Today’s Track: Andy Shauf – ‘Halloween Store’

February 16, 2023 — Leave a comment

Sending a signal from the outer reaches of the planet. Yes – I’m back with a new post!

Good Afternoon to you! My name is Jacob Braybrooke, and, after a year and a half of going through an existential crisis, I have returned to my directing chair as I finally bring you a new post on One Track At A Time – because even though we have been apart for a while, it will always be my day-to-day pleasure to showcase the greatest emerging artists who deserve to be played more on the radio! If you were previously a long-term reader of One Track At A Time (First of all, thank you very much for your kindness and patience), you may recall how I used to adore writing about an artist called Jens Lekman – a Swedish indie pop/folk singer-songwriter – who really stands out for me due to his strong ability to tell engaging stories with an equal measure of melancholy and subtle appreciation for the profound moments in life. Well, Andy Shauf is an artist who I’ve been loving recently because they offer a very similar USP but their music is a little more gritty in its textures. With his origins rooted firmly in Saskatchewan in Canada – Andy Shauf later moved to Biennfait and Regina where he developed an interest in playing Christian music with his parents, a time where he learned how to play various instruments including the Clarinet. Today, I’m going to be telling you about ‘Halloween Store’ – so take a few to check it out and join me below.

If you are new to Andy Shauf, then you share the same story as me. I only managed to catch glimpses of his most recent music on BBC Radio 6 Music through various shows including The New Music Fix playlist and Tom Ravenscroft’s weekend show. ‘Norm’ is his latest album, having been released on February 10th, 2023 via Anti- Records. The full-length album is built around a fictional character of the same name, with Shauf commenting, “The character of Norm is introduced in a really nice way, but the closer you pay attention to the record, the more you’re going to realize that it’s sinister”, in press releases building up to the release date. If you have an ear for the softer side of music, you’re going to be quite pleased to know that ‘Halloween Store’ is a sparkling highlight of warm substance, and not a terrifying descent into chaos. Starting off the summer-friendly, concise indie pop/rocker with a raw acoustic guitar strum and an embellishment of drum cymbals, Shauf starts with a light rhythm as he tells an amusing anecdote about seeking a Halloween costume before a surreal encounter with an old flame. You can hear gentle sweeps of electronic Synths and a gentle Hi-Hat groove that creates more upbeat rhythms, soundtracking the butterflies in his stomach as he delivers lovely lyrics like “As my fog cleared/I realized, That you were sitting in your car/Smiling at me in the Halloween store” with a youthful bombast as the near Classical-like crescendo picks up. While his voice feels a little brittle and nervous, the twee nature of his anecdote fits the mood of the character with expert precision. The track feels like one of those dreams you experience where you wake up feeling cheerful and amused, but you’re never quite sure why because the positivity that you just felt was a half-remembered entity. It’s perhaps not a track that will tip the world on its axis commercially – which is exactly my type of music – but I find it gripping and enjoyable how Shauf manages to balance mundanity and drama in a way that feels warm and nostalgic simultanouesly due to his softly simple-but-effective approach. We just had Valentine’s – but this is as autumnul as late October.

Thanks so much for checking out my latest post! I may have lost my music mojo, but my dedication has always been to bring you my thoughts some emerging artists that simply take my breath away! I would love it if you would give me a follow on Twitter at @JacobBraybrook2 and I may help you to discover your next favourite artist there!

Today’s Track: Aldous Harding – ‘Lawn’

February 24, 2022 — Leave a comment

Pictured: Aldous Harding performing a live set for ‘Morning Goes Eclectic’ at KCRW (2019) (Photo by Elli Lauren)

Good Morning to you! This is Jacob Braybrooke, and it’s time for us to get invested in yet another daily track on the blog, because it’s always my day-to-day pleasure to write up about a different piece of new music every day! Ever since being scouted by her fellow New Zealand-born musician Anika Moe, who came across Aldous Harding when she was busking outside of the venue that Moe was going to be performing at, who asked her to support her on that fateful night, the Lyttelton-born Alternative Folk anomaly of Aldous Harding has added a list of impressive credits to her resume despite still feeling relatively fresh for my ears. She scored an IMPALA’s European Album of The Year award nomination for 2017’s ‘Party’ and she won the APRA Silver Scroll Award in 2019 for her track ‘The Barrel’ taken from her third studio album, ‘Designer’. She has released music through various labels like 4AD, Spunk and Flying Nun, and she’s also proven to be a good collaborator for the likes of Perfume Genius, Fenne Lily and Marlon Williams over the years too. Next month, Harding is adding another album to her repertoire as her fifth full-length studio LP effort – ‘Warm Chris’ – is set to be released on March 25th, 2022 via 4AD. She will hit the UK and Europe for a tour in support of the new record in the Spring, with tour dates in North America to follow later in the summer. The new album was recorded at Rockfield Studios in Wales with producer John Parish. ‘Lawn’ is the lead single, and it comes accompanied by a reptile-themed music video which Harding co-directed with Martin Sagadin, a longtime collaborator, and it features a quirky cameo from Iggy Pop. Lets check it out.

