Thumpermonkey - Abyssopelagic

1) The last full length release was back in 2012, so what have you guys been up in the interim?

Working very, very slowly on a new album, though it is pretty much complete now. Additionally, a lot of the last year has been spent concentrating on making sure that we have a good strategy for its release. Sel Balamir of Amplifier is going to be putting out the album on his new ‘Rockosmos’ label, so we’re all super excited to finally share it. Rockosmos has also just put out a 4 track EP called ‘Electricity’.

2) Where did the inspiration for ‘Electricity’ come from?

We’d played the new songs to Sel that we wanted to release as an album, and while he was really into the vibe, he felt that he’d like us to produce an EP quickly to help consolidate the identity of the label and ease new fans into what we do. So the initial ‘inspiration’ was basically Sel saying ‘write a load of new songs!’ This was a totally different approach to how we’d written the upcoming album – it’s the fastest we’ve ever written new material.
A lot of inspiration came after we settled on the EP’s front cover image – I’d been trawling through the British Library archives looking for ideas, and the image of a pith-helmeted englishman getting blown up by his experiments, (in this instance, trying to use electricity to ‘transform babylon’), stood out. We already had the shells of songs by this point, but the image suggested new themes to me – ancient civilisations, colonial arrogance, religion – that kind of stuff. These ideas seemed to naturally worm their way into the lyrics.

3) How do you write and compose your songs? And are there any specific influences on your writing style?

It’s a very democratic process. What normally happens is that everyone produces scores and scores of demos that eventually get whittled down to a shortlist that everyone is happy to experiment further with. There’s very little jamming, really. One of us will end up taking a demo, mutating it into something else, and then if everybody is into it, we’ll start trying to learn it and refine it in a rehearsal space. We’re big fans of the Immersion Composition Technique – also known as the ‘20 song game’, where everyone in the band is forced to write 20 songs in one day, and then meet to see if there are any bits worth keeping. You can check out www.ics-hub.org for more information about this way of writing.

4) Since your last release the industry has moved apace, are you fans of streaming or do you prefer the physical release?

I think it’s not worth getting too attached to a particular delivery method – I think bands just need to canvas the opinion of their fan-base and see what they are into. What we have learned, (and I don’t know if this is specific to the genre of music we’re making), is that there’s certainly a desire for physical product not to disappear completely. We get a lot of requests to reprint old albums and EPs that have been only available digitally for the last few years, so we promise we’ll try and get round to that!

5) Is there a new album due soon?

Yes indeed – now that the EP is out of the way, the next few months are going to be about getting an album release date set – the album is called ‘Make Me Young, Etc’, and will be released in 2018.

6) In the digital age how important do you see the role of social media in promotion?

I know many bands are frustrated by having to engage in advertising on social media platforms, and it’s easy to focus on the negative, but it really is critical I think. While you are fighting against a certain amount of white noise due to the sheer volume of people competing for attention, it’s worth stopping and reflecting on how these platforms offer you the opportunity to connect with people who otherwise never would have heard your music.

7) any further live dates planned?

We’re playing at the ‘8 Years of Chaos’ all day-er on Feb 3rd at The Brewhouse, London – Chaos Theory is our favorite promoter, and it will be great to play alongside all the other excellent bands that Kunal has picked from nearly a decade of bonkers shows. We’re also looking at dates outside of London as well.

8) Who are your favourite artists/bands?

We don’t all agree on the same influences, but generally speaking we’ve got a lot of time for Shudder to Think, Magma, King Crimson, Deerhoof, Sleepytime Gorilla Museum, and Scott Walker’s recent output.

9) Can you recommend any up and coming bands to us?

Most recently I’ve been really getting into Charlie Cawood’s lush instrumental solo album ‘The Divine Abstract’, (Charlie is the bass player for old label-mates Knifeworld, as well as being a multi instrumentalist in about 20 other bands). Here’s hoping he figures out how to perform it live I’ve also been enjoying recent releases by Yowie (“Synchromysticism”), and Strobes (“Brokespeak”).

10) What question would you like to be asked in an interview that you never have been? (And what would be your answer).

I’d like somebody to ask me about my constant inclusion of references to Aztec theology in Thumpermonkey song lyrics. My answer would be very long.

11) Vinyl. Yes or No and why?

Sure – why not! Our upcoming album is hopefully going to have a vinyl release. I’m not one to spend too much time engaging in discussions about the perceived positive or negative aspects of a specific format – a substantial amount of our fans have asked for vinyl version, and all I’m concerned about it that this sounds like a lot of fun. I’m personally looking forward to seeing the artwork in a larger format as well. If enough people demanded our album on a 90 min cassette, I’d be happy to consider it. Maybe not minidisc though. Or wax cylinder.

From: https://www.progradar.org/index.php/2018/01/09/interview-with-thumpermonkey-by-james-r-turner/ 

 

Marisa & The Moths - Get It Off My Chest

ReturnToSound: “A great show at The Green Door Store, though it all started off with a little bit of technical difficulties and you probably had to adapt. I think you had to go acoustic a little bit early in the set, didn't you?
 
Marisa Rodriguez: “Yeah, that's never happened before so that was an interesting one, so basically Myke Gray was stepping in for Alez (D’Elia). It was his first time doing it and he brought his amp and it just broke. It was working and then it broke a minute beforehand. It's annoying because we prep for so long, we make sure this stuff's working, but you just can't predict if something's gonna break that's of no age”.

RTS: “There was a period when everyone was trying to go wireless, but everyone's gone back to good old plug it in with dodgy cables because it's rock ‘n’ roll isn't it?”

MR: “I actually feel differently. I've had less issues since using wireless than when I had cables because I no longer trip over them and actually, we fit my pedal board - because there's quite a lot of pedals - into a flight case where our in-ear system is then no one touches it. All of the leads that connect it were custom-made, so it lives in the drawer, and nobody touches it. I've also had an amp die at a gig as well, but I was like fuck it, I’ll just do it with lead guitar, bass and drums, it's fine I just won't play - it's fine. The good thing about that experience was that I realised that I didn't have to play a guitar in every song and that's why we are doing what we're doing now. It's meant that we can elevate our live performance more. I feel like there's a silver lining when things go wrong sometimes”.

