Listen: 1000% — Panda Riot

1000% arrives on a wave of fuzzy distortion and punchy drums, a grungy fury that comes together to create a melodic wall-of-noise. Vocals surf that wave, infecting the song with a candy-like nihilistic form of optimism.

Hailing from Chicago, Panda Riot create dream pop and describe 1000% as:

“A song about endless desire — about wanting everything all at once, even if it destroys you. It expresses an all-consuming, self-destructive need that makes you want to burn everything down and hold it all forever at the same time.”

With its pumped-up chorus of “I need you now… Boy, I need you right now, girl”, 1000% bristles with a joyous energy that reminds me of mid- to late-90s alt-rock, and I love it for that. 1000% is talent from Panda Riot’s forthcoming album, Extra Cosmic. Check it out below:

Watch: Facetime After Sex — Girlhouse

Girlhouse is back with her same aloof delivery, but this time embracing a more soulful sound.

On Facetime After Sex, Girlhouse (real name Lauren Luiz) manages to deliver an infectiously laid-back melody whilst evoking a feeling of despondent boredom and disappointment. The opening lines may rank as my favourite this year, with Luiz deadpanning:

“He called his friend on FaceTime, after we had sex the first time. I never talked to him again, and I don’t think I … ever told him why.”

From those opening lines, Facetime After Sex slow motion trips and falls into a big hooky chorus that sounds like Luiz daydreaming for someone just a bit more fucking interesting. One of my favourite touches to the restrained production work here is the occasional moment where Lauren lets out an “Ohhh” that sounds just a bit like a disappointed sigh.

Inspired by an awkward dating phase in her early-20s, Luiz describes the thinking behind Facetime After Sex:

“I wanted FaceTime after Sex to feel as nostalgic as this story is for me. My early 20s were filled with lots of searching for love on the apps (tinder, bumble, etc) right at the beginning of that kind of online dating. Wow. What a time. The types of things people used to say on dates, mostly coming from me, still haunt my dreams. I have some friends that have actually met their current partners on the apps so I know it’s not all bad but for me it was nothing but top tier awkwardness. This song is about a few men I met along my journey to get off of the apps and why I tolerated the shit that I went through.”

Facetime After Sex comes from Girlhouse’s new the third ep. Both are released today.

Watch: I Don’t Think We Can Be Friends — TOVI

TOVI’s I Don’t Think We Can Be Friends starts with swaggering bass and sharply punched drums that bite with a crisp sharpness, but within the song’s fifth second, musician Rebecca Emms already subverts our expectations. A cacophony of electronic noise rains down on us — fuzzy drum patterns, staccato melodies and squeaky analogue synths create a chaotic and disorientating sound that almost feels at war with the artist. That perhaps explains why the various elements of instrumentation become visualised in the form of digital paint smeared across the song’s video, which otherwise consists of a slightly bored looking Emms, obscured by the all that noise.

Talking about that video, which she created, Emms said:

“This song, the colour of each instrument really comes across to me with so much personality. My aim with the video was to basically put a ‘face’ to the sound — the movement and colour of these sonic personalities.”

TOVI references some of the music she loved as a teen as being an inspiration for I Don’t Think We Can Be Friends, specifically Yeah Yeah Yeahs’ Fever To Tell. With production from Josh Korody, and mastering from MSTRKRFT and Death From Above 1979’s Jesse F Keeler, the song but blends that sound into something that draws on all the bits of mid- to late-00s alternative rock and electronic music. The whole piece just reeks of attitude, in the best possible way.

The song comes alongside the announcement of TOVI’s forthcoming debut album, I Keep Floating Away, and Emms describes this new song as:

“...A mini anthem about being okay with letting go of people who cause you heartache or just made you feel like shit. Sonically, I think the track channels some of the albums I loved in my teens –like Yeah Yeah Yeahs’ Fever to Tell – just pure fun. When it comes to songwriting and being in the studio, I’m learning to let the chips fall where they may, stop overthinking every decision. I’ve taken my songwriting pretty seriously over the years, which is still really important to me, but I am also becoming more inspired by notes and textures — and allowing that lead me somewhere new.”

The result is a truly thrilling piece of art, even if it lasts just under three minutes. That tension between the organic and electronic elements within the song feel like the emotional interplay that exists when we try to forget about someone and move on... The machine hitting like the persistent desire to go back in, even when you have decided to move on.

Can’t wait to hear more, and in the meantime will be playing this a lot.

Listen: Cool Guy — Girlhouse

I wrote about Girlhouse’s hazy sun-kissed sound last year upon the release of her single Happy Now, and Cool Guy is cut from the same cloth. Having garnered Radio 1 and 6Music airplay with recent single paul blart mall cop, Girlhouse, real name Lauren Luiz, now has her sights set on another forthcoming EP, appropriately titled the third ep.

On Cool Guy, Girlhouse continues to channel the likes of Phoebe Bridgers and Soccer Mommy, but with just a touch of the polish of post-Folklore Taylor Swift.

Somewhat universally relatable in its theme, albeit to anyone who isn’t the kind of person the song depicts, Cool Guy is a song about those who live with a sense of aloof detachment and privilege. The song’s sound and production treatment fits that theme perfectly — the gradual pace and glossy sheen hits like a musical slow clap. Describing the song’s inspiration, Luiz says:

“The term ‘cool guying’ means to acquire a slight amount of clout and become a complete weirdo. I wrote this with my friend Mark Campbell when I was feeling a lil zesty about some of the clouty people in my life. In all seriousness, no shade on them, I just had to figure out if that was of value to me. I had an ex that got mad at me for calling him ‘cool’ and that was really confusing to me until he ended up actually being very very ‘cool.’”

Cool Guy plays into the broader themes of the forthcoming the third ep, as Luiz describes:

“I split this ep in two acts. The first act follows the euphoria of avoidance, doing everything to detach from all feeling while playing house. The back half is meant to snap you into reality with darker sounds and themes, I talk about losing friendships not only to death but also to the flow of life, and I try to be more vulnerable with the person I love and ask them straight up, “please don’t stop loving me”. The theme of this ep is really about coming to grips with reality and the growing pain that comes with it. I hope you like listening to this train wreck as much as I liked writing it.”

Check out Cool Guy below:

Watch: Heavy — PELA

Following on from their lovely song (and gorgeous live video), Tell Me, Brighton pair PELA are back with new song Heavy.

PELA’s latest song takes a song about feeling slow and heavy and combines it with the kind of groove that feels like it could lift the darkest of us out of the doldrums.

The duo, made up of Hannah Coombes and Olly Shelton, describe Heavy as “kind of an anxious indie-pop”. Co-written with British musician Liz Lawrence, the new song deliberately juxtaposes the song’s optimism with its insecurity, its organic sounds with electronic ones. It feels like a testament to the duality that exists in all people and all things.

Heavy is the latest song to be unveiled from PELA’s imminent debut EP, Little Ceremonies. That release is PELA’s “first time bringing together a body of work that’s connected”, the band say. As they explain the relationship between the two tracks heard to date and the rest of the EP, PELA describe Heavy and Tell Me as songs that:

“Confront frustration and anxiety, both personal and societal … (whereas the three songs that follow are) a way to transform these feelings. How making everyday acts ceremonial and precious can be a way to find joy, peace and solace from anxiety and pain.”

Check out PELA’s live performance of Heavy, recorded live at St Mary’s Church, below: