Hear Peter Bjorn and John Reach "Breakin' Point" on New Single

It may feel hard to believe it was a full 10 years ago now that "Young Folks" whistled Peter Bjorn and John into our ears and hearts, especially with how similarly the new title track from the band's forthcoming LP Breakin' Point starts out.

Originally debuted on NPR in a broadcast from as far back as last July, the single joins "Do Si Do" and "What You Talking About?" as our first glimpses of PB&J's comeback record slated for release on 6/10 via the trio's own label, INGRID. Still thumbs-upping since 2011's Gimme Some, the cheerful Swedes add an impassioned chorus and gently raining piano to the whistles, explaining to Stereogum:

“It’s about waiting for new things coming ahead that will leave the past in the dust or at least make it look very different. About mental and physical adjustment. About kids becoming parents and maybe about growing up. About perspective, balance and seeing things for what they might actually be and not blown up to grotesque proportions. It features great production from Emile Haynie and whistling (may seem like bigger news than it is, hey its only whistling) and its the title track from our new album and we’re very proud of it!”

Buy our new single 'Breakin' Point' on iTunes here: http://smarturl.it/pbjbreakingpointdl Stream our new single 'Breakin' Point' on Spotify here: http://smarturl.it/pbjbreakingpointsp Follow Peter Bjorn and John: Facebook - http://smarturl.it/pbjfacebook Twitter - http://smarturl.it/pbjtwitter Spotify - http://smarturl.it/pbjspotify Instagram - http://smarturl.it/pbjinstagram www.peterbjornandjohn.com/ This is the Official Youtube Channel of Peter, Bjorn and John.

"What You Talking About?" Peter Bjorn and John Finally Return With New Single, Album Announcement

Endlessly endearing Stockholm indie pop trio Peter Bjorn and John have been taunting followers with hints of #PBJ7 for what seems like ages now, though with only last year's one off single "High Up (Take Me to the Top)" to satiate us in the long five years since 2011's Gimme Some there's been little from the band to show for it.

That all changed today, with the release of lead single "What You Talking About" and the announcement that #PBJ7 will finally arrive on 6/10, titled Breakin' Point and released via the rockers' own label INGRID they cofounded with fellow Swedes Miike Snow and Lykke Li. It seems safe to assume that the two tracks premiered on NPR's World Cafe last summer - one of which was called "Breakin' Point" - will also be on the LP.

Breakin' Point will feature production from some well-known names, including Paul Epworth (Paul McCartney, U2, Florence + the Machine), Greg Kurstin (Beck, Adele), and Emile Haynie (FKA Twigs, A$AP Rocky).

Check out "What You Talking About?" below, in all its upbeat, disco-vibe glory.

Yeasayer Drops New Single "Silly Me," Announces Tour

Following music videos for "I Am Chemistry" and "Prophecy Gun" Yeasayer have continued their Amen & Goodbye rollout with new single "Silly Me" and a bevy of tour dates.

With the first two tastes being "long and linear," the new offering is "something from a different spectrum," according to the band's Twitter. Opening with choppy acoustic stabs the track sharply transforms into a full blown dance lament with sparkling synth and an instantly infectious refrain of “Silly me / Where’s my head / I can’t believe now it’s over / She would be here if it wasn’t for silly me / Silly me.”

With glittering lines like "With crystal ball I now can see / That I'm a man of low degree," it's surely one of the most cheerfully upbeat confessions of guilt you'll ever have the pleasure of hearing.

Amen & Goodbye is due out 4/1 via Mute, and can be preordered here. Check out the song and schedule below.

'Silly Me' taken from the upcoming Yeasayer album 'Amen & Goodbye' which will be released April Fools' Day, 2016.

The Magnetic North Release Dreamy 'Prospect of Skelmersdale' Single "A Death in the Woods"

“A Death in the Woods” is the lead single from British rock symphony outfit The Magnetic North’s forthcoming album Prospect of Skelmersdale, the second full-length installment from the Erland Cooper led trio - featuring Simon Tong (The Verve, Blur, Gorillaz, The Good, the Bad & the Queen) and orchestral arranger Hannah Peel. Prospect of Skelmersdale continues the band’s series of musical vignettes drawing from its eponymous village.

