In the Thursday Pressing Concerns, we have the good fortune of looking at four exciting records that you’ll be able to hear tomorrow, April 11th: new albums from Gum Parker, Sunny Intervals, and Bedridden, plus a new EP from Fantasy of a Broken Heart. Should you need to catch up with what the blog covered earlier this week, here are links to Monday’s blog post (featuring Cootie Catcher, Penny Loafer, Takuro Okada, and Mantarochen) and Tuesday’s post (featuring Pat’s Alternative Bus Tour, Bliss?, Marshy, and Seances).
If you’re looking for more new music, you can visit the site directory to see what else we’ve written about lately. If you’d like to support Rosy Overdrive, you can share this (or another) post, or donate here.
Gum Parker – The Brakes
Release date: April 11th
Record label: Repeating Cloud
Genre: 90s indie rock, power pop, garage rock
Formats: Vinyl, digital
Pull Track: Not Breaking Rocks
The Portland, Maine indie rock supergroup Lemon Pitch only lasted for two albums, but that’s not getting Galen Richmond down. Richmond (who also plays in Teenage Tom Petties and runs one of the labels most frequently appearing in Pressing Concerns, Repeating Cloud Records) quickly enlisted Lemon Pitch drummer Jeff Hamm as well as newcomers Kate Sullivan-Jones on bass and co-lead vocals and Jason Unterreiner on lead guitar, and Gum Parker was formed. Richmond no longer has to share songwriting duties with Brock Ginther and Alex Merrill, but I still hear a bit of the former’s manic punk-pop and the latter’s sickly-sweet guitar pop smile in The Brakes, the debut Gum Parker album. If you already know Lemon Pitch and/or Midwestern Medicine, Ginther’s other band, then that’s roughly what Gum Parker sound like, but if you don’t then they’re sneakily difficult to define. Richmond’s a 90s indie rock devotee with (presumably) plenty of Archers of Loaf, Guided by Voices, and Silkworm albums in his collection, but with Gum Parker he comes off as much more interested in simply making loud pop music than trying to directly emulate his influences. It’s “power pop” without that genre’s defining reverence, “pop punk” without a trace of what that term traditionally evokes, “slacker rock” made by someone with the perpetual nervousness.
The biography for The Brakes notes that Gum Parker is Richmond’s first band in his twenty-five year music career where he’s the sole primary songwriter, but that doesn’t mean he doesn’t benefit from quite a bit of help. Bradford Krieger recorded the LP and contributed keyboard to it and deserves credit for how good it sounds–always emphasizing the vocals but without obscuring the raucous band behind them. All of the band helped in “shaping the final…arrangements” of these tracks, and I know that Sullivan-Jones at least contributed some lyrics (not to mention her lead vocals, which add a touch of variety to the record while still being in line with Richmond’s enough to fit his writing). A speedy album, The Brakes zips through a few classic pop songs in its first half–the Archers-nodding, Superchunk-evoking opening anthem “Two Subarus” and the catty guitar pop drama of “Not Breaking Rocks” are my favorites, but “Only Boxes” has some of the best lyrics (“For a fortnight and a half / I stood right in the forklift’s path / And when I finally let it pass it was only boxes”). Gum Parker do not slow down in the second half of The Brakes (obviously), but we get some development–between Sullivan-Jones’ operatic vocals and the fuzzed-out guitars in overdrive, “Crocodile” feels like the most ambitious rocker on the album (still a great pop hook in that one), while the diss-ballad “Silver Medalist” is a nice surprise and penultimate track “Thumbtacks” is some sneaky brilliance. It all ends with one last (relatively) blistering rave-up called “Bird in the Furnace”, in which Richmond boisterously proclaims “I wanna walk out of the movie / Throw my keys down in a grate” in the chorus. Gum Parker muster up some real defiance here, but probably only because it seems like the most fun thing for them to be. (Bandcamp link)
Fantasy of a Broken Heart – Chaos Practitioner
Release date: April 11th
Record label: Dots Per Inch
Genre: Prog-pop, art pop, experimental rock, indie pop
Formats: Vinyl, CD, digital
Pull Track: Passion Clouds
It can be hard for some people (not me) to keep all these various Water from Your Eyes-associated bands straight, but I’m here to tell you that Fantasy of a Broken Heart is well worth your time. Bailey Wollowitz and Al Nardo have been touring members in Water from Your Eyes for a while now, and they’ve recently completed the full live band version of Nate Amos’ project This Is Lorelei. 2024’s Feats of Engineering, the first Fantasy of a Broken Heart album, was pieced together over a few years by Wollowitz and Nardo while on tour and in between other musical duties, and it’s an exciting and chaotic collection of inventive proggy pop music. The next Fantasy of a Broken Heart release didn’t take nearly as long to materialize–the six-song, nineteen-minute Chaos Practitioner EP arrives only a few months later. Chaos Practitioner is also a patchwork record, partially recorded by Nick Noneman in Los Angeles, partially made in Brooklyn and Mexico City, and featuring a few guests. The collaborative nature is probably the biggest difference between this EP and Feats of Engineering (which was recorded mostly by the main duo)–there are some prominent outside contributions on Chaos Practitioner, but additional hands don’t end up tipping Fantasy of a Broken Heart any further towards either “weird” or “pop”.
