Cliche Apologies

Jordan. 21. Pennsylvania. Put your face to the glass and called it good cinema. www.facebook.com/CantDanceMusic

[hayleypowers]

[panatmansam]

[eirwnia]

[expressions-of-nature]

[expressions-of-nature]

Pines & Morning:  Henrik Emtkjær Hansen

[gangstersson]

[cerceos-deactivated20160308]

Ryan Voetsch

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Album: Dealer - Foxing

Words: Jordan Gorsuch

“The content of ‘Weave’ is kind of like an answer to what ‘The Albatross’ was…It’s intended to put ‘The Albatross’ to bed in a way” bassist Josh Coll said about Foxing’s second single from their highly anticipated album, Dealer. The song features direct references to the album, and sets the stage for the entire album’s lyrical premise: moving on.

Foxing aren’t just moving on from the explosive bouts of emotion and un-restrained, personal subject matters that were found on their debut. Every song on the album features an anecdote or a larger story built around the ideas of forgetting, forgiving, and disappearing. Even the two instrumental tracks on the album sound like nothing found on The Albatross. Foxing was very focused on creating lush, atmospheric soundscapes, incorporating synths and piano into their typically guitar-centered approach.

Stand-out track “Indica” finds singer Conor Murphy singing in a calm reverie about parent’s nightmares for their dead children, accompanied by gentle guitar plucks. It’s a chilling contrast, a man so broken by his acts of war, yet so able to sing calmly with such clarity. “Do I haunt their parent’s dreams? And in so, am I summarized by sounds of young one’s screams?” Murphy croons while a piano coda plays out.

Violins swim lovingly over the piano-led instrumental, “Winding Cloth.” This bleeds into “Redwoods,” a beautiful song focused on memories of home, wishing that you can find love and set down roots without having to leave.

“Glass Coughs” follows the lead of the third track on the album, a more straightforward, cathartic song about faith in God and the shame that can result in the fallout. The drums are less reserved, the two guitars sound simply uplifting when they fly in the chorus. Murphy’s vocals eschew the former restraint, allowing himself to give the performance screaming girth.

Overall, this a more cohesive, mature album than its predecessor. It’s also an album that is layered so densely that it takes multiple listens to parse through it all. Which is great, because the lyrics resonate on repeat listens, and with these feelings of regret and a desire to move on, sometimes it’s good to sit and wrestle with a record for a good while. The themes of sexuality, faith, and self-paralysis culminate in the final, somber track.

“When it’s three on a match. The Lord won’t let me in. I’m survived by the weight of my own sins,” Murphy sings on the concluding track. The album focuses so much on learning to move on, but sometimes all that growth leads us to the same place.

Dealer is out now on Triple Crown Records.

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premiere // “All My Girls” - Daddy Issues

Before we dig into this premiere of one of Daddy Issues final tunes, allow me to get sappy for a moment. Following this band and championing them through their releases was one of the many highlights of even starting The Grey Estates. It was my absolute pleasure to spotlight them and to be given this chance to premiere their final work means the absolute world to me. They were legitimately more than just a band who lands in your inbox and continues to pester you again and again, like this is your job; they were my friends.

Anyways, “All My Girls,” is the sweetest send-off you could imagine. The single comes from Fuck Marry Kill out 11/3. The band recorded it after coming back from tour, taking two days to record as much as they could knowing they wouldn’t have another chance before members departed for dreams that took them elsewhere. 100% of the proceeds from sales of the album will benefit Girls Rock NC.

This particular garage rock gem sparkles and shines in a message of empowerment. A reminder that no matter what life throws us at, or where we end up, we always have each other. Lucky for us, we’ll always have the music of Daddy Issues, too.

photo: Abby Oliver

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“separation is ok” - Boosegumps

Ahead of next week’s ☺ tape release, Boosegumps continues to enthrall us with their magic. “separation is ok” is soft and innocent - Heeyoon’s vocals a thing of pure and profound beauty. There’s a kind of melancholy about the whole single that leaves you wanting to cozy up under the covers and wait for the promise of “we’ll be together someday,” to finally come true.  