A mecca of the Transcendental Meditation movement, Skelmersdale, Lancashire was a haven for families to settle and continue their lives enlightenment and mediation. Included amongst these families was The Magnetic North’s own Tong, whose experience undoubtedly provided a wellspring of inspiration as the band worked to inhabit the spirit of Skelmersdale.

“A Death in the Woods” acts as the introduction to the overall motif for both the album and Skelmersdale. The video opens with bright flutes and twinkling guitar bouncing along as we’re introduced to a collection of Super 8 clips of what can be assumed as the titular town itself.

The lyrics feel like a sort of archival account of the initial pitch used to bring people to Skelmersdale way back in the 1960s, as Erland Cooper maintains a soothing timbre over the dream-like melodies. Ambient guitars drift and meander as Erland croons “The New World’s round the corner / They found a new world order,” and the track continues to slowly build sonically with each subsequent verse. The video exudes a sort of utopian uneasiness that comes to a head as the footage shifts its focus on the children from the Skelmersdale community, and suddenly breaks into the mellowest of electronic rampages until the song and video come to a close.

Prospect of Skelmersdale is out 3/18 via Full Time Hobby

Has Father John Misty Lost His Humor With Lana Del Rey's "Freak"?

Grab the hotsauce from your nightstand and pour it down your throat, because Lana Del Rey has a banging new 10 minute music video / tour-de-farce. Hipster lore and teenage phantasm reach critical mass on Lana Del Rey’s “Freak,” off her 2015 release, Honeymoon.

Sarcasm aside, the video features the misanthropic matrimony between two of music’s most aloof artists - Lana Del Rey and Father John Misty. A video sure to be misinterpreted by throngs of YouTube-ing teenyboppers, “Freak,” offers a glimpse into the pseudo-story of a cult chieftain (Lana Del Rey) and her ardent disciple (Josh Tillman AKA Father John Misty ) as they blur the lines between liturgy and carnal desire.

An unwarranted combination, the pairing represents a potentially troublesome career choice for the Father, whose career prior to his “star” turn in “Freak” was predicated mostly on skewering the life of the pseudo-ultra-apathy of “indie” pop queens such as Del Rey. Its perplexing as to why Misty would agree to involve himself in something that seems so ludicrously serious – not in the sense of importance, but rather self-perception – though, perhaps the ambiguity of Misty’s tenure throughout the video is his ultimate act of satire.

There are scenes of sacramental exchanges of acid tabs, a presumably unholy red concoction, and sultry corporeal cavorting, as doyen and disciple traipse through a hallucinatory spectacle that is Topanga, California. Supposedly inspired by Tillman’s past experience with acid (purportedly, at a Taylor Swift concert in Australia), the music video portion ends with Tillman and Del Rey dancing in thick smoke, holding hands and walking into the void.

Following the music video portion, the remaining 5-ish minutes are filled with the aforementioned harem of women swimming in a pool while “Clair de Lune” plays, eventually joined by Del Rey and Misty. Is there a more divine purpose to the video? Who knows? Is wild speculation and purveying ones own inaccurate notions abound likely? Yes. Either way, the video is a spectacle in and of itself, much to its own bemusement, and 10-minute time allotment. Here's hoping Father John Misty has reached peak prankster and not descended to half-assing apathist like his newfound contemporary. 

Starfucker Drops Single "Never Ever" Ahead of New Tour, Hints to Transverso About New Record

To kick off their impending tour with Com Truise and Fake Drugs, Starfucker have released a single title "Never Ever."

Bursting with their signature danceability and the repeated question "What would I lie for," the Portland group are as upfront as ever. Hopefully this is a sign of new music to come soon, as it's now been almost exactly three years since their last LP, pop masterpiece Miracle Mile, hit shelves.

EDIT: Starfucker have hinted to Transverso that this may be the first of more to come after all:

@TransversoMedia @Polyvinyl @windishagency never said it was a one off!

— STRFKR (@starfucker) February 10, 2016

Check out the track and tour dates below.

Take a Bizarre Trip Through Yeasayer's 'Amen & Goodbye' Album Art in New "Prophecy Gun" Music Video

Following Amen & Goodbye's lead single "I Am Chemistry," Brooklyn trio Yeasayer have invited us deeper into their twisted world with a new music video for previously unheard single "Prophecy Gun" that gives life to the album art that had - up until now - been still.

