Loud And Quiet

The Proper Ornaments work fast.

After their debut album ‘Wooden Head’ was released in 2014, in between their other ventures James Hoare from Veronica Falls and Ultimate Painting and Max Claps from Toy got back in a room together. It was only last summer that they started work on their forthcoming second album ‘Foxhole’. It’s now ready for release later this month on Tough Love.

‘Bridge By A Tunnel’ is the latest track to be shared from it. It’s quite lovely. Listen below:

The Proper Ornaments are heading out on tour later this month. They’ll appear at the following places:

Leeds, Brudenell Social Club – 22 January
Glasgow, Mono – 23
Birmingham, Hare & Hounds – 24
Brighton, Joker – 25
London, Moth Club – 26

If JFDR’s slightly obscure press photo isn’t enough to entice you into listen to her latest track, then her previous credits will.

She’s prolific Icelandic multi-instrumentalist Jófríður Ákadóttir, and previous collaborator with Samaris and Gangly. Alongside artists like Serpentwithfeet and Katie Gately, Björk spoke about how JFDR is currently one of her current big influences.

JFDR’s debut solo album ‘Brazil’ will be released in the spring on her own imprint White Sun Records, and this is the second track to be taken from it.

The song, produced by JFDR and Shahzad Ismaily, features Greg Fox’s distinctive, roomy drum sound, a simple piano loop and Jófríður Ákadóttir’s breathy vocals.

JFDR explains of the recording: “The next day [after Greg Fox recorded] Shahzad and I pulled up the session and without speaking he started cutting up Greg’s take, copy pasting bits and pieces and turning it up so loud it was the same level as the rest of the recording, if not louder. The result is this half programmed, half live drum performance, carefully but effortlessly stitched together by Shahzad, merged with my fragile piano break up ballad.

The track was later blessed by De La Soul’s Maseo who stopped by the studio and listened. He said it was dope.”

Listen to ‘Airborne’ below.

Some much deserved good news for Memphis songwriter Julien Baker today.

In March, Matador will re-release her excellent debut album ‘Sprained Ankle’. That should help a whole lot more people discovery it.

It’s not just the album that was charming, our writer Ian Roebuck interviewed Baker last year and discovered an artist with impeccable manners getting to grips with her growing notoriety.

“My high school band got our picture in the paper once and that was amazing to me and then all of a sudden I am doing interviews with London and I am like, oh my gosh! It’s overwhelming,” she said.

Complimenting the news, she’s also announced that a new 7” will come out on the same day. The tender ‘Funeral Pyre’ is the A-side.

She’s also back in the UK in June, playing shows in London and Manchester.

It was a pleasant and unexpected surprise when The Shins got added as a fourth headliner to last September’s End of the Road festival.

James Mercer and the band turned up in Dorset with a couple of new tracks to share and a clear delight to be back playing together again. They were enjoying themselves.

That meant there was clearly an album on the way, and they’ve announced the details today. ‘Heartworms’, their fifth LP, is coming out on 10 March.

Those details come attached to a new song, ‘Name For You’. According to Mercer it’s a song about female empowerment inspired by his three daughters.

Back in the late summer Resonance FM invited us onto their airwaves to record the first edition of Loud And Quiet radio. Each month since we’ve heading on for an hour to play our favourite new music. But this one is different. It aired last night (Wednesday 28 December) and this is a special 2016 recap offering. You know what that means, we went on and played our favourite tracks of the year before pushing 2016 down the nearest sinkhole where it deserves to be. Loud And Quiet Radio will be back at the end of January. See you then.

Tracklist:

Fat White Family – Breaking into Aldi

Let’s Eat Grandma – Sax in the City

Cat’s Eyes – Chameleon Queen

Hamilton & Rostram – Sick As A Dog

Show Me The Body – Aspirin

Warpaint – New Song

Mitski – Your Best American Girl

Jessy Lanza – Oh No

Father John Misty – Real Love Baby

Those into the world of experimental percussion-driven noise will be well-acquainted with NAH. The Philly drummer/producer is continuously playing with a number of projects, including drumming in punk duo 1994!

And, he’s prolific. The number of albums Michael Kuhn has released under the name NAH is well into the double figures. Now, like some kind of ear-blasting Christmas present, NAH has put out FOUR new albums in one go.

‘Michael’, ‘Untitled Works 2016’, ‘Enduring’ and ‘Garbage Crap’. They’re all up on his Bandcamp.

But for the moment, this is our favourite, the recently shared ‘May 7th’ featuring rapper Moor Mother. If you like Run The Jewels or Death Grips we reckon you’ll be into it.

This week (Friday 16 December) the Manchester band Unpaid Intern are releasing their debut EP, the smartly titled ‘Unrivalled Work Ethic’, on Havana Tapes. It’s seven tracks, which maybe classes it more of a mini-album, but either way, it’s great stuff. It’s also coming out on limited edition cassette.

True to the EP’s title, they’re putting some graft in around the release playing the following shows.

Manchester, Eagle Inn – 15 December

London, Birthdays – 17

Brighton, Green Door Store – 19

Listen to ‘Unrivalled Work Ethic’ below.

Daniel Woolhouse, who released two albums under the alias Deptford Goth, has a neat idea to cap off 2016.

Every couple of days in December he’s been putting out new videos and alternative versions of tracks which appeared on his debut album ‘What’s That Sound?’ released on 37 Adventures earlier this year.

We’re getting in on this advent calendar action by sharing this piano session version of his track ‘Soup For Brains’. It tears the song down to its bare bones.

Daniel describes the track as being about “self-examination”.

“There’s this soup in my head. There are circumstances, memories and images in there that reflect on the past few years. There are coping mechanisms you develop that can be destructive and whilst you might recognise that yourself, you end up always playing catch-up with them, trying to fix one thing with another. You can end up in a repetitive cycle and I’m trying to get out of that.”

It’s been a couple of years of change for Glasgow outfit Babe.

Back in 2014, they released their debut album ‘Volery Flighty’ on Moshi Moshi.

Since then, in a bit of a line-up reshuffle, drummer John Baillie Jnr from Alarm Bells, Bossy Love and Dananananaykroyd has joined up with the group. He’s also produced their new material.

The new album is coming out in the spring but they’ve just shared this new track from it, ‘Bit Part’.

In this shadowy, electronic track, which features frontman Gerard Black’s haunting choirboy vocal hovering above a simmering backdrop that sounds almost Bristolian in its murkiness.