Four years after the release of “What Went Down”, the Britons Foals return not with one but with two albums. What delight fans of their hypnotic pop and morning math rock. We find Yannis Philippakis and his clique on the stage of Gaîté Lyrique, on the occasion of the fourth edition of the ARTE Concert Festival.
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Those Fantastic Things – Don’t Feel
Those Fantastic Things have dropped their new video for the track titled ‘Don’t Feel’. Paul Donnelly, frontman for Those Fantastic Things, gives a personal reflection on a situation and stays rooted in the realism of said situation; something more of us should do in this day and age. Musically, this is a brilliant retro-styled electro-magical song that is one consistent hook with that pop sensibility that is somewhat lacking today. The instruments become symbiont with the vocals and come together to deliver the message in a way that captures the ears and stimulates the mind.
ABOUT ‘DON’T FEEL’
Packed with John Carpenter-esque synths, razor-sharp drum beats and jangly guitar hooks, Don’t Feel offers a high energy anthem that leaves you wanting more.
Don’t Feel “is about someone close to me going to a psychic, coming back, and telling me all kinds of nonsense I didn’t want to hear. They thought they were helping but couldn’t have been further from it – the future they talked about trapped me” says Paul Donnelly, the man behind ‘Those Fantastic Things.’
Clocking in at 2.46, Don’t Feel doesn’t drop its energy from the moment the drums kick in until the closing beat, keeping your attention until the closing note. The single epitomizes the pop ethic which is reflected throughout the whole album…this is just the beginning for Those Fantastic Things.
LINKS:
http://thosefantasticthings.com
https://www.facebook.com/thosefantasticthings
https://twitter.com/ThoseFantastics
https://www.instagram.com/thosefantasticthings -
Rachel Mintz – Silly Weight
Jammerzine has a special treat in the form of an exclusive interview with mega-talent Rachel Mintz as well as her brand new video and single titled ‘Silly Weight’.
In the interview, we get a glimpse of what it’s like to be that artist at the edge of going to the next level. Professionally and personally. We get that virtual screen capture of a moment where an artist shows how she’s gotten to where she is now and what that next level holds in store for her and those she is taken with her.
Plus, we get what draws most people closer to an artist as well as brings new fans. We get that personal glimpse at the mind behind the music!
Click HERE to listen to the interview.
The video for ‘Silly Weight’ matches the music in originality and scope. Rachel has that uniqueness to her vocals and it is perfectly complemented by the music of Mintz and DSBlade in that dynamic-duo combination of musicians who understand one another. The dystopian feel and sparse setting give Rachel more room to play with the settings and interact with the camera as if the viewer was there. And they are.
ABOUT RACHEL MINTZ
Rachel Mintz is the kind of genre-fluid mind that could easily become an algorithm’s dream, even if the LA-based artist has some doubts on her latest single about social media as a whole.
Growing up in Miami with a musical family, she performed with one of the world’s most celebrated children’s choirs before pivoting to gritty rock and punk bands in her teens and eventually relocating to California. “Being raised in Miami, I never quite felt I fit in,” Mintz adds in retrospect. “My upbringing influenced my rebellion, which may have led to the artistic freedom expressed in my music. My teenage girlfriends and I listened to a lot of hip hop growing up, which cemented my love of rhythm.”
Working with Grammy Award-winning engineer and co-producer Ian Cross (Usher, Janet Jackson, Lauryn Hill, Gwen Stefani), Mintz finally found her own voice on her 2019 debut Shed A Tear, which found her gleefully weaving between dream pop, darkwave, and baroque pop to praise from The Big Takeover and Pure Grain Audio. Building on top of Tear’s success, Mintz is readying a new EP for 2021 heralded by “Silly Weight,” a Bangles-reminiscent synth-pop blast of a lead single questioning social media and technology’s grip on daily life.
“I would regularly lament social media culture with [producer DS Blade]… which oddly enough, is how we were introduced,” recalls Mintz. “There are things, especially now, that we focus way too much of our energy on. Things like social media and consumerism are ultimately meaningless and don’t serve us at all. I am just as guilty of this as the next person. In a way, I wanted the lyrics to be a reflection of our conversations.”
