Great Songs From Q1 2021.

Spent a great deal of time revisiting my favorite records from 2020 and writing about my favorite elements of those full albums. What I noticed was that there were so many one-off discoveries, songs I let fall by the wayside because I focused so much on the full albums that I let the little cracks of genius disappear. This year I believe I am going to be taking a little bit of a step back in terms of my constant [stressful] chase of the perfect #1 record of the year and take a more organic approach at finding and enjoying music. That being said, I’m always on the hunt for more! It’s going to be a tough shift. If you end up finding any albums, songs or artists you think I should be checking out, please continue to reach out via Twitter and Instagram (@iamnoimpact) or by shooting me an email (steve.cuocci [at] gmail.com).

Vagabon — Reason to Believe (feat. Courtney Barnett)

A beautiful porch song, longing and austere. Copper guitar tones paint a starry night with the emptiness of a missing hand to be held while considering if it’s worth the pain trying to navigate the labyrinth of their promises. A powerful song that is delivered in subdued tones and contemplative vocals, as intended for our ears as it is for the open air. (Youtube)

Madlib & Four Tet — Hopprock

It starts as a meditation, long bows running across thick strings and bells that shake on the edge of the geography. As the automaton tells of missed messages, a hibernation is shaken and the song opens up into a driving and strumming instrumental, a hallway lined with the fits and starts of vocal samples creating a stroboscopic tunnel. This track comes off a collaboration between two of some of the most creative minds in the music-making space, both having created intriguing worlds with very little words contributed to their work. (Youtube)

Tigers Jaw — Hesitation

I’d never found a lot to love about Tigers Jaw, but had a couple of friends who swore by them. Seeing them live really tuned me into the love, and gave me a bit of a lifeline into their energy. So when this new batch of singles started showing up, I had the new record on the radar and it is nothing short of one of the best records released all year. I think I’ll be pulling this one out a lot once the weather is bright and glowing. The song boasts an unbelievably well written chorus, big and supple that swells but never drowns itself in its wake. The signature guitar chords that drive the song in and come back in the middle hold a quiet aggression that lifts the mood of the entire track. (Youtube)

Hand Habits — 4th of July

“Don’t cry, demolition baby” is one of the greatest lines I’ve heard all year. Meg Duffy has lots of songs that I like a lot, but more importantly many songs that I love. This song acts as an observation of someone’s building obsession with their own stability, being shaken from a place of routine and having no aim and no path without that trench lifepath in place. There is such lithe use of guitar throughout the song, with the main instrument you’ll hear over most of the song being a steady and driving snare drum. The vocals will be the focal point, but the more you hear the song, you’ll see the tracks have built a deeper underground that reveal themselves as you begin to loosen your focus. (Youtube)

Khruangbin (feat. Knxwledge) — Dearest Alfred (MyJoy)

Both of these artists had some of my favorite records from last year, and if this song is indicating a new direction and collaboration for them together, I am very excited to see what they plan on creating. The waking-from-hallucinogenic quality of the vocals bleeding from the walls is an incredible touch, casting just enough of a lightness to consider their presence as they dance and dash throughout the atmosphere. The loop of the keys and the guitar hook’s flourish as it shows up just as you’ve forgotten about it is yet another touch of how this brilliant little song can act as a method of hypnosis. This is a liquid labyrinth, less known for its difficulty to traverse than it’s intricate beauty. (Youtube)

Zella Day (feat. Weyes Blood) — Holocene

I’ve heard often of Weyes Blood but have yet to find a song that I’ve fallen in love with. This song that she appears on with Zella Day is a great way to slowly ease my way into her truth. The track is an easy and light summer haze, slowly rolling sunbeams glowing on dewy green hills, shallow breezes shaking leaves and casting waves across the earth. The song is loosely hypnotic, a reminder that “time forgets no one”, a reality that echoes first as an affirmation and then eventually for me as a dark tool to cast a reflection on the harms you may have caused to yourself and others, a penance hanging over you to ensure you keep your feet more firmly grounded in the present because you cannot go back to shift the past. (Youtube)

Monobody — Harvester

I loved the self titled record from Monobody. It’s great to see them back with a few new singles this year, and hopefully a new full length some time this year. The big and shiny synth notes are the stars of this track, but their large sounding crashes make appearances to portend the tectonic nature of the post-rock sound, while they still throw those noodling and fractal guitar parts to fill out the spirit of the song. A really nice spread in the instrumental music genre, certainly not a single noted drone. (Youtube)

JID (feat. Denzel Curry) — Bruuuh (Remix)

This is so far outside of my ‘comfort zone’ or my radar when it comes to new music or music in general. I’ve struggled with the modern style of music that the younger guys are rapping over (as I’m sure generations have before me, etc.) but this cool urgency seems to hit the right note, knowing when to drop a hook or a catchy onomatopoeia. (Youtube)

Fleece — Do U Mind? (Leave the Light On)

Loved this song as soon as I heard it. It’s smooth as hell. It’s got that surreal indie drift that Local Natives have often brought to the table. It’s got the detached comfortable helium haze of the sensation right before dream. Of course I’m going to love this one. (Youtube)