Turning the full gatefold into a performance piece, the film explores the eclectic landscape created by sculptor and New York-based Canadian artist David Altmejd. Yeasayer describe it in a press release as "Sgt Pepper meets Hieronymous Bosch meets Dali meets PeeWee's Playhouse."

Opening with miniaturized Pyramids of Giza and a pool of blood turned watermelon puree, the bizarre trip through Amen & Goodbye's mise-en-scène carries you past Caitlyn Jenner animorphing into a butterfly, a severed and lacerated Donald Trump head (which was also visible in the background of "I Am Chemistry" as Yeasayer happily confirmed to Transverso), Mark Twain, an amusing heavy metal parody band poster for Yayslayer, and even the beloved alien from past classic "Madder Red," may he rest in peace.

Altmejd explains,

“I’m not very comfortable thinking about image and graphic design. I decided to offer them a sort of landscape filled with as many details as possible. I thought about a series of objects that would be inspired by characters that came from Yeasayer’s albums... but also characters that come from the news. There’s really fake looking sculptures, there’s printouts representing cartoony characters, there’s naked people… For me what’s very important is that the image offers enough visually for people to be really absorbed in the observation of details.”

As for the song itself, it opens with a lightly frenetic beat and ominously pulsing bass before vocals almost reminiscent of Paul Simon at his most soothing and twitching space synth are gently layered on.

Amen & Goodbye is due out April Fool's Day via Mute. You can revisit past teasers and preorder the record here.

'Amen & Goodbye' is the new album from Yeasayer. Released April Fools' Day, 2016.

Catch Some "New Psych" From Ladada

Virginia Beach-based Josiah Schlater's project Ladada (pronounced "luh-DAH-duh") released a self-titled debut back in 2014 that was quietly one of the best records floating around the indie lane of the information superhighway that year.

Ladada's most recent release, "New Psych," is just that, expanding upon Schlater's rich surf rock riffs and lazy vocals with a louder, punchier effort demanding to be heard. Purveying a self-described "soda pop" genre, the sound energetically ricochets between psych rock and shoegaze.

The track is the lead single from Ladada's forthcoming EP, Hi Five, which will hit hands everywhere 4/1 via Gold Robot. Hi Five will take physical form as a curious limited edition "transparent coke bottle green" 12" with Ladada on the flipside, which you can pre-order here.

Lead single off the forthcoming Hi Five EP, available as a limited edition 12" on transparent coke bottle green. Pre-order now: http://goldrobotrecords.bigcartel.com/product/ladada-hi-five

Hear Courtney Barnett's New Track "Three Packs A Day"

Before the Melbourne artist rose to critical acclaim, Courtney Barnett used money she borrowed from her grandmother to start her own record label, Milk! Records, on which she released her first two EPs, I've Got A Friends Called Emily Farris and How to Carve A Carrot Into a Rose, long before they were later were repackaged as The Double EP: A Sea of Split Peas via Mom & Pop Music.  

Next month Milk! Records will return, releasing their second compilation following 2014’s A Pair Of Pears (With Shadows), Good For You. It was recorded over a single weekend in September 2015, and includes an original from Barnett called “Three Packs A Day", which you can listen to below.

Good For You also features new material from Jen Cloher, Fraser A. Gorman, and the East Brunswick All Girls Choir, and can be preordered here. 

Gláss Stays Darkly Translucent on Second 'Accent' Single "You're Not Real"

Following lead single "Glass(-accent)", post-punk upstarts Gláss have allowed a second track titled "You’re Not Real" to ascend from the murky depths of their upcoming full length album, Accent.

Immediately apparent from the beginning of "You're Not Real" is a certain sense that something, however undefined, is coming. Like a sunset seen through the thickest smog, or a pulse of light coming from the remnants of a dead star, a certain sense of hopelessness and disquietude oozes from every part of the song, from the way the crystalline yet dissonant guitars dig into themselves, the sprightly yet lumbering drums, and the cold, disaffected vocal delivery repeat “you’re not real in any way”.

The ghost of Joy Division hangs heavy here, but Gláss manage to, in spite of everything, instill a certain youthful vigor into their songs and a certain mischievousness in the face of bleak despair. If Gláss has anything to prove, they’re doing a hell of a job.

Gláss "You're Not Real" Accent (02/05/2016) http://Post-Echo.com Find Gláss on Facebook- on.fb.me/1QHk02U Bandcamp- bit.ly/1FtcRmo