“It sounds to me like there’s something completely new happening with my voice”, Harding told BBC Radio 6 Music in a recent interview about her new LP ‘Warm Chris’, where she added, “The vocals are tiny. I won’t try to speak about sound too much, because it’s here, and I don’t want to ruin or create a surprise. It reminds me personally and musically of a large horse trying to keep up with a train”, in her discussion about her follow-up to her one-off single ‘Old Peel’ that she released in 2021. Her vocals clearly become a point for emphasis on ‘Lawn’, where she stretches her vocals with a high-range that goes beyond her prior boundaries a little bit. She hacks away at the dead weight of a failing relationship lyrically, with some refrains like “Doors are the way you leave/Just be the way you are/Just be out and free/Can you imagine me?” and “If you’re not for me/Guess I’m not for you/I will enjoy the blue/I am confused by you” that are whimsical in tone and they retain a quirky energy throughout the track, but they also feel concise and to-the-point when you really sit and read between the lines. The instrumentation has a similar effect of pairing a lean and accessible arrangement with slow-moving melodicism that feels a little cerebral, too, in texture. The sparse smatterings of Drums and the steady bass melodies complement the vocals, where she confesses her annoyance on wasting time on “Writing b-sides” with her former partner and she dares herself to charge into the unknown with a proud declaration at the end, and she finds a new sense of liberation after being severed by the light shades of disappointment met by the situation of a relationship ending. The source material can feel a little dark in nature, but Harding’s voice has a whimsical and airy ring to it that makes everything flow smoothly and the formula grows from a fairly simplistic Alternative Folk track to something that takes a brazen step into more distinctive territory. Overall, ‘Lawn’ is a track that feels as exciting as it does intriguing, with cerebral acoustic production that is barely melodic enough to create some catchy and eminently listenable hooks, making for a sugar-coated equation of raw grit and gentle Dream-Rock influence which really stands out.

Pictured: Black Vinyl of ‘Warm Chris’ (LP) (Available from March 25th, 2022) (via 4AD/Rough Trade Records)

That brings us to the end of the page for another day – and thank you for your support as always. When you’re finished collecting B-sides, please make sure that you follow @OneTrackAtATim1 on Twitter and follow the site on Facebook to be notified whenever one of my new posts reaches the internet. Tomorrow, I will be marking the second appearance on the blog from a David Le’Aupepe-led alternative rock group from Sydney for ‘New Album Release Fridays’ as they will be releasing their third studio album tomorrow. The band won four awards at the ARIA Music Awards in 2017.

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New Year’s Day 2022 Special: Al Stewart – ‘Year Of The Cat’ (Live In Seattle, 1976)

January 1, 2022 — Leave a comment

Pictured: Cover Art for ‘Year Of The Cat’ (LP) (Released in July 1976) (via RCA Records/Parlophone Records)

This is Jacob Braybrooke and I’m wishing you a good version of your own of what has been the best day of the year so far for me with yet another daily track on the blog, since it’s always been my day-to-day pleasure to write up about a different piece of music every day! A Scottish folk revivalist figure who found prominence in the 60’s and 70’s as a unique songwriter who would combine soft rock songs with stories of different characters or significant events from history, Al Stewart is a talent of delicate weaving who once recorded a very fitting single to ring the New Year in with his 1976 offering, ‘Year Of The Cat’. For a musician who played a live set at the inaugural Glastonbury festival in 1970, reportedly knew Yoko Ono before John Lennon caught wind of her activist work, and shared a flat in London with equally memorable artist Paul Simon when he was frequently collaborating with Bruce Woodley of The Seekers fame in his younger years – Al Stewart scored a #8 hit on the US Billboard Hot 100 chart in 1977 with ‘Year Of The Cat’. Famously described by AllMusic as “one of those mysterious woman songs” nearer to the time, Stewart recorded the track as the title single of his seventh studio LP release during a session at the iconic Abbey Road Studios in London, before recording sequences from his live tour, including one performance in Seattle, for a live album, ‘The First Year Of The Cat Tour Live In Seattle’, to spring off its success one year later, where the album had become a top five chart hit in the US. Becoming a popular record to be used to demonstrate Hi-Fi demonstration, ‘Year Of The Cat’ was certified Platinum to indicate sales of over one million copies in the US during 1977. Get the kettle on, take a moment to reflect, and hear a tale of a love affair in Casablanca as we enter 2022 as a ‘Year Of The Cat’ below.

When Al Stewart stormed the mainstream with ‘Year Of The Cat’, you may be forgiven for believing him to be an overnight sensation but, in reality, it took him six previous albums worth of material and logging a bundle of hours on the Folk festival circuit before achiveing his stardom. Described by Stewart during his live set at Seattle’s Paramount theater as “a South African love song”, it remains to be the only appearance in the UK Singles charts for Stewart, who reached #31 with ‘Year Of The Cat’, a track which he ironically wrote and recorded during the Vietnamese Year Of The Cat, as it was the Year Of The Rabbit previously in China. Kicking proccedings off with a straightforward Piano line, the guitars flutter along beautifully as Al continues to kick into a higher gear with his combination of soft Rock ‘N’ Roll melodies and Progressive Pop rhythms that eventually morph into a stirring symphony of romantic guitar arrangements and radiant Piano chords as Stewart’s moving vocals concerning a whirlwind relationship in an exotic locale hit their timeless mark. Lyrics like “On a morning from a Bogart movie, In a country where they turn back time” hit their stride as Stewart sets up a vibrant scene of a one-time fling transforming into something much more substantial. Lyrics in the verses like “She comes out of the sun in a silk dress running, Like a watercolour in a rain” ignite more poignant sparks that make the otherwise sensual lyrics feel genuinely meaningful in the story, which is nicely complemented by the elegant String sections and the somewhat downbeat vocals by Stewart that provide a grounded take on the flirtatious dialogue between the two partners. It almost feels like Stewart is singing a duet meant for two vocalists on his own for the most part and he strikes a great balance between poise and sincerity with the delivery. Moving on to the instrumentation, we find Stewart bursting through various styles and motifs throughout the song – including a long instrumental section that leans towards classical Jazz with a colourful Saxophone solo and taking turns between the explosive guitar solo and the abruptly placed Brass instrumentation, but his production feels coherent enough as all of these varied elements complement the warmth of the lyrical mood. Overall, through melding his anecdotal storytelling that seems quite influential for the likes of Jens Lekman later on, and playing with the contemporary Blues song structure of the time, Stewart created a suitable story for New Year’s season with a very stylish and sophisticated range of talents. With that – I wish you a fantastic new year, and I cannot wait to hear the music contained within it.

