Chris Liebing "Another Day"
Another Day sees Chris Liebing once again collaborating with an eclectic mix of artists, including several who were involved with Burn Slow. Miles Cooper Seaton, in one of his last performances following his sad and untimely passing earlier this year, and Polly Scattergood lend vocals to a track each, while Ralf Hildenbeutel returns to produce. Ladan (formerly known as Cold Specks), Tom Adams and Maria Uzor (Sink Ya Teeth) are new collaborators for Liebing.
“With this album, I wanted to take myself out of it as much as possible,” explains Chris Liebing. After three decades working dancefloors with pummelling techno, Chris Liebing formidable reputation as a DJ and is certainly comfortable with being in the spotlight, but for his solo work he has chosen a different avenue.
No Bragging Rights "No Bragging Rights (EP)"
Don’t call it a comeback. After an extended hiatus, California’s No Bragging Rights have returned with their first new music since 2014’s The Concrete Flower. Like that record, this self-titled EP is being released on Pure Noise, which was actually started by Jake Round in order to put out the band’s 2009 album, The Consequence Of Dreams. Now comprised of vocalist Mike Perez, who started the band in 1999, Martin Alcedo (drums/vocals), Daniel Garrow (guitar/vocals) and Anthony ‘Tron’ Laur (guitar), the four-piece produced these seven songs themselves. Recorded between Laur’s home studio and Decade Sound Studio, both in Tacoma, WA, it’s an invigorating blast of melodic hardcore that pays homage to their past while also bringing them into the present.
“Daniel and I would write these songs,” says Laur, who also engineered the record, “and give Mike and Martin blanket ideas – like ‘This one is kind of triumphant but has no resolve to it, so I don’t know what that means to you but you should aim your writing towards that’ to help curate the attitude and personality of each song.”
Like Pacific "Control My Sanity"
Marissa Paternoster "Peace Meter"
Marissa Paternoster (Screaming Females, Noun) began writing Peace Meter immediately after arriving home from a west coast tour cut short due to COVID. Alone in her posthumous grandmother’s empty home, Paternoster sent the skeleton of a song to Andy Gibbs from the metal band THOU with the hopes that he might be able to extrapolate on the original idea. Andy sent his accompaniment back, and that process continued for the bulk of the first wave of quarantine. As the songs developed, Paternoster decided to include two other musicians whom she admired: long time friend Shanna Polley of the NYC-based band Snakeskin on backup vocals, and the cellist Kate Wakefield from the Cincinnati-based band Lung. All parties recorded their parts within their respective homes. Once the songs seemed fully realized, they were mixed by Eric Bennett, one of Marissa’s oldest friends and closest collaborators, who was also quarantined at home alongside his mixing studio.