RTS: “That's the experience you pick up playing live on the road. Those scary moments test you and like you say something good may come out of it”.

MR: “Definitely. I mean there’s nothing scarier than everything going off on stage and everyone just looking at you like “dance monkey”. I actually found out recently that I have ADHD, which makes a lot of sense for how I think I react to certain life scenarios. When small things happen, I can freak out more than a normal person but when under severe pressure, or in a really bad situation I can be the calm one. I'm like, right, how are we gonna deal with this? So I think maybe that part of my personality comes in handy.”

RTS: “You've actually been diagnosed? Though I don't know how you test for conditions like ADHD to be honest, what did you go through if you don't mind me asking?”

MR: “It was a psychiatrist in the private NHS sector. I was basically struggling with a lot of things that other people didn't seem to be struggling with and I've been struggling since I was at school. I just thought that maybe I was stupid or something, so if I struggled, I just kept quiet about it. I've actually just realised that I've spent my whole life bullying myself for being me when there's nothing wrong with me, my brain just works differently and actually I think I excel at certain things that other people wouldn't because of my brain being the way it is. I think, if you have the knowledge, that knowledge is power and if you understand how you work, you can accept it. You can double down on the things that you're good at and try to work on the things that you're not, rather than just beating yourself up for it. They're talking about this a lot more now especially for women, because they're now calling women with ADHD the lost generation. It shows completely differently in women than guys, that's the reason why they couldn’t be tested for it before because when they were studying people with ADHD, they only studied boys, so it's only recently that they have done something about it. So, yeah, to be honest I just wanted to know that I wasn't mental (with a chuckle)”.

RTS: “Haha, yeah, I think as you get older, I'm not calling you older in any way, but you learn more about your personal qualities and your imperfections. That's part of growing up, I think when you're very young, as you say, you may get mixed up and it can be very hard. It has probably given you some sort of release to know?”

MR: “I just wish that I had done it sooner, but I believed that in my head it was like, well … that's just the naughty boys at school that didn't get good grades or try hard, because I had to try hard. I struggled but it was like I had to get good grades, and I had to do what it took to get the good grades. It's just different. I think they said that women tend to internalise it more and mask it better than boys do.”

RTS: Has this played into your lyrics and song writing?

MR: “I didn't actually find out about the ADHD until after our recent album releases. It’s totally given a different meaning to a bunch of my lyrics and makes me think… oh yeah, this all makes sense now.  Obviously, I write a lot about mental health and my experience of being in an abusive or toxic relationship. I think having undiagnosed ADHD may have affected my relationships and the choices of people I’ve been with. They weren't good choices, let's put it that way. They weren't very kind to me, but I think maybe I don't realise that I have a PP (people-pleasing) nature myself and maybe I could have gotten out of those situations more easily rather than just thinking there's something wrong with me all the time and thinking that I had to fix it because it was my responsibility, as it must be my fault.”

RTS: “It seems that you have come to a place where you can please yourself, you can now demonstrate to others who you are? Fate is taking you into the right place to be yourself in front of a band?”

MR: “Definitely yeah, everything happens for a reason, I really feel that. I’m still human, though, and have my bad days like everyone else. In Brighton I kind of touched on that fact, I was very open about the fact that I had a bad day. I know it sounds random maybe but part of me was like, oh no, did I bring this chaos with me BECAUSE I was having a bad day. I was just a bit overwhelmed. But it happens to us all, right?

RTS: “You have the band around you, they look like they back you both in musical and mental terms?”

MR: “Absolutely! We're all really good mates. We all have our strong points and our weaker points but, yeah, we're a really good team and we all get on and have a laugh.”

From: https://www.returntosound.co.uk/features-and-interviews/marisa-rodriguez-from-marisa-and-the-moths-explains-life-on-the-road-in-an-honest-interview

Poco - What If I Should Say I Love You

From the Inside is Poco's most unusual record, and one the band -- especially founder Richie Furay, whose songs were sort of pushed into the background -- finally didn't like all that much. But it was a very good one anyway, produced in Memphis by guitar legend Steve Cropper and featuring the group generating a leaner, more stripped-down, somewhat bluesier sound. The harmonies are less radiant and the guitars more subdued, and the spirits also a little more low-key than usual. But the sound they get is still appealing, the singing more reflective and a little bit closer to R&B than to the post-Byrds country-rock for which they were known -- the songs are pretty, and in listening terms George Grantham's drums and Timothy B. Schmit's bass are nice and upfront in the mix, and the guitars have a really close presence, even if they are turned down.  From: https://www.allmusic.com/album/from-the-inside-mw0000268643#review  

Laüsa - La-Baish A La Ribera

Laüsa [lahuzo] means in Gascon: “A glowing piece that moves away from a fire, or that springs from the friction of two units.” Laüsa is a musical journey through songs, which draws its identity from the Gascon musical tradition and takes a detour here and there. Their music is multifaceted, open and generous: we hear Mediterranean and Atlantic influences, as well as sounds borrowed from modern music. Rich texts and personal compositions, as well as a repertoire that is the result of carefully selected collections: Laüsa offers a fresh perspective on traditional music. Lolita Delmonteil Ayral: accordion, vocals Camille Raibaud: violin, mandolin, vocals Julien Estèves: bouzouki, tenor guitar, vocals Juliette Minvielle: vocals, percussion.  Translated from: https://www.balfolk.nl/bands/lausa-fr/ 