Pictured: Al Stewart in a publicity shot before his performance at the Libbey Bowl (2018) (Photo via Noozhawk.com)

That brings us to the end of the coverage for the best day of the year so far on One Track At A Time and, as always, I thank you a great deal for your interest and support towards the site every day. After a brief hiatus, ‘Scuzz Sundays’ returns to its normally scheduled placement from tomorrow onwards, where we will be remembering a popular track from a very famous East Bay native punk rock band who found fame in the early 1990’s as we kick off the new year with familiarity. One of their tracks is the centerpiece of a Broadway musical, ‘American Idiot’, that was first performed in 2010.

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New Year’s Eve 2021 Special: Fleet Foxes – ‘White Winter Hymnal’

December 31, 2021 — Leave a comment

Pictured: Cover Art for ‘Fleet Foxes’ (Self-Titled LP) (Released on June 3rd, 2008) (via Bella Union Records)

Good Morning to you! This is Jacob Braybrooke, and it is time for a fleeting (If you see what I did there…?) moment of cool reflection in the midst of ringing in the New Year, with yet another daily track on the blog, seeing that it has always been my day-to-day pleasure to write up about a different piece of music every day! Although they took a reasonable hiatus between 2013 and 2016 so that lead singer-songwriter Robin Pecknold could pursue an undergraduate degree, the Washington-based Alternative Folk group of Fleet Foxes have always churned out their strong share of critically acclaimed and commercially successful material over the years and they released their fourth album – ‘Shore’ – as recently as last September via Anti- Records – a very enjoyable record that was featured on my ‘Top 25 Albums Of 2021’ list last January. The band stood up to prominence in mainstream consciousness, however, with the release of their self-titled debut album in 2008 via Bella Union Records. The hit that its associated Simon Raymonde-ran label needed to stay afloat at the time, the retro LP was the band’s first example of blending their refined vocal harmonies and tribalistic lyrical qualities together to widespread acclaim. The album was eventually made available to buy in places as common as your local Tesco’s supermarket shelves after it eventually reached #1 on the UK Albums Chart. Since being considered one of the best albums of the 2000’s and a highly impressive debut release, Fleet Foxes have continued to make ‘White Winter Hymnal’ a popular addition to festive playlists (both befitting of the Christmas and New Year’s season), a Silver-certified single full of beautifully layered vocals that has also been used in media productions like Hulu’s ‘The Path’ and 2015’s ‘Love The Coopers’. The track was also ranked as #66 on Pitchfork’s decade-end list of the greatest singles of the 00’s – and it has been covered by other established names such as television presenter Alexander Armstrong and A-capella act Pentatonix. Get swept away in the sound of ‘White Winter Hymnal’ below.

Issued on 7″ Vinyl as well as the digital MP3 format, ‘White Winter Hymnal’ was written by Pecknold from personal experience, as he was inspired to write the lyrics about a time where his friends ditched him in middle school. Although the lyrics might have been about childhood past, the source of the melody came from the familiar source of Walt Disney. Pecknold recounted to Rolling Stone during an interview in 2012, “The idea was a song like ‘Whistle While You Work’ from Snow White”, adding, “So it started with that very beginning thing, the first kind-of like, melody. And then once the verse was done, it just seemed like it lent itself to repetition”, in the discussion. Beginning with “I was following the pack” as the backing vocals of the band harmoniously overlap each other to capture the melancholy of winter and snow, ‘White Winter Hymnal’ was memorable for creating the effect of a dense cloud of harmonies that mimic a Cathedral reverb. Later lyrics like “White snow red as strawberries in the summertime” and “With scarves of red tied around their throats” feature imagery that is undeniably much stronger and the meaning of the track is left quite ambiguous. However, refrains like “To keep their little heads from falling in the snow” make me think of blindly following a bad influence without considering the repercussions. Instrumentally, the stirring drums and the ascending guitar melodies mimic the feeling of a sled that is riding down a path at a breakneck pace. The minimalist vocals, however, are more likely to convey a sense of contentment and peace, but the cavernous layered harmonies have a frosty and distant sound that relates to a white sheet of ice on a tranquill snowy morning. What was very interesting, and really quite groundbreaking, about the track is that, in seasonal terms, Indie and Pop music often tend to be more celebratory towards the summer season and, therefore, the qualities of a Christmas carol hidden in the melodies are more reminiscent of a traditional hymm and so Fleet Foxes’ ode to cool reflection in the winter was refreshing. Overall, ‘White Winter Hymnal’ had all the makings of a modern classic back in 2008 and that’s a quota that the Grammy-nominated band have fulfilled in 2021 with a recording that still sounds as gorgeous and as nostalgic as the first time it hit the radio airwaves. Cheers to a merry new year!

Pictured: Robin Pecknold (Lead Vocals/Rhythm Guitar), Skyler Skjelset (Mandolin/Lead Guitar/Backing Vocals), Casey Wescott (Keyboard/Synths/Backing Vocals), Christian Wargo (Bass Guitar) and Morgan Henderson (Upright Bass Guitar/Woodwinds/Violin/Saxophone/Percussion) (in 2020) (Photo via PR)

If you told me that Fleet Foxes were covered on the blog more recently – ‘Can I Believe You?’ here: https://onetrackatatime.home.blog/2020/10/26/todays-track-fleet-foxes-can-i-believe-you/

Pictured: Cover Artwork for ‘Shore’ (LP) (Released on September 22nd, 2020) (via Anti- Records)

That’s all for today and so all I have left to say for you in 2021 is… See you next year! Join me then for a special New Year’s Day edition of my regular posts tomorrow that you’ll really enjoy if you’re a fan of my weekly ‘Way Back Wednesdays’ feature! We’re going to be remembering a well-received late-70’s single by a prominent Scottish figure of the British Folk revival scene in the 60’s and 70’s. Famously described by AllMusic as “one of those mysterious woman songs”, the album of the same title as the song is a #5 hit in the US. The singer used to share a London flat with Paul Simon.

