Indie

They say never trust the Holy Gracious Medley Band. But I say, never trust the guy you sent your CD to months ago to ever get around to writing a review. It's a backhanded compliment of mine for musicians that I really like, because I wander around with their CD in my car constantly - but because the CD is in the car, I often to forget to do a write-up whenever I'm indoors.

You're gonna build up a lot of preconceptions when I tell you that Roy Rieck is part of a musical collective from Israel, now living in London. And of course, the Holy Gracious Medley Band is a name that begs to be said in a wickedly bad Eastern accent.

The surprising thing is, you'd be wrong. My feeling about Roy Rieck an the Medley Band is that musically, he almost picks up where artists like Jeff Buckley left off. Despite their Israeli heritage, Rieck's music is grounded in a satisfyingly rich, rootsy, blues. He's surrounded himself with a talented and tight bunch of musicians, and this tells in the eclectic range of original tunes Rieck and his associates have put together for their debut album.

Let me introduce you to Sambassadeur, a Swedish four-piece who (from what I hear) began as a "DIY version of ABBA" back in 2003.

Whatever those early ambitions might have been, in 2010, Sambassadeur have a style that's more Belle And Sebastian than Dancing Queen. Stranded, the opening track from their third album, instantly recalls that dreamy, otherworldly effect that Belle And Sebastian created with Act Of The Apostle from The Life Pursuit album a couple of years back.

The rest of the nine-track album carries on in a similar style - sweeping symphonic strings are married to delightfully prominent bass guitar grooves. Lead singer Anna Persson lends a rich and relaxed vocal to each song, which makes European a very mellow album to listen to, even on the more uptempo tracks.

Possibly my favourite band of the year, Jupiter One have released the opening track from their Sunshower album, Volcano.

To put it simply, Volcano is an Indie-pop anthem and another great taster of an excellent band making fantastic music. Listen to them, become a fan and spread the word!

I wanted to share this one with our New Music Showcase group - it's the latest single by Leeds-based Indie foursome Tigers That Talked. I've had the video for Artificial Clouds playing in the background this evening, and the song is another one of those beautiful, delicate Indie-ballads that I'm growing fond of this season.

Jamie Williams of the band describes the song as

about the hope of breaking down borders between people and of rediscovering a connection.  It evokes one lover's desperation to recover and retrace back from the point at which romance falls apart and is replaced by a sense of disconnection, longing & loss.

I won't go overboard pontificating about the song. It's simple, beautiful, the instrumentation soars and lulls and I think you'll like it.

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Hey guys! I've had a sudden urge to start writing again and thought I'd bring you some of the singles being released in the next few weeks. You can see them all below. And I will be reviewing everyone of them. Yeah, that's right! You might ask how I will have time to write all these reviews? Well, instead of writing a review for each individual single, every week I will do a round up of all the singles being released during the week. This allows me to cover more singles and my thoughts and opinions on them. But more importantly, I get to here feedback from you guys. Except reviews for singles being released 21st August 2009 tomorrow. Bye!

21st August 2009:
Biffy Clyro: 'That Golden Rule'
Erik Hassle: 'Don't Bring Flowers (After I'm Dead)'
Flo Rida featuring Nelly Furtado: 'Jump'
Ian Carey Project: 'Get Shaky'
Jet: 'She's A Genius'
Lily Allen: '22'
Noah And The Whale: 'Blue Skies'
T.I. featuring Mary J. Blige: 'Remember Me'