The Underground of Happiness

TCIC are releasing a special edition of last year’s stirring album Channel the spirits . This previously unreleased track is part of the expanded package. You know what to expect at this stage and yet it still gets the blood pumping. Saxophones. Jagged bass pulses. Spacey bleeps. Groovy breakbeats flirting with jazz. A savage cosmic stew.

Bracing new single from the San Francisco band... ...as if John Fogerty was stepping out with The Byrds. So. Muscular. But cosmic in that harmony drift. Glorious and uplifting pop music to coin a phrase.

Another great service to humanity by Earth Recordings in reissuing this... ... another sublime soundtrack from the Russian master. Jazz and orchestral influences. Piano. Flute. Harpsichord. Vibraphone. Strings. Brushed drums. Absolute bliss in a minor key. https://tariverdiev.bandcamp.com/

Sometimes a plainly gorgeous piece of music is enough. Other times the softly muted fanfare of brass like the beloved sound of Eric Matthews can make all the difference. No sense of Mr Matthews’ baroque flourishes here though. More akin to some of The Byrds’ subtler experiments. Around the Younger than yesterday album when David Crosby in particular struck out on a tantalising dreamy limb before heading off into the sunset. There’s a distinct domestic feel. An idyll. As Alisdair MacLean details a daily routine around Silver Street and singing strings buoy up every word. It amounts to a kind of soaring chamber pop as poignant as it is uplifting.

Another wonderful clatter from the English duo ahead of the debut album Come play the trees . Electronics. Urgent buzzing pulses. Perfunctory drumming. Garage rock whoops. Yes. Come Play The Trees by Snapped Ankles

Something about the spareness and spaciousness of this music went perfectly with cool breezy nights in the middle of nowhere French countryside lately. Piano and cello is all that’s involved for the most part... ...well that and the essential element of the room in which it was recorded. The space. Long cello bows. Hanging piano notes. Plus of course the unbeatable touch of Mr Bourne . Classical music (if you wish) with a wonderful feel and tons of heart. A beautiful record. Isotach by Matthew Bourne

Another wonderful nugget from Matthew E. White’s Spacebomb hub in Richmond Virginia. The origin though is the voice and songs of Azniv Korkejian , born in Syria to Armenian parents but resident in the US for some years. Her voice is an intoxicating thing. Hushed. Softly spoken. Insistent. Containing something of a Carole King about it. Or even a Karen Carpenter maybe. Another time anyway. When there was strength in subtlety and soul was in the nuance as much as the volume. And the dream of an arrangement behind the perfect match. Gently enervating brass and woodwind. Uplifting top note strings. Beautiful pitter patter bass. A genius falsetto backing vocal that seems to catch me every time. She also has a way with as lyric, Ms Korkejian. California city parks They talk in exclamation marks An understated treasure. Bedouine by Bedouine