Fear of Men tour news

RZ9A0722esFresh from spending most of this year touring with Pains of being Pure at Heart, Fear of Men today announced their first headline tour of the UK. It doesn’t kick off until September because the band already have their summer filled up with festival dates, and the first night of the tour is a hometown gig at The Hope – which I’m sure the band could sell out many times over, so get in early buying a ticket. The full list of tour dates is:

25th September – The Hope, Brighton
26th September – Epic Studios, Norwich
27th September – Brudenell Games Room, Leeds
28th September – The Castle, Manchester
30th September – The Bull’s Head, Birmingham
1st October – Start the Bus, Bristol
2nd October – Concrete, London

new music – Bentcousin, Demob Happy, Dark Horses, Black Black Hills, Cate Ferris, Japanese Sweets, Fragile Creatures, Eva Bowan

The World Cup’s over with for another for years, so you can all turn your attention to music again. It’s less than a week since we last posted up a new music update, but we’ve still got eight tracks to share today.

First up is the video for Bencousin‘s new single Dizzy, which features Pat an Amelia larking around on the beach with surprisingly few people about.

Demob Happy‘s latest offering is a track called Suffer You, less than three minutes of melodic, breathless rock:

New first track from the upcoming Dark Horses album Hail Lucid State (due out on 28th August) actually surfaced a few weeks ago, but we were caught napping. Slightly late to the party, here’s Live on Hunger:

Up until last week, we were under the immpression that maybe Black Black Hills had split up – the only activity this year on their facebook page has been about their lead singer’s new solo project Rooster Cole. There’s still no news on their facebook page, but a new track called Beneath The Soil has appeared on Soundcloud:

As a stopgap before her new EP arrives Cate Ferris has uploaded a new track to Soundcloud. There’s no loops or big vocal acrobatics on Bad Day, just beautiful folk harmonies:

Owen from Speak Galactic ambient project Japanese Sweets has a new video online. Tune out and let Coming To With Yr Friends Around You wash over you:

Sunshine is the first track out there from the upcoming Fragile Creatures EP. The EP is due later on in the summer, with no firm date yet although the launch will be at the Komedia on Friday 12th September:

Last but by no means least is some more ambient, this time from Eva Bowan. Her facebook page says that Peach Parfait is “the most sunny song I’ve ever made” and comes with a gorgeous video from videographer Robin White:

Royal Blood album and single news

Royal Blood have announced details of their debut album and put out a video for the single that precedes it. The eponymously titled Royal Blood is out on 25th August, a week after Figure it Out is released on 7″ and download. You can watch the video for Figure it Out below. Pre-ordering the album through iTunes gives you an instant download of Figure it Out. If you’re after something a bit more physical it’s also coming out on vinyl, with the first 500 copies sold through Rough Trade being pressed on white vinyl.

new music – The New Union, House of Hats, Caveman Genius, Steve Elston, High Tyde, Spacenoid, Lion Bark

Here’s this week’s roundup of Brighton (and Hove)’s new music

First up is news of The New Union‘s new single Believe in Nothing. It’s being released by legendary indie label Fierce Panda (on their Fandgo imprint) on 4th August. There’s details of a London launch for the release, but no word yet on a Brighton launch.

House of Hats, just back from touring the US, have put up a new video for one of the tracks from their album This Love. This is Close to Me:

Our friends over at Some Of It Is True tipped us off about Soph Nathan. Soph is in a number of local bands (including fronting Hella Better Dancer) and has just posted up her first solo effort – Our Girl.

Caveman Genius has a new EP entitled Paradise out next week on Kaleidescope Records. Hand Drawn Paradise is the first track to be given an airing from it, a lovely dose of fuzzy house:

Steve Elston sent me a message earlier today asking me to give his new EP a listen. I clicked through the link and the name-your-price Bandcamp download is actually seven tracks long. I’ve got albums with fewer tracks than that. The Dear Em EP is lovely lilting folk – perfect for warm summer nights.

Karibu is the new single from High Tyde, out on July 14th. The video was filmed all around Brighton – see how many of the locations you can spot. The band are hosting a launch show for the single at the Komedia on July 18th.

Spacenoid released their new single Vanished last weekend, available as a free download from bandcamp. If you missed their single launch at The Hope, you can catch them again at the Gladstone on 16th August.

Lion Bark release their debut single Come in to my Arms on 28th July on their own Creepy Love records. Come into my arms is gentle folk-pop, standing out from the crowd thanks to lead singer Guy’s distinctive voice:

Electric Soft Parade’s Thomas White covers Saint Etienne’s Good Humor

About half an hour ago we sat down to pen a new music blog post, which will be coming soon, but before we get to that something popped up that distracted us from the matter at hand.

saint-etienne-good-humor

Back in January we posted news of two covers albums by the White brothers, and news has just reached us of the latest instalments in their ongoing covers project. Alex White is working on another Steely Dan, while Thomas has posted up his take on Saint Etienne’s Good Humor. As with their previous covers albums, it’s pretty much a note for note re-recording of the original, but where Saint Etienne decamped to Malmo in Sweden for a summer and roped in the Cardigans producer to produce the album using old 60s analogue equipment, Thomas has recorded his version at home on Garageband in the space of a week. You can download it for free over on bandcamp now:

 

June Top Ten

Slightly delayed since we’ve been on holiday, here’s out top ten tunes from June:

1 Fear of Men – Descent

Descent is the second single taken from Fear of Men’s fantastic debut album Loom. The band have spent the past few months supporting Pains of Being Pure at Heart across the US and Europe. The tour’s now over, so hopefully they’re taking a well earned rest before playing a few festival dates over the summer, including Green Door Store’s 234 festival taking place over the August Bank Holiday Weekend.

