Johnny Bell - Mountain StatesThis album is made out of simple, spare materials — banjo at the forefront, fiddle, acoustic guitar and synth drones filling out the backdrop. But somehow, Johnny Bell’s Mountain States manages to sound absolutely immense and sweeping, like the stark, wide-open landscapes of the musician’s home state of New Mexico. On a similar level as the great Nathan Bowles, the banjo isn’t some dusty Americana relic in Bell’s hands; it’s a living, breathing thing, resonant…

Best Record of 2001: Day 41 Good morning! Today we’re taking a look at Gorillaz’ self-titled debut as it faces off against Clearlake’s Lido. Note: As many of you saw, I recently wrote about a Best Record of 2001 challenge and noted that I’d be writing some of these up. The plan is to do quick hits on each first-round matchup and post them directly to the page. Some will be longer, some won’t, and some might just be a handful of sentences. There’ll probably be a few typos. We’ll also have a few…

Darkthrone just released a new album, so Shelley and Jason thought they would get together with some beers and not talk about it.

Note: May 18th is a big day both in music history and for anyone who lived in the PNW in 1980. I first ran this piece when there were about 6 of us here (and 3 of them lived with me), and it’s become an annual tradition. We don’t have many musical traditions in my family. On Thanksgiving, my wife & kids have to endure “Alice’s Restaurant” at least once (or rather, my attempts to sing it). Sometime in the next few weeks after that, Otis Redding’s version of “Merry Christmas Baby” gets a spin,…

I hope I am getting the band name correct and that they weren’t called something else. I found this account by a Duncan Forgan that has 19 tracks recorded between 1995 and 1999 by what looks like a band called The Cairo Years. The quality is varied, but there are some gems not to be missed like “Summer Starts Here” or “City Sickness”. The tracks available are: “Girl You’ll Never Know”, “Telling Jokes at the Astral Flights”, “Can’t Recall”, “The Other Side of Summer”, “Over You”, “Am I Bothering…

Neck resets can be tricky to explain in the abstract, but a travel guitar that came in for a setup this week provides a really clear illustration of what's actually happening — and why it needs to happen. Worth a look even if you've covered this ground before. I’m taking a little step into the past this week and discussing something we’ve talked about before. However, an instrument that I was asked to set up has provided me with a really nice illustration on the subject of neck resets and I…

Day Nine in Tokyo. No new kyujo in the top divisions. Kazekeno picked up his first loss against Shonannoumi. At 8-1, he still holds a solo lead in the Juryo yusho race. Kazuma and Enho trail at 7-2. Enho defeated Nishikigi, a fading member of the old guard – and one of the larger members … Continue reading Natsu 2026: Day Nine

The first Pressing Concerns of the week features a new album from Avery Island BCE, as well as new EPs from Me at the Zoo, Rob & Ellen, and FOND. Check them out below! 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. Me at the Zoo / Rob & Ellen – Vol. 1 / In on It Release date: April 17th / May 1stRecord label: Vacant Stare / Take a…

On Sundays I try to at least quickly note some of my favorite listening from the week prior — things I would later regret having not written about in more depth, so better to share here briefly than not at all. ▰ Solo ambient cello, heavy on the texture, from Ukrainian musician Fedir Tkachov: ▰ On July 17, Kate Carr will release Vertical London (New Year’s Day), a collection of field recordings that aim to collate the sounds of London from minus 20 metres below sea level to 240 metres above,…

Music is key to my archaeological process especially since so much of the fussy work of archaeology is relentlessly boring. Fortunately, there is more than enough good music in the world. I have been charmed by Alan Braufman’s recent revival. His most recent album, Anthem for Peace (2026) includes Patricia Brennan on vibes, Chad Taylor on drums, and Luke Stewart on bass. This has drawn me back to Wendell Harrison’s work from the 1970s. His debut album An Evening with the Devil (1972) released…

While researching, looking for the hippie roots of Ibiza’s “Balearic Beat” for a magical minute I got distracted by music being made on Mallorca, and, in particular, in the village of Deia … In the `60s Ibiza’s live music really only consisted of spontaneous jams. Beach drum circles beating, naked folks dancing, as night fell. Crazy parties / happenings in fincas full of freaks. Nothing was recorded. All was of, and lost to, the moment. However, on the neighbouring Mallorca there was in…

I am obsessed with the advertisements in the old music papers - the New Wave era is particularly rich for the semiotician and lover of graphic design trends, but then so is the Old Wave era. For a historian, it's almost as rich material to draw on as the actual journalism.However that is not my subject today - my subject today is advertisements for the music press. I'm going to start looking for the ink-and-paper versions, which I suspect are clueless in the extreme. But for now here are four…

After venturing a bit out of our comfort zone to see Bring Me The Horizon and Motionless In White play an arena show, my partner and I got to see one of our favorite metalcore bands play a much smaller venue last night↗ - and we didn't even have to drive two hours to get there! Fit for a King came to the Mars Music Hall↗ here in Huntsville, and they brought with them Invent Animate, ten56., and ACRES. It was so nice getting back to a smaller local metal show. ACRES British melodic metalcore…

