Con Brio "Explorer"
San Francisco’s Con Brio proudly announce on track two that they are “Too Lit To Quit,” and if you check out their debut Explorer you will totally agree. Full horns, backflips, dance moves, hooks and choruses, these guy went to the church of James Brown and then graduated from the University of Sly and The Family Stone. During these troubling times, its fun to have a record where you can your funk out – It is probably the best therapy for all. So get the party with “Feels Good”, get jiggy with “Body Language” and the best cover of Nirvana’s “Heart Shaped Box” you will ever hear. (BRM/RTP one-stop except for the nirvana cover duh).
Hamish Kilgour "Finkelstein (Ba Da Bing!)"
Hamish Kilgour from The Clean is back for his second solo LP Finkelstein. Its… um… weird. Any album where the PR talks about how renowned the artists is for his “footstepping” on an album is sure to be pretty weird, and this does not disappoint. However, if you like messy, loose music you’ll likely love this Frogs (minus the jokes) sounding album. Hamish is a legend though, and has earned the right to do whatever he wants. Remember, I DID say “from The Clean” a few sentences ago? If every record was an easy listen, we’d all have Phil Collins tattoos and Lou Reed would have been stuck working the door at The Pyramid Club. Sometimes the songs are hazy, but most times the genius shines through like on the New Morning/American Beauty vibes of “Sidetracked.”
Jaye Jayle "No Trail and Other Unholy Paths (Sargent House)"
If you are looking for a moody, atmospheric record then you have arrived at exactly where you need to be. The new record from Jaye Jayle (the alternate musical personality of Evan Patterson) is all that, and more. No Trail and Other Unholy Paths (Sargent House) has hints of Philip Glass, Fripp and Eno, Tangerine Dream, Nick Cave, and other high water marks for the coolest of record collectors (full disclosure: I have records from each of the aforementioned artists) as well as guest turns from Emma Ruth Rundle (again, on my shelf). The record is meant to be played in any order you deem fit, with Sides A and B being interchangeable. But for our purposes, we need to start somewhere. So start with haunted rock sounds of the Emma Ruth Rundle featuring “Cemetery Rain.”
The Essex Green "Hardly Electronic (Merge)"
It’s been about a decade since the sweet sounds of The Essex Green went silent. Once Brooklyn’s premiere leaders of the Elephant 6 Collective sound, they all just sort of disappeared from our turntables. What happened? Well, the trio decided to give the band a break for a while and peruse some separate interests, all the while knowing that they would reform in secret in in 2015 under the blood moon eclipse at Lake Champlain. And they did! No one turned into a werewolf or anything (as far as this blurb writer knows) but they did start writing music again then and over the next two years, and lo and behold we have Hardly Electronic (Merge). Back are the pastoral throwback classic rock and British folk rock sounds that they were known for. In an instant, the last decade disappeared and how lovely would that be? Oh well… Until I work the kinks out of my time travel machine, give a listen to “The 710.”