Welcome to the third annual Rosy Overdrive Label Watch! In what I guess is a yearly tradition now, I check in on what a dozen (give or take) of my favorite modern labels have been up to the past few months, and pull a couple of highlights from each one. Rosy Overdrive is fully in the corner of small record labels and, as a blog, sees a kinship with them as a fellow human-based, passion-driven resource for discovering new music. The past two years I did this in early November, but this year I didn’t get to it by then, and so I figure why not run it during the week of Thanksgiving? I sure am thankful for these labels and the music they release!
As I always reiterate, this is not a “best record labels of 2024” list (although there would, of course, be some overlap). These are the labels that I’ve grown to love over the past decade or so, some of which were quite active this year, while others were less so. Still, everyone on this list put out enough music for me to choose both a favorite record and a worthy “honorable mention” (which can be either my second favorite, something I thought didn’t get as much attention as it should’ve, or something I didn’t have time to review in Pressing Concerns but still merits a closer look).
There are a bunch of great record labels doing great work that I don’t have time to highlight here, but, since the last Label Watch, the blog now has a “browse by label” section which lists every record label whose releases I’ve covered at least three times on the blog. Pretty cool, huh?
Two-time veteran Mt. St. Mtn. drops off this list as they only put out one release this year (System Exclusive’s Click; it’s a good one); here’s hoping we hear more from them next year. And, last but not least: continuing my goal to add a new label every year, we now welcome Meritorio Records to the club!
RO Pick: Alexei Shishkin, Open Door Policy
The prolific Alexei Shishkin, upon linking up with Candlepin Records, actually cleans and polishes up his lo-fi bedroom rock sound on Open Door Policy. The studio-recorded album ends up sounding like the more refined, pop-friendly sides of Shishkin’s 90s indie rock influences (Malkmus, Berman, Linkous, Martsch, and Lytle) or like a lost underground “best of” compilation, and there’s also a newly-pronounced rootsy streak. (Read more)
Honorable Mention: Glaring Orchid, I Hope You’re Okay
Like pretty much everything co-released by Julia’s War and Candlepin, Glaring Orchid’s I Hope You’re Okay falls somewhere on the 90s-style lo-fi indie rock, shoegaze, and slowcore continuum. Bandleader Quinn Mulvihill is nonetheless a rising talent to keep tabs on in this crowded and noisy field, as there’s a ton of brilliance to be found in between their debut record’s walls of fuzz and requisite sonic left-turns.
(Also reviewed on Rosy Overdrive: Abel, Dizzy Spell / Chaepter, Naked Era / The Collect Pond, Lightbreaker / Saturnalias, Bugfest)
RO Pick: Kal Marks, Wasteland Baby
Kal Marks describe their sixth LP, Wasteland Baby, as a “borderline-concept album”, and the Boston trio spend it wandering around a dystopian, post-apocalyptic world that looks pretty similar to our own. As much as or even more than the lyrics, it’s the band’s playing that turns the record into something like a story; there’s Kal Marks’ signature noise rock, yes, but the group use rhythms and sweeping art rock to embark on a journey removed from their dingy basements of origin. (Read more)
Honorable Mention: Mandy, Lawn Girl
Melkbelly’s Miranda Winters doesn’t abandon the Breeders/Veruca Salt-indebted 90s alt-rock sound of her main band on Lawn Girl, her first record as Mandy, but it does still sound like a “solo” album underneath its fuzzed-out guitars. Winters doesn’t have to shout over her band, as they shape their sound so that her voice can be quietly intense and still command full attention. It’s something of a patchwork record, but Lawn Girl’s disparate moments all hang together. (Read more)
(Also reviewed on Rosy Overdrive: Babe Report, Did You Get Better / Pile, Hot Air Balloon)