[blue-voids]

Giorgio Ciam – Autoritratto in teoria, 1980

[blue-voids]

Hua Jun - Zhixuji No.3, 2015

[dededeman]

[shiny-ebooksremade35p06787-blog]

Kirby you piece of goddamn shit 

[jadedqueer-deactivated20180702]

[queercliche]

my autobiography

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EP: very tiny songs - Honeyuck

Peer at the simplest moments in life through the rainbow-hued kaleidoscope of Honeyuck. The self-described twee-pop duo takes the events of everyday - first day of school jitters, falling in love, and even heartbreak and enlivens them with whimsical keys, soft strings, breathy vocals and even a few giggles. very tiny songs is a collection of cutesy confessions and doodles scrawled with neon chalk on sidewalks. These “cool jams” are breezy and brief, leaving you dreaming of summer days and the boy you fell in love with at the custard stand. 

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Album: Harmlessness - The World is a Beautiful Place & I am No Longer Afraid to Die

Words: Jordan Gorsuch

I’m tired of the endless discussion on how we should be classifying The World is a Beautiful Place and I am No Longer Afraid to Die. Genres are important to a degree, but classifying them as “post-emo” or “emo-revival” or arguing that calling them “emo” at all is doing them a disservice; it just serves to distract from the stellar album they have created.

Harmlessness is TWIABP’s strongest album yet, the band looks outward on issues of women’s rights and the justice that must be taken (“January 10th, 2014”) while also looking inward into our own being (“I Can Be Afraid of Anything”). The album’s production sounds warmer and the lyrics reach further than ever before.

The instrumentalization follows suit: bombastic drums, expressive guitar lines, lush strings, quirky synths, and horn arrangements fill out the background. The album wisely bounces from big, grandiose songs dealing with huge universal themes to these sad, personal, often times beautifully tragic anecdotes that ground the proceedings in mimetic reality (“Willie”). Complex song arrangements go from quiet tender moments to loud, almost operatic soundscapes. The lyrics never balk from discovering the pain and beauty in life.

The seamless transition into “Ra Patera Dance” is one of my favorite moments on the album. Another return to their signature campy synthesizer, which then gives ways to smooth strings. “Today we are superheroes, tonight we’ll just be tired,” David Bello sings over colorful synths. There’s this abstract quality, almost imagist approach to the lyrics but the listener always has some emotional response to a line in each track.

“Stop Crying” the singer sings pleadingly over soft, basic acoustic drums and a gentle soundscape on “Mental Health”, backed by lush strings and acoustic guitar plucking. “You are normal and healthy to forgive yourself,” Bello sings soothingly. “Wendover” possesses this wry, sardonic smirk throughout the whole song. It transitions subtly into one of the darkest cuts on the album, “We Need More Skulls.”

Keyboardist Katie Shanholtzer-Dvorak lends incredible backing vocals for the powerful “Haircuts for Everybody,” the cathartic buildup to the rousing mantra at the end is bliss: “Change my life. Please, change my life.”

“I Can Be Afraid of Anything” is the first in the one-two punch of tracks to close out the listening. It’s about wanting to get over depression for loved ones and moving on with life, but it demonstrates just how simple willpower won’t just allow that. “Here, I’m in hell. I’m carrying this empty bucket, I wanna empty myself,” Bello guts the listener. There are several allusions to trees and hell in this album. Trees are often symbols of unwavering resilience, and these tracks are often about our ability to get through the most catastrophic storms, climbing out of holes that we dig four ourselves. Greek myth describes oak trees as so strong that their roots dug into the underworld. Our strength leads to our hell, but that same strength is the only way we can overcome our personal hells.

The album concludes with a simple notion, “we’re all gonna die.” It’s that last line that fuels everything they are creating music for. Death is their muse, which sounds cheesy, but hell, a lot of the best things in life are. There’s a lot of suffering, oppression, and hate in the world - but there’s also a lot of joy, acceptance, and love. This band knows how to walk the line between both dualities and create something amazing.

[cigarette-angels]

AOTY maybe

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Photo Diary: Run Forever & Looming Tour 

Earlier this summer, Run Forever & Looming hit the road for a short series of dates together. The images above are a result of that tour, and were captured by the bands.

[wanaongaku]

The boy cries ya a sweater of tears