What a year! The past 12 months have been just incredible in terms of quality music output from our hometown. In fact, people are releasing albums left and right last minute in order to get on lists for the year. So instead of reading about year-end wrap-ups, let’s delve into some new releases you’ll still be bumpin’ in January.
What a year! The past 12 months have been just incredible in terms of quality music output from our hometown. In fact, people are releasing albums left and right last minute in order to get on lists for the year. So instead of reading about year-end wrap-ups, let’s delve into some new releases you’ll still be bumpin’ in January.
Soulful Division is the combo of Wise Inquisition and Cadillac CAT, and they just released a video from their upcoming album Lettuce (look for a review in the next couple of weeks on SoundsofRVA.org). The track is called “Trill Chill Era,” and was filmed in classy black and white. The two dudes chill amongst some decaying and/or abandoned housing with really cool angles and architecture.
photo by Inga Schunn
Celtic Panda has released a live recording from a show in Harrisonburg, VA at the Blue Nile. The 5-piece jam band enlists the help of Tyler Donnely on saxophone while Nick White mixed and recorded the set. Make sure you check out “City of Freaks” for some psychedelic goodness. There’s also a Phish cover in there (“Chalkdust Torture”) that is the anthem of countless youth (and wannabe-still-youth). “Ratchet Ass Princess” is a really cool progressive rock tune that is reminiscent (in name only) or in the light of Phish’s cover of “Funky Bitch.” Catch Celtic Panda on 12/23 @ The Camel opening for Silo Effect!
Will Fisher is a music major at VCU, and he just released a song from his upcoming album, Monologues. “The Road to Hell Is Paved with Good Intentions” tells us the other side of the story in his minimalist piano track. Dissonance and downtempo characterize the beginning of this piece. By mid-song, though, the hands are heavier and the notes more plentiful before dropping off again. It’s important to note that this was recorded in one take.
Stone Mountain has released a heavy as shit self-titled 3-song EP, and it burns with doom intensity, stoner licks, and sludgy crassness. Engineered by Mike Tony from Ground Up Studio (Hard Stripes), the album is the kind of distorted progressiveness that builds and builds. RIYL: Cough, Windhand, Lost Tribe.
Pelican Johnny lives in Norfolk now, but he has released an acoustic album recorded at Snake Oil Studios by Dan-O Deckleman. The folk punk troubadour also spent some time in Austin honing his skills. 13 North and South EP contains old bedroom recordings plus songs that will appear on his upcoming Relentless Heart. This album was made “during the darkest – and medium brightest – of times.Ups and downs.Good and bad. North and south.”
photo by Bridget Camden
The Richmond Shape Note Singers take us way back when shape note singing was THE THING. Shape notes were a way of notating music in the 1800s in an effort to make reading music easier for the common man, fostering community singing. The Shenandoah Harmony Sessions from the James River Sacred Harp Convention 2013 has been released for mass consumption, and if you’re into it, there are 39 tracks of a capella chorus music.
Pike Possum‘s Matt Colvin and Todd Tipton have a new power trio called The Continental, and they are heavy and garagey. The band just put out an album of instrumental progressive stoner metal, and it slays. Check out “Heavy Bones” for a thrash-worthy epic of grunge time and space.
Colvin has also released some solo material this year called Origins: I, II, and III. Just below is Origins III, an introspective acoustic EP. Colvin’s deep baritone joins a female vocalist for some passionate, heartfelt melodies.
Sleepy Brother is an Americana duo who has recorded a Christmas tune called “Joy is Here.” The twosome released an EP called Attachment at the beginning of the year, and somehow we spaced on covering it. Heather Wiederholt’s vocals arrest your ears with her lilting soprano. Nathan Burns’ surrounding guitar fills a great space while his keys mimic Wiederholt’s melodies.
photo by Wes McWillen
Queer Rocket is the coolest grunge punk band out there, and they just released Blast Off! recorded by Bryan Walthall at the Sound of Music Recording Studios. Five tracks of riot grrl trash rock is just what you need to take this 2013 to the ’14.
By Sarah Moore Lindsey (soundsofrva.org)
