Premiere: Never Lie About You — Olivia Castriota

New York-based musician Olivia Castriota grew up in Pennsylvania, with a passion for music manifesting early as she wrote songs in elementary school about boys and heartbreak. Her music today is a little more self-reflective, and whilst it may largely focus on matters of the heart, she rarely makes songs about being in love itself:

“Feelings are my favourite and I love, love. The weird part is, I rarely write actual “love” songs, but the second things go south, I have no problem writing an entire album about it. I love a cry your eyes out heartbreak song as much as I love a badass anthem.”

With a style that blends an upbeat electronic pop aesthetic with the earthy vocal delivery that channels the likes of Amy Winehouse, Castriota’s sound is distinctive in its ability to sound both grounded and dream-like. Here on Never Lie About You, Olivia depicts a situation where a small argument boils over into something more meaningful and hurtful. Drawing on that aforementioned self-reflection, Castriota concludes that “I lie a little bit more than I like to, but I would never lie about loving you”.

With production work that evokes easy-breezy summer days and the nervousness that comes from skirting the boundaries of a relationship’s comfort zone, Never Lie About You feels both hopeful and nervous. The chorus itself has this playful shout-out-loud cadence that captures something of the argument itself — that wonderful thing of a song whose very sound conveys the thing it depicts.

Listen: Get Loose! — Petticoat

Having grown up listening to his parents’ music, Let Loose! drips with the energy of Madonna, Depeche Mode and Soft Cell. Rather than relying purely on the sounds of the 80s, Petticoat combines them with the polished sounds of modern R&B and pop, itself a reflection of the exposure he gained into the hip-hop scene in the Bay Area through his older brother.

On Get Loose!, Petticoat (Real name David Halsey) serves up an enthusiastic and glossy piece of modern pop that still manages to create a nostalgic feeling. The big, crisp drums and vocal samples evoke something of Positive K’s sassy classic, I Got A Man, whilst the vocal effects and synths feel much more modern. All in, it’s a busy but accessible sound.

The song itself isn’t intended to be taken seriously, as Halsey explains:

“For me, the song isn’t as introspective. It’s a fictitious love story that is acknowledged through tongue-in-cheek self-doubt. I was listening to a lot of shallow heartbreak pop songs, and the concept of Get Loose! didn’t click right off the bat. Instead, it was this melding of narratives over time that led me to what you are hearing now.”

Check out Get Loose! Below:

Listen: Back To The Future — Arthur Moon

Back To The Future is the kind of song that makes it very clear what it is, almost instantly. With taut bass, crisp percussion and cheeky vocals, the song clearly leverages a mixture of late-70s / early-80s punk-funk sound to arrive at a kitchen-sink style of avant-pop.

In short, there is a lot going on here — brass kicks, vocals suddenly harmonise en masse, drums slip in and out of staccato rhythms and a weird experimental jazz sections suddenly turns up halfway through. All of this in a song that doesn’t even make it to the three-minute mark.

Arthur Moon is the musical Monica of Lora-Faye Åshuvud, a queer artist and multi-instrumentalist from New York. Back To The Future is “a song about what it might mean to be aware of your body as it moves through space and time, so you can help make the future an answer to the past”.

Clear? Clear.

Watch: Pauline — Sunnbrella

Pauline gently arrives with a dream-like melody that, for me, invokes Sofia Coppola flicks and shoegaze. Sunnbrella claim their inspiration is actually Éric Rohmer’s 1983 movie Pauline At The Beach, a French film following two young cousins in coastal Normandy. It’s not something I have seen, but the yearning sound of Pauline definitely piques my interest.

The sound Sunnbrella conjures here has something of the earnest and serious emotion of Teenage Fanclub, shot through a misty gauze of nostalgia for the 80s and 90s. With additional vocals from Claire Peng, the chorus is as restrained as the rest of the record, yet is buoyed by soft focus layered vocal harmonies.

Having initially started as a bedroom lo-fi pop project, Prague-born and London-based musician David Zbirka has gradually refined the Sunnbrella sound into something fuller and more ethereal. Describing the process of making Pauline, Zbirka said:

“We went through a few different versions of this song. By the time we landed on the final arrangement, the old lyrics didn’t fit the vibe any more, and I wasn’t sure what I wanted to write about. When I got home from the studio that night, I decided to watch ‘Pauline At The Beach’ on a whim and when I finished it, I sat down and wrote the new lyrics based on the characters in the film. It felt good not to write from personal experience for a change. The film is about the collision of childhood innocence with adult lies, and about how age doesn’t guarantee wisdom. I tried to get these themes across in the lyrics as well.”

Pauline comes ahead of Sunnbrella’s eponymously titled debut EP, out on 1 September on London label Permanent Creeps Records.

Watch: Inappropriate — River

Inappropriate comes with a nostalgic video, drawing on 80s teen movies to create something that channels our youthful need for drama. It’s mysterious and exciting, much like growing up — a period where big things still feel unknowable and the edges of our experience are still expanding.

As a duo, River were California-bred but are now based in Hamburg. On their debut single, Inappropriate, they actively choose to take a hard-turn away from the clichéd traps of sorrow, anger, or regret, and instead embrace freedom, desire, and opportunity.

Describing the song, the pair explain:

“This song is like traveling back in time to when we were still kids living each day to the fullest, not a care in the world. Not taking life and ourselves too seriously can be a lot harder than expected, but with just the right bit of distance it’s a lot less drama than you think.”

Check out Inappropriate below: