In 2013 we must have seen IYES at least half a dozen times. Things have been a bit quieter in 2014 though – despite a few singles and remixes it was only last night that they played their first hometown gig of the year, supporting Game of Thrones actor turned R&B songsmith Raleigh Ritchie. Since we last saw them they’ve signed to Sony (you’ve probably heard their track Glow on the adverts for Sony phones), and they’re sounding better than ever. Support came from local lad Sam Jordan, whose set was running late which mean that IYES had to cut a few songs from their set. Hopefully they’ll be back soon with a headline gig when Glow gets released in February. Until then here’s our shots from the last night. Click through to view large:
First time we heard Glow was a while back, in demo form on Soundcloud, the second demo IYES had put up after getting the whole of the internet’s attention with Lighthouse. Both tracks have long disappeared from Soundcloud and IYES have been pretty quiet in 2014, save for a few remixes, but then a couple of months ago Glow came back into our lives, soundtracking an ad for the new Sony Smartphone.
News came in earlier today letting us know that the single – sounding even better than ever in it’s newly re-recorded state – comes out on 22nd December on Love by Mistake, a new imprint of Sony records run by the band. The debut album is due in Spring next year and if you want to catch the band live they’re playing at the Hoxton Square bar and kitchen on 3rd December.
At the start of the week we posted what we said was “probably” our last New Music post of the month. As it turns out, there’s been so many great tunes in our in box we’ve decided to squeeze in another.
This evening we got very excited when Fujiya & Miyagi posted a brand new remix of Daggers from their latest album Artificial Sweeteners put together by Stephen Morris from New Order
Blood Red Shoes have launched their own label called Jazz Life, and the first release will be out on 1st December from Tigercub with a newly recorded version of live favourite Centrefold:
Tyrannosaurus Dead‘s new album Flying Ant Day is out a week next monday. To get everyone in the mood they’ve shared the track Bagged & Boarded:
Ewan Hoozarmi has a new free download up on Soundcloud. Reaching Dragons is five minutes of funky electro-house:
As well as tomorrow night being Normanton Street’s EP launch at The Haunt and Spit Shake Sister’s single launch at Bleach, it’s also the next Spectrum at the Dome Studio Theatre, which this month is headlined by Speak Galactic. Joining them on the bill is Abraham Moughrabi, who’s recorded a live video of Cross The Line for the Site and Sound part of Spectrum in advance of the night:
One of the supports at the Spit Shake Sisters launch tomorrow is Morning Smoke. They got in touch to let us know about their new single Hunger which is out on December 1st:
As I’m writing this, I’m missing out on Prince Vaseline playing live at the Prince Albert supporting 80s Matchbox spin off group Piano Wire. If you didn’t make the gig either (or maybe if you did and you’re reading this later), here’s the video for their new track Orchid:
Finally a new remix by IYES who are on the brink of releasing some new material of their own very soon. Here’s their taken on Jack Garratt‘s Worry, which they’ve turned into a much more upbeat, dancable affair:
It’s been too hot for new blog posts the past couple of weeks. It was too hot for me to sit in front of my PC typing away, and it was too hot for you all to be sitting in reading the internet. Now the weather’s slightly more bearable, here’s a whole heap of new music that we’ve been waiting to tell you about:
We wrote about Aashton‘s new single I Can’t Shake It way back in April. Things got a bit delayed with the released, but it’s out now, and to celebrate he’s giving away a free download of his track Status Ain’t Crooked:
Phantom Runners‘ debut EP is out on 22nd August. The three track EP featuring featuring On The Run, Anna and Goddess of War has been produced by Fun Loving Criminal’s Huey Morgan. You can hear lead track On The Run here:
Whenever we hear that Eagles for Hands has posted some new music up we drop what we’re doing and listen straight away. Glass Heart is Laurie Ross’ latest offering of uplifting electronica with female vocals.
Thyla release their debut EP in October and have shared the first track, Sticky Red. You don’t get too much female fronted grunge so Sticky Red is a welcome breath of fresh air.