Led Zeppelin - Black Country Woman

When Led Zeppelin entered the studio in January 1974 to record what would become Physical Graffiti, they wound up with just over three sides of material for a four-sided double LP. They reached back into their archives for previously recorded but unreleased material. This is one of the main reasons why, even though Physical Graffiti has some serious moments of brilliance, as an album it is kind of disjointed.
One of the tracks they decided to use was Black Country Woman, which was originally recorded with a mobile unit in 1972 in the garden at Mick Jagger’s estate, Stargroves. The song was intended for Houses of the Holy and was originally titled Never Ending Doubting Woman Blues. Although never acknowledged by the band, one of the reasons the track was likely left off Houses of the Holy was the unfortunately timed flyby of a private airplane.  From: https://us.kef.com/blogs/news/did-you-hear-that-led-zeppelin-black-country-woman?srsltid=AfmBOooxNUYq98XVLQj_v-yUkBsSJbTwTbXw29bMBQdxxUiN6dc-KxV5

Lais - After the Goldrush (Neil Young cover)

Having seen Laïs live at the Tilburg International Folk Festival in January, I was in a way impressed: a group of three pretty girls with gorgeous voices, bringing with them in concert a folk rock band, but presenting themselves in a very professional and attractive way, comparable to rock/pop bands - a high potential for stardom. Still they find the time to start the whole set with a capella folk singing in front of big audiences. Maybe the music style they do is not really new but their appeal definitely: young, charming, yet the right appeal to attract the masses. Just the right stars to lead the folk music to new audiences and new grounds... 
So how did the Laïs success story start - and why with folk singing? All three of them had no background in traditional singing - "traditional singing does not exist in Belgium", as Jorunn says. Yet she has a family background in folk music, with her father playing the accordeon. Laïs started five years ago, in a small village near Brussels called Gooik, being famous for its folk music courses. "I have come to these courses since I was a little child. So I brought on Annelies once, in 1996. On the last evening, everyone started singing with each other; and we started singing and everyone was quiet and listening. That was the start. Among the listeners were some members of Kadril, and they said we had to go on and rehearse." 
The core of Laïs' repertoire are traditional Flemish songs; so if there is no traditional singing these days in Belgium, where are these songs from? "The texts are from old books. The melodies and the arrangements we make ourselves." It is not too difficult to find those books and songs; they have bought quite a few books in second hand bookshops: "There are a lot of texts that nobody ever used, so we have plenty of texts. These songs are usually not sung in Belgium these days." 
Laïs only sing a part of their songs in Flemish; they add to their repertoire French chansons from Brel, English pop songs by Sinead O'Connor, trad songs from Italy and Sweden. As Marc Bekaert of the Flemish Magazine T'Bourdonske puts it, "they seem to fit in a Pan European influenced movement. This generation grew up with lots of compact discs from all different styles and regions. There are only some vague Flemish roots, and the fact that the performers are Flemish people. But their international success did draw the attention to the growing Flemish scene."  From: http://www.folkworld.eu/14/e/lais.html 

Mu - Make A Joyful Noise

If you’re feeling lost, depressed or brought down by life’s humdrum reality, a good cure is to give Mu a listen. Much of the music on these pages carries a certain amount of — weight. Which is fine if you want to get out there on the perimeter. What Mu does, though, is like a warm gentle breeze blowing through your soul, a spiritual spring clean.
All the members of Mu had been in LA pop bands at some time during the early 60s, oriented towards surf with Beatles and Byrds influences. Fapardokly was an album collection of these early efforts released only in LA and copies used to change hands for up to $2000 among collectors, such was the aura surrounding it. Fankhauser was in the Surfaris, and I think it is his voice that can be heard laughing maniacally at the beginning of Wipeout. Cotton landed a gig in Beefheart’s Magic Band, playing on Strictly Personal and Trout Mask Replica. Many chapters have been written about the influence of this latter album on rock, one of the most surreal, jagged episodes ever in music, and Cotton was a key part of the creation process. 
So … surf meets Beefheart. They recorded a promising first album in LA, then decamped to Hawaii where they embraced a blissed-out lifestyle of vegetarianism, flying saucer watching, study of the lost Pacific continent of Mu and creating gentle, organic music. The CD reissue on Sundazed contains the first album, the second, only released locally at the time, plus singles.  From: https://www.headheritage.co.uk/unsung/reviews/mu-end-of-an-era

Joan Osborne – Dracula Moon

 

Joan Osborne is a crazy chick. At least, this seems to be the consensual view in the more retro and retarded areas of rock culture, as in the latest issue of Q magazine, where she's listed in that category alongside musicians such as Alanis Morissette and Sheryl Crow. When she released her debut single earlier this year, One Of Us, "kooky" was the word applied to its lyric lines, "What if God was one of us/Just a slob like one of us?" Crazy? Kooky? That sure seems to be the way rock'n'roll now seeks to define, deny, reduce and potentially limit the latest breed of female singer songwriters, as happened roughly three years ago when a similar label was slapped on that other magnificent triumvirate Tori Amos, PJ Harvey and Bjork. But it ain't gonna work, boys.
Crazy? I might be slowly approaching that state, but I wasn't when we recorded that song!" Joan responds, speaking on the phone from Nevada. "But that kind of stuff has probably been, historically, a way to marginalise somebody who has a view that may be a little bit threatening. Yet I don't let it bother me too much. I don't think most people think I'm crazy."
Or if they do, clearly Joan Osborne is not alone. The mere fact that One of Us has spent the last three months in the Irish Top 30 would suggest that there are many people in this country who are tuning into her God/slob question at some intrinsic level, as though it tapped right into the core of some religious zeitgeist. That definitely seems to be the case in America, where this 33 year old "lapsed Catholic" has discovered that women, in particular, seem to cheer deliriously when she sings that line in concert, from a song she describes as "relatively light hearted" but "asking some pretty fundamental questions about what you believe in terms of God and the universe and all that".
Equally, Osborne's glorious, Grammy nominated album, Relish, reflects her own current obsession with what she calls the "concept of falling from grace" and even more sinfully, perhaps, relishing that descent, as in the song Dracula Moon where she sings "I'm naked in a hotel room/making out with my one true love/You say, come back home/I say I'm just falling from grace/I said, I like falling from grace.
"It's not that I'm subscribing to falling from grace as necessarily a way to self discovery it just seems that in religious fundamentalist culture there is this picture of a spiritual person as being something of a child, a sheep following orders and that this is the only way to get into heaven," she elaborates. "I rejected that a limited perspective. I believe you can be a really spiritual person and still be in touch with your own intellect, sexuality and free will all the things that make you a human being."  From: https://www.irishtimes.com/culture/not-quite-saint-joan-1.58361

