London-based neo-soul artist Pollena has released the video for new single ‘Diamonds’ starring acclaimed writer and actor Jack Holden. Star of the critically acclaimed West End show ‘Cruise’ and BBC’s ‘Marriage’, Holden performs as a theater technician on the cusp of exploring his true passion. His first steps into his own limelight represent the journey we’re all on to find ourselves, and is reflected in the other characters we see – parents, families, children, all trying to express themselves in love and creativity. Each story embodies the track’s core message of fighting against societal pressures that force us into lives and roles we don’t fit: “I’m tired of society dictating how we should live our lives. With ‘Diamonds’, I want to encourage listeners to fight for what makes them happy, for a better, truer life.” Pollena. Jack Holden and cast in video for ‘Diamonds’ Holden stars alongside a cast of dancers and families in the piece conceptualised and directed by Georgia Rajah, best known for her work on the BBC documentary ‘Learning To Grieve.’
It was Halloween earlier this week and Yeah Yeah Yeahs are howling at the moon with their new music video, ‘Wolf,’ starring Britt Lower of Severance. The visuals were directed by Allie Avital, and open with Lower seated across a table from veteran character actor Will Brill. After a blue jay sings to her — in Karen O’s voice, no less — Lower’s character heeds the call of the wild. She hunts, changes hair color, and generally enjoys her feral life. As the song breaks down into the repeated phrase, “Into the wild,” she even runs into Yeah Yeah Yeahs performing in a seedy bar. At the end she meets again with her housebroken former partner, with unexpected results. “It was our great fortune to collaborate with the powerhouses Allie and Brit on this video for ‘Wolf,’” Karen O said in a statement. “Allie casts a spell with the gorgeous world she weaves — always with teeth that bite, and Britt embodies all the contradictions in the themes of ‘Wolf,’ so enamored with her performance that’s got as much heaven as it does hell. We were beside ourselves with excitement when Allie cast Brit as the lead in the video, YYYs are serious nerds for Severance, what luck when the stars align.” Lower added, “When I heard the title of the song and description of the role were both ‘Wolf’ it was a full body ‘yes.’ To get to work on a story about a woman discovering the wild within and without was a dream. And to do so alongside legend Karen O… I mean, I’m speechless.” [via Consequence]
New York Korean-American artist Margaret Sohn, who performs as Miss Grit, has announced their debut album, Follow The Cyborg, out February 24 via Mute. The album is deeply conceptual, “following the path of a non-human machine as it moves from its helpless origin to awareness and liberation,” as a press release lays out. Follow The Cyborg follows Miss Grit’s two EPs: 2021’s Imposter and 2019’s Talk Talk. Along with the album announcement, Sohn is sharing the title track, which is below and comes with a video directed by Curry Sicong Tian. Recorded entirely in Sohn’s home studio, Follow The Cyborg features the already released single ‘Like You,’ plus contributions from Stella Mozgawa of Warpaint, Aron Kobayashi Ritch of Momma, and Pearla. Opening up about ‘Follow The Cyborg‘s many cinematic influences and its accompanying video, Sohn says: “I wanted to place my body in the cyber world, allowing the different variations of my ghost to move about freely. I wanted to look a little freakish, unrecognizable to myself to avoid my instinctive filtration.” [via Stereogum]
