New music guide The Neu Bulletin (16th June 2014)

Slacker kids who aren’t actually slacker kids at all - just sensible, nice boys who write lots of great songs - Happyness tonight launch their debut album ‘Weird Little Birthday’, which fits the summer mood in that it’s about a guy sharing a birthday with Jesus before going on a bloody rampage. June vibes all round. They headline London’s Servant Jazz Quarters tomorrow.

If synths could talk, the ones on Litany’s new ‘Slopes’ track would be crying out for help. They have an eerie, sadness-drenched quality, as replicated in the music of SOHN or ‘Silent Shout’-era The Knife. Litany are a UK duo who recently underwent a nifty name change, this being their most confident track to date. Downbeat vocals are cast up alongside those ringing synths, each word pronounced with complete clarity - no nonsense effects here. A product of so much of the best music from the past few years, Litany also resplendently form their own path.

Ashley Garcia’s most recent Toothless LP, ‘Janus’, was written after she took one too many hallucinogens and took off on one big, apparently life-changing acid trip. She reached the other side, although by that point her perspective had changed. The songs on this record combine both a good and a bad trip - strange qualities mix with undeniable beauty, off-key synth notes bent around more comforting vocals. “The trip has impacted her in a way that has made her more aware of her daily life,” apparently - either way, she’s making brilliant music.

Tags: Features, Neu, Neu Bulletin, Happyness, Listen