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Music

Spencer Doran – Title Screen

It’s been a crunchy old start to the week after a genuinely blissful weekend, but this is deeply relaxing stuff from Spencer Doran that’s making me feel – if not brilliant – then a bit more chill about everything. Taken from his album SEASON: A letter to the future (OST) – a soundtrack to a video game about preserving the natural world – you don’t need the accompanying visuals to be fully immersed in its gentle, meditative atmosphere.

https://visiblecloaks.bandcamp.com/album/season-a-letter-to-the-future-original-soundtrack

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Music

Natural Wonder Beauty Concept – Sword

Natural Beauty Wonder Concept is the new project from DJ Python and Ana Roxanne, both of whom I love. There’s an album due out in July, primarily recorded during covid days, and this is the first single. It’s great, and not even the press release describing the LP as “two artists learning to be alone, together” (🤮) can dull my enthusiasm.

https://naturalwonderbeautyconcept.bandcamp.com/album/natural-wonder-beauty-concept

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Music

Madison McFerrin – Testify

Madison McFerrin has previously been lauded by a range of the music media Big Dogs, including The New York Times, NPR, The FADER, and Pitchfork, who named her a Rising Artist in 2018. Her debut album I Hope You Can Forgive Me landed last week, coming in at a sparse 26 minutes and including this 10/10 stripped-back r&b gem.

https://madisonmcferrin.bandcamp.com/merch

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Music

Fatoumata Diawara, Angie Stone – Somaw

Fatoumata Diawara shot for the FT by © samuel kirszenbaum +336 15 26 80 21 mail@samuelk.net

Malian singer Fatoumata Diawara releases her new album London Ko today, exploring Malian blues, folk and r&b and blending traditional West African sounds with contemporary production. The album includes a number of collaborations, including Damon Albarn, Roberto Fonseca, Yemi Alade, M.anifest and this gem from US soul legend Angie Stone.

https://www.normanrecords.com/records/197161-fatoumata-diawara-london-ko

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Music

Cloth – Never Know

Sidestepping out of my comfort zone directly into the path of some oncoming indie rock today, but it’s fine: there’s a breathy female vocal involved and it all gets a bit electronically fuzzy in its final third, so I don’t feel to anxious about it. Cloth is twins Rachael Swinton & Paul Swinton from Glasgow city, and Never Know is taken from their second album Secret Measure which came out last month.

https://cloth-music.bandcamp.com/album/secret-measure

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Music

Doc Sleep – C & L at the Sea

Continuing the theme of floaty electronica this week with this beautiful track from Doc Sleep’s recent album Birds (in my mind anyway), in which soothing, ebbing waves are firmly pinned to earth with subby breakbeats and crashing snares. It’s very good, as is the entire album. TPW recommends!

https://docsleep.bandcamp.com/album/birds-in-my-mind-anyway

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Music

SVLRBD – The Lighthouse

Here’s some highly atmospheric, beat-driven ambient for you courtesy of Agus Mena, who also records as Warmth and runs both the respected Archives and Faint labels. His latest album as SVLRBD The Waves arrived on the latter of these a couple of months’ back, and if you like The Lighthouse is very likely to appeal.

https://faintmusic.bandcamp.com/album/the-waves

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Interviews Music

One Track Mind: This Is The Kit

Kate Stables on the prismic, reflective qualities of a Paul Simon classic

The premise of One Track Mind is pretty simple: I ask artists to pick one track that means a lot to them – either something they’ve discovered recently, something that’s been with them for years, or one that reminds them of a specific time in their life or career – and tell me what makes it so special to them. I get to talk to the artists I love, and they get to talk about the artists they love. Love all round!

This Is The Kit is the alias of English musician Kate Stables. Established in 2003, she released her first album Krülle Bol in 2008 and has over four subsequent albums – the latest of which was 2020’s Off Off On for Rough Trade – established a sound deeply rooted in the folk traditions of storytelling, with songs evoking an earthy, tactile sense of time and place one moment and ethereal, dream-like atmospheres the next.

Recently she announced her new album, Careful of your Keepers, due for release 09 June along with the lead single Inside Outside which you can listen to below.

For her One Track Mind selection, Kate has penned some typically poetic words about a favourite track from Paul Simon’s seminal album Graceland.

Continue reading “One Track Mind: This Is The Kit”
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Music

Rozi Plain – Complicated

Rozi Plain’s album Prize came out in January and completely passed me by, despite it being reviewed it various publications I read. She was recently announced for Glastonbury and I’m currently attempting to listen to every act listed: this stopped me in my maniacal tracks. If you like gentle melodies and minimalist, electronic folk that sits somewhere between This Is The Kit and Zero 7, you might well be into this.

https://roziplain.bandcamp.com/album/prize

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Music

Nabihah Iqbal – In Light

Nabihah Iqbal’s new album DREAMER arrived last week, nearly 6 years after her debut Weighing of the Heart. That gap was due to her studio being burgled in early 2020, with her gear and work – including her new album – all taken. DREAMER see’s Nabihah reflect on these experiences, and was produced with a vastly reduced suite of instruments – not that you’d necessarily be able to tell from the results, which are rich and expansive, encompassing shoegaze, post-punk and the more experimental electronica with which she name her name. In Light opens the album, beautifully setting a hazy, dreamlike tone which continues throughout.

https://nabihahiqbal.bandcamp.com/album/dreamer