RO Pick: VACATION, Rare Earth
Rare Earth is an Ohio rock and roll record made with the belief that pop music should be played loud and fast; the Cincinnati-based VACATION combine together Midwestern, blue-collar pop punk with meaty, mid-period Guided by Voices might. All in all, Rare Earth is one of the most inspired-sounding rock records I’ve heard in quite a bit–huge-sounding, catchy, with the edges anything but sanded off. (Read more)
Honorable Mention: Marcel Wave, Something Looming
London’s Marcel Wave put out a demo EP back in 2019, so their debut album Something Looming has presumably been in the works for a while. It’s a confident, polished, and accessible first statement that follows in the grand tradition of British “post-punk”/“indie pop” records, balanced on both sides of the spectrum by vocalist Maike Hale-Jones’s delivery and a well-seasoned cast of instrumentalists. (Read more)
(Also reviewed on Rosy Overdrive: The Ar-Kaics, See the World on Fire / The Drin, Elude the Torch / Why Bother?, Hey, At Least You’re Not Me)
RO Pick: Mope Grooves, Box of Dark Roses
Box of Dark Roses is Mope Grooves’ posthumously-released final album, and it’s a double LP full of ramshackle pop music drawn from clanging keyboards and buzzing beats and vocals that regularly surprise. Box of Dark Roses is so easy to follow despite everything about it because its leader, the late Stevie Pohlman, is unfailingly consistent in her worldview as a writer and doesn’t shy away from following these core tenets to wherever they take her. (Read more)
Honorable Mention: Love Child, Peel Session
12XU has single-handedly spearheaded the Love Child revival this year, putting out a double LP compilation of work from the 80s/90s indie rock group as well as making their albums Witchcraft and Okay? available digitally. I’m going with their (unaired) 1992 Peel Session for this list though, as the four-song, fifteen minute release is a brief but excellent introduction into the New York group’s noisy power trio version of Big Apple indie rock.
(Also reviewed on Rosy Overdrive: Chimers, Through Today / Lupo Citta, Lupo Cittá / Weak Signal, Fine)
RO Pick: Humdrum, Every Heaven
Chicago guitar pop veteran Loren Vanderbilt has a keen grasp on a very specific time and place in the history of indie rock on the debut record from his new solo project, Humdrum–specifically, vintage jangle pop, new wave, college rock, and dream pop. Every Heaven is largely the work of a singular pop-minded visionary, with everything from its prominent, pounding mechanical drumbeats to its New Order-y synth washes to sprinkled guitar arpeggios all working in tandem to service the melodies and hooks. (Read more)
Honorable Mention: Lunchbox, Pop and Circumstance
Lunchbox’s Donna McKean and Tim Brown are Bay Area indie pop godparents–it took the rest of the region a couple of decades to catch up to the 90s-originating group, but when their moment came, Lunchbox was ready. The dozen pop songs on Pop and Circumstance come from people who live and breathe vintage pop rock of the 1960s and 70s–bubblegum pop, mod, psychedelic pop, and soul, delivered with ample experience and honed knowledge. (Read more)
(Also reviewed on Rosy Overdrive: Birdie, Some Dusty / Chime School, The Boy Who Ran the Paisley Hotel / Lightheaded, Combustible Gems / Neutrals, New Town Dream / The Reds, Pinks & Purples, Unwishing Well / Tony Jay, Knife Is But a Dream / Torrey, Torrey / The Umbrellas, Fairweather Friend)
RO Pick: The Spatulas, Beehive Mind
The Spatulas will probably always be an under-the-radar band (even I kind of forgot about this album until it came time to put this list together), but it suits them just fine. Cambridge, Massachusetts singer-songwriter Miranda Soileau-Pratt is a sneakily beautiful pop writer on Beehive Mind, which has one foot in the worlds of Pacific Northwest/Bay Area indie pop and twee but with diversions into more Post Present Medium-esque experimental psych pop and even some New England folk touches.