Oslo Parks have just released their debut single on X Novo records.If you like the sound of Twin look out for the fantastic video produced by Jeb Hardwick from Phoria.
Samuel Organ has posted some more electronica to his Soundcloud page. Feeling Underwater starts off ambient before slipping into a slick house tune:
Heliopause gave use the heads up about the new video from Stuart Warwick, who have played a few live dates together recently. Here’s the haunting Sailors.
I Am Ampersand recently did a few solo shows supporting Pete Fij and Terry Bickers (whose new album Broken Heart Surgery is on our list of things to write about). To celebrate the event, they’ve put up a reworked version of I Thought I was Alone which originally appeared on 2012’s eponymous album
Soft Walls is the solo project from The Cold Pumas’ Dan Reeves. No Time is the the name of his new album, and also the name of the lead single which has a video from Innerstrings Light Show:
Flash Bang Band got in touch with us today to share the video for their new single Art History. Art History is the third and final single to be taken from last year’s album Bite Your Tongue.
Tied to the Mast have an album called Some Strange Chemistry on the way later this year. Some of the album has been produced by the legendary Stephen Street but the first track they’re sharing from the album – Melissa – was produced by the band’s guitarist Rhys:
Brighton Music Blog favourites IYES are back with another remix , this time sprinkling skittery beats and wonky electronica over The Night VI‘s Wonderlust:
Finally, we have a live video from Adolescent, playing K:TV from their recent Golden Halls EP:
We seem to be chasing our tail with new music again – this week we’ve got absolutely loads again for you up with more from Fear of Men (who appeared in the last new music roundup we did with their French version of Luna), Bentcousin, Fujiya & Miyagi, Moulettes, Hundredth Anniversary and many, many more:
First up is the video for Fear of Men‘s new single Descent, directed by Eleanor Hardwick, who also directed the video for Dog in the Snow’s last single Factory.
Fujiya & Miyagi have put out a video for the lead track from their new album Artificial Sweeteners. The band are currently off touring the new album and have taken AK/DK along as support.
Palm Springs new single Seal My Fate is out now on Hove’s Random Acts of Vinyl label on 7″ and download, and also has this rather tasty black and white video:
FEVRS (pronounced “Fears” – the V is actually an upsidedown A) put out their debut EP on Everything is Chemical earlier this month. Here’s the first track, the ambient electronic Sirens / Control
Mother of Billions are a new London / Brighton based pop duo who are putting out their debut single Universe on 10th July. The launch party for the single takes place at The Hope on 11th July.
We’re gutted that we missed Bunty‘s single launch which took place at the Spectrum night at the Dome last Friday. The summery We Are Here is out now:
Egg Shells is the lead track from Jacko Hooper‘s upcoming For You EP, which had a very successful pledge campaign last year. The EP comes out on 30th June on One Inch Badge’s imprint:
Boon Magazine put out a 12″ Record to coincide with their last print issue. Here’s The Hundredth Anniversary‘s contribution, a slow brooding number called Stretched Lungs
Water Canvas are a new Brighton based rock band. You can grab their new At Least EP at bandcamp or take a listen to lead track Memorial Drive here:
The brand new Rooster Cole track Up To The Teeth only appeared on Soundcloud this afternoon. We don’t know much about it, but we like it!
Something else only uploaded today is the video to Moulettes new single. So It Goes is out today and is backed by an edit of Lady Vengeance which we’ve previously featured.