Last year, the London-based musician Eva Liu released her debut EP as mui zyu, a wonderful thing vomits, which was fronted by the lead single ‘pour a brain.’ Now, she’s back with news of her first full-length album, Rotten Bun For An Eggless Century, which was co-produced with her Dama Scout bandmate Luciano Rossi. ‘Ghost With A Peach Skin,’ the first we’re hearing from it, is a warm and interior burble with sticky synths and a lullaby-esque melody. “This song is about leaving your former self and entering your new peach skin. Peaches are considered a symbol of longevity and even immortality in Chinese culture,” Liu, who was born in Hong Kong, said in a statement, continuing: The protagonist has overcome enemies and has bruises to prove the damage. However the bruised peach becomes stronger by overcoming them. The song features guzheng samples that have been highly edited and mangled. We liked the idea of having an excellent musician improvise on the traditional Chinese zither and ‘bruising’ their performance with distortion and effects to create a new stronger sound with little of its former self present – much like the meaning of the song. The ‘ghost’ inside refers to the ghost we used to be, the ghosts we carry with us and the ghosts we have to overcome too. Watch a CLUMP Collective-directed video for it above. [via Stereogum]
Steady Holiday’s Dre Babinski has announced a new album, Newfound Oxygen, her follow-up to Take The Corners Gently, which came out in early 2021. This one will be out in early 2023, and today the Los Angeles-based musician has shared its lead single, ‘Can’t Find A Way,’ a sweepingly sad track about not feeling the same way about someone else as they do about you. “Can’t find a way to fall in love with you/ You worship everything I do/ But I know I can’t find a way to fall in love,” Babinski sings. The track comes with a music video directed by Isaac Ravishankara. “I wanted to make a video that was far less literal than the song itself, but externalized the same emotional core – that the world as I know it is suddenly disoriented,” Babinski explains. “We brought to life the scene from the single’s artwork with fishing wire, blowdryers, and a platform that shifted to a 45 degree angle that the camera and table/chair was mounted to. I had to hold on for dear life.” [via Stereogum]
indie-pop wonderkid Ellie Dixon releases satirical new video ‘Swing!’. The hyper realistic clip plays on Ellie’s experience receiving unexpected online negativity last year. Directed by Jasmine De Silva, the video sees Ellie bounce from set-to-set tackling hurtling baseballs and intrusive microphones. Responding to the incessant nature of trolling, Ellie finds the confidence to swing back when times get tough. With intelligently balanced wit, Ellie taps into the damaging impact traditional feminine stereotypes and impeccable beauty expectations (bright lipsticks, baseball hair curlers, bleach-blonde barbies) have on women today. Speaking of the video, Ellie says, “For this video, I had this idea where I was being bombarded with baseballs and ended up on a baseball pitch against my will. It was a visual metaphor for when you find yourself in unexpected, unpleasant situations and you have to learn to get through them. The director instantly understood the sense of humour and surreal imagery I wanted – I love blending real life with elevated fantasy. The styling brought such a playful, retro feel to the whole video. You have no clue what decade you’re in, but you want to stay.”
Global pop icon P!NK releases her new single, ‘Never Gonna Not Dance Again,’ out now via RCA Records. Produced by GRAMMY-winning hitmakers Max Martin and Shellback, who also co-wrote the song with P!NK, the vibrant pop single is a euphoric and joyful ode to dancing through the hard times. Accompanying the song’s release is its playful music video, co-directed by P!NK and creative duo Nick Florez & RJ Durell. Set in a grocery store, the visual finds P!NK dancing and skating through the aisles, joined by a colorful cast of characters.