Country Joe & The Fish - Silver and Gold

How Country Joe & the Fish got their name: As their original guitarist/organist David Bennet Cohen tells it:
“Joe McDonald and E.D. [Eugene Denson, the band’s friend/manager] were sitting around E.D.’s cottage in Berkeley trying to think up a name for the group. As they both had revolutionary tendencies, they wanted a name reflecting their political position. Leafing through Chairman Mao Tse Tung’s ‘Little Red Book’ when E.D. found the phrase, ‘The revolutionary is a fish that swims in the sea of the people.’ From that came ‘Country Mao and the Fish.’ But Joe said it might cause confusion as America didn’t recognize Red China. So, E.D. suggested ‘Country Joe and the Fish, with ‘Joe’ being Josef Stalin.”
“Joe’s approach was…profoundly cerebral. His concept was basically to get a few people around and make something happen,” lead guitarist Barry “The Fish” Melton explains.
“None of us were professional musicians, except maybe for David, who came from New York. [Drummer Gary] Chicken Hirsh was somewhat professional, but only because he was a few years older than the rest of us.”
“When I got to California in 1965 I had been playing guitar, mostly folk songs,” Cohen said.
“I didn’t decide to buy an electric guitar until after seeing the Beatles’ movies. They finally got me to accept rock ‘n’ roll. I had been really opposed to it before that. I started hanging around the guitar shops and a few small local clubs called the Jabberwock and the Questing Beast, where we’d perform for $5 and food. The Jabberwock had an old beat-up piano and Barry went nuts over my boogie-woogie playing on songs like ‘St. Louis Blues.’ Country Joe wanted an organ player in the group after Highway 61 came out and Barry told him that I played.”
“Church organs were really big intimidating instruments, with all those pedals. I’d never played organ before, but I wanted the gig,” Cohen said with a laugh. “So, the band got me a Farfisa organ. I had no idea what I was doing. None of us did! We were just making up this music, creating a sound and then it became real. Later the reviews said I had ‘a unique style.’ But I was just copying my own guitar riffs!”
“We’d been a jug band but we didn’t play in a conventional way,” Melton said. “We were doing something new. We deliberately walked a different path. It wasn’t like we discussed it. We bridged folk and jazz with bluegrass, country and blues. It was an improvisational folk music, like what the Grateful Dead exploited commercially. When you’re creating something new you can’t be held to any standard of criticism.”
Just six weeks after the band formed they decided to record an EP comprised of three songs, and released it on the obscure Rag Baby label, as no record companies were pounding on their door…yet. The disc included three tracks that would soon appear on their debut album: “Section 43,” “Bass Strings,” and “Love.”
“We weren’t even sure we were going to remain a band for very long, but we wanted to make a record,” Cohen said. “The EP came out surprisingly good.” Soon after the band signed with Vanguard Records.  From: https://observer.com/2017/05/country-joe-the-fish-electric-music-for-the-mind-and-body-anniversary-review/

Aretha Franklin - Swing In - Germany 1968

It's frustrating how little well recorded live soul music there is from the 1960s and 1970s. Even for big names like Aretha Franklin, you're lucky if you get an official live album or two, usually short and flawed, and quality bootlegs are extremely rare. But this is one of those nice rare instances. Franklin became a big star in 1967, and arguably had an even bigger year in 1968. A lot of Europeans discovered American soul music in the late 1960s. When soul stars toured Europe then, they usually were surprised by the size and passion of the fans there. Franklin was so big in 1968 that she was given her own entire episode of a German TV show called "Swing In."
This show has its plusses and minuses. A minus is that there was a very talkative MC who spoke in German a lot. He also did a short interview with Franklin right in the middle of the show (with everything being painstakingly translated in German and English in real time). One other minus is that Franklin pretty much never says a word between songs. I'm guessing this is because she surmised the German audience wouldn't understand her, as well as the fact that she only had an hour for the concert and couldn't afford to waste any time.  
One minus is also a plus in the sense that the German audience was unusually polite and subdued for a soul music audience at the time. They were even subdued compared to other European audiences, because one can see video on YouTube of a much more lively Aretha Franklin concert in Amsterdam in 1968. But this is a plus because one can clearly hear the music instead of lots of screaming and cheering. Also, it's a big plus that the recording exists at all, since this sort of soul bootleg from the time is so rare.  From: http://albumsthatshouldexist.blogspot.com/2020/04/aretha-franklin-swing-in-wdr-studio-l.html

Sweet Pill - Starchild EP (full album)

Philadelphia emo rockers Sweet Pill have readied their most recent EP, Starchild. Their debut for Hopeless Records will drop on March 15, 2024. The band's new four-track EP is a poignant and introspective exploration of battling anxieties, your inner voice, navigating life's transitions, and battling against a world that always seems to be against you. The band, consisting of vocalist Zayna Youssef, guitarists Jayce Williams and Sean McCall, bassist Ryan Cullen, and drummer Chris Kearney, delivers their most masterful and vulnerable work yet on Starchild.
The title track, "Starchild," opens up the effort and is a standout moment, serving as an ode to undervaluing oneself and the pressures of people-pleasing. Youssef's introspective lyrics and emotive delivery make this song a powerful and relatable anthem for anyone grappling with self-worth.
"Chewed Up," following "Starchild," takes a slightly more aggressive musical approach, mirroring the intrusive thoughts that plague the mind at night. It's a plea for assertiveness and self-advocacy, a call to break free from personal downfall and speak up for oneself. Whereas "Eternal" is a slower number showing the band's dynamic side. The music is slow and melodic, but every word Youssef sings cuts like a hot knife.
Throughout Starchild, Sweet Pill's musicianship shines, with dynamic instrumentals that perfectly complement Youssef's raw and emotive vocals that help her vocals soar. The EP's production is crisp, allowing each instrument to stand out while maintaining a cohesive sound from the start of "Starchild" all the way to the end of the closing number "Sympathy."
Overall, Starchild is a testament to Sweet Pill's growth and maturity as a band. It's a must-listen for fans, both old and new, showcasing the band's evolution and cementing their status as one of the most promising alternative acts of the moment.  From: https://www.crucialrhythm.com/sweet-pill-starchild-review