Bentcousin had an early demo of Dizzy up on Soundcloud last year, but that got taken down a long time ago. Since then they’ve rerecorded their ode to Brighton Summers for a full release on Team Love records on 1st July:
Adolescent have a video for another track from last month’s Golden Halls EP. The video for Hangshai is a digital animation which matches the music it accompanies:
Finally we have another remix from IYES, who have mixed up Brooklyn’s Paperwhite, making their track Magic sound much much cooler than the original
It’s been a frustrating week for us – our internet has been playing up and we haven’t been able to make half the posts that we wanted. As time has passed we’ve ended up with more and more to add to our regular new music post, so here we go, with more music than normal:
Fear of Men have spent the past few months supporting Pains of Being Pure at Heart on tour in America. Next week the tour moves to Europe, starting in France, so to celebrate the band have recorded a French version of their single Luna:
It’s not just Fear of Men who are off to Europe on tour next week – Flash Bang Band are too. Here’s a brand new video for Young Rogue from their album Bite Your Tongue that they’ve posted to celebrate, made up of footage from last year’s European tour.
The latest new music from Foreign Skin is a video of a live remix of Draper’s Electricity. You can catch Foreign Skin performing in the flesh at the Green Door Store on 26th June supporting Bernholz:
Sticking with remixes by Brighton acts, here’s IYES remixing 1965 by Zella Day, taking something that Lana Del Ray wouldn’t be ashamed of into electro wonderland:
This Friday we’re off to see Fujiya & Miyagi, supported by AKDK. You don’t have to wait until then to hear them in the same room though. Here’s Flaws from Fujiya & Miyagi’s new album remixed by AKDK:
Fool’s Empire release their debut EP on 16th June and have a launch party at the Green Door Store on the same day. Here’s the title track This Is Not For You:
Faux Flux put out a new single yesterday. You Know follows on from the electro pop of last year’s Come Alive and Week Long War releases:
Last, but by no means least, is the massive new tune from Anushka. Mansions is taken from the band’s upcoming album Broken Circuit. Huge wobbly bass, jittery beats and gorgeous harmonies
May always passes too fast for us in Brighton — too many things to do and not enough time to do them all. We did get enough time to get our ears around plenty of local new music though, and here’s our pick of the bunch.
1. Fujiya & Miyagi – Caucasian Sweat
Our most listened to track this month was Caucasian Sweat, taken from the bonus disc of their new album Artificial Sweeteners. That’s nowhere to be found online – it’s from the bonus disc, part of the incentive for you to put your hand in your pocket and spend some of your hard earned money on the cd – so here’s album opener Flaws instead:
2. Eagles for Hands – Glitterall
Last month Handprints topped our chart. The new Eagles for Hands double A side is still on heavy rotation at Brighton Music Blog towers and this month we’re featuring the chilled house b-side Glitterall:
3. Tigercub – Blue Blood
Number three in our chart is the new 7″ from Tigercub which comes on rather cool blue vinyl:
4. Adolescent – Golden Halls part II
Golden Halls is the new EP from Adolescent. Part One is a short piano piece with additional ambient textures, part two which we’re featuring is this fantastic effervescent electronica:
5. Us Baby Bear Bones – Old
This month Us Baby Bear Bones split up and left us with a final EP – Ursari – to remember them by. Our favourite track was the wonky r’n’b of Old:
6. IYES – Toys
In retrospect, it shouldn’t have been any great surprise that IYES latest demo was so good, after all Lighthouse (now sadly taken down from their soundcloud page) was just a demo. Anyone wondering if they can maintain their high standard should take a listen to Toys:
7. Gazelle Twin – Antibody
I don’t think I’ve been disturbed my a music video quite as much since Aphex Twin’s promo for Come To Daddy. Not for the faint hearted, but brilliant nonetheless:
8. Alice Amelia – 11:11
Alice Amelia’s 11:11 is the kind of music that you’ll want to be hearing once the sun finally comes out properly – soulful r’n’b for summer days:
9. Sam Organ – It’s cool if you don’t want to say anything, I’ll just say nothing too
Sam Organ’s latest offering is the second track in this month’s ten from KLSDCP records. They also put out the Adolescent EP, and the downtempo beats of “It’s cool if you don’t want to say anything, I’ll just say nothing too” sit perfectly alongside it:
10. Winston & Goldstein – Non omnis moriar
Finally we have Non Omnis Moriar. We joked when we wrote about this at the very end of April that we don’t often post up Latin on the blog, but we’ve also gone and featured Us Baby Bear Bones Ursari in this month’s top ten (Ursari being Bear in Latin). You can catch Winston & Goldstein live for free at the Green Door Store on 9th June, on the bill with Brighton Music Blog favourites Dog in the Snow.