“Passion Clouds” is Fantasy of a Broken Heart at their most accessible–somehow, Nardo and Wollowitz make the song sound both incredibly streamlined (in a way that reminds me of bedroom-era This Is Lorelei) and like it’s indebted to post-prog 80s synth-rock stuff. “Have a Nice Time Life” is another hefty pop song, a dizzy and fuzzy piece of indie pop that also features the first obvious cameo on the EP, a rap-like guest verse from Jackson Katz of Brutus VIII (it kind of reminds me of Landowner–it’s probably the least congruent part of Chaos Practitioner, but I like it). Nick Rattigan of Current Joys’ vocals on “Road Song” are less attention-grabbing, but it’s not like he derails the smooth folky synthpop ride at all, and it’s a nice breather after “Star Inside the Earth”, which is Fantasy of a Broken Heart bouncing off the walls in a deconstructed sugar rush. “We Confront the Demon in Mysterious Ways” is the big finale, and it’s built like it, both in terms of the instrumental (which stretches the EP’s suave prog-pop across five minutes, pulling a bit from all the songs before it) and lyrically (Fantasy of a Broken Heart are rarely the clearest messengers, so it’s notable that the dissolving romance portrayed in the song is unavoidable from the writing). “We confront the demon in mysterious ways / I’m at a loss right now, I’m gonna push you away,” sings Wollowitz, and later “At the end of the day, you’re a chode / You’re a shadow on the side of the road”. Mysterious ways indeed. (Bandcamp link)
Sunny Intervals – Swept Away
Release date: April 11th
Record label: Self-released
Genre: Indie pop, soft rock, psychedelic pop, jangle pop, folk rock
Formats: Digital
Pull Track: I’ve Been Looking Over My Shoulder for Too Long
The artist behind Sunny Intervals may be a bit under the radar, but that doesn’t mean that he hasn’t been at this whole “indie pop” thing for a while now. In the mid-2000s up until 2012, Andy Hudson was the songwriter and co-leader of the London quintet Pocketbooks, who seemingly were right in the middle of the era’s British indie pop scene (Wikipedia claims that they played shows with The Pains of Being Pure at Heart, Art Brut, and Camera Obscura, among others). Hudson started Sunny Intervals, a solo project, sometime around Pocketbooks’ dissolution, and for a while they were releasing records fairly frequently–Rooftops in 2012, Step into Spring in 2014, Sunrise in 2016. After the latter of those three came an eight-year gap, however–I don’t know where Hudson went in that time, nor do I know why he decided to come back this year, but Swept Away is welcome all the same. The Sunny Intervals comeback record is a delicately beautiful LP of quiet indie folk, soft rock, chamber pop, and good old-fashioned indie pop. Swept Away is friendly and familiar-sounding, evoking modern Belle & Sebastian-influenced acts like Grand Drifter, Peel Dream Magazine, and Trevor Sloan as well as the more “mature”-sounding indie pop veterans on Skep Wax Records.
