My favourite songs of the past month – all in one place.
1.
Fever Ray – To The Moon And Back
After 9 years away, Karin Dreijer returned with her first album as Fever Ray last week, Plunge. ‘To The Moon And Back’ was the first taste from it and it is the album’s most pop moment. More than that though, the song’s familiar electro mechanised beat is the most Knife-esque thing on the album. “I played something catchy / You leaned forward and kissed me,” Dreijer sings on a euphoric reintroduction doused in enough oddness for it to be totally of her own universe.
2.
Lankum – Déanta In Eireann
From one of my albums of the past week (and a band who announced a Vicar Street show yesterday) comes this standout from Between The Earth & The Sky about Ireland. The 8-minute ‘Deanta in Eireann’ that could be about nearly any time in Irish history but are applicable to the now – migration, a government who doesn’t care about the little people and using your Irish charm abroad but it turns the song’s gaze back on the homeland – “if the Dáil are the pimps, then we are the whores” and in the end, you’ll want to stand up and declare the song our new antagonistic national anthem.
3.
Daphni – Vulture
One of the few songs on Dan Snaith’s new Daphni album Joli Mai that didn’t feature on this summer’s Fabriclive mix, ‘Vulture’ is a bubbling pot of horror synth, bass rumbles, mechanised percussion and effects.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CYE1scS8WG8
4.
Julien Baker – Turn Out The Lights
21 year-old songwriter signed to Matador Records who was my new artist of the week for the Irish Times recently, hits some big highs on her second album with the title track vividly shares her pain. The gig on November 9th is sold out.
5.
Four Tet – Lush
A mellow and melodic highlight from Kieran Hebden’s largely understated new record New Energy.
6.
King Krule – Dum Surfer
The most menacing cut from The Ooz, Archy Marshall’s newest as King Krule is saying something. Marshall’s voice moves between ominous hedonism, speedy narrator caught in a night of gambling, car crashes, puking and shit bands. A seedy modern villainous jazz song.
7.
St. Vincent – Pills
Annie Clark’s Masseduction is a barrage of percussive sonics and skilled guitar music. ‘Pills’ is the album’s most fizzy-pop moment with its nursery-rhyme chorus about pharmaceutical dependence contrasted with buzzed-up guitars and outro that shakes out the song’s vigorous energy with a coda that features Kamasi Washington on sax and offers more than a handful of hope.
8.
DJ Seinfeld – Time Spent Away From You
Previews of Mr lo-fi house himself’s forthcoming album on November 3rd have raised expectations for an already buzzed about artist. Tracks like this proves their is substance beyond the style and movement tag applied to the Swedish producer.
9.
Tribal Dance – Flongo
Math rock makes a return to the Irish music scene! Tribal Dance reminds me of all the Richter Collective gigs, the music of Not Squares and Cap Pas Cap that had a big hold on what was going on in the country 10 years ago. ‘Flongo’ is this Dublin trio’s debut single and features the rhythmic tautness of early Foals with a bassline in a rush to the finish.
