Fuzzy Meadows: The Week's Best New Music (July 17th

Oct 25, 2023

by Dan Goldin (@post_trash_)

Welcome to FUZZY MEADOWS, our weekly recap of this week's new music. We're sharing our favorite releases of the week in the form of albums, singles, and music videos along with the "Further Listening" section of new and notable releases from around the web. It's generally written in the early hours of the morning and semi-unedited... but full of love and heart. The list is in alphabetical order and we sincerely recommend checking out all the music we've included. There's a lot of great new music being released. Support the bands you love. Spread the word and buy some new music.

*Disclaimer: We are making a conscious effort not to include any artist in our countdown on back-to-back weeks in order to diversify the feature, so be sure to check the "Further Listening" as well because it's often of top-notch quality too.

We’ve been charmed by Appleton, WI’s Dusk since their debut single, and nearly a decade later, it’s great to see the sextet hasn’t lost their touch. The band’s upcoming album, Glass Pastures, due out in October via Don Giovanni, is their first record in five years and while it’s only their second album, the band have been busy in the intervening years, both backing R Boyd and Tim Buchanan as well releasing solo records (including Julia Blair’s excellent Better Out Than In and Amos Pitsch’s Acid Rain). The band have come together yet again though, and “Pissing in a Wishing Well,” the record’s first single is more than a great title, it’s the welcome return of the band’s home-cooked country fuzz. Long before making twangy tunes was “the thing to do,” Dusk were making some of the most genuine country-fried rock ‘n’ roll of the last decade and they’re showing no signs of rust. “Pissing in a Wishing Well” is equal parts muscle and barn-yard boogie, a song full of soul, massive guitars, pedal steel, and some exuberant harmonies that have the “good times” at heart.

The cowgirl ain’t in the ditch no more. Florry, the Philadelphia sextet, are making the scrappiest alt-country we’ve come across, led by Francie Medosch’s brilliant songwriting, and The Holey Bible is fully immersive, overflowing with detail from start to finish. Having already shared the triumphant “Drunk and High” and “Take My Heart” singles, the band return with another preview of their album, the glistening “Cowgirl Giving,” a song that moves at a slow country saunter. From the harmonica assisted introduction to the lush twangy drift, Medosch and company set the scene, transporting us from the hustle and bustle of the city to open spaces with arid reflection. It’s a song about commitment and resistance, love at odds, and the words seem carefully chosen for their clear presentation. The doubled vocals of Medosch and Victoria Rose sit perfectly uneasy in the dust of country guitars and forlorn sentiment. It’s a transitory song, reluctant to embrace the need to move on and head out of town.

Five years after their first full length, Douglassville, PA’s Outer Heaven return to the maelstrom and devastation with Infinite Psychic Depths, a record as unnervingly brutal as it is subtly psychedelic. The five-piece death metal band plow forward with stampeding rhythms and sludgy force, the riffs contorting time itself as the album unwinds into the pits of destructive abandon. Outer Heaven’s second album, released via Relapse Records, shows growth and experimentation, moving beyond the traditional confines of the genre to incorporate a wider array of aesthetic choices and hallucinogenic tendencies, digging ever deeper into the remains of the unknown. The band twist and sputter, their violent upheaval brought on by technical riffs via twin guitars and a sheer assault on the drum kit. When the band break for ominous melodic breaks (“Unspeakable Aura”) or scenic terror (“Rotting Stone / DMT”), it highlights Outer Heaven’s ability to shape-shift without alienating death metal purists. Their attempts to reshape and expand their sound in new directions does so while paying tribute to the visceral rampage of those that came before them.

Nearly twenty five years removed from their debut album, Oxbow still stand in a league of their own. The incomparable band have spent decades redefining their caustic blend of art-metal, punk, free jazz, blues, and noise rock, a kitchen sink of forward thinking heavy music and brainy construction. Love’s Holiday, their first for Ipecac Records (Melvins, Human Impact, Palms), is the band’s first new record in seven years, and there’s an immediate nature to the knotted churn, their songs rush over you like an open floodgate, raw yet refined, avant-garde but easily digestible. Throughout the album Oxbow challenge our notion of accessibility, what at first seems relatively gentle or simplistic becomes increasingly complicated upon repeat listens, the compositions take vigorous shapes that present themselves with familiarity. As always, the elastic howl of Eugene S. Robinson stands deranged and in control at the forefront, his contortions leading the way down claustrophoic corridors and explosive resolutions. There’s a cinematic quality to Love’s Holiday, a trip that demands patience as the pieces come into place.