Out of nowhere, IYES have come out with another amazing brand new track. Toys turned up online at the end of last week. If we hadn’t been so busy embracing Brighton Festival which started this weekend we might have been able to post about it before now, but hopefully you’ve been as busy as we have and you’ll forgive us being a bit slow to pick up the baton this time.
Toys follows down the route of the other-worldly r’n’b of their past few tracks – Vocals get time stretched and underneath some of the choruses there’s some brilliant 8-bit arpeggiated bleepiness, but alongside all that there’s a great pop song there, with lyrics about a childish argument – “that’s why you throw your toys at me / do you feel much better now?”. Don’t worry though, as the Ronnettes sang in 1964, the best part of breaking up is when you’re making up, and the heavy breathing just after the two minute mark implies that maybe Josh might get his way when he sings “I just wanna feel”…
And this is just what IYES call a demo. Most bands would sell their grandmothers to have demos that turned out this good.
Here’s the pick of our favourite tracks we’ve been listening to this month, just in case you missed them first time around
1 – Bentcousin with LL & the D’s / You Make Me Feel So Young
OK, so maybe we’re a bit biased here because Bentcousin gave us our first exclusive track that we’ve posted on the blog, but nevertheless it’s still a great catchy tune
2 – Dog in the Snow / Factory
Dog in the Snow’s latest single is a more electronic affair than their earlier work, and their best yet in our opinion.
3 – The New Union / Now
The NME have just caught onto the New Union’s new single Now. We first posted about it back in February.
4 – IYES / Breathe
IYES ascendancy continues apace with their new single Breathe which ropes in production dues from MNEK.
5 – Phantom Runners / Chase the Feeling
Another Brighton band who’ve roped in a name producer are Phantom Runners, whose new single has the guiding hand of the Fun Lovin Criminals’ Huey Morgan.
6 – Them The Sky / Fall (Finjin remix)
The original of Fall was a more guitar based post rock affair, but in it’s remixed form is much more blissed out.
7 – A Lily / A House is not a Motel
Over the course of March, A Lily put out an EP of four cover versions called Augury. Their version of Love’s A House is not a Motel is our pick.
8 – Eagles for Hands / Appalachia (feat Sivu)
Eagles for Hands latest soundcloud upload is a collaboration with Sivu, which shows a completely different side to both artists work.
9 – Black Rooster Black Shag / Borderline
The new video from Black Rooster Black Shag is another teaser for the band’s debut album which gets released on 1st May, which we’ll be telling you more about very soon.
10 – Hypnotized / Hylia
Hylia is the track with the strongest Eastern flavour from Hypnotized’s new Telesto EP, marrying sitars with rolling beats.
News has just come in of IYES follow up to last year’s debut single Til Infinity. Breathe has been released today on Duly Noted Records, produced by the band with additional production duties from MNEK. As with most of their songs, Josh and Melis share vocal duties, and the additional production gives Breathe more of an urban edge than some of their earlier material. Breathe is out now and available to buy through iTunes.
“Breathe is our sexiest song,” says Josh. “We wrote it with an image in mind of a naked lady, in a jungle, with a snake wrapped around her. The beat came first – we wanted a tribal sound featuring lots of percussive elements. Melis’ voice is often quiet and cute. It’s always beautiful, but I thought it would be great to get some sass out of her. Hence the no clothes and the python idea.”
“Josh showed me clips on YouTube with wild animals – lions, snakes, tigers – all in slow motion, looking very sensual and dangerous” says Melis. “The track’s demo title was Jungle Sex. I loved the concept but when he started mentioning video ideas with naked women, I told him he’d best get another girl.”
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