Desert Noises - Highway Cars

Thanks to “You Ain’t No Picasso” comes this awesome track. The Fleet Foxes comparisons are obvious from this one. It’s a beautiful track, from the urgent drumming that has been overlaid with a relaxed guitar line to the powerfully strong yet subtle vocals. Have fun!

Inkships - Cassettes

I haven’t posted a song in a while and I think that’s because I have been waiting for one to really grab me. This is a song I heard by complete accident and it’s great. It gets you in with that awesome guitar hook and the lo-fi sound just warms it up nicely. I want more!

Lise - Textura Reversa

I’m a big fan of instrumentals, especially when they’re done right. Instrumentals have the ability to carry feelings and emotions that can’t be felt using words, we’re limited to feeling whatever we can articulate, but with instrumentals we aren’t limited by those constraints. This make gorgeous background music but stands up so well when focusing on the music. It moves, it flows, it takes you a journey. Get lost in it.

Fuck Art, Let’s Dance - The Conqueror (Original)

This track is a bit of fun, and with a name like Fuck Art, Let’s Dance it doesn’t really come as a huge surprise. They’re channelling a bit of a Phoenix vibe and it’s totally working for them. There’s also a remix floating around at the moment but the original is much better. Have fun!

Northpilot - 1000 Lives

Why don’t Coldplay write songs like this anymore? Northpilot could certainly give them a few pointers on how to write music that really kicks along while still having a melancholic tinge. Northpilot are a band out of Chicago and they’ve certainly got my attention with this single. Give it a listen.

Wild Child - Pillow Talk

Ok, so I’m definitely on an indie folk binge at the moment but when the songs are this good who is going to complain? This is a band from Texas called Wild Child (I can’t believe that name wasn’t already taken!) who, if this track is anything to go by, craft beautiful, touching songs with simple structures and outstanding harmonies. Enjoy!

Laish - She Is Clever

Just listening to the glorious, lush textures that hold this song together brings me feelings of joy. This quintet from Brighton has some very formidable musical skills, the elusive woodwind melody during the intro, the wonderful guitar line that holds the song together and those beautiful cascading string jumps during the verses show you just how talented this bunch really are. And they make it all sound so effortless. I’m guessing from the first line of the song that this is about a girl who looks after herself and a boy who has a few really good nights. I can relate to that, bottoms up.

Foy Vance - Indiscriminate Act of Kindness

I only came across this song recently but it came out in 2006 on Foy Vance’s album “Gabriel and the Vagabond” (fantastic name for an album if you ask me). It seems like if it came out today, with the indie folk scene as big as it is now, it may have made a bit of a splash. You can always tell how good a musician is by how well they can perform with just a guitar behind their voice. This guy holds his own and then some. If you’re looking for a song to drink a few glasses of red with then you’ve found your soundtrack.

Radical Face - Always Gold

There’s so much emotion captured in the intro of this song, before the words even start it has so much feeling. Radical Face is a side project for Ben Cooper who is also part of a duo called Electric President. This is from his latest album called Roots, which is apparently going to be part of a trio of albums called Family Tree. He’s obviously a fan of The Fleet Foxes and Sufjan Stevens and there are probably a few Simon and Garfunkel albums in his collection too. It’s good, really good.

Mayer Hawthrone - You Called Me

This guy has got soul! Mayer Hawthrone is an artists from LA and he performs with a band called The County. The retro soul scene has made me pretty happy this year with quite a number of artists getting back into those 60s and 70s sounds that made artists like Marvin Gaye and Stevie Wonder famous. I’m very keen to see what else this gentleman has to offer. Enjoy!