Temples - Shelter Song

British neo-psychedelic band Temples combine a trippily retro approach with classic pop craftsmanship, though they aren't afraid to stretch the fuzzy boundaries of their chosen sound. The group debuted a core style of chiming guitars, tight harmonies, and an easygoing T. Rex-inspired boogie on 2014's Sun Structures, an album that gained the band a following that expanded beyond neo-psych circles. Nonetheless, Temples found themselves at the forefront of a miniature psychedelic revival, along with fellow travelers King Gizzard and Tame Impala. Their guiding principles stayed firmly intact, even when exploring synth-heavy territory as they do on 2017's Volcano, or giving their sound a sonic glow up courtesy of a Dave Fridmann mix on 20223's Exotico.  From: https://www.allmusic.com/artist/temples-mn0003051049#biography 

Royal Thunder - Fade

“I want to tell my story and I want to be honest,” Royal Thunder singer/bassist Mlny Parsons says after I offer her the opportunity to tell me if there’s anything she’d rather keep private from the hour-long conversation we have. “My father killed himself in 2017. He overdosed and I still haven’t dealt with it. I haven’t really touched that. I forgave. I get it – mental health, life falling apart, addiction.” Parsons shares this story, as well as revealing her own struggles with addiction and how she’s come through on the other side, in hopes that other people who are experiencing similar issues don’t feel so alone. While those addictions were present during the making of Royal Thunder’s fourth album, Rebuilding the Mountain, Parsons says she considers February 1, 2023 to be the start of a new, positive chapter in her life. As with most of us, the pandemic had some negative mental health side effects on Parsons and her bandmate, and ex-husband, guitarist Josh Weaver. The two had been slumbering along with fill-in drummers after Evan Diprima left suddenly while on tour in 2018 and, while battling their own demons, were reaching a crossroads in their musical career when they were hit with another blow – a global pandemic. If there’s a silver lining for Royal Thunder, it’s that Diprima came back to the band and the reunion inspired the trio to start working on new material. 

2020 happens and we’re all in a bad place – the country, the world, politics, Covid. Had you started working on new music?

MLNY: It’s weird how quick we are to punish ourselves when we lose something. I don’t know what’s in that. I went through a thing where I didn’t want to hear music. I didn’t care if there was something brand new that came out and everybody was like, “Have you heard it?” and I was like, “No, and I don’t care. I don’t want to hear it. I don’t care about my favorite album that I’ve been listening to since 1992.” I didn’t enjoy anything. I was very suicidal, depressed, confused. I felt just naked as fuck and ugly inside and I didn’t have an outlet or anything. It was not a good time. I threw myself at self destruction. I was just like, “I’m going to fucking hide. I’m just going to bury my head and make this worse.” It felt so bad to not have it anymore. I wonder what’s in that? Maybe it’s an excuse to be like, “Everything’s fucked up and it’s gone.” And it was my excuse to be like, “I’m going to drink this whiskey at 9am because look what’s happening. Everything’s fucked, so fuck it.” It was just a good excuse to not give a shit and I really didn’t.

If this is not too personal of a question, how were you able to get out of that hole you were in?

MLNY: I barely made it out. I didn’t make it out until February 1 of this year. I was sober when we were making the album but that was a good behavior. Show up, do your job, be clear headed, be present. I didn’t really do it for me, I did it for Josh and Evan. But, really, all I was done was crawling out of my skin to get out of the studio as possible. I wanted to get fucked up. I was like, “Man, we’ve got two more weeks.” I was going to get an eight ball. I was going to fuck it all up. I was not in a good place until February 1 and what got me out of it was getting really sick from not drinking. I thought I had Covid or the flu. I thought I might be dying because I was throwing up everything I ate. I had constant heartburn. I was bleeding. Everything was just off. I was bloated. Actually, in “The Knife” video, and especially in the new video we did, “Fade,” it’s hard for me to watch because I can see it in my eyes and my face. I was just so sick. 
What got me out of it was getting sick and not being able to do it. Getting through that and then waking up and having a clear head after a few days and being like, “I have completely fucked over my bandmates. I have fucked myself over. And everybody in my life has been putting up with my bullshit.” It hurt. It broke me when I actually realized what I was doing to myself and to other people. That really broke something in me and I’m glad it did. It was not easy to realize that you’re kind of a piece of shit. You’re making really bad decisions. But I walked through it on February 1. I was like, “All right, I got do to this.” The first 30 days was not even about being sober. It was about my old self being like, “What the fuck?” I was at war with myself big time. 
And when we were making that album, I didn’t realize it until recently, it’s an internal warfare. It’s what was coming talking to what was. It’s me in a mirror, a two-sided mirror, just figuring it out and calling myself out and being like, “I know you’re really comfortable over here but it’s time to get uncomfortable and make some positive change.” I turned that corner. I cried so fucking much. I was like, “I didn’t know it was possible to cry as much as I was crying.” I was like, “Am I just that broken? Am I going to cry every day for the rest of my life?” 
I fucked up a lot of shit. It’s a little embarrassing but I pretty much almost killed myself accidentally. I got some cocaine and was playing Scrabble with my friend and my friend was like, “Dude, are you okay?” We were playing Scrabble at four in the morning, doing blow, and I’m drunk and I turn ghost white and start sweating and the room is just disappearing. I’m thinking, “You got to go.” I’m stumbling down my apartment complex parking garage and the cops are standing there and they’re like “Put your hands on the hood.” And I’m like, “Fuck.” They’re like, “What are you doing?” And I’m thinking, “Did I do all that coke or is it in my pocket?” Then I’m in the ambulance and then I’m being told I need to go to the hospital because I’m probably having a fentanyl overdose and I run out of the ambulance. All this to say, I’m blowing everything up. I’m blowing up my relationship. I’m losing my apartment. I’m getting talked to at work about how drunk and fucked up I am by other people who are drunk and fucked up. And I’m like, “Wow, I’m really blowing it.” 
I ended up moving in with Josh and his girlfriend. I live with them now. It’s just temporary but they were like, “Bring your two cats. We’ll put them in the basement.” We can’t have cats upstairs so they live in the basement. They’re happy. I made a cat cave. It was my crying cave for a long time and then it became a cat cave. I did a lot of healing down there. Things got really shitty but I’m thankful that they did because I came out of that and I wouldn’t trade how real life feels right now. I can’t fight myself anymore. I’m winning all the time. In my mind, I’m like, “I know what I need to do. I know how I feel. I know what’s next. I know what I want.” I wouldn’t trade that. I didn’t know for years who I was or what the hell I wanted. I thought I did. I thought the louder you are, the more confident you are. I found out that’s not so true.