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Today’s Track: Marissa Nadler – ‘If I Could Breathe Underwater’

December 20, 2021 — Leave a comment

Pictured: Marissa Nadler in a promo photoshoot for ‘For My Crimes’ (2018) (Photo via Sacred Bones Records)

Good Morning to you! You are reading the words of Jacob Braybrooke, and it’s time for you to catch up on some great music from 2021 that may have skipped you by during the first time with yet another daily track on the blog, since it’s always been my day-to-day pleasure to write up about a different piece of music every day! If you’ve been a regular follower of my site for a while, you may know that I love a bit of moody, bluesy and sometimes Folk-ish Americana, with artists such as Weyes Blood, Sharon Van Etten and Alexandra Savior being some of my favourites of this style, to name just a few. One of the genre’s most memorable offerings from the past year was ‘The Path Of The Clouds’, an album released in late October by the Boston-based and Washington-born singer-songwriter Marissa Nadler via Bella Union Records. She has managed to sustain a 20-year-plus career, and her latest record was her tenth mainline studio album. She typically swings for a Chamber Folk style of sound with elements of Gothic Rock and Dream-Pop mixed into the cauldron, but myself and a few online publications, such as Pitchfork and The Boston Globe, have each also noticed an underlying influence of Black Metal within her production too, an element of her mezzo-soprano vocals and dark instrumentation that sets her apart from other fine artists of the genre. Raised as Jewish, Nadler studied Painting at the Rhode Island School Of Design, where she learned artistic drawing techniques such as illustration, bookbinding, woodcarving and encaustic painting while singing at Open Mic Nights in the Providence area while she achieved a bachelor’s degree and a Master’s degree a year later, and the hard effort that she puts into the visual storytelling of her music is evident through her unique background in Art Education, later touring with Drone Metal bands like Earth and the American primitive guitarist Jack Rose. Like many others, the origins of ‘The Path Of The Clouds’ were established during the Covid-19 pandemic, where she spent her time of self-isolation by watching repeats of the True Crime documentary series ‘Unsolved Mysteries’ and began writing songs about, and inspired by, the subjects of the series through their perspective. Receiving a wealth of positive reviews throughout NME, UNCUT, Record Collector, MOJO and more, Nadler fulfilled her goal of immortalizing the stories of people who deserve to be told on the recent LP. She also enlisted guests like Mercury Rev’s Jesse Chandler and multi-instrumentalist Milky Burgess. Her longtime friend Mary Littlemore, who plays the Cosmic Harp, features on Nadler’s wistful song ‘If I Could Breathe Underwater’ below.

Accompanied by an official music video directed and edited by Jenni Hensler with cinematography by Nick Fancher that depicts a preternatural world of fiction where Nadler changes the colour of the water and the sky, while floating effortlessly through a lake, becoming one with the colours and the ink, Nadler says, “When I wrote ‘If I Could Breathe Underwater’, I was contemplating the possibilities of possessing various superhuman powers: teleportation, aquatic breathing, extrasensory protection, and time travel to name a few. As a lyrical device, I married those powers with events in my life, wondering if and how they could change the past or predict the future”, in her press release. ‘Ethereal’ seems like an over-used word to me in the music press of today, but, really, there’s no better word to use for describing the textures of Nadler’s soundscape craftwork here, using a pulsating keyboard rhythm and a delicate, seductive bassline to create a light and flute-like series of sounds. Lyrics like “Shapeshifter, a cloud above your door/Late winter, like a storm” merge together with a poetic fluidity that conjures up a Shoegazing atmosphere and creates some menacing, but defiant, chords that feel as if they’re skipping weightlessly between a row of imaginary clouds while carrying an anchoring resonance through the zoned-out state of the subtle grooves of her rhythm guitar melodies. Lyrics like “If I could bring the moon down/So the day would never come/Would you fly, circle around the sun?” ponder something more philosophical and shore up against her vocals like the tide slowly coming in during a frosty morning at the seaside. Overall, it feels like perfect listening for the dry and icy December or January season of the year, as the melodies feel a bit ‘dreary’ in a way. That’s usually a derogatory statement, but what I really mean to state is that her sound is very cerebral while just about reaching some melodic heights that make it feel catchy enough to resonate. Moreover, the very layered and hallucinatory toolkit of Mary Littlemore’s cosmic harp echo the tone of the story nicely, as to bring the conceit of the song’s title to life in a fictional dream-state way when met with the consistency of the mildly anthemic guitar beats and the gradually paced Drum riffs. An intricate beauty with plenty of diverse inspiration to it.

Pictured: Cover Art for ‘The Path Of The Clouds’ (LP) (Released on October 29, 2021) (via Bella Union Records)

That’s all for now! It is almost time to float away into the good times of Christmas in just a few days away, and so we will be soldiering on with our ‘Countdown To Christmas 2021’ series tomorrow with a brand new and original Christmas single that is also raising money for Feed The Homeless in Bristol. It comes from an equally talented female solo artist who released her debut self-titled LP on Invada Records last year with a follow-up EP releasing earlier this year. She also performed ‘Mork ‘N’ Mindy’ with Sleaford Mods on ‘Later With Jools Holland’ on BBC Two earlier this year.

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Countdown To Christmas 2021: Emily Alyn Lind – ‘That Was The Worst Christmas Ever!’

December 16, 2021 — Leave a comment

Pictured: Emily Alyn Lind on the set of HBO’s ‘Gossip Girl’ (2020) (Photo by Jose Perez/Bauer-Griffin/Getty)