Hey people! Almost seven years ago, I featured on here a song by a Swedish singer songwriter Melina Borglowe; the only song by her that I knew at the time, and the only thing that I knew about Melina herself was that she is Swedish. I really liked that song and actually still come back to it, and I’ve tried to keep an eye on Melina’s career over all this time, even if not super closely or regularly. I was reminded of her recently and thought it would be nice to feature her once again, after all…

Photo by ZoeA number of months ago I heard some music coming from my daughter Zoe's room that caused my ears to prick up. The vocals were outstanding. I asked who it was - Sienna Spiro, she's all over TikTok was the answer. I checked if she was touring, but her SWG3 show in Glasgow was long sold out. It was subsequently upgraded to the O2 Academy, but tickets went in a flash.Late on Friday afternoon, a source came good for a couple of tickets and we were going. We got parked round the corner…

carolina eyck - how to play a scale on the theremin I'd never thought about how this was done. Almost every time I see a theremin played, it's for a reverb/delay-heavy freakout solo. Now I see that their sensitivity can be tuned! And you can either quantize them for easy scales or do it “fretless” for maximally expressive singing. Neat. Her orchestral performances are beautiful. See Ocean Light for Theremin and Orchestra with the Berlin DSO. I love the bass range she can pull down to (at 1:41)

"Do You Feel Like We Do (Live)" by Peter Frampton Listen on Apple Music Your browser does not support the audio element. Post a song that uses an instrument in an abnormal way - Do You Feel Like We Do by Peter Frampton The talk box turns the guitar into a voice-like instrument, especially in the live version from Frampton Comes Alive!. View Lou Plummer's Crucial Tracks profile

Twenty One Pilots maintain a firm grip on the top spot for a third week with their beautiful song “Drag Path”, while Brigitte Calls Me Baby‘s delightfully boisterous “Slumber Party” and Talk in Waves‘ plaintive Americana-tinged “Waiting for Me” move up a notch to #s 2 and 3, respectively. “Riptides” by Death Cab for Cutie moves up three to enter the top 10 at #10, and The Strokes are the biggest upward movers again this week, as “Going Shopping” jumps seven spots to #13. Four terrific songs…

For me, absence never killed momentum. Despite being active since the late '90s, Chile's Godless released their debut full-length album in 2010, and circle back to studio action 16 years later with the second album, Adversus Parousia, having sparsely released only a handful of EPs and demos in between these three decades. My first experience with the band was on the Omega Omnipotens EP (2017), which left me an impression good enough to explore previous material, but I still almost didn't…

Listening to on a Linux app: Shortwave

Because this is a sentiment that is surely timely. In addition to singing, I’m playing bass on this one. I tried chugging along with the guitar but it sounded just terrible, so the guitars on this one are courtesy of UJAM, and some MIDI programming on my part for the solo. Also, I wasn’t intentionally trying for a Tom Petty-like drawl, but damn it’s hard to sing a Tom Petty song without one, so here we are. I hope wherever he is in the universe right now, Tom is not rolling his eyes too hard…

Before the show…

If you still haven’t encountered Angine de Poitrine, do yourself a favour and take a few minutes to watch the first 3 minutes of this. If you’re intrigued, just let me tell you it just keeps getting better.

Got up, ran 5K in downtown for the AZ sunrise series, got a huge burro and rode over to Kilby court for the Kilby Block Party. Today’s weather was cloudy with a small amount of sun late in the day. The music and skateboard contest. The bowlriders were so fast and ripped so hard. We got to see so many great artists too. Jill Whit, the Kilans, feeble little horse, automatic, Briston Maroney, last dinner party, xx

Album of the Week, May 16, 2026 It’s a challenge to approach an album like So. Easily Peter Gabriel’s most popular album, arguably one of the most talked about and best albums of the 1980s, and it’s not like it’s obscure. But, like the songs themselves, the album is made of layers upon layers, and that’s where our tale begins. In fact, let’s begin at the beginning. Following the 1982 release of Security and the subsequent tour, you’d be forgiven for thinking that Peter took some time off, save…

And so it came to pass that yesterday evening I took the train into Dublin and back to see what, for me, will be the penultimate concert by National Symphony Orchestra Ireland at the National Concert Hall. The conductor for this occasion was Colombian born Lina Gonzalez-Granados. There was a good crowd at the NCH, although it wasn’t quite full. By way of a starter we heard Ciel d’hiver by Kaija Saariaho, a Finnish composer who spent her later life living in Paris; she passed away in 2023. This…

Art Brut Bang Bang Rock & Roll Get It At Discogs"Formed a Band" was such a brilliant first single, and summed up Art Brut's aesthetic so perfectly, that there almost seemed to be no need for more songs from them. Driven by a jagged, ragged guitar riff, it sounded like it was thrown together in ten minutes tops, and had lots of great, quotable lyrics ("I wanna be the boy -- the man -- who writes the song/That makes Israel and Palestine get along"), which were held together and topped off by…

Hey people! I was recently reminded of Welsh alt-electronic duo Cotton Wolf’s 2017 debut album “Life in Analogue”, which I happen to have really pleasant memories of, when I was listening to it for the first time a few months after its release, and so I thought that today I would share one of the songs from it, as I still think it’s a great album, and this song is one of my favourites on it. Their follow-up “Ofni” (Fear) is great too, by the way, so I seriously recommend you have a listen to…