Listen: Hostage - Maya Malkin

Having already impacted the Canadian music with her band, Motel Raphael, Montreal singer-songwriter Maya Malkin is now launching her solo musical project with the single Hostage.

Hostage is a short-but-punchy piece of powerful alternative pop about the dissatisfaction that can come from a relationship that doesn’t exhibit a sense of equality, where one person feels the other brings more negativity than reassurance to the relationship. Malkin's vocal delivery is assured and has plenty of pop-polish, and yet still ultimately manages to feel grounded, honest and human. With production details that accentuate and enhance the performance, I couldn't help but fall for Hostage.

Check out Hostage below:

Listen: How We Wanted - Logan Prescott

Logan Prescott is a Dallas-based indie pop artist, and How We Wanted has one of those hooks that you just can’t help but want to dance to.

Drawing on 80s influences but with a thoroughly modern layer of sheen, the track combines reverb-soaked percussion, muted guitars and soft synths to make a wistful track about yearning for something better. It’s the feeling of looking back at yesterday’s hopes for today. In the current climate, that feels more relevant than ever - and the song’s title in the chorus almost feels like both a knowing wink and a huge understatement... “It’s not quite how we wanted it”, sings Prescott.

Check out the sunshine-infused How We Wanted below:

Dallas-based Indie Pop artist Logan Prescott returns with his 80’s vibes in “How We Wanted” after being selected as Editor’s Pick on music blog IndieShuffle. In times of quarantine and isolation, “How We Wanted” yearns for better days and resolves to its frank reality with the help of plucky guitars and dreamy synths, while being swept up in the “what ifs” of vocoders and poppy melodies. Look for Logan this summer on the front page of Splice for his game-changing Modern Pop Vocals sample pack.

Listen: Get Better - SupaSlo

Just the title of Get Better was enough to catch my attention. We’re going through quite literally the toughest period I’ve experienced in my whole life. It’s not so much the isolation and distance, it’s also the complete and overwhelming uncertainty. COVID-19 has torn-up the rules, at least as most of us understood them, and I think all of us can’t wait for things to get better. I’ve never felt less certain of my decisions - be they how much to buy at the supermarket, or how to do the right thing for my family, my colleagues and my friends.

SupaSlo position themselves as alt-tronica - a sound they describe as “Daft Punk, M83 or Disclosure, but shoved through a buzzing guitar amp”, but Tame Impala feel like their closest peers. The duo formed in 2019 after guitarist Joe Gomez relocated to New York and met producer Emmet Folger. Joe has spent years playing in a psychedelic rock group, CJ Clydesdale Band, while Emmett had spent his time perfecting drum loops and experimental electronic music. The pair were friends for a year before actually sitting down and working to bring these influences together.

Get Better starts gently - the kind of 70s retro sound that somehow captures the feeling of both blue eyed soul and progressive rock. Backwards guitars, low-slung bass and earthy vocals come together to create something that thuds with a tactile sensibility.

But for what it is, it’s played straight - a guitar solo picking its way through a smokey room, drums that kick with a sense of solid foundation. From two-minutes, however, all bets are off... Suddenly we have vocals drifting out of phase and the traditional(ish) instrumentation evaporates - it’s like taking a breath and sinking into the water, or yielding to the embrace of someone you love. The things that felt solid and important no longer are, and the main vocal hook kicks in, a simple-yet-reassuring “I wanted you to know that things will get better”.

Sometimes I pick people up, and sometimes I need to be picked up. The experience of having someone tell me they are there for me and that it’s okay to not be okay? This record triggers the same parts of my brain as that, which basically makes it medicine as far as I’m concerned. Put this on your best sound system or headphones, crank it up and close your eyes...

Listen: A Million Doubts - Glassio

Glassio is the NY-based dream pop project of Irish-Iranian songwriter and producer Sam R. In much the way BlackPlastic favourites Yumi Zouma do, Glassio draw on influences of dance music but apply them to introspective, slow disco.

A Million Doubts is a perfect example of what Glassio can deliver... At this strangest of times, this is music that feels what I feel, but sets our loneliness amongst rock pools and salt spray and sunset cocktails. The vocal harmonies, acoustic guitar and loose, electronic percussion give this a beautiful, soft and spellbound feeling. It’s being alone in beautiful, crowded spaces.

Launched alongside the announcement of his debut album, *For The Very Last Time, A Million Doubts is about nostalgia and the things that get left behind. Describing the meaning behind the song, Glassio says:

“As a song, I was writing it with my late grandmother in mind. She passed when I was six-years-old, and I wanted the song to pay homage to the people no longer with us that we think of making proud through our careers and through our lives without them. The people that are always on our mind when something good or bad happens to us. When I finished the first mix I remember going up to my roof and staring at the moon for hours and feeling really close to people no longer in my life. At the time I really needed a song to serve that function and I think this one really did and still does.”

A Million Doubts is beautiful - I can’t wait to hear more of For The Very Last Time when it is released in July.

Written by Sam R., Charles Fauna Produced and Arranged by Sam R. Mixed by Ariel Loh Mastered by Ariel Loh

Listen: You Should Know - PRIZM

True story: I pretty much think Carly Rae Jepsen saved pop music. Ask me to select the best pop records of the past decade and I expect at least three of them would be by her.

Which is all my way of saying, DAMN do PRIZM sound like a Carly Rae Jepsen. 80s sheen? Check. Playful vocals? Check. Joyous “whoop”? Check. Massive chorus? Check check check!

PRIZM are Dallas-based duo Danni James and Krisluv, and having experience together across a number of different genres they are now focused on creating music in tribute to the synth heavy sounds of the 1980s.

So in short, You Should Know is three-and-a-half-minutes of polished pop joy, complete with lovely vocal harmonies and pretty much flawless production. Just check it out.