it was just like, “Let me just make something.”
It’s such an honest album, even when you’re exaggerating or playing a character. One thing in particular that I love is how it expresses sentiments that are simple or would otherwise be perceived as cliché – like the “when you fell from the sky” line on ‘Make My Day’ – but it always feels genuine. Where do you think that comes from?
It’s hard to dissect, but I feel it’s just a matter of how I’m used to writing, or why I started writing. When I started writing love songs, it’s about making the other person understand something that you think. That’s how I started writing very… almost like letters, you could say, to the person I was trying to tell something to. So I think the honesty comes in that. Sometimes I’m – for example, doing these interviews, I’m like, “Am I saying something that’s contradicting what I said a few days ago?” You know, you constantly evolve, and that’s why in some of the songs I’m the one with the upper hand and some of the songs I’m the victim, almost, or defeated, as you said. I’ve just tried to get as many of these different roles we have in our lives.
This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity and length.