From: https://bigtakeover.com/interviews/interview-royal-thunder 

Orkan - Ytan

Gothenburg−based rock force Orkan returns with a storm. Today, they unleash “Ytan”−the powerful first single from their forthcoming album Vakendrömmar (Dreams You Dream While You’re Awake), due for release on August 28th via their newly founded label Blåsväder Records. With nearly 200 shows across Sweden and Europe under their belt, Orkan−Swedish for Hurricane−has become a name synonymous with raw energy and politically charged rock that resonates deeply with fans of the Swedish prog tradition. Their high−voltage live shows, swirling psychedelic riffs, and fierce lyrical honesty have established them as torchbearers of a sound that’s both rooted in history and fearlessly modern.
“Ytan” (translating to The Surface) sets the tone. It opens with a signature Orkan riff−gritty and hypnotic−then unfolds into a psychedelic shuffle that bends and breathes like a fever dream. Lyrically, the song explores deep exhaustion−the kind that pulls you under and makes you long for a world that feels just out of reach. As the track surges toward its finale, it blossoms into what can only be described as a rock symphony.
The upcoming album draws on the eerie essence of The Mare; a figure from Swedish folklore known to haunt sleepers by night, forcing them to relive the day’s traumas in paralyzing darkness. Vakendrömmar inhabits this haunting borderland between reality and dream, day and night, injustice and hope.  From: https://femmusic.com/2025/06/05/orkan-ytan/

Reflective Detectives - Brave New Boogie

Reflective Detectives are a group from Los Angeles led by songwriter, producer and guitarist Ryan Gabrinetti. Drawing from the city’s vibrant past and present, their sound propels and subverts the tropes of modern garage and psychedelia while seasoning them with social and political consciousness. Joined live by Cameron Burt (bass) and Warner Hiatt (drums), the Reflective Detectives inject the tunes with dynamic improvisations and mind-bending freak-outs that are never played the same way twice.  From: https://shindig-magazine.com/?p=4092 

Laboratorium Pieśni - Saidalo

Laboratorium Piesni was formed in 2013 in Poland and is made up of seven women, Iwona Majszyk, Kamila Bigus, Karolina Stawiszyńska, Klaudia Lewandowska, Lila Schally-Kacprzak, Alina Klebba, and Magda Jurczyszyn. They sing ancient folk music passed down through generations from many countries across the globe, specifically from; the Ukraine, Balkans, Poland, Belarus, Georgia, Scandinavia, just to name a few. These traditional songs are brought from their homeland of origin by members of the group, they then work together to create an arrangement that brings new life to the folk music of the past while keeping the original integrity. Both the original and new version are sung in the traditional polyphonic way of singing creating an enchanting sound that resonates with modern day as much as when the songs were new. Most of the songs they sing are acapella, some are minimally accompanied by ethnic instruments adding a genuine touch. Shaman drums, a shruti box, kalimba, flute, gong, zaphire, koshi chimes, singing bowls, and rattles are some of the instruments used. 
Laboratorium Piesni does more than just make albums and perform concerts. They hold musical workshops where they keep the stories and music from days gone alive in this new generation. Keeping history alive is very important to these women, passing on the music and poetry to generations that would otherwise never have known them. While doing this they also help ensure that the cultures of the world are not forgotten and continue to be passed down to new generations. During their theatre performances they use these traditional songs to tell stories about disappearing cultural rights and heritage. 
While singing most songs acapella you would think it would be difficult to identify musical elements, that couldn’t be further from the truth. Even acapella you can easily find the harmonic texture known as polyphonic. Two or more independent melodies can easily be found while listening to Laboratorium Piesni. Another standout sound you can hear in the voices, a drone, much like the sound of bagpipes some of the singers maintain a single note while singing. Even the minimal accompaniment from different instruments adds a layer to the overall timbre of the music.  From: https://priscillamusicf200x.wordpress.com/2019/03/11/a-musical-journey-with-laboratorium-piesni/ 

