Chris Stamey & The Fellow Travelers "A Brand-New Shade Of Blue (Omnivore)"
From Omnivore Records:
Chris Stamey’s collaboration with The Fellow Travelers, A Brand-New Shade Of Blue, was inspired by the intimate small-combo sound of the late ’50s and early ’60s—a time when the “cool jazz” compositions of such luminaries as John Coltrane, Bill Evans, Miles Davis, and Thelonious Monk lived alongside the expanding pop vocabulary of Burt Bacharach and Jimmy Webb. “These are songs for late nights and rainy days,” Chris explains. “I wrote most of it in the dark of winter, in whispers, in the ‘wee small hours of the morning,’ that magic time ‘when the whole wide world is fast asleep.’ And these great singers and musicians kept that mood alive throughout the sessions that followed.”
Sparkle Division "To Feel Embraced (Temporary Residence)"
It’s a tale as old as time. World-renowned musician leaves Brooklyn for the sunny shores of L.A. There, he hires a studio assistant who is a composer in his own right, and the two of them release an album 5 years later. Thus concludes the origin story for Sparkle Division’s debut album To Feel Embraced, a origin story that will be retold numerous times Batman (WHAT HIS PARENTS GOT SHOT?), Spiderman (A SPIDER? NO WAY), or the Banana Splits (wait, how did the form?). William Basinski (the aforementioned world-renowned musician) has teamed uw with Preston Wendel (the aforementioned studio-assistant) to create a strikingly original sound. Loops, original samples, and oddly detuned lounge music all while Basinski ripping saxophone solos that would make John Zorn blush. If David Lynch made an L.A. Noire movie, it would absolutely sound like this. Oh wait, he has! Guess what? They kinda sounded like this! Start anywhere and be thankful you are already wearing a mask because this record is smoking – wait! 2020 version: Start anywhere and be thankful you are already wearing a mask because if you aren’t, you are a jerk! Check out “To The Stars Major Tom” and the haunting looped vocals on “To Feel Embraced”
Tommy & The Commies "Hurtin’ 4 Certain (Slovenly)"
From Slovenly Records:
Finally our most beloved Sudburians,
Under the extreme duress of these most turbulent times
Careen forth with a new four track 7inch EP
Knuckleheadedly entitled “Hurtin’ 4 Certain.”
Tommy and the Commies, lone purveyors of “Hooligan Pop”
Rock this one out with breakneck precision and attitude
Unheard since their 2018 masterpiece “Here Come…”
Meaty odes to their “One Arch Town” appear this time,
Perfectly executed and gritty, but never served raw.
Tilly & The Wall "Woo! (Team Love Records)"
From Team Love Records:
Many labels start because a record needs to be released. No one is stepping up to the plate, everyone’s too busy chasing trend and getting boringly drunk at SXSW. This was certainly the case when it came to Omaha’s Tilly & The Wall and the label Team Love. It was viewed by Team Love as a crime against pop-art and all that is good in the world for the album Wild Like Children not to be given a shot: three singers, a tap-dancer, three songwriters and songs meant to be thrust into the sky with joyous punches. Recorded in a basement by Conor Oberst, the album’s danceability and “f*ck it up” chants, it’s sorrow and punk, dress up brawling and bottled call to friendship and grab-it-off-the-shelf folk was like nothing that had ever come before. It took indie pop and kissed it on the forehead leaving a glitter smear. It stomped on hate and refused to be part of any scene that wouldn’t let every single kid in the door.
A decade flew by. Everyone, it seemed, moved to Brooklyn and grew beards. The band toured the world, made three more albums, had a hit, and then called it a day. People don’t talk about Tilly & The Wall now the way they should. This Best Of hopes, very simply, to help correct that error.
Woo! is the preamble to all of that. It’s the pre-album, the not-demos packaged in a zip-lock and sold after the show. These songs show a band in its infancy, and to every Tilly fan, this is the final sequence in the mapping of the Tilly genome.