Good Morning to you! This is a tired Jacob Braybrooke, but I’m here to ‘Countdown To Christmas’ with you before the Christmas sandwich ranges of the major supermarkets get shelved for another year, since it has always been my day-to-day pleasure to write up about a different piece of music every day! My fairly recent discovery of Emily Alyn Lind was an interesting and unusual one. That’s because the 19-year-old indie folk singer-songwriter is actually a multi-talented creative and, in fact, I didn’t discover her through listening to music initially. I was simply sat on the sofa during a rainy evening watching ‘Doctor Sleep’ with my two parents at home, and she popped on-screen in the role of Snakebite Andi during the movie, which is well worth checking out. I enjoyed her performance very much and I decided to do some casual research into her, and I found out that she’s also an independent musician – as well as a film and TV actress – who has released some Americana-style music that is right up my alley, as I’m a huge fan of Alexandra Savior and Weyes Blood, who she reminds me of musically. She also directs her own music videos and she’s also been talking about releasing her own full-length album since 2020. ‘Spotless Mind’ and ‘Tantra Practice’ are my favourite songs by her, but her first track was a cover version of Sufjan Stevens’ ‘It’s The Worst Christmas Ever!’ that she issued in 2019. As an actress, Lind can be seen in the duology of ‘The Babysitter’ movies on Netflix, as well as the recent reboot of ‘Gossip Girl’ made by HBO. She began her acting career as a child star on ABC’s ‘Rampage’ and CBS ‘Code Black’ television series in the US, but she has also appeared in some productions like Hulu’s ‘Future Man’, Keanu Reeves’ 2019 Sci-Fi vehicle ‘Replicas’ and 2010’s ‘November Christmas’. Speaking to Vice about the niche dynamic of balancing music with her love for acting on camera, she says, “I was just always writing music since I could remember. My dad introduced me to folk music really young – Bob Dylan, Neil Young – and I just thought they were the coolest people in the world. Instead of wanting to be a ballerina, I just wanted to be Neil Young. I just loved the 60’s”, adding, “But I picked up a guitar and I started writing, so it started to become an outlet for me and I never stopped”, in her conversation. I’d very highly recommend her music videos for ‘Spotless Mind’ and ‘Castles’ because the two tracks showcase her unique personality excellently. However, the Sufjan Stevens cover really fits the theme of the moment here on One Track At A Time. Let’s give it a listen below.

Although she’s only an emerging talent in the film world, the roots of the medium are also in her blood, as she’s one of the youngest members of a dynasty of creatives from the film industry. The ‘Haunting In Connecticut’ 2 star has been working since she was four years old, and she is the daughter of the actress Barbara Alyn Woods and the producer John Lind. Her two sisters, Natalia Alyn Lind and Olyvia Alyn Lind, are also actresses. Her charming and reflective cover of ‘That Was The Worst Christmas Ever!’ captures the slight melancholy of the winter season acutely and insightfully, and she told American Songwriter, “I’ve always loved Sufjan’s take on writing holiday music. Not to get all sad boy here, but I think there’s something so nice about the realistic spin he puts on a genre of music that is very one dimensional. It’s a beautiful song, and a stunning melody, and I hope you like it as much as I do”, in late 2019. I feel that Lind’s sincere, stripped down rendition of Sufjan’s track is probably compared most favorably to Phoebe Bridgers and Bob Dylan, while Lind herself has been drawn intensely to Leonard Cohen and Neil Young since her childhood. It starts off with a sweet, soulful vocal sample that provides a swift opening for her lyrics, which feel soothing and graceful. They are gently poetic, with Lind using her natural voice to complement the radiant and mellow sound in a lovely way that makes the song sound more akin to one of her own. Some of her vocals have been layered, and I love that she doesn’t use any auto-tune here, instead relying on her harmonies and contemplative vocal delivery instead of a sense of over-production. The lyrics are about the commercial industry of Christmas if you will, and so the production choice fits the theme well and pays respect to it. I really like the laidback acoustic guitar melodies as they create a measured pace that works cohesively with her soft and clear vocals, walking the tightrope between soft and bright nicely. There’s some moodier and slowed pacing here and there, but the textures remain warm and delicate throughout with a vulnerability in her voice that is attentive. Overall, the track is a real hidden gem as such from Lind, with a lush fusion of gentle Dream Pop and Americana-tinged indie folk that works with her pure, unsullied by any artifice, vocals beautifully. I follow Emily on Instagram, so I can’t wait to hear more about her upcoming music and movie projects in the future. I think that she’s got an absolutely lovely voice and a natural likability, and I feel she’s a decent actress as well since I felt inclined to do some casual research into her after coming across her instead of just simply forgetting it, and I wish all the best to her with her diversity of projects, since I am glad that I came across her. This cover is a perfect vibe for this ruminating season.

Pictured: Emily Alyn Lind in a recent photoshoot wearing Dior for Harper’s Bazaar (2021) (Photo by Lucas Garrido)

That’s all for now! Thank you for reading my latest post and supporting my daily content on the blog, and I’ll be back tomorrow to guide you through another daily track on the blog, as we take a brief breath of respite away from our annual Christmas coverage. The refreshing change of pace will be a funky one, coming from a Nashville-based Psych Rock singer songwriter who began writing poetry at the age of 8. He released his latest EP, ‘What Box?’, this July and he describes himself as a “walking question mark”. The track was supported by BBC Radio 6 Music host Tom Ravenscroft.

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Today’s Track: Kings Of Convenience – ‘Rocky Trail’

December 13, 2021 — Leave a comment

Pictured: Erlend Øye (Vocals/Lead Guitar) & Eirik Glambek Bøe (Bass Guitar/Vocals) (2021) (Photo by Salvo Alibrio)

Good Morning to you! This is Jacob Braybrooke, and its time to catch up with some of the music that we missed earlier in the year as we approach the start of a new one, because it’s always been my day-to-day pleasure to write up about a different piece of music every day! For the Norwegian indie folk duo of Erlend Øye and Eirik Glambek Bøe, you could say that it has been a ‘Rocky Trail’ on their return to making music. After a 12 year hiatus, in which the Bergen native pair saw some relationships continue to form and dissolve, felt record label pressure, and they confronted the onset of their 40’s, the Cornelius collaborators have returned with their first album to be released since 2009’s ‘Declaration Of Dependence’, a #10 hit in Italy. During their time, Kings Of Convenience were the inspiration for the Indian dream pop duo Parekh & Singh, they topped MTV’s European list of the best music videos in 2004 for ‘I’d Rather Dance With You’ and they performed at the Primavera Sound Festivals in both Barcelona and Porto. Øye is also known for a side project, The Whitest Boy Alive. ‘Peace Or Love’, their latest LP and fourth studio album release overall, features two collaborations with the Canadian global indie pop star Feist, and it reached #26 on the UK Albums Chart. Recorded across five years in five different cities, ‘Peace Or Love’ was a mellow take on Easy Listening Pop where Bøe and Øye leaned into the appeal of ease instead of confrontation after a difficult period of time away. After all, despite envy of Europeans easy leisure, it is distinctly an American trait to look for cracks in their mirage or facade – and that facade, if there was one, was very smooth here. They recently went on tour to support the record, including a double-header at London’s Royal Festival Hall in September, and a share of these dates have already come and gone. However, they are still scheduled to visit sites in Sweden, Belgium, Netherlands, Portugal, Germany, Switzerland and Luxembourg from March until June 2022 – if Covid restrictions allow for it. Let’s hear more about their ‘Rocky Trail’ below.

