Lomon is a Seattle-based musician who feels out of place, as if he had been born a thousand years early. His style is described as psychedelic indie electronic, and perhaps that is the case in general, but this particular song we are featuring today, Little Visitors, is actually closer to glam rock. There’s certainly a David Bowie vibe to it.
Passionate about science fiction and all things related to space, Lomon, aka Zander Chocron, usually writes songs about our planet, taking care of it, and space exploration. Little Visitors, for example, is a metaphor for the human race not appreciating the beautiful planet we have. All in all, Lomon is certainly an artist with plenty to say and the creativity to do so in quirky and interesting ways. Check him out below.
This iconic album, No Doubt‘s Tragic Kingdom, is 25 years old this month, and, as a homage, I decided to feature one of its songs as this week’s #ThrowbackThursday entry. Usually, with bands or albums this popular, I try to highlight the lesser-known gems, but I can’t do that this time around. I got a soft spot for Don’t Speak and can’t pick another song (which would probably have been Just A Girl, which is pretty popular anyway) over it. I’m sorry.
It is not precisely a secret that by adding contrast between different sections of a song –particularly, between the verses and the chorus–, the resulting songs will be more interesting. This is what makes Come Together so great! Yet, plenty of songwriters make the mistake of having a chorus that sounds too similar to the rest of the piece. Luckily, that wasn’t the case for Rough Gentlement, a four-piece rock band from Canada, with their latest single, Black Gold. A banger with an infectious chorus made even better by the high contrast it has with the rest of the tune.
After starting in 2017, the Canadian band has garnered a following in Quebec and this year released this new single in preparation for a future EP. Black Gold is an energetic rock inspired by the various crises the world has gone through this year and how we just have to keep marching on. Not only it is a catchy track, it also has meaning. Check it out below!
Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to add a new entry yesterday, but I’ll try to make up for that today. Here, I bring this musical crush from Night Traveler, a terrific duo from Austin, Texas. I discovered this song back in August but between prioritising submissions and other plans, I had been delaying its inclusion here. It’s about time that changed because Watching You certainly deserved better than that. It’s a really great track.
The duo recently released their debut EP, Dreams You Don’t Forget, for which Watching You was its latest single. An atmospheric track of searing indie pop with traces of melancholic 80s music, this song got everything you need to put it on repeat, including the perfect vocals for this type of music. Actually, I dare you to listen to this great tune just once. I had to put it on repeat.
Back in 2007, a little alternative rock band from Pennsylvania released Aurora, their debut album, which got overlooked despite being one of the best rock albums of that year, perhaps even of that decade. I’m talking, of course, of Desoto Jones and for this week’s #ThrowbackThursday entry, I thought we could reminisce about one of the gems in that record.
Three of the five members of Desoto Jones –they are still active– are brothers and while they were recording Aurora, their father passed away. Nonfiction is a an emotional song the brothers dedicated to him. Its acoustic overtones and the heartfelt lyrics intertwine into a beautiful track that doesn’t get old. Listen to this song and then play the whole album. You will see why it is a shame this record didn’t become more popular.
Sour Honey is a four-piece alternative rock band from Manchester that had to swim against the current pretty much from the start. Formed out of two other bands: Young Monarch and Cosmo Calling, their debut gig and launch party had to be cancelled due to the lockdown. This didn’t prevent them from releasing their first single then and a series of cover videos just to keep the momentum going. Set on maintaining the ball rolling during these trying times, Sour Honey is back with a second single, Snub, a clear statement telling the world that this young band is going places.
I really love the guitar riff during the pre-chorus and the overall soundscape created by the misty vocals and the multiple layers of music coming together. It is another example of the amount of talented musicians who are out there waiting for a chance to be heard. Something tells me we’ll keep hearing from Sour Honey.
Kat Victoria is a young and multifaceted artist that cannot really be tied to any genre in particular. She has released six singles so far and each one of them is different. I mean, one of them is even categorised as freestyle rap. However, the song I’m featuring today, Tell Him, lies in the grey area between alternative rock and pop-punk.
Tell Him is an interesting track with an infectious chorus that I’m sure many listeners will enjoy. I think it’s really impressive what Kat can do pretty much by herself, including shooting a music video for her song (which you can watch below). As her bio on social media pages say, this talented songwriter makes music from her bedroom. I can only imagine what she would be able to do in a top-notch music studio. Definitely, check her out.
Manchester band Cultures, which you should know already if you’ve been paying attention ;-), are back with, in my humble opinion, an even better single than its predecessor (which was pretty good on its own). Shake is a catchier single with hooks from beginning to end that will probably still play on your mind long after the song has finished. Lyrically, it pertinently talks about how everything is better when you have good company, even being stuck in one place.
If Shake is a glimpse of where Cultures is headed now, then they’re going in the right direction. Here we are looking forward to more singles from this promising band.
I got a request last week for this week’s #ThrowbackThursday entry: “If You Could Only See” from American alternative rock powerhouse, Tonic. So, naturally, I complied by featuring a different song from the same band (=. I got nothing against “If You Could Only See”. It’s a great song, possible Tonic’s best and undoubtedly their most iconic track to date (after all, it was 1997’s most-played song in rock radio), but that is precisely the reason I opted to talk about a different, lesser known gem included in their 2002 album, Head On Straight, Do You Know.
This song is a guitar-driven alternative rock song with a melodic chorus, but the reason why I’ve always liked it so much is that it got terrific lyrics, which shine the most during the great chorus. I don’t think this tune got much attention back then when it came out, but it’s not too late to give an overlooked outstanding song a second chance. Tonic and Do You Know certainly deserve it.
Remember that Egyptian Summer The fork lightning over the bay When we forgot everything We forgot our troubles When love was kind And the silence was noise But Underneath a marble sky I never seen you look so happy In your life.
And you were always cracking jokes And laughing at my funny ways And as the thunder rolled Well so did my sorrow We told lies We told them all the time But underneath a marble sky Nothing mattered.
I need a thunderstorm To distract from the pain Cause tomorrow might be the same damn sorrow I need something to happen The heavens to burst The sky to tear open The passion to run and flow like a river Out of my eyes Once it’s out of my heart It’s such a cold and desolate Happy ever when It’s such a cold and desolate Happiness never came.
We sat at the bar and we talked about the things we used to like And romanticised the pain Always remember it’s a crying shame Like reaching for the heavens but the heavens never came And I’ve played the victim long before you arrived These are not my people It’s not my scene not my style So I’m going back I’m going back to the city Please forgive me
Blame Baby are a Los Angeles trio that produces catchy indie rock with strong late 90s/early 2000s vibes. They only got three songs in their catalogue, but they got an EP on the way. Silhouette is their most recent release and, in my humble opinion, the best so far. A song about incomplete relationships, it got a nice combination of distorted guitars, good vocals and a chorus that gets stuck in your head. They recently made public the tune’s music video (you can watch it here), which is deliberately bad, in that so-bad-it-is-good kind of way.
I hope they do well enough to keep making music without having to change their sound and feature rappers or K-Pop groups as guest vocalists. They know how to write a good alternative rock song. They should keep doing just that.
