RECENT ARTICLES

Matt Berninger, the crooning front man for the popular rock ‘n’ roll band, The National, likes to write songs while riding his bike. The sharp, rapid-minded and loquacious singer-songwriter engages in conversation often like a metaphorical triathlon participant. His brain is chugging along in a marathon, swimming laps and cycling all at once. But amidst all the frantic activity, a logical through-line emerges. So does sonic and melodic clarity. Berninger says lyrics come to him as he pedals, avoiding trees and following traffic signs, because when his mind is focused in on myriad other things, the art can step forward and show itself. Revelations like these are the substance of Berninger’s forthcoming solo record, Serpentine Prison, out October 16th.

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Australian country musician, Angus Gill, has a baby face but an aged soul. The 22-year-old, award-winning songwriter first began making music at six-years-old. By the age of 11, Gill had contemporary music heroes like Kris Kristofferson and Johnny Cash while other kids were donning Batman costumes or playing peewee soccer. Later, Gill began to regularly play at his own high school assemblies with his self-titled three-piece. He’s been rife with ambition since listening to his grandmother’s favorite twangy records as a boy. For his whole life, Gill has been focused on becoming an established artist. And he’s off to a fast start. His latest in this effort is the new 11-track LP, 3 Minute Movie, which will be released Friday and features the legendary songwriter, Steve Earle.

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Jessica Dobson, frontwoman and principle songwriter for the Seattle-based band, Deep Sea Diver, was adopted. While this is indeed a very personal bit of information it is also pertinent to the story of the band’s new LP. Any work of art takes a lifetime to create. While, in truth, from first note to final mix, a song may take, say, a year or two, the work is, in actuality, a culmination of a person’s entire existence. It wasn’t until recently that Dobson met her birth mother, which was both monumental and fascinating for the expert musician. The encounter is one of several recent marvelous moments for Dobson and her percolating, neon-electric-sounding group, which is set to release its latest LP, Impossible Weight, on Friday.

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Los Angeles-based musician-producer-songwriter, Terrace Martin, didn’t grow up in a safe place. Born in 1978, Martin came up in very dangerous areas of Southern California. He was forced to make his own safe places, while never truly feeling protected. Music became his safe place. It became his time machine, too. It became the keyhole through which the entire universe began to unfold. It was also the thing that bonded him with now longtime friend and collaborator, Snoop Dogg. Martin met the rapper over 22 years ago. Ever since, they’ve held together through love of life and song. This shared, heartening bond is the hearth that continues to warm Martin’s creative soul. It is the furnace for his speeding locomotive of production. And it was the model for the musical supergroup he co-founded – Dinner Party – and the band’s latest album, Dessert.

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Many music fans can remember where they were when rumors of Jay Z’s The Black Album began to swirl on early blogs in 2003. One of the most notable aspects of that particular record’s announcement was the inclusion of the then-underground producer, 9th Wonder (born Patrick Denard Douthit). At the time, Jay Z was one of the biggest names in entertainment (still is). For the rapper to reach to the underground to bring up 9th Wonder was remarkable – a bridge to a new generation’s sound. Ever since, 9th Wonder’s career has taken off. His appreciation for music validated by fans all over the world. But, perhaps first and foremost, that validation began with family – his mother, his older brother. And that familial inspiration continues to permeate 9th Wonder’s music today, including in the songs he makes in the supergroup, Dinner Party, which released its latest record, Dessert, on Friday.

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Today, important notions of mental health, support systems and self-love are in the public consciousness more and more. And rightly so. As they say, you can’t put someone else’s oxygen mask on without first putting on your own. Miami, Florida-based R&B artist, Savannah Cristina, has taken that idea to new and scintillating heights. Cristina, who released her anticipated EP, Self-Care, earlier this month, thinks of her songs like contained, miniature therapy sessions. Instead of paying someone for a 30-minute Zoom consultation, Cristina says, just put on one of her new tracks and lose yourself in the necessary revelations and the repetitions of self-confidence and personal appreciation.

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If you’d only just met her, it might be hard for you to believe that accomplished New York City-based EDM singer and songwriter, Lachi, grew up shy. The charming, loquacious, effervescent personality, who can soar and glide on a dance track, grew up quiet, resigned. She didn’t always want the spotlight on her but today she’s making up for lost time with enough sonic power and force to get any other like-minded wallflowers within earshot out of their chairs or off their relaxed poses and onto the dance floor to show their stuff. Lachi’s latest musical endeavor is the perceptive, candy-sticky track, “Messages,” which we’re happy to premiere here.

“It wasn’t until college that I opened up,” Lachi says. “I gained confidence through joining different music groups and sharing my talent.”

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Every morning, Albuquerque-based songwriter, Heather Trost, puts on a new record to fill her home with sound. It’s a habit she and her husband, Jeremy Barnes, who plays in the band, Neutral Milk Hotel, have started and sustained during the months of quarantine. But it’s also one borne of a life enriched early on by music. Trost, whose parents regularly played albums in the house growing up, learned to love vinyls from Bach or The Beatles. Now, she and her hubby, spin an array. Each one is like a bridge or portal to another space. This idea delights Trost, who relishes delving into sonic textures, as evidenced by her latest single, “Jump Into the Fire,” which we’re happy to premiere today. The song, which dances and splashes, is from her forthcoming LP, Petrichor, out November 6th on Third Man Records.

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At a young age, records transported Kurt Vile. The soon-to-be professional songwriter would, as a kid, play his father’s albums over and over again. There were standards like John Denver but there was also the personal favorite, Rusty and Doug, two brothers who recorded mostly in the 1950s. Vile loved their brand of Louisiana-infused early rock ‘n’ roll. Listening to his dad’s albums, Vile would imagine he was a singer in the bands. Those early, foggy memories were, in actuality, some of the earliest proverbial building blocks of Vile’s creative and musical foundation. From there, he would go on to co-found the band, The War on Drugs, and build a fruitful solo career, which continues with the release of his latest EP, Speed, Sound, Lonely KV, which was released Friday.

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