Honorable Mention: Muscle Beach, Muscle Beach
Oh, boy! Do you like rock music that sounds like it’s been warped and stretched and deconstructed to all hell? Does Trout Mask Replica make sense to you? Do you hate hooks? If any of this describes you, you’d probably be into the self-titled debut album from Muscle Beach, a Los Angeles band about whom I know almost nothing. There’s two guitarists, a drummer, and Jane on “vocals/effects”–and you never know just where any of them are headed on Muscle Beach.
RO Pick: Fust, Songs of the Rail
Aaron Dowdy put out seven EPs in 2017 and 2018 as Fust, years before the North Carolina project became a full-fledged country rock band with a couple of excellent full-lengths. Dowdy’s intimate, lo-fi bedroom pop take on alt-country in these twenty-eight songs, compiled digitally by Dear Life as Songs of the Rail, paints a blurry homespun picture, with songs running into each other as Fust moves from one sleepy-sounding idea to the next. (Read more)
Honorable Mention: Lindsay Reamer, Natural Science
The debut album from Philadelphia alt-country/folk rock singer-songwriter Lindsay Reamer is an impressively-orchestrated, polished record that’s never not breezy and pop-forward. It’s one of the most “instant-gratification” records to come out of Dear Life in a while–but Reamer isn’t put into a box by that at all, gleefully hopping from upbeat country rock to dreamy, layered folk music throughout Natural Science. (Read more)
(Also reviewed on Rosy Overdrive: Hour, Ease the Work / Nina Ryser, Water Giants)
RO Pick: Bad Moves, Wearing Out the Refrain
At their best, D.C. power-pop-punk quartet Bad Moves are a walking, talking, harmonizing example of how pop music can be jam-packed with meaning and intent without losing any other part of itself in the process–and Wearing Out the Refrain is Bad Moves at their best. The group’s third full-length lives up to its name; the hits keep coming, and while Bad Moves have always been some of the best hook merchants in broadly-speaking punk music, Wearing Out the Refrain is the sound of them leaning fully in. (Read more)
Honorable Mention: The Ergs, dorkrockcorkrod (Steve Albini Remix)
This is pop punk! This is dorkrockcorkrod! For its twentieth birthday, the debut album from New Jersey power trio The Ergs–the one that propelled Mikey Erg to one of the most interesting careers in punk over the next two decades–was given a shined-up new remix by Steve Albini and a good old-fashioned repressing from Don Giovanni. Sixteen songs, thirty-two minutes, and no shortage of high-flying, wildly catchy writing that is even better than you remember it being (unless you’ve listened lately, in which case you know that it holds up).
(Also reviewed on Rosy Overdrive: Mourning [A] BLKstar, Ancient//Future / St. Lenox, Ten Modern American Work Songs)
RO Pick: Dummy, Free Energy
Los Angeles noise pop group Dummy approached their sophomore album, Free Energy, with the clear intention of making something different than their 2021 sensory overload debut Mandatory Enjoyment, and the band indeed have grown into something new. The resultant album is something that’s sleek, slick, and smooth–rather than come at you at full force, Dummy dart around us and leap over top of us, marrying fuzzy, distorted shoegaze-pop with alternative-dance elements in a way that’s frequently surprising but always coherent. (Read more)
Honorable Mention: Nightshift, Homosapien
Glasgow’s Nightshift have experienced significant lineup changes since 2021’s Zöe, so it’s not surprising that their third album, Homosapien, brings some changes for the band. The quartet are hardly unrecognizable, but there’s a palpable shift from an emphasis on Young Marble Giants/Marine Girls-esque minimal rhythmic guitar pop to a clearer embrace of a fuller, busier, and electric (but still quite catchy) experimental/art rock sound. (Read more)
(Also reviewed on Rosy Overdrive: Writhing Squares, Mythology)
RO Pick: Lily Seabird, Alas,