Sunny Intervals pull a neat trick on Swept Away–these ten songs sound relaxed, unhurried, and content, but, at almost exactly half an hour in length, there’s not a wasted moment among the tasteful acoustic guitars and minimal but brisk percussion. Between the uptempo but laid-back opening track “Waiting for Sunshine” (featuring a couple of motor-mouth-delivery moments from Hudson that don’t harsh the vibe at all) and the gorgeous 60s-style piano pop blossoming of “I’ve Been Looking Over My Shoulder for Too Long”, Swept Away is about as forward as this kind of music can be–and while the pensive ballad of “In the Blink of an Eye” slows down the high-flying momentum just a little bit, Hudson doesn’t ever stop trying to impress with heavy-duty fluffy pop songs (see “Lost and Found” and “One Last Day of the Holidays”, which pick up the pace as Swept Away forges into its second half). There’s an electronic/synthpop undercurrent to the entire album, but “Synchronised” is the moment where it really comes to forefront–it’s an interesting creation, a chamber folk tune with a dance beat lurching over top of it sleepily. The record wraps things up with a full-on piano sendoff in “Draw the Curtains”, and its simplicity reflects not a lack of ideas from its creator but a brief respite after a full exploration of them. (Bandcamp link)
Bedridden – Moths Strapped to Eachother’s Backs
Release date: April 11th
Record label: Julia’s War
Genre: Shoegaze, alt-rock, space rock, grunge, fuzz rock
Formats: Cassette, digital
Pull Track: Chainsaw
New Orleans-originating, Brooklyn-based band Bedridden first got onto my radar at the beginning of 2023 with their Julia’s War debut EP, Amateur Heartthrob, which was also the group’s first proper record after a 2022 demo tape. Vocalist/guitarist Jack Riley started the band in NOLA with a different lineup, but before he moved to New York he enlisted a couple of other Louisiana residents, drummer Nick Pedroza and bassist Sebastian Duzian, to make the journey with him. Amateur Heartthrob was a compelling mix of space rock, the heavier side of 90s alternative rock, and a bit of shoegaze, all of which are still very apparent on the first full-length album from the group (who recently added guitarist Wesley Wolffe after recording their latest record). Moths Strapped to Eachother’s [sic] Backs has plenty of nice and large Hum-inspired guitar riffs and Pumpkins-level pummeling alt-rock rhythms, but there’s just enough of an expansion in Bedridden’s sound to encompass some interesting melodic guitarwork and other pop instincts beyond the outward assault. Like the band’s debut EP, it was recorded by Momma’s Aron Kobayashi Ritch, who does an admirable job at honing in on some of Bedridden’s more unique impulses without taking away from their sheer might.
Moths Strapped to Eachother’s Backs opens with some really strong Hum-worship with “Gummy”, but there’s also some transfixing guitars happening in the song’s second half that set the tone for what to listen intently for throughout the record. The stop-start alt-rock of “Etch” accomplishes something similar, while “Chainsaw” bursts the “Bedridden sound” right open with a ripping noise-punk melodic explosion–the band say it’s inspired by The Lemonheads, and while I don’t really hear that, it does kind of remind me of bands like Gaadge and Ex Pilots who are plumbing the more pop-friendly depths of shoegaze and fuzz rock. The midsection of Moths Strapped to Eachother’s Backs walks a similar tightrope, but it’s the ending of the LP where Bedridden’s less-obvious influences begin truly winning out. In particular, “Uno” and “Ring Size” are really where the band indulge in post-punk, college rock, and new wave excursions–the former is wistful, jangly 1980s indie rock punched up with heavy guitars, while the latter is more of a straight-up Frankensteined combination of punchy alt-rock and jangle pop. It seems fitting that Moths Strapped to Eachother’s Backs ends with a jerky, grungy instrumental trying to break bread with a ringing, jangling guitar line–it’s the cleanest example of what Bedridden are trying to do on this album, but hardly the only successful one. (Bandcamp link)
Also notable:
- Dumb Things – Self Help
- Eraser – Hideout
- Bow and Yarrow – Bow and Yarrow EP
- Will Johnson – Diamond City
- Leopardo – Side A / Side B
- Index for Working Musik – Which Direction Goes the Beam
- Ribbon Skirt – Bite Down
- Breichiau Hir – Y Dwylo Uwchben
- Gloria – III
- Fusilier – Ambush
- Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs – Death Hilarious
- Heaven – Dream Aloud
- Silvis – A Tendency to Seek Distraction
- Commoner – Change of Heart EP
- The Ophelias – Spring Grove
- Nell Smith – Anxious
- The Entire Earth – I’m Not Scared EP
- Johanna Warren – The Night of the Wind EP
- Twat Union – Don’t Look It in the Eye EP
- L.A. Witch – DOGGOD
- Dustin Wong – Gloria
- Tapeworms – Grand Voyage
- The Hemphill Stringtet – Plays the Music of Julius Hemphill
- Superworld – Surefire EP
- Babe Rainbow – Slipper Imp and Shakaerator
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