Dead Tooth "Dead Times"
Dead Times is Lee Buford (The Body, Sightless Pit) and Steven Vallot (Muslin). The duo originally began working together in 2008 while living together in Providence DIY space The Sickle, and releasing the early records from The Body and Assembly of Light Choir on their short-lived Aum War label. They quickly achieved cult status with just two limited releases. Those releases have become highly coveted rarities for The Body fans and those familiar with the world of Providence, Rhode Island’s legendary DIY scene, which gave rise to artists like Lightning Bolt and Black Dice. Emerging over a decade later, Dead Times connects the threads of the untethered extremes of their origins to the mastery of production, composition and structure each member has cultivated in their time apart. On their debut self-titled full-length, Dead Times present a kind of mesmeric dread, a world of desperate beauty wrapped in sonic venom.
Dead Times takes after Buford’s The Body in its thirst for ever harsher atmospheres, often pushing the mixtures of noise and volume to extremes previously not thought possible. Still, between each avalanche of sound peeks magnificent spectacles of melodicism and harmonic motion. Looping synthesizers bob like buoys in oceans of distortion. Samples are pushed to their absolute limit while remaining discernible against the thrum. Sparse electronic beats blast beneath pensive organs while Vallot’s echoing wail and consistent The Body collaborator, Providence’s Ben Eberle’s (Sandworm) signature bark conjure pillars of magma. The blown-out choral melody of opener “Rosewater” showcases the duo’s propensity for alchemizing serenity and severity. “Psyche Surprises Love” turns cries of pain into rising drones that build into a veritable bass drop. Across the album, the duo oscillate between overwhelming volleys that sheath hidden splendors and suffusing moments of quiet and clarity with melancholy and grit. “Comfort and Control” juxtaposes tender acoustic guitars and warm synths with an underlying crackle like a portent of ill-tidings whispered rather than shouted. The thunder-pulse of “Be Glad” gives way to an anthemic keyboard phrase that evokes defiance in lieu of hopelessness.
Buford and Vallot each bring wells of experience and new skill to Dead Times since their days living together in dilapidated warehouses. The duo’s shared history remains an essential element to their chemistry, but each has sharpened their craft to harness that raw creativity into music that is fearless, poignant and undeniably unique. A band’s band, but not for long. Dead Times, the duo’s first album, is staggering in its ambitions and exquisite in its execution.
Neighbourly "Neighbourly"
Despite having a concept in mind, Neighbourly didn’t want to limit themselves when it came to the process of recording the songs. Some songs evolved collaboratively within the group, while others were written naturally by individual members.
The band engineered the album themselves, and each song was produced by its respective writer. This project serves as a centrepiece showcasing the band’s growth over the past year. Mixing and mastering credits go to Latham Reader, who continues to support other artists in the Vancouver Island scene.
Neighbourly, the album, transcends through psych-funk grooves, calypso beach vibes, and dreamy shoegaze, offering the epitome of what the group has to offer.
Jeremy Dutcher "Motewolonuwok"
From Secret City Records:
“There is no one making music like this” – NPR Music
Dutcher originally vaulted himself into the upper echelons of Canadian performance with his 2018 debut, Wolastoqiyik Lintuwakonawa. Since winning the Polaris and JUNO Prizes, performing for NPR Tiny Desk, and collaborating with Yo-Yo Ma, Buffy St. Marie and Beverly Glenn Copeland, Dutcher returns with a moving and radiant exploration of contemporary Indigeneity and his place within it, presenting his most expansive work yet.
The Motewolonuwok album inspiration began with a poem by Cherokee writer Qwo-li Driskill. “From the heavy debris of loss, together we emerge,” a singular story of a two-spirit kin who was taken too soon, and calls us all together to witness, celebrate and heal. Jeremy sings in Wolastoqey — his native tongue, considered an endangered language — anchoring his work while he continues to reimagine the song traditions of his people from the banks of the Wolastoq River, just like he had previously done on his first full-length.
The new album also marks Dutcher’s first time writing and singing in English. A powerful invitation for collective healing and understanding. “Shared tongue is a beautiful gift, with a complicated reason,” Dutcher explains. These new English songs are also a way of singing directly to the newcomer, or settler, in their own language — a direct line of communication that seeks to platform his community’s stories of healing, resilience, and emergence to all that may hear.
'68 "Yes, and…"
From Distorted Sound Magazine:
Titled Yes, And…, the upcoming album from the Atlanta-based rock duo is the follow-up to 2021’s Give One Take One, and is scheduled to be released later this month, via Pure Noise Records.
Speaking about the upcoming new album, vocalist/guitarist Josh Scogin says, “this is by far the heaviest album ’68 has ever done. It wasn’t on purpose, it just sort of evolved into what it is. As soon as we could see the full gravitas of the album, we just leaned into it. Many of the bluesy tracks didn’t find a home and some of the parts that were on the fence, we doused with gasoline. For us, the pendulum has never been extended so far, in one direction. This is exciting because it was obvious how this album needed to turn out and it pretty much solidifies how the next album will end up as well.”