New music guide The Neu Bulletin (Smerz, The Van T’s, Weird Milk & more)

With a name that sounds a little like a special edition spin-off of everyone’s favourite marshmallow sandwich snack, Smerz specialise in viscous, late-night bizarreness, and accordingly, they’ve just been snapped up by XL. Though the Copenhagen duo have caught our attentions before - early tracks ‘Blessed’ and ‘Because’ standing up as massive straight-up club bangers - ‘Oh My My’ shows them laying aside the more tenacious beats of darkened basements, making something far more subversive, and distorting and mangling every last second instead (El Hunt)

Glasgow four-piece The Van T’s enjoy creating their own fuzzed-up blend of garage rock with shoegaze elements, throwing in a good pop hook for good measure. With their latest single ‘Fresh Meat’ though, they’ve produced their most aggressive gut-punch to date. Swathed in huge, crushing riffs that border on grunge and while still casting a psych-induced haze, it’s a mile a thunderous rush of pure rock that never lets up. In that sense, it’s as raw as a steak tartare, but it’s also a delicious delicacy that you’ll want to taste even more of. (Eugenie Johnson)

Despite now residing in London