2 Anushka – Mansions

Mansions is taken from Anushka’s brand new album Broken Circuit, out now on Gilles Peterson’s Brownswood Recordings label. It’s good, but play it loud and it’s even better.

3 Jacko Hooper – Egg Shells

Because we’ve been away we missed the launch party for Jacko Hooper’s new For You EP, which took place last week at the Green Door Store. The EP is out now on One Inch Badge’s record label.

4 Palm Springs – Seal My Fate

Seal My Fate is one of those slow burners which has got under our skin a little bit more every time we’ve played it. It’s out now on 7″ on Random Acts of Vinyl

5 Alex Banks – All You Can Do

The whole of Alex Banks’ new album Illuminate but we’ve decided to put the Gazelle Twin collaboration All You Can Do into our top ten.

6 Moulettes – So It Goes

To promote their new album Constellations, Moulettes put out a double A-side single, with Lady Vengeance backed with So It Goes which we’ve featured.

7 Bunty – We Are Here

We Are Here is the new single from the ever-creative Bunty, launched at last month’s Spectrum night at the Dome Studio Theatre.

8 Black Honey – Sleep Forever

Black Honey are the latest band to have a single put out by Duly Noted Records, which have put out previous releases by IYES and Fickle Friends. In a change of style for the label, Sleep Forever’s backing isn’t electronica but lush reverb drenched guitars.

9 The Mojo Fins – Longwave Reach

Longwave Reach is the latest single from The Mojo Fins brand new album Circa, which has been getting plenty of plays at Brighton Music Blog towers.

10 Faux Flux – You Know

Fuax Flux came out with another new track in June, the summery You Know.

 

Esben & The Witch new album news

Esben & The Witch announced details of their new album A New Nature this week. The follow up to last year’s Wash The Sins Not Only The Face has been produced by legendary producer Steve Albini at his Electric Audio studio in Chicago, and will be released on September 1st on a new label set up by the band called Nostromo records. The first taster of the album is a track called Blood Teachings, which you can hear below:

There’s a lot more information over at The Quietus, including the album artwork and comments from the band.

New Music – Tyrannosaurus Dead, Bar Stool Preachers, Mother of Billions, Will Mussett, Black Honey, Fable, Andrew Montgomery, Mindofalion

Here’s this week’s dose of new music for you all. We’re kicking things off with Tyrannosaurus Dead, who have a new split single coming out soon with Joanna Gruesome. Post Holiday Dead Song is out on 7″ on July 21st, and can be pre-ordered now via Odd Box Records.

Bar Stool Preachers are a new local ska punk band. Here’s the video for their debut release One Fool Down:

We can’t stop listening to the Mother of Billions we posted up last week. Where the original had a classy trip hop feel, the Arshaw Remix gives Universe a sexy house sheen:

News about Hurricane, the first single to be taken from Will Mussett‘s debut album, only reached us this evening. Here’s the lyric video for the track, taken from the record due later this year.

Black Honey‘s first track was also a new arrival in our inbox today. The band are already getting props from Royal Honey and The Wytches, which should be more than enough recommendation to get your ears around Sleep Forever

Fable is a new Brighton based singer songwriter, but don’t let the description pigeon hole her. At only 19 years old she’s already provided vocals for the upcoming Orbital album and now releases her first track I Speak Words

Back in the 90s, angelic voiced Andrew Montgomery was better known as lead singer of Geneva. Since then he’s been involved in a number of musical projects, but later this year releases his debut solo album. After the Storm is the album’s opener and a taste of what we can expect when Ruled By Dreams comes out on 5th October.

Our last track this week is Obstacle by Mindofalion. The single is out on July 18th, with a launch gig the following day at The Hope:

Momotaro and Winston & Goldstein at the Hope

Last night Momotaro and Winston & Goldstein supported Garden City Movement at a sweltering night at The Hope.

We’ve written about a few of Winston & Goldstein‘s tracks before but this was only her second proper gig (after playing with Dog in the Snow a few weeks ago). There’s an album that’s being sold at the live shows which showcases not just her dancier tracks we’ve posted about already, but a whole spectrum of electronica – we’ll be writing more about that when it’s a bit easier to get hold of. Last night was Momotaro‘s first gig as a five piece, having recently added a bassist and a VJ to their line up. Their set was mostly taken from this year’s album Second Side with a couple of new tracks, or maybe radical reworkings thrown in, bolstered with live bass, and accompanied by visuals which they’ve played to a few times but are now on a permanent basis. Here’s our photos we took of the night:

(click pics to view large)