Kevin McCormick
Sticklebacks

Tape collages of post-punk, avant-pop, and tribal rhythms. Folklore and dub, unpretentious yet sonic sophisticated.

Danish punk weirdness 🦜

Coolhaven is a band based on the principle of diabetics. Their music is inspired by the disturbance of balance between centrifugal and centripetal energies.

Powerful downtempo ballad with heavy emotions from Louisiana based guitarist Chris McCaa. Originally released as a 7” promo oriented record in 1983, the band had hopes of it leading to bigger projects but most of the pressing probably ended up in someone's basement with very few copies available online. 40 years later, “If I Had To Say Goodbye” is back again to bless your ears at the ending sets of special dancefloors. Featuring a sound that is highly reminiscent Chris Rea's aesthetic, both in terms of vocal and guitar use, yet still breaking new ground in the power ballad department. Now in 12” 45rpm format with an extended edit by Castro on the B-side, remastered at Berlin's finest manmade mastering.

Tout Bleu's second record, Otium, recalls a route where the electronic crosses paths with the acoustic.This new milestone in Genevan multi-instrumentalist Simone Aubert's (Massicot, Hyperculte) musical field represents a kind of fruitful deceleration. Initially conceived as a solo project in 2018, the act is now an exploration ground for the musicians gathered on Otium : Naomi Mabanda on the cello (Orchestre Tout Puissant Marcel Duchamp, Chien Mon Ami) and Luciano Turella on the alto (Irtum Branda) encounter the sampling machines of POL, that could already be found on the first eponymous album Tout Bleu. In Tout Bleu's music, the part-melodic, part-abrasive riffs reminiscent of Massicot are present, and so are the socially engaged, energetic singing of Hyperculte. However, the band, by using acoustic instruments, vocals and electric guitar in an unconventional way, draws an orchestral landscape that sometimes flirts with pop, and where strings merge in polyrythm on low tempo beats.

Long improvised explorations of sound.