“Another classic Eirik composition that skillfully ignores the verse-chorus-chorus blueprint”, Bøe and Øye said about the structure of ‘Rocky Trail’ in April during a press statement for Paste Magazine, concluding, “It’s pop music, but not as we know it”, in their teaser. A welcome re-introduction to the group and what their sound achieves well, ‘Rocky Trail’ features a humble approach to production where the Kings’ simply harmonize about life’s grief and a failed relationship with a man featuring “a world on his shoulders that needed lifting” on top of a wholesome and jaunting acoustic guitar riff. The duo recite sequences like “Brave enough to go climbing up a wall so high that no sunlight is seen through winter” and “Brave enough to go travelling the world without money to eat or sleep for” to express a deep sense of freedom and contentment that create buoyant vocal hooks and laminate reality in a more optimistic light. There are some moments of a bleaker nature, with the opening refrain of “Let’s say you give me one more time, One last chance to speak again, Let’s start from what we left unsaid” highlighting a shade of relationship break-up glumness, for example. However, the tonal differences are sugarcoated by a warm violin string section that adds a slightly bitter ache to the forefront of the track. Their intertwining vocals are uplifting, giving the anecdotes of travelling penniless and surviving hungry a more inspirational feeling instead of a pessimistic outlook. However, the in-sync and timbre voices of Bøe and Øye remain a key fixture of their charm, while lyrics like “I should have carried you to the top of the rocky trail” have moments of reflective contemplation to them, later giving the lyrics of “How am I to know about your problems and your load/I am blind to what you show” some additional meaning in the realm of forgiveness. Overall, ‘Rocky Trail’ was a solid Folk track that doesn’t show any signs of being left on the cutting room floor for 12 years. Instead, it feels like a paled back ode to restoration from the duo and it seems like a warm welcome back from them. Delicacy and care are given to both of their vocal performances, a tactic that perfectly expresses an innocence and veteran experience simultaneously, attained through their pitches. A beautiful and simple return to form.

Pictured: Cover Artwork for ‘Peace Or Love’ (LP) (Released on June 18th, 2021) (via Virgin/EMI Records)

That’s all for Monday, and, with that conclusion, it’s time for me and the Kings Of Convenience to lead you on your way through the ‘Rocky Trail’ of mid-December living. I hope that all goes well for you today, and please feel free to join me again tomorrow to resume our ‘Countdown To Christmas’ with a fresh new Grunge spin on a popular Christmas carol that was performed by a female-led indie punk band from Auckland, New Zealand. Signed to Carpark Records in the US, they have toured throughout the UK and some European cities supporting Death Cab For Cutie in 2020.

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Countdown To Christmas 2021: Julien Baker – ‘A Dreamer’s Holiday’

December 11, 2021 — Leave a comment

Pictured: Cover Art for ‘A Dreamer’s Holiday’ (Single) (Re-issued on November 29, 2021) (via Matador Records)

Good Morning to you! You are reading the words of Jacob Braybrooke, and it’s time for you to decide upon all of your last-minute Christmas gift purchases straight after reading our latest installment of this year’s ‘Countdown To Christmas’ on One Track At A Time, not forgetting that it’s always my day-to-day pleasure to write up about a different piece of new music every day! ‘A Dreamer’s Holiday’ is a recent cover of the 1945 track of the same title that was originally performed by Perry Como, which the Tennessae-based 26-year-old indie rock singer songwriter Julien Baker released for a ‘Spotify Singles’ collection of Christmas covers by alternative artists in late 2020, exclusively issued for the conglomerate streaming platform – with Black Pumas, Jazmine Sullivan, Ruston Kelly and Dashboard Confessional also appearing on the extended play. Baker has recently re-uploaded the cover to her Bandcamp page, however, and so the 12 month exclusivity deal must have expired, meaning that it is now available to actually buy or download for the first time and it is technically a brand new release if you look at it one way. You may already know that Baker was a member of the Boygenius trio that has similarly launched the solo careers of Phoebe Bridgers and Lucy Dacus to the stratosphere in recent years, and Baker’s latest main release was ‘Little Oblivions’, an album that she released in February to solid acclaim and decent commercial success. On the record, she tackled the theme of underlying darkness inside the corners of her mind. Themes such as sobriety, heartache, relapse, failure and redemption were explored on the album, which was mixed by Craig Silvey (Florence & The Machine, The National, Arcade Fire) and engineered by Calvin Lauber, and she recorded it at home in Memphis. ‘A Dreamer’s Holiday’ has only been covered once before by Willie Nelson in 1983. Let’s hear Baker’s spin on the old formula below.

