Listen: Happy Now — Girlhouse

With crisp, sun-kissed guitars and hazy vocals, Happy Now feels like summer vacations bottled and spritzed, a film of warmth upon my skin. At the same time, it bristles with a level of anxiety — vocals puncturing the easy-breezy feeling melodies with the refrain of, “Are you fucking happy now?”

The lyrics themselves portray the experience of sacrificing a bit of yourself for someone else, and yet feeling that the sacrifice isn’t recognised. Discussing the song, Girlhouse, real name Lauren Luiz, says:

“Happy now is about trying to make someone else happy at the expense of your own mental health. I wrote it shortly after moving to Nashville and had a lot of anger at the time. It was recorded and produced in the basement of a frat house in Nashville.”

Having grown up in Portland, Luiz initially pursued acting in LA, and it was this that exposed her to the people and places that would ultimately form the basis for her music career. She met her future bandmate and producer Tyler Thompson in the UK whilst studying and working in Bristol. Once Luiz returned to LA, her and Thompson formed the band WILD with another bandmate, who saw success on streaming platforms and through advertising and movie exposure.

In the background, however, Luiz was writing music for her own project, Girlhouse. Drawing inspiration from the likes of Phoebe Bridgers and Soccer Mommy, The eponymous Girlhouse EP was a breakup letter to LA. Now residing in Nashville, Luiz continues to make music as Girlhouse. Check out Happy Now below:

Watch: Slip Away — Meet Me In Orbit

Meet Me In Orbit are Bay Area duo Jared Brannan and Brandon Bews. The band formed in 2014 when the pair, then roommates, started releasing their self-produced music on Soundcloud.

Following a feature on the Tricycle Record’s annual compilation of up and coming artists from the Bay Area, Meet Me In Orbit were signed by NY indie label Sky Council Recordings. Radio coverage and numerous live appearances followed, with the duo taking quarantine as an opportunity to refine their sound and work on a new EP.

Slip Away represents the product of that time, and like a lot of art emerging now it feels like it not only comes from, but also reflects on, the experience of isolation resulting from COVID-19. Meet Me In Orbit explain:

“With Slip Away, we wanted to explore the claustrophobia of desperately yearning for something, but having no clear sense of what that thing is. It’s a song about the ways we tend to craft our inner-dialogue around autobiographies that are themselves constructed of little lies and self-deceptions. In the end, that’s what nostalgia itself is--the overwhelming desire to go back to a time and place that never really existed in the form we’re yearning for.”

The sound created of Slip Away blends modern electronic production with melodic pop and a dash of 80s New Romanticism. Meet Me In Orbit have created an appropriately otherworldly feel to the song — percussive melodic synths picking out rhythmic melodies beneath vocals with effects that enable them to embellish the emotion of the record. It’s a crisp, accessible and atmospheric record — check it out below.

Listen: Burning Rubber In The Sun — Don’t Connect

London-based collective Don’t Connect are back with another lethargic and laid-back piece of experimental indie-pop. Having caught my attention back in May with On My Mind, their Metronomy-like tribute to being genuine, I was excited to hear another new track so soon.

Leveraging the same vocal overdubs and lo-fi production tropes as On My Mind, Burning Rubber In The Sun is a slow song about driving fast. I can’t help but think about slow motion cinematic scenes of wheel spins when listening to it. With an easy guitar melody and fuzzy bass played gingerly, this song has exactly the raw and loose feel that drew me to On My Mind.

Check out Burning Rubber In The Sun below:

Listen: Why Would You (Go) — Jodie Nicholson

Why Would You (Go) bubbles with a soft melancholy, like a tender but firm squeeze of your hand and your heart. With a production style that places the focus on layers, Jodie Nicholson has created a piece of music that conveys depth despite the fact it is just three-minutes in length.

Jodie has spent the past 18-months building her reputation as one of the UK’s most exciting talents, having been play-listed by BBC 6 Music and receiving coverage from numerous other radio stations and blogs. And Nicholson’s foreboding track Move left an indelible impression on me last year.

Taking inspiration from her father’s love of prog rock, Nicholson loves music that places you in a moment. There is something about the way Why Would You (Go) surrounds me in sound that evokes the feeling of prog rock and folk, albeit heavily filtered through a contemporary pop lens. Indeed, it immediately makes sense upon hearing her music that Jodie cites artists as diverse as Daugther, Warpaint, Pink Floyd and Laura Marling as influences.

Clearly unafraid of taking risks, on Why Would You (Go) Jodie has a chorus played in an uncommon 7/8th time signature. The disconcerting upheaval we hear musically makes sense, given the song’s subject:

“It’s about knowing a relationship is no good for you, but as soon as you see them, you’re like ‘how could I possibly leave?’, a conversation I had with myself time and time again. You'll hear clips of me driving, talking to myself in my car, which became a safe space for me to voice how I was feeling without ever having to admit anything to anyone else.”

Check out Why Would You (Go) below, and look out for Jodie Nicholson’s forthcoming EP, Can’t Espace The Feeling.

Listen: Easy To You — Gary Mictian

Easy To You is the new single from London-based musician and producer Gary Mictian. Drawing his inspiration from vintage pop, dystopian sci-fi and cinematic sound, he looks to use modern production techniques to create fantastical worlds within “a carefully constructed pop song”.

Here Mictian does just that. Easy To You is a song about the experience of feeling disillusionment in the face of an ex-partner, whose ease in moving on seems to cheapen the memory of the relationship. The song conveys the depth of Mictian’s emotion, as he places heartfelt vocals front-and-centre, with a slow electronic groove underpinning the melody. The whole song is buoyed by layered harmonies and a slightly crunchy production style. It feels analogous to the depth of layered emotions… The experience of love, disappointment, and betrayal that can linger once a relationship breaks down.

Having studied music in his native home of New Zealand, Mictian has developed a level of technical knowledge that he brings to his music. This technical ability ultimately unlocks his natural ability — with a vocal capability that spans four octaves.

Check out Easy To You below: