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Get Weird
Okay, so I’m going to be completely honest. This post may or may not have been inspired by the fact that the band is called Us Baby Bear Bones. They’d have to go out of their way to be distinctly bad for me to NOT post this. That said, they sound similar to Au Revoir Simone but with a little more teeth. Atmospheric and just the right amount of melancholy for Sunday night listening.
Also, they’re called Us Baby Bear Bones. Did I mention that yet?
Not your average buzz band
The buzz band cycle has changed in the last few years with the widespread use of digital distribution. Now a band can pick up a lot of attention long before releasing an album, and it’s always a toss up whether or not a finished product will live up to the promise. With the release of CHVRCHES’ last single, “Gun” I think we can all agree that this band is the real deal. Let’s hope we can get one or two more of these before their debut LP in September.
These keep leaving me at a loss for words, just listen below:
Purity Ring live at The Independent 2013- San Francisco, CA
You know who Purity Ring is. We don’t have to do that whole song and dance. Their debut album Shrines was one of our favorite albums of 2013 and just a few months ago they released this surprisingly (well, not so surprisingly) INCREDIBLE cover of Soulja Boy’s “Grammy.” Typically when the whole indie-band-covers-rapper thing goes down it’s very tongue in cheek, but in this case we have a laughably ironic track turned into something vulnerable and pretty. The cover has received so much traction that it makes regular appearances at live shows and fits in seamlessly with their repertoire.
Never judge an artist by his haircut
Bastille may be the best band you’ve never heard about. Simply put, they produce incredible cover songs. Nothing is out their wheelhouse as they tackle artists like Seal, Frank Ocean, Lana Del Rey, Fleetwood Mac and more with a dark, electro atmosphere and the occasional movie dialogue sample. While some of the source material could be considered kitschy, the moody makeover they’re given comes across as rich, dark and powerful. Even the occasional flavors of dubstep thrown in are surprisingly welcome.
I’d posted about their City High cover back in 2011, a few months before signing to Virgin Records, but had fallen off my radar. While it may have been a one-off for us at the time, a year later they’ve grown a serious following in their native UK and amassed a treasure trove of cover songs on their Other People’s Heartache mixtapes. It should be noted that they do have a small handful of good original tracks to their name, but they are at their best with this approach. If you like the cover of TLC’s “No Scrubs” posted here, you owe it to yourself to listen to it all.
Superhero-Pop
Are you ready for a brand new electro-pop darling? Copenhagen’s Karen Marie Ørsted (MØ) killed it with the release of “Pilgrim“ last October and followed suit with “Glass,” a space voyage of light drums and cascading synths. Aside from giving us a new reason to use the [Alt] function on our macs, MØ gets extra credit for including the line “turn the lights off so our horny souls can get some private time.” I mean, really. It just doesn’t get better.
While her distribution currently remains through Sony Music Denmark, word on the street is that Neon Gold is cooking up a 7″ in the near future. Stay tuned.