Following the release of their second EP, Modern Millenial, LibraLibra return with their utterly unique fusion of pop, electro and punk with an immense new single. Lulling us into a false sense of security with a sweeping orchestral intro, ‘Frenemies‘ soon builds with a haunting majesty into an epic frenzied cacophony. Reflecting on the comfort we may find in fake or damaging ‘friendships’, the track fizzes with a chaotic energy that’ll blast into the ears with a fierce sense of urgency. As it rages with a colossal magnificence, front woman Beth’s vocals simmer with a sultry allure before exploding into a riotous anthem seething with dark undertones. Of the track, Beth explains: “‘Frenemies’ is for all the fake friendships out there. Those friendships bound together through getting f**ked up, losing yourselves, your keys, your phone, blacking out and ending up a shell of your former self in a random kitchen at 4am with no way to get home. Your frenemy is your ride or die, you both should and could be each other’s saviors, but instead the chaos is calling and annihilation feels really good.“ ‘Frenemies’ is accompanied by a brand new video. Directed by kink photographer Sorry Jonny Died, it offers an eerie insight into the wonderfully sordid underbelly of LibraLibra’s world. [via Get In Her Ears]
After coming of age in a “chaotic, bohemian household,” and splitting time between Los Angeles and London for the past two years, budding singer-songwriter Grace Inspace Garner has forged a brand new musical alchemy that blends her interests in rock, pop, and “journalistic observations to create a unique, colorful world.” She found her bearings in London while fiddling with dynamic arrangements and experiments alongside a battalion of musicians holed up in her apartment, which presided over a mechanic’s garage. Garner’s single ‘Last Girl’ is a hypnotizing, electronic spark that highlights her infectious pop vocals. The song flutters and flickers, never pausing for a moment. It’s energetic, memorable, and an irreverent-but-earnest take on dystopia, written and recorded in an Airstream trailer while she was decamped near the Jedediah Smith River and Redwood Forest. Ever since her time in London toying with recordings that featured faint clanks of tools in the background, Garner’s had her sights set on making music that’s industrial in how it combines the sounds that populate her own creative psyche with the echoes of the real world surrounding her at all times. ‘Last Girl’ is a product of Garner’s writing blueprint, in which she composed “poems about places and people set to my head music.” “Imagine if you woke up one day and you’d missed the memo about pairing off for the apocalypse and you were left stranded on Earth while all the couples fled to safety in their spaceships,” Garner says. “You’re left roaming the Earth alone, enjoying the freedom and lamenting the loneliness. That’s the tale of ‘Last Girl’; I wanted to write a song that would celebrate the power of being alone as well as make fun of my insecurities about it.” [via FLOOD]
Nashville indie pop artist daena portrays a magician in the video for her new single ‘Disappearing Act’ – and she’s the most magical talent to hit Music City in quite some time. daena grew up not far from Bruce Springsteen’s old stomping ground in New Jersey. You can hear a little bit of The Boss in her music, as well as 2000s Liz Phair, Prince and Taylor Swift. And, like any great magician, daena surprises you with each new single. ‘Disappearing Act’ urges listeners not to be intimidated by the “perfect life” others project on social media. If you look behind the façade of perfection, even folks like Kim Kardashian have their struggles (Pete didn’t work out, Kanye’s gone crazy, etc.). [via Ladygunn]
With its distorted guitars and echoed backing vocals, ‘Love!’ is infused with 2000s pop nostalgia, with Hallie recalling ‘Cool’ by Gwen Stefani as an influence. “Oscar and I listened to ‘Cool’ by Gwen Stefani in the studio and I loved how the main hook of the song was one lyric and that lyric felt almost personified by the energy and sonic world of the song.” Still, the track sits well amongst other contemporaries (Oliva Rodrigo, Clairo), with hints of pop-punk and dream-pop revealing themselves throughout. Initially lamenting a romantic love lost, Hallie was able to re-channel that energy into a song of appreciation for the supportive bubble of friends around them, and the result is a refreshing take on the relatable concept of love. “I initially wrote ‘Love!’ about my then partner, when I woke up on my period feeling irritable but was instantly comforted by the love and depth of connection we had,” they comment. After finishing the writing and production with Oscar Sharah, I found new meaning in the song, and how in my current life it speaks to the platonic love surrounding me. It’s really nice to be reminded that within all the chaos and confusion of my early 20’s, there is so much support and love in friendships that often surpasses the romantic flings in my life.” As the track unravels, Hallie, we get to see Hallie’s witty lyricism revealing itself (“You call my bluffs / Like I call my mom / You hold me still / With a finger and thumb”) before the track blossoms into luscious guitar lines and a euphoric sense of closure and acceptance. In the accompanying video, Hallie is seen with their closest friends, as they explain, “Running lines and dancing around in our lounge room felt so healing for my inner child; it felt like we were 8 again being silly and full of joy while being creative. We’re all working out who we are and what we want at this time in our early 20’s, so it’s really nice to be reminded that within all the chaos and confusion, there is so much love and we can grow and work it out together. I am so in love with my friends!” [via Line Of Best Fit]