LINKS:
https://www.facebook.com/rachelmintzmusic
https://twitter.com/Rachelmintz
https://www.instagram.com/rachelmintz
https://linktr.ee/Rachelmintzmusic
https://rachelmintz.bandcamp.com
https://open.spotify.com/artist/54RQwyzpAT4tNL71xGLdhg?si=yh6gc11LSc2F5iPv4OBOJQ
https://music.apple.com/us/artist/rachel-mintz/1486127780
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCgSkTzQNTrCXEXI5oNTgcrg -
Mayflower Madame – Sacred Core
Mayflower Madame returns with a new video for their single titled ‘Sacred Core’. With a root in the gaze and a finger on the pulse of the alt, the Madame gives a dark and brooding opus with equal parts introspection and extroversion combining to make an almost holy sounding trinity of mind, motion, and music. The soul is sacred and the id is core from the hearts of Mayflower Madame. Inhale, ingest, intake, and introvert.
‘Prepared for a Nightmare’ was released on vinyl and CD on June 12. It is available through Bandcamp in all formats, as well as digitally via iTunes and Spotify.
Check out our other articles about Mayflower Madame HERE.
ABOUT MAYFLOWER MADAME & ‘SACRED CORE’
Norwegian psychedelic post-punk outfit Mayflower Madame presents the third single ‘Sacred Core’ off their new second album ‘Prepared for a Nightmare’, released via French label Only Lovers Records in collaboration with Portland’s Little Cloud Records and Parisian label Icy Cold Records,
“Sacred Core is a song about getting lost, drifting away and trying to find the way back to your safe haven – guided by swirling, hypnotic guitars and an insistent, heavy beat. Compared to the shoegazey post-punk of the album’s previous singles “Vultures” and “Swallow”, this track digs deeper into haunting, psychedelic territories, yet still maintaining our trademark dark and atmospheric sound,” says frontman Trond Fagernes.
The accompanying video was directed by Astrid Serck, who also created the videos for previous singles ‘Swallow’ and ‘Vultures’.
“To me, the song is like an open landscape – it’s grounded, but at the same time moving. I wanted to capture that feeling visually with footage from windmill fields and beaches, where there’s constant movement – like rhythm, as opposed to the solid ground. A contrast between motion and stillness. Something to hold on to as well as something loose and vibrating,” says Astrid Serck.“The core is what you hold on to. The motion is what you can let go. The sunbeams are blinding you, like a sacred light. The ceiling of a church is another symbol of sanctity. The moon is dancing, in disturbing ways, on the screen. In the video, there is also an abandoned house, left with the door open. It´s a metaphor for the feeling of something that is lost, you can go back there, but only the memories are left. In addition, there’s live footage of the band filmed from shows in Oslo and San Diego.”
‘Prepared For a Nightmare’ presents a dark and distinctive blend of post-punk, shoegaze and psychedelia. Here, the band delves deeper into their own distinctive blend of psych-noir and post-punk with elements of shoegaze and noise-rock.
Hailing from Oslo, Mayflower Madame is Trond Fagernes (vocals, guitars, bass), Håvard Haga (guitars) and Ola J. Kyrkjeeide (drums). Formed in 2011, they first rehearsed in a desolate industrial building, sharing space with a carwash company. Their hazy, smoke-laden sound was conceived naturally amidst these gritty surroundings. They soon recorded a four-track demo and became ‘Unsigned Band of the Week’ on a major Norway stations.
After a few years of touring, Mayflower Madame finally released their debut album ‘Observed in a Dream’ in 2016, followed by the ‘Premonition’ EP in 2018. Through eight tracks of theatrical psych-gaze exploration and dark romanticism, the album conveyed the wintry feeling of their home country – icy and gloomy, haunting, and majestic.
Mayflower Madame has shared the stage with bands like Killing Joke, Moon Duo, Night Beats, Psychic Ills, Froth, The Underground Youth, Crocodiles, Cosmonauts, and La Femme. They have also toured North America, the UK, and Europe.
LINKS:
https://www.facebook.com/mayflowermadame
https://mayflowermadame.bandcamp.com
https://www.instagram.com/mayflowermadame
https://www.youtube.com/user/MayflowerMadame/videos