Last month saw Thank, the Leeds’ based experimental noise rock band share “Torture Cube,” their first new music since the release of their debut album, Thoughtless Cruelty. The A-side of the band’s latest 7” (out via Zen F.C., the label run by Yard Act) found the band in top form, splitting the difference between demented noise rock, industrial punk, and pop hooks at their utter most unhinged. The record’s B-side, “Dead Dog In A Ditch” is the heavier and more direct of the pair, a song that seems to focus their aggression toward dangerous incels, taking the piss out of the perversely damaged trolls, a regular pastime of Thank’s ever flippant internet persona. With an insistent pounding beat and the harsh yelp of Freddy Vinehill-Cliffe’s signature vocals, the song pulses with sustained noise and piercing synths, careening into a wall of noise. Propelled ever forward by the punch of the bass and the battering of the kit, the structure veers off the rails but never looses Thank’s mysterious ability to make obnoxious and chaotic music sound catchy and mesmerizing.

This has nothing to do with this week’s new music, hell, it’s not even remotely new, but I can’t stop watching videos of Aldous Harding playing the song “Horizon” live. The track, taken from 2017’s Party, finds her expressive, exaggerated, and occasionally sarcastic; shifting pitches, wandering into engaging vibrato, and generally swooning out discomfort. Any video you find of her performing the song is truly incredible and captivating, her attention to shape and sound is stunning. It’s as much about the words and the music as it is the performance and the way she forms her vocals with each part of mouth and her charismatic expressions that screams “this isn’t quite as serious as it seems,” and it’s truly amazing. I could go on and on about it, but it’s been six years, so just watch and enjoy. Experience a profoundly performance.

7XVETHEGENIUS & DJ GREEN LANTERN “Back End Development” | AL MENNE “Kill Me” | ANASTASIA COOPE “Tough Sun / Seemeely” | APOLLO BROWN & PLANET ASIA “Get The Dough Off” | AXIS: SOVA “Hardcore Maps” | BEEF “Beef” | BIG THIEF “Vampire Empire” | COR DE LUX “Rumors” | EXPLOSIONS IN THE SKY “Ten Billion People” | FUGITIVE “Blast Furnace b/w Standoff” | HALF HUMAN “Hills Leaning Backwards“ | HOLY WAVE “Nothing In The Dark” | HOMEBOY SANDMAN “Bop” | ILLUMINATTI HOTTIES “Truck” | JEFF TOBIAS “Snow” | THE JESUS & MARY CHAIN “Half Way To Crazy (Live)” | LATHE OF HEAVEN “Ekpyrosis” | LUGGAGE “Hand Is Bad” | MISS TINY “River Hands” | MOTHER TONGUES “Dance In The Dark” | NON PLUS TEMPS “Dark On Harmon” EP | OVEF OW “MAD” | OXBOW “Lovely Murk” (feat. Lingua Ignota) | PET FOX “It Won’t Last (Audiotree Live)” | SCULPTURE CLUB “Cursed or Hexed” | SPLIT SYSTEM “Alone Again” | SQUIRREL FLOWER “Full Time Job” | SUNFORGER “Sunforger” LP | TAN COLOGNE “Visitation” | UNSCHOOLING “Ribbon Road” | VAGABON “Do Your Worst” | WETSUIT “Twiggy” | WHO IS SHE? “96 Ghouls” | WOOLEN MEN “Spoiled”

Tagged: Thank, Outer Heaven, Oxbow, Florry, Dusk, Aldous Harding, 7xvethegenius, DJ Green Lantern, Al Menne, Anastasia Coope, Apollo Brown & Planet Asia, Axis:Sova, Beef, Big Thief, Cor de Lux, Explosions In The Sky, Fugitive, Half Human, Homeboy Sandman, Illuminati Hotties, The Jesus & Mary Chain, Lathe of Heaven, Holy Wave, Jeff Tobias, Luggage, Miss Tiny, Mother Tongues, Non Plus Temps, Ovef Ow, Lingua Ignota, Pet Fox, Sculpture Club, Split System, Squirrel Flower, Sunforger, Tan Cologne, Unschooling, Vagabon, Wetsuit, Who Is She, woolen men