Burlington, Vermont’s Lily Seabird throws down the gauntlet in the realm of “folk rock/alt-country-influenced indie rock” with Alas, her second album. It’s a bold statement by someone making a case to be thought of as one of the most exciting and intriguing voices currently doing it, to get mentioned in the same breath as Wednesday and Big Thief one of these days. Bud Tapes put this out on cassette at the beginning of the year, and Lame-O rightfully took notice, adding Seabird to their stable and issuing Alas, on vinyl this November. (Read more)
Honorable Mention: Dazy, IT’S ONLY A SECRET (If You Repeat It)
It’s short, and it’s very sweet. IT’S ONLY A SECRET (If You Repeat It) is Dazy’s first new music in a year, and the three-track EP picks up the thread right where James Goodson left off, with his instantly recognizable huge hooks that are equal parts pop punk and Madchester losing no potency over time. Dance-pop and electronica, punk energy and huge guitars–all in under ten minutes. (Read more)
RO Pick: Styrofoam Winos, Real Time
It’s not like “laid-back country rock” is new territory for Nashville supergroup Styrofoam Winos, but the way that they do it Real Time–effortlessly passing the torch between the band’s three co-leaders, creating a singular vibe across these ten songs–is a palpable leap. Joe Kenkel, Lou Turner, and Trevor Nikrant meld together here more than ever before, creating a cohesive album that sounds relaxed and comfortable as a whole. (Read more)
Honorable Mention: Animal Piss, It’s Everywhere, Grace
What a name, eh? Well, there’s nothing foul about the smooth, irreverent version of country music practiced by western Massachusetts’ Animal Piss, It’s Everywhere (featuring Animal, Surrender!‘s Rob Smith on drums, among others). On Grace, the Pissers sing about vacations, beaches, and cocktails, sometimes as though they’re in the midst of enjoying them and other times like they could really use ’em.
RO Pick: Mint Mile, Roughrider
Roughrider, the long-awaited second album from Chicago’s Mint Mile, has a “snapshot” and “wide-ranging” feel that becomes more pronounced here due to it being significantly shorter than their double-LP debut, Ambertron. Silkworm/Bottomless Pit’s Tim Midyett guides Mint Mile through meandering country-rock, sunny pop rock, and moments of surprising bareness throughout their latest triumph. (Read more)
Honorable Mention: Deep Tunnel Project, Deep Tunnel Project
The debut album from a Windy City indie rock supergroup featuring the aforementioned Midyett as well as John Mohr and Michael Greenlees (both of Tar) and Jeff Dean (Her Head’s on Fire, The Story So Far, The Bomb). Deep Tunnel Project is all Chicago, from the lyrics to the band and album name to the music, which is a garage and punk-influenced take on workmanlike Second City underground rock music. (Read more)
RO Pick: Dancer, 10 Songs I Hate About You
After two stellar EPs introduced the Glasgow band last year, 10 Songs I Hate About You is Dancer’s first full-length, and their potent indie pop/post-punk sound hasn’t missed a step. Vocalist Gemma Fleet is still announcing every song’s title before it begins, Andrew Doig’s bass is all over the place and a treat to observe, and so on. All the ingredients for an excellent first album were lined up, and 10 Songs I Hate About You knocks it out of the park. (Read more)
Honorable Mention: Best Bets, The Hollow Husk of Feeling
The Hollow Husk of Feeling is a record full to the brim of smart pop craft and energy. On the New Zealand band’s sophomore album, Best Bets put together a grounded, unsubtle collection of power pop, garage rock, and even glam rock that eschews the hazier and subtler sides of their home country’s guitar pop scene. The Hollow Husk of Feeling is a cathartic listen, as there’s a palpable edge to Best Bets’ jangly, fuzzed-out tunes. (Read more)
(Also reviewed on Rosy Overdrive: Jim Nothing, Grey Eyes, Grey Lynn / The Maureens, Everyone Smiles / Rural France, Exactamondo! / Sad Eyed Beatniks, Ten Brocades)
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