“I chose ‘A Dreamer’s Holiday’ because I found it incredibly unique as far as holiday songs are concerned. It’s a very understated song – both lyrically and musically; while it’s technically about a ‘holiday’, it doesn’t reference any specific holiday theme, it leaves the lyrics a bit more open-ended”, Julien Baker explained last year, adding, “It’s the same way with the music – the chord structure is complicated but surprisingly timeless to me even though the song itself is over 70 years old. It’s the kind of song whose arrangement can be re-imagined so many times, and I love the feeling of sonic potential a single like that gives me”, as she discusses how the task of tackling ‘A Dreamer’s Holiday’ could be considered a challenging one, but her own cover of the track passes off well due to her hard work and determination. The Tennessee native sets the mood with “Climb aboard a butterfly and take off on the breeze” for her daydream-like opening, using some vulnerable finger-style guitar playing before the gentle Horn section enters the picture, with Baker promising to “Make it a long vacation/Time, there’s plenty of” as her reverb-drenched vocal tones create some space for an inviting Piano solo to join the soundscape, with Baker encouraging us to “Help yourself to happiness/Close your eyes and concentrate” prior to the main musical hook of “You will feel terrific when you come down to earth/From a Dreamer’s Holiday” as the tight track draws to it’s natural conclusion. Although not mentioning ‘Christmas’ as a key concept, it feels suitable enough for the season. Baker’s vocals and laidback production provide a mellow quality to the original source material, while her minimalist take on the instrumentation and her tactile guitar melodies would still feel cohesive with the music found on her recent album ‘Little Oblivions’ as the track feels like a somewhat underground choice for a cover version. While the groundwork of the airy String-based scatterings and the subtle scratches of her crackling Vinyl production bears resemblance to her said latest album, sharing similarities with the style of her chronological music, it replaces the more morbid lyricism of that record with lyrics that are brighter. It never gets too excitable and Baker thankfully doesn’t feel the need to place some filler vocals or reach into the realms of a high pitch solo for this, and so I think the track is a good merger between the feelings of anticipation and longing that she wanted to portray. Really, it’s her vocal performance that gets the emphasis here, and she gives the track a relatively short duration so the themes don’t overstay their welcome. Overall, this was a lovely little cover that got the job done and Baker is a true musician having played all, or nearly all, of her instruments on this here track, with some newfound textures that were edited in her signature style. A sumptuous addition to your playlist.

Pictured: Julien Baker in promotional artwork for a ‘Spotify Singles’ collection (2020) (Photo by Alysse Gafken/PR)

‘Little Oblivions’ was previously a pick for ‘New Album Release Fridays’ on the site. We covered ‘Hardline’ here: https://onetrackatatime.home.blog/2021/02/26/new-album-release-friday-julien-baker-hardline/

Pictured: Cover Artwork for ‘Little Oblivions’ (LP) (Released on February 26th, 2021) (via Matador Records)

That’s all for now! I’ll be taking my own ‘Dreamer’s Holiday’ tomorrow morning as Father Christmas himself will be spreading his share of seasonal cheer by introducing you to one of his favourite edgy hits for ‘Scuzz Sundays’. He’s told me to relay that it will be coming from a legendary Brooklyn native Synth Punk band whose leader is the co-founder of DFA Records. Their 2007 album ‘Sound Of Silver’ was listed as one of the 666 greatest albums of all time by KEXP listeners during a poll finished in 2019.

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Countdown To Christmas 2021: Jens Lekman – ‘The Cold Swedish Winter’

December 1, 2021 — Leave a comment

Pictured: Jens Lekman in a garden photoshoot for a Bandcamp Daily feature (2017) (Photo by Ellika Henrikson)

Good Afternoon to you! You are reading the words of independent music journalist Jacob Braybrooke, and it is time for me to clock in for yet another daily track on the blog – since it has always been my day-to-day pleasure to write up about a different piece of music every day! It’s the 1st of December today, and so a new entry in our ‘Countdown To Christmas’ series for this year is a must-have. However, it feels a touch too early for a true Christmassy ballad yet to me, and so here’s something a little bit more generally winter-specific for your enjoyment instead. ‘The Cold Swedish Winter’ is a gorgeous and transcendant one from Jens Lekman, a Swedish indie folk singer-songwriter from Gothenburg. Known for his lyrics that are usually anecdotal and wry, backed by sampled strings and guitar-oriented melancholic pop textures, Jens is one of my favourite purest songwriters in the industry, and so any excuse for me to talk about his creative choices is enough to make me grin from ear to ear. Written in the style of a narrative, as usual for the former Swedish #1 album chart holder Lekman, ‘The Cold Swedish Winter’ is one of the finest tracks to be found on his first full-length album, ‘When I Said I Wanted To Be Your Dog’, which he self-produced and released via Service in April of 2004. It was re-released with slight variations by the more well-known label, Secretly Canadian, later on that year. Let’s spin the winter ballad below.

‘The Cold Swedish Winter’ by Jens Lekman is also the namesake and theme tune for a radio drama series which airs on BBC Radio 4. Showrunner and voice actor Danny Robins was influenced to create the sitcom after hearing the ditty, which tells the story of a marginally successful London-born stand-up comic who has relocated to Sweden that began in August 2014, and it began airing it’s fifth series last December. Given that he’s still a pretty niche artist, I can only wonder if Jens actually knows about the programme. Still, it is easy to see why ‘The Cold Swedish Winter’ sparked some ideas because it truly is a very pretty number. As usual for Lekman, the lyrics are dry but lightly comedic, with sequences which compare Cliff Richard and Lou Reed’s ideas of Sweden briefly, and other lines that involve porn and gonorrhea. It feels intimate and striped back, and his instrumentation lacks the budgetary bells and whistles of contemporary acts but it still manages to encapsulate the comforting and frosty feelings of the festive season decently enough, so it therefore still manages to click together as a Christmas single despite not intentionally being designed as one. He uses simple refrains like “The Cold Swedish Winter is right outside, and I just need somebody to hold me through the night” to set the romantic scene of asking a girl to pretend that he likes her. She replies in a shy call-and-response format, hushing him with solid refrains that expose his simple desire to feel loved. It also ends with Lekman’s typically introverted twist on the material, where he predicts the future of Sweden where archaeologists will dig up their hearts of stone. On paper, it looks random and seems as though it plainly shouldn’t work. However, it does cohere, as Lekman manages to sound convincing with his voice and tell the anecdote with a sincere, somber note where although we don’t know whether the overall anecdote is true or fictional fantasy, but he makes me feel like it is, as his listener. A patient and thought-provoking songwriter, Lekman is the type of artist who I could write a full essay about if I could be assigned to. Meanwhile, the mournful Violin samples that underscore the point and the powerful female vocals are the metaphorical angel on top of this Christmas tree. Overall, its an icy visual as pretty as a hand-drawn painting.