Manchester Orchestra — Bed Head

Absolutely one of the best songs that I’ve heard all year and it’s not even close. I cannot wait for this record (April 30th!). Andy Hull has been an incomparable songwriter for over a decade and within the role he plays beside this full band, he allows himself to write enormous moments that pull his voice from his body far and long and distant. His grumbled, growling whispered alto voice holds a level of vulnerability that feels so lassoed when he finally unleashes some of the desperation it sounds like he’s been trying to quell for so long. This shows up big time around three and a half minutes into the track when the the guitars and drums clash in the same fully phalanxed attack with his howling plea. A Black Mile to the Surface crippled me. I can’t wait to buckle under the same emotional burden of The Million Masks of God. (Youtube)

Genghis Tron — Ritual Circle

Genghis Tron was introduced me a long time ago, when doing anything within the hardcore scene and utilizing some form of synth or post-production was somewhat avant-garde and garnered a ton of ears on the work. Somehow, they were always bunched with Horse the Band. I never drew that analogy. Genghis was always doing something far more detached from the norm. Sure, there were screams amidst the electronic parts, both enormous and transient. But what really set their tone for me was a cohesive vision, a universe that they were creating and giving a voice to. All of the settings had a sensation. Ritual Circle is no different, creating a 10 minute vortex dream within a pulsing vortex. Tom rolls hit large, invoking a sense of galactic tribalism, an exquisite marriage of all that is primal within and all that is compounded without. There are widely spanning influences that exist throughout the ten minute dream, from Depeche Mode to to LCD Soundsystem to Phantogram to The Dillinger Escape Plan. I’m also not sure if I would call it an influence, but at least a parallel: this sounds like a track I would have imagined in a subsequent Codeseven record had they not broken up after Dancing Echoes Dead Sounds. This is a wildly ambitious track, a deeply produced experience. (Youtube)

HAIM (feat. Taylor Swift) — Gasoline

HAIM can often do no wrong. Even the songs I don’t love, I can definitively say “this is definitely a song that someone loves.” I can’t put my finger on why their music sounds so timeless. Is it the vintage sound that isn’t a put on? Is it the lack of hokey novelty? The layered vocals always blend and flow so perfectly in a milky cascade, lending a brief peak into the power of their sisterhood. This new release of the song with Taylor Swift isn’t particularly different from the original, but it’s as solid excuse as any to revisit a piece of pop rock genius. (Youtube)

Nick Hakim — QADIR (BADBADNOTGOOD Remix)

When BADBADNOTGOOD is involved, I’m engaged. Their acute respect to the material, whether it’s original work or a remix is remarkable and their elevated and uncaged jazz grants a positive note to any playlist. I am personally unfamiliar with Nick Hakim outside of this track, so this will act as my introduction to him and if his library carries the same low and restrained soul vocals with a sense for creating a lounge mood for the room, one that has caught the attention of BBNG, I’m going to be super happy when I check out his record from last year. (Youtube)

Lord Huron — Not Dead Yet

This song sounds kind of like a strange little nod to Elvis Presley with a snarl in the lip and a swing in the hips, low and easy in the barefoot morning of a weekend trip to a cabin in the mountains. The guitar is whispering a sound that begs to be louder, the strings flow serenely through a valley hallowed for the solitude it offers. There’s an organic sound that pervades the entire track, a sound that not only touches the sensations of the outdoors but also the rustic and dirty hands of a man who has found love in the dusk of his life. (Youtube)

Wild Pink — Pacific City

The simplicity of this song is its strongest point, not trying to accomplish more than it ought. There’s a sweeping feeling of open air guitars and hazy mountain ranges, observations of simple evenings away from a city that has built up a new animalistic misery and the way that finding an oasis has at last eroded the gnarled and wicked callous that you’d worked an entire life to avoid. It’s a song that seems to allow forgiveness to not only one’s self but to those who have encroached upon any light that you’d found, a song that feels like the cooling skin of a rope that was wound too tight but now has loosed. (Youtube)

Ya Tseen — Knives (feat. Portugal. the Man)

I’ll be very real: prior to hearing this track, I’d never heard of Ya Tseen and didn’t know what to expect. But seeing the feature of Portugal. the Man was enough for me to completely buy in as I’ve been fan boying them since I thought their line ‘shouting’ in the song Gold Fronts was saying ‘cheyenne’. I trust them completely. This is a smooth and microdosed sail down a shimmering multicolored river, a pass through the southern reach and its oil slick visual palette. It’s not a surprise that PtM has lent their efforts to the project as Nicholas Galanin (Ya Tseen) is an Indiginous man from Sitka, AK and their backing and support of the people of their native state has been overwhelming and loud for years. Digging deeper into Galanin’s work, his need to create striking and courageous art in the name and defense of his people is staggering. The full length drops April 30th. (Youtube)

Ryley Walker — Axis Bent

What an artist. I absolutely adored Walker’s 2018 Deafman Glance and this song seems to follow more in the vein of that sound than many of his other features and projects have between now and then. It’s not that those other works didn’t catch my attention, but they didn’t have the picture perfect presentation that this song has. The production pulls out every golden tone of each instrument so beautifully, articulating the fingers and the hums that orchestrate them. Walker’s cracking and imperfect vocals add a crunchy and urban tone to the otherwise outdoor sound. There’s fuzz in the speakers, there’s distortion and squealing, enough to bare the joys of a favorite old sweater or a car you’ve driven your entire life, one in which you know the shakes and the ways that the wheels pull. This full record drops April 3rd and I’m excited to take the time and sit with it in the early morning. (Youtube)