Pulse: New Music You Need #1

So, as I sit here ‘pon me settee and the dog is snoring, far from, gently next to me. I have realised, if there’s one thing I like doing it’s sleeping, but I’m not very good at it. If, then, there’s another thing I like doing it’s intoxicating myself, which I’m very good at.

However, as I’m unable to do either at this particular moment, I’m going to satisfy myself another one thing I like doing. That thing is pestering people with things I like, in this case new music, until they like it too. I’ll leave it to you to decide whether I’m any good at it. So, without further ado I introduce you to Pulse, which in itself will introduce you to new bands, new artists, just new fucking music. All your musical needs right now, from my fingers to the internet to your ears.

Oh, and no matter how good at it you think I am, I’m going to do it again. Maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow, but actually next week, and (maybe) for the rest of your life. Enjoy.

 

Son Little

son little music

Son Little, or Aaron Earl Livingston, may well be known to some already as a collaborator with The Roots and RJD2, adding his soulful croon into the mix of their music. He’s only gone and gone solo now though, to pursue his own sound and bring his impressive vocals truly to the fore.

Through his collaborations Livingston has got to dabble in quite a pallet of styles and sounds, for his own outgoings he has honed in upon that wide array of influences to craft the music his voice was meant to sing. The result is sparse and slowburning but thick with soul and blues as his vocals seem to carry the instrumentation to the end.

 

Riddles

riddles band psychedelic

I fucking loved psychedelia when I was younger, still do, but I absolutely loved it with my shoulder length hair, my SG, my distortion pedal, and my Wah pedal. There was just so much fuzz, from the top of my head right to my amplifier. Now there are lots of variations on the theme of psychedelia. You’ve got your weird and surreal, your ambient and spacey, your flowery and hypnotic, and many more, but then you have your lowdown dirty, technicoloured, fucking messes.

It’s all raw, raucous, radical, radiant, and other R words I can’t be arsed to get down. I mean, come on, this song is called Psychedelic Power Engine Iron Claw Thunder Mistress. Imagine if Hawkwind let Lemmy cane speed, instead of kicking him out.

 

Hundred Waters

hundred waters music

If you like your indie ethereal, electronic, minimalist, dense, entrancing, experimental, and just plain hard to pin down, then Hundred Waters might just be a dream come true. A music collective that bring together numerous elements of numerous styles of numerous genres to create a serene sonic sanctuary of sorts. I like alliteration. Though you could pick apart their sound and find all those little elements, it all comes together to make very much one solid sound.

Drawing comparisons to the soundscapes of artists like Bjork, Sigur Ros, Animal Collective, Sleep Party People and James Blake, if you had to give them a genre you could go with experimental-R&B-electronica-ambient-indie-dreampop. Their new album is stunning.

 

Empty Pools

empty pools band

Bristol based four piece (or perhaps three piece as vocalist Leah ‘no longer wishes to do the band’) have just released Liberation Prayers, their EP follow up to their debut Saturn Prayers. Which is a shame, as it’s… it’s just great. So what the cards hold for Empty Pools in the future, I cannot say, but I can say that the music they already have out you should listen to and then listen some more. It’s audible from first listen that Empty Pools boast a sound that is equal parts classic as it contemporary.

If you took a cross section of it, it would have indie written through it like a stick of rock, but credibly so and in an awesome way. Rumbling, popping basslines, fuzzy guitar lines that are angular but delicately smooth too, skittering drums, and distinct and affective vocals. What more could you want?

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