Greetings old friends, I hope 2022 has been treating you well. It’s been a couple months since I’ve sent out a missive of hot new music picks. I hope you managed through the year end period. In case you need to catch up with any 2021 music, I’ll point you in the direction of my year end favorite 100 albums from 2021 playlist. But, even though 2022 is but one month old, there are already a load of great new releases I’d like to share with you. So let’s get to it!
As a reminder, the RecommNeds is a monthly rundown of maybe-not-on-your-radar new music, hopefully with something-for-everyone variety. I’m also putting together a special 25-track playlist each month: songs I’ve been digging, some from the monthly picks, some from albums that weren’t featured, some singles from upcoming releases and maybe a random blast-from-the-past favorite or two. This month’s playlist is here. Dig it!
Without further ado, here are my latest finds, enjoy!
The Monthly 10:
Ten under-the-radar albums released last month that I think you might dig, presented in alphabetical order.
Black Flower: Magma
Let’s get right to it with this marvelous new release from Belgium. Yes, we’ll start the year off in Europe and what better way than with Black Flower, a jazz quintet that mutates in real time into something more psychedelic or funky or all-world-encompassing. There’s a fantastical quality to this album, dreamlike and yet very much here in the waking world. Highly recommend you give this one a listen or two or three.
The Diasonics: Origin of Forms
It says here that my next pick is from a straight funk band from Moscow which … can’t be right? But lo!, yes it is. The Disasonics are indeed a funk band from Moscow. Origin of Forms is their debut album and it’s a discovery of dark, exotic grooves. There’s a depth of delights here, each track bringing something new to the collection, while staying clearly a part of it. I have no doubt you’re gonna love this one, so get to that funky lovin’!
The Kernal: Listen to the Blood
Bringing things back stateside, how about checking out The Kernal out of Nashville? Just give that opening track “U Do U” a try, with its southern-country boogie and irresistible hook and you’ll be, well, hooked. The whole record is chock full of nuggets like that, stories you want to hear, melodies you want to hum, choruses you want to sing along to. It’s country done right in all the right ways. Enjoy it!
Bobbie Lovesong: Paris By Starlight
Let’s go straight dreamstate with the next rec. The album is Paris By Starlight by Bobbie Lovesong and this one positively floats. Yes, this is one of those dreams where you can fly and Lovesong has created a lighter-than-air soundscape. With analog synths, vibey grooves and subliminal voices popping up throughout, Paris By Starlight is an energy all of its own. It’s something special.
Modern Nature: Island of Noise
It can be fun to see genre melt to meaninglessness in so many different ways. The new album from Modern Nature is expansive in the way it captures bits of jazz, folk, baroque pop and more. It’s all of these things and it’s absolutely none of them, all-encompassing and yet small and intimate. At times the record feels as if someone took the indefinable mass that is Yo La Tengo and made some weird-angle cross-section. It’s hard to fully describe the joys of this one, but rest assured Island of Noise is a must-listen, one of the best albums of the early new year.
John C. O’Leary III: The Sundering
This one’s a little different than the rest of this month’s batch. It’s a solo piano record from John C. O’Leary III, who is also in the previously RecommNed’d Mexican jazz trio La Lucha. On The Sundering O’Leary is able to seize every advantage playing solo affords, improvising himself into far-flung spots and tidy corners, taking as many right or left turns as he needs. O’Leary is also a neuroscientist, and his playing has the feel of a wide network of interconnected synapses, as it lights up in surprising and coherent ways. When you’d like to let your mind wander to some wonderful piano playing, this is worth a listen.
Rude Skøtt Osborn Trio: The Virtue of Temperance
Fittingly following Papir’s latest is another heater out of Denmark. Martin Rude, Jakob Skøtt and Tamar Osborn are the Rude Skøtt Osborn Trio and their latest album, The Virtue of Temperance, is just out on the RecommNed-favorite El Paraiso label. The sax/drum/bass trio almost has an instrumental-Morphine sound, a dark, swinging jazz with a wealth of groove and a serious ability to stretch things out. Highest recommendation.
The Soundcarriers: Wilds
Get a load of The Soundcarriers out of Nottingham. Riding a thump of omnipresent bass, the quartet hits too many sweet spots to count. At times it’s loungey, at others total exotica, with hints of jazz and psychedelia and, sure, folk as well. These guys just tie it all together with an easiness that’s incredibly addictive. Put this on your need-to-listen-right-away list and thank me later.
Jeff Tobias: Recurring Dream
Jeff Tobias is another regular around these parts, but if you’ve heard him, it might have been with punkrockjazz’ers Sunwatchers, or even with Modern Nature from a couple picks ago. Here, Tobias is out on his own in an explosion of what may best be described as art-rock. Catchy, poppy, smart, wildly creative, weird in just the right ways and yet very listenable and accessible. It’s dense, but doesn’t fill you up too much. I think you’ll dig!
Trees Speak: Vertigo of Flaws
The full name of the latest album from Arizona duo Trees Speak is Vertigo of Flaws: Emancipation of the Dissonance and Temperaments in Irrational Waveforms. It’s a mouthful and at 29 tracks it’s an earful as well. Lots of words, lots of tracks and lots of cool sounds to go with it. From krautrock to horror film soundtrack, from synth electrogroove to psychjammer, this one runs the gamut and pretty much nails it all.
Bonus Round
In addition to the Monthly 10, I’ll try to throw in a few other picks each month.
For my live pick this month, here’s some more solo piano magic, this time a live studio performance from Polish pianists Hania Rani. Magic stuff!
As for my EP picks, check out this mini-set of folk loveliness courtesy of Luca Nieri & the Dark Branches and then this blast of bright, off-kilter pop from Norway’s Pom Poko.
And finally, five more recommendations that may not be on your radar but are well worth a listen, presented without comment: Jake Xerxes Fussell, Jamestown Revival, Little Barrie, Mystic Braves, Penelope Isles … what other good ones did I miss this month?
I think that’ll do, more next month.
Please note: all of the music mentioned in this column can be found in this February compilation playlist on Spotify. I’ll also keep up this running playlist with all the recommendations from 2021 so they’re all in one place for easy new music discovery at any time.
Enjoy!