Igorrr - ADHD

According to Igorrr mastermind Gautier Serre, Meat Dept. extensively (and ethically) trained the AI using their own artwork and properties to create the video. The video also reflects the music of "ADHD", in that it's impossible to recreate in the real world. 
"The music of 'ADHD' was in the making for quite a long time – a couple of years actually," said Serre to Metal Injection. "I wanted to take time to experiment with that unreal feeling coming from real drum sounds, and use those glitches almost as an instrument that makes actual notes. If you pay attention, the drums are actually playing a melody that follows the bass, and that has been done only by audio glitches and not synthesizers. 
"This track is not humanly possible to play with real instruments, so I thought it was a great opportunity to call back my friends from Meat Dept. They always create a kind of surrealist imagery for my music, as they did on 'Very Noise' back in the day, and this track 'ADHD' is completely in that vein. 
"We started the clip in 3D like we did for 'Very Noise', but at some point we were laughing so hard while messing around with AI that the clip ended up as a mix of both technologies.
"Meat Dept. actually trained the AI extensively with their own work so we could maintain that 'Very Noise' feel, but it was pretty hard to create an actual storyline throughout with this very new and unstable technology, especially with two main characters that had to be and look like the same person until the end. AI technology still lacks accuracy and doesn't consistently show the exact same character every time. Even still, a lot of work from Meat Dept. was put into this piece. 
"The music approaches a difficult topic, which is a condition affecting real people that makes their life a bit less real, so I created it with tools that take roots from the sound of real instruments and make them less real through glitches. And the music video does the same."  From: https://metalinjection.net/news/igorrrs-gautier-serre-explains-the-insane-ai-video-for-new-single-adhd 

Beth Orton - Stolen Car

What makes Beth Orton’s Central Reservation better than the yearning-but-uplifiting Trailer Park isn’t just the fact that the tone is slightly darker. Central Reservation works due to Orton’s focus and commitment to each song, as there isn’t a single vocal performance that doesn’t feel 100% genuine and there isn’t a moment wasted musically. Opening song “Stolen Car”, for example, burns with a nervous energy, Ben Harper’s wild electric guitar texturing giving the song drive and verve, highlighting descriptive lines like “You were sitting / Your fingers like fuses / Your eyes were cinnamon” — simple, sharp, and precise details that set the scene but never tell you directly what to feel. It’s moments like this that make Orton as effective a storyteller as she is, luring you into the nature of the moment instead of telling you the moral of the story. 
In typical attention-grabbing fashion, she follows that firestarter of an opener with a lush, romantic, string-drenched number called “Sweetest Decline”, which, according to T. Cole Rachel’s brief-yet-casual liner notes, is a song that Orton considers one of her all-time favorites, decorated with gorgeous jazz piano (courtesy of Dr. John) and a string section that does more than play the same refrain ad nauseum, switching up their playing style at numerous intervals to keep things lively. Although Orton explored some cosmic-jazz textures on Trailer Park, she really refines those instincts into tight, formal structures on Central Reservation, with augmented vibraphone bends in “Couldn’t Cause Me Harm” giving a specific kind of texture without meandering too far off the pasture. It’s so easy for your ears to simply “accept” into the grooves that Orton and collaborator Ted Barnes are able conjure for this album, but only upon close examination do you realize how well-considered their choices are, these detailed chasms of sound giving way to Orton’s immaculate songcraft.  From: https://www.popmatters.com/183683-beth-orton-central-reservation-revisited-2495639556.html 

The Jimi Hendrix Experience & The Who - Beat-Club 1967

Beat-Club was a West German music programme that ran from September 1965 to December 1972. It was broadcast from Bremen, West Germany on Erstes Deutsches Fernsehen, the national public TV channel of the ARD, and produced by one of its members, Radio Bremen, later co-produced by WDR following the 38th episode. Beat-Club was co-created by Gerhard Augustin and Mike Leckebusch. The show premiered on 25 September 1965 with Augustin and Uschi Nerke hosting. German TV personality Wilhelm Wieben opened the first show with a short speech. After eight episodes, Augustin stepped down from his hosting role and was replaced by British DJ Dave Lee Travis. 
The show immediately caused a sensation and achieved cult status throughout West Germany among the youth, while the older generation hated it. The show's earlier episodes featured live performances, and was set in front of a plain brick wall. It underwent a revamp in 1966, when a more professional look was adopted with large cards in the background displaying the names of the performers, who now mimed to their hit records (the standard practice on most music shows from the era) in front of the studio audience. (A companion series, Beat Beat Beat, continued to run live performances.) Around this time, a troupe of young women billed the "Go-Go-Girls," were introduced to dance to songs when their performers could not appear.
In early 1969, Travis was replaced by Dave Dee, of Dave Dee, Dozy, Beaky, Mick & Tich. On 31 December 1969, Beat-Club switched to colour and again featured live performances, but without an audience. Dee departed in 1970, leaving Nerke as the lone host. In the later years of its run, the series was known for incorporating psychedelic visual effects during many performances, many concentrating on images of the performers in the background. When the show switched to colour, the effects became much more vivid.  From: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beat-Club 