Pictured: Jens Lekman performing ‘A Postcard To Nina’ live (in 2008) (Photo via Interface Sessions)

Last December, we effectively reacted here on the blog to the day where the UK government essentially axed Christmas, and the kind words of Jens Lekman came to our aid like Rudolph on that fateful night with a song that helped us all to put these things into some proportion. Relive the emotional moment with the post here: https://onetrackatatime.home.blog/2020/12/22/todays-track-jens-lekman-the-end-of-the-world-is-bigger-than-love/

Pictured: Cover Art for ‘Night Falls Over Kortedala’ (Released on Sept 5th, 2007) (via Secretly Canadian)

That’s all from me today! Thank you for your support with the site, as usual, and please keep an eye out for tomorrow’s post. It comes from a fresh face on the blog whose music resembles psychedelic soul, prog jazz and alternative folk. Raised in Richmond, California – she participated in the Red Bull Music Academy programme in Tokyo in 2014 – where she co-recorded ‘Late Night Munchies’ with RJ & Mark Maxwell.

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Countdown To Christmas 2021: Frightened Rabbit – “It’s Christmas, So We’ll Stop”

November 20, 2021 — Leave a comment

Pictured: Cover Art for “It’s Christmas, So We’ll Stop” (Released on Dec. 15th, 2008) (via FatCat Records)

Good Morning to you! You are reading the words of Jacob Braybrooke, and it’s time to grab your Gingerbread Latte to sip along with as we continue our ‘Countdown To Christmas’ today, which I’ll be leading because it’s always my day-to-day pleasure to write about a different piece of music every day! A Scottish indie folk band who were formed by Scott Hutchinson, who originally began the group as a solo project, in 2003 – Frightened Rabbit were a band who released five albums, two EP’s, two live albums and ten singles to critical acclaim, which allowed the band to develop a large cult following that is still avid to this day. There is a sadness to the band, however, as Hutchinson fell ill and he went missing on a terrible night in 2018, where his body was later found dead near Port Edgar, South Queensferry. Based in Glasgow from 2004, the band were also known for their frequent collaborations and extensive touring with Aaron Dessner, a multi-instrumentalist from The National. Frightened Rabbit’s work has been released across Fat Cat Records and major label Atlantic Records, and the strongly reviewed 6-piece were also well-liked for their regular charity work with the Invisible Children Inc. music coalition project. Hutchinson, alongside his brother Grant Hutchinson, also worked with Justin Lockey (Editors) and James Lockey (Minor Victories) on their side project Mastersystem. Mainstream-wise, Frightened Rabbit were perhaps best known for 2013’s ‘Pedestrian Verse’, which reached #9 on the UK Albums Chart. However, their final album, 2016’s ‘Painting Of A Panic Attack’, which included the particularly good single ‘Get Out’, was my personal favourite. In 2008, they got into the seasonal spirit with ‘It’s Christmas, So We’ll Stop’. Let’s give it a spin.

Scott Hutchinson released an original mix of ‘It’s Christmas, So We’ll Stop’ as solo material in 2007, before he reworked the track with expanded instrumentation and additional production for a re-release the next year. He said, “It’s Christmas… is about people deciding to be pleasant to one another for about a day, regardless of whether or not they actually get along the rest of the year”, adding, “I feel it’s maybe healtheir to live a little more consistently (not that I do), but often humans need excuses to be nice and giving and loving to one another, and Christmas is one of those times, for better or worse”, to the Vinyl’s product description. At just over five minutes in length, Hutchinson encourages a ceasefire for hatred over the top of some swelling String sections, a melancholic lead guitar hook, some softly psychedelic backing vocals that feel warm in texture, and some gradually building Drum rhythms. Lyrics like “As the rot stops for today, Let the rot stop for just one day” touch on restraining the disillusionment and sensual assault that comes with the excess of the holiday season. Later lyrics, like “‘Cause the wine on our breath puts the love on our tongues”, touch on product overindulgence and throw shade at commercialism a little, while vaguely spotlighting the community of Christmas as the main theme. The final refrain of “The next day, life went back to its bad self” hints towards the hostilities of the wider world being resumed after the big day of December 25th. While treading familiar ground for a Christmas single, in terms of the key material discussing the halting of arguments and the easing of tension that it all brings, Hutchinson manages to polish everything in a neat way. His vocal delivery feels sharp and piercing at times, giving off the idea of the knives being put down for the single day but also suggesting a warmer armistice, and it introduces a raw element of melancholy and a sense of foreboding to the instrumentation. The soundscape, as a result, is full of musical diversity. It is slightly charming and witty in a black comedy format, but it’s also a little sombre and downtempo, all while maintaining an uplifting quality in the spirit of the religious season. It feels very frank, with the blend of orchestral and acoustic instrumentation complementing his variety of tones as the songwriting develops in a way that’s gradual. It is one of the most poignant, yet realistic, festive songs out there.

Pictured: Scott Hutchinson (Lead Vocals/Acoustic Guitar/Writer), Billy Kennedy (Lead Guitar/Keyboard). Andy Monaghan (Rhythm Guitar/Backing Vocals), Simon Liddell (Bass Guitar) and Grant Hutchinson (Drums/Percussion/Occasional Backing Vocals) (in 2013) (Photo via RedBull.com/Atlantic Records)

That brings us to the end of our trimming of festive output for this week! Please join me again tomorrow for ‘Scuzz Sundays’, as we take a listen to a Pop-Punk anthem from a well-known California-formed rock band who bonded over their love of music on the football pitch and they recorded one of their albums in the Paramour Mansion.

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