BEL — Quando Brinca (2017)

Band: BEL
Album: Quando Brinca
Release Date: 03/27/2017
Listen and Purchase here: Bandcamp
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Opening with a squelching bass & keyboard groove drawn from the wells of Stevie Wonder, "Bem-Vindo" sets the tone for a gorgeous album of funky and spacious electro-pop from vocalist Bel Baroni. Across the eight tracks of Quando Brinca there's a clear effort to take popular, traditional forms and mutate them ever so slightly, whether by choice of instrumentation or disrupting expected repetitions in favor of a brief solo or gentle dissolution.

And when that last keyboard lick fades into oblivion, get ready to hit replay.

Salt Cathedral - Salt Cathedral (2013)

Whoa from the first few moments you're going to have the fish hook lodged deep. Busy post-rock electro pop with some really juicy math tendencies AND sensational female vocals. Its a recipe for digging deep into this rich dish. Its always at the right amount of restraint and never plays into any one area more than another. The guitars are always playing some crazy little background licks while the drums dance around while the  forks down the movement with the angelic singing. I'm just being blown apart by this Brooklyn group while their music is re-assembling me. TOP PICK AHOY!

SALT CATHEDRAL (2013)

Roz Raskin and The Rice Cakes - Floor Boards

Signals - Square Wheels EP

I can see this getting huge in 15 seconds

 Female VOX... YES!

indie rock with a smattering of math from Southern England

ALTHOUGH wish the math elements were stronger.

STILL

Square Wheels EP 2012

The Nine Lives of the Parachute Tester - Joe Banana and His Bunch

Three piece indie math lite group with a lot of potential. These guys have fairly straight forward structures but truly excel with excellent vocals and some pretty inspired and sprightly drumming.  All in all these three songs showcase their strengths incredibly well with my only minor gripe being that I wished the girl would sing more. I can truly appreciate a group that puts actual time into their vocal contributions because lets face it a lot of math (or even indie rock groups for that matter) have a very slap dash approach to writing lyrics and vocals melodies. As stated this is not at all the case here. Best of luck to these guys and very excited to see where a full length will take them.

Joe Banana and His Bunch!

Diane Cluck - Oh Vanille

Slight change ups are always for good reason around this part of town, Diane Cluck is worth the notice.  Folk music has certain unfounded stigma's that seem to follow this most "academic" of musical genre's. Charges against? uninspired acoustic guitar music for old people that are bored and boring. You know where this is going. In every way these songs excel at giving hope to people that have written of Folk as such. Cluck has a wonderful sort of throw back voice that she has undeniable control over and isn't afraid to use. Acoustic guitar is played with a fairly unique rhythmic voice with interesting progressions to match for the genre. Folk is fat with female artists all trying to do the same things as one another. Diane distance's herself in every way and you don't need to be a fan of the genre to enjoy. Stand out track has to be "Easy to Be Around" I could try to sit here at 2:00AM and explain feebly how amazing this song is but let me just say that Diane harmonizing with herself is just too flipping tight for words. Any fan of music should be more than down and will be able to find at least something to enjoy here.

Oh Vanille

Borderline Syndrome - Promo

It appears we have something exciting and a bit left of the center here today and that leads us to Borderline Syndrome. A female fronted, Athens Greece 5 piece that clearly has no idea what they want musically and I for one couldn't be happier. Kinda pop rockish with some clear math rock (of the jazz variety) lovin but also not afraid to stomp the distortion pedal. If I am not mistaken there is some internalizing of greek folk music crammed in there as well which certainly gives it a flavor all its own. My one and only gripe is that its three songs....I could go for at least four times as many its really that worth it. So if your ready for a change of pace I would stop reading and go for it..

..no seriously stop reading.


PROMO