Michelle Shocked with The Tower Of Power Horns - Live Newport Folk Festival 1990

Michelle Shocked isn’t as big as she used to be, and she just got smaller. Last Sunday the singer-songwriter told a club audience in San Francisco that gay marriage would destroy civilization. She also told them to “go ahead and tweet or write and say that Michelle Shocked says God hates f—s,” according to an account by an eyewitness who is delicate with bad words. The audience walked out, the club owner (a gay man) shut down the lights and power and banned the singer from his club, and soon enough Shocked’s concert dates had been scrubbed by nine of the ten venues where she was planning to give shows. The exception, oddly, was a place in Madison, Wisconsin. We’ll see how many people turn up.
Michelle Shocked is kind of crazy. To put it another way, she is someone who has long struggled with mental illness. Way back in 1988, the Spin profile that alerted the dull mass of music fans to the new star’s existence told how her mother had the teenage Michelle (or Karen Johnston, as she was then known) locked up in a mental facility. Maybe her mother was on to something, or maybe dealing with mom set up the kid for a lifetime of chaos. Either way, Shocked is now 51 and here we are.
Some people wondered if the gay rant was caused by drugs. Our eyewitness says no: “She seemed like someone who had actually gone off medication—anxious and rocking back and forth and a lot of activity and about to explode with emotional anxiety.” That’s the guy’s impression from talking with the singer in between sets, just before she went back on stage and blew up the house. (The fellow’s name is Matt Penfield, and his account is quoted extensively in a Yahoo! post that’s the best piece I’ve seen on the mess.) Shocked has been around many bends, and for now it looks like she has not come out okay.
Like many crazy people, Shocked can be a real pain in the ass. This was evident back in the 90s, when her career was riding higher than it is now. I don’t go to a lot of shows, but I went to two of hers. One, in 1993, was wonderful. There was a big crowd, a lot of laughing and shouting, and an on-stage tribute by Shocked to her husband (“My oak, my rock, my strength,” if I recall correctly). He lumbered into view so Shocked could wrap her arms around him and drop her head on his chest.
But there was one small danger sign. To encourage the good times, she told each of us to turn to the person next to us and say, “I love you.” I didn’t, and maybe I offended the young lady who happened to be next to me. But there is no reason to say, “I love you” to somebody you don’t know, and one of the worst non-reasons is to further some celebrity’s plans for your emotional life. The next concert was in 1996 or ’97. Another big audience, but now her mood appeared to be foul. She made a sour comment about her husband’s mental outlook, and she spent a lot of time giving us commands: shake this, shake that, jump up and down, and so on. The audience went along, trying to pretend it was fun, but the performer herself didn’t smile once.
I’m pretty stiff and reserved, and I don’t like following orders from someone who isn’t paying me, so I made only minimal efforts to cooperate. I felt bad about that until Shocked told everybody to turn around, bend down and shake their asses. Why would that be fun? It isn’t abandon, it’s having your boundaries stripped out by somebody who’s high up on a stage with a microphone. Fuck her, she wasn’t bending over and shaking her ass. She was standing there shouting orders.
Maybe she saw me toward the front of the crowd, scowling, because soon she was discoursing on those with a bad attitude. Why, in this very hall she had recently seen a George Clinton concert, and those New Yorkers (the hall was in New York) were just too cool to let on how groove-a-delic the Clinton beat actually was. Here she did an imitation: she frowned, wrapped her arms about herself and held still. Well, at that moment I was frowning, had my arms wrapped about myself and was holding still. I sometimes have to do the second two things when a crowd is packed tight, since I take up more space than most people. I’d been doing them at the concert Clinton gave in this hall a few weeks before, the same one attended by Shocked, I guess. Maybe I personally stuck in her craw or maybe she had just seen my type. Either way, she could have tried to help people have a good time, or she could reflect on how awful it is that the uncooperative exist. Guess which she chose.
I never went to another of her shows. At some point an acquaintance, an office hipster, attended one and reported back. “Michelle was in a weird mood,” he said, shaking his head. Yeah. Since then I had not heard or read her name until Sunday’s fag incident. Just last week I was wondering if her song “Anchorage,” about an ex-punk girl addressing a still-current punk girl, was meant to be a letter to an old friend or to a lost lover. I also wondered if anybody would even know whom I was talking about if I mentioned the song. Now this. Still there, crazier than ever. After the debacle, the singer released this Tweet: “Truth is leading to painful confrontation.” Michelle, the truth is you’re nuts and in being nuts you act like a high-handed asshole. Get well soon and until then don’t bother us.  From: https://www.splicetoday.com/pop-culture/michelle-shocked-was-also-crazy-and-unpleasant-in-the-1990s 

Michelle Shocked's bogus copyright attacks
TimeTravelSounds
Hi folks - I sell vinyl here & on a few other platforms including Amazon (where I mainly sell books.) On Dec 26 2018 dozens or hundreds of Amazon sellers were hit on Amazon with accusations of effectively being pirates/bootleggers with a very misguided attack on every used LP, CD & cassette (!) by Michelle Shocked, filed as a copyright violation. I happen to have had two of her LPs listed (I listed them in 2010 & neither has sold so not exactly popular items) and thus was hit with two claims of copyright infringement, a ban-able offense.
These are ridiculous claims from an artist who appears pissed off about digital sales of her music being down and who is lashing out at people who literally have one or two used CDs or LPs of hers for sale. She appears ignorant of the federal copyright law in "First Sale Doctrine" that anyone has a right to resell a legit used copy of copyrighted material. Discogs couldn't exist without this law, nor really could Amazon.
This however doesn't matter because Amazon deals with copyright infringement claims like a Kafka story, asking me in this case to prove that my 1988 and 1989 pressings of Shocked LPs aren't bootlegs by asking me to produce an approved wholesaler's invoice for purchase of the items... and one obtained within the last year! We're all trying to fight this as best we can. This has-been spends her days trolling the internet for old copies of her music and sometimes even sending threatening emails personally to people who might have one lousy used copy of one of her CDs for sale for $3. Has anyone else gotten the Shocked treatment?

rugogs
Who the hell is shocked Michelle?

TimeTravelSounds
Ha, Her whole schtick was "lesbian protest folk singer" 30 yrs ago. That's the worst part, she's supposed to be fighting The Man and here she is crushing mom & pop businesses with false copyright claims she thinks protect her profits.

trachi 
If possible, I would just remove her titles from your Marketplace, throw them in a metal bin and set them on fire. Then I would make sure I avoided anything with her name associated to it in the future. Job done.

TheOubliette
Since it appears there's not much (any) profit (interest) in second-hand Shocked releases, might I suggest we all just mail them back to Michelle's personal residence and let her deal with them.

merlin99
I assume her efforts to remove them are less about digital sales and more about her wanting to delete her past - those church meetings must get a bit uncomfortable when one of the congregation quizzes her over the meaning behind "God is a Real Estate Developer' or 'Hardcore Hornography'... 

From: https://www.discogs.com/forum/thread/783750?srsltid=AfmBOoq0sHIlss6_iUw3TEawB9iPA9ZbHHD-VTajgmNSRk64pNkH7LWE