Heartland Canadian indie rockers The Sarandons deliver defiant optimism on their debut full-length album Sightlines, a rich body of work replete with spirited rhythms, lustrous synths, punctuated guitars and delightfully rugged vocal harmonies, produced by Dan Hosh (Wild Rivers, City and Colour, Glorious Sons) at Double Car Recording and Trench Recordings in Toronto. The Sarandons have shared stages with Dakota Mill, Mattie Leon, Julie Title and more.
Gainesville, Fla., 9-piece Southern soul outfit The Savants of Soul are releasing a series of singles leading up to a July tour. These singles will follow the release of their pre-pandemic self-titled album, recorded over 10 days at legendary FAME Studios in Muscle Shoals, Ala. SoS have been making a name for themselves as live performers on the festival circuit, including Suwannee Rising, Okeechobee Music & Arts, Gasparilla, and Red Gorilla at SXSW. They’ve shared bills with Benjamin Booker, St. Paul and The Broken Bones, Maggie Rose, The Original Wailers, George Porter Jr. of The Meters, and the late Charles Bradley.
A singer, producer, multi-instrumentalist, writer, poet, actor, comedian and seasoned vagabond, Bee Appleseed has performed in 50 countries across Europe, North and South America. This past year, the Portland-raised, Los Angeles-based artist released his sophomore LP, Starflower’s Cosmic Soul, a ten-track album of psychedelic rock & folk songs that chronicle his spiritual awakening after several particularly tumultuous years spent as nomadic, globetrotting troubadour.
A standout single from Starflower’s Cosmic Soul, “All Is Forgiven” blends ’60s psych-pop, garage rock and indie-folk into an uplifting celebration of healing with Bee’s raspy vocals floating atop layers of jangly guitars, punchy horns and singalong backing vocals. The new video for the song—shot all around L.A. and featuring a cast of charmingly off-kilter puppets and masked weirdos—does a great job of capturing the contagious, eccentric charisma of this 21st Century cosmic ambassador.
Hoofing through the better part of a decade, Gainesville’s 9-piece retro-soul and blues amalgam The Savants of Soul have been threading the needle, pinpointing the evolution of their sound to the city of Muscle Shoals, where they recorded their latest record at Rick Hall’s legendary FAME Studios. Over the course of ten days, the band recorded 14 songs with acclaimed producer Vince Chiarito (Charles Bradley, Black Pumas) and engineer John Gifford III, Studio A manager, tenant and student of Rick Hall (Aretha Franklin, Wilson Pickett, Etta James), aka “the father of Muscle Shoals music.”
Last year, Los Angeles’ Goliathan—the enduring collaboration between guitarists and lifelong friends Shawn Doster & Kevin Cogill—released their two EPs, Albion and Awakens, on vinyl for the first time, as well as a set of raw, primal early recordings, Artifact, that was remixed by Toshi Kasai (Melvins, Red Sparowes, Helmet) and mastered by Gene Grimaldi (Failure, Fantômas).
Through their alternately punishing and ethereal instrumentals, which seamlessly toggle between doom metal and blackened post rock, Goliathan tells stories as vast as geologic time itself. Tales of epic beginnings and inevitable ends, of the epochal crawl of continents, apocalyptic future landscapes and, perhaps most impactfully, of nature finally—and violently—reclaiming its rightful dominion over humanity.
Now, for the first time, Goliathan has documented one of its earsplitting live performances, at the Five Star in downtown Los Angeles, and is releasing a set of hi-quality live videos from the show. You can check out the new video for “Albion” exclusively today at The Spill… READ MORE
Within the first five seconds of Makeout Mountain, I want and need to be front row center at an illiterates show with a beer in my hand. This isn’t your everyday punk rock album, it’s loud and fierce and not afraid to be different. Makeout Mountain is a cohesive body of work as a whole starting with the stunning artwork. The arrangements and production of some songs like “Owl Commander” capture the raw talent of illiterates. Some punk nowadays can seem forced to fight the man or be hardcore enough, but not illiterates. These guys are not afraid to throw some piano into a punk ballad and make it their own, or blend genres throughout the album. The songs are short and sweet, but have a wealth of depth at further inspection into the lyrics. Several songs on Makeout Mountain could be deemed anyone’s favorites but if I had to pick my top 3 they would have to be; “Ramones City”, “Svengali”, “Mayonnaise Elbow”, and “Blood Bath & Beyonce”. It was such a pleasure to listen to this gem of an album and I look forward to throwing it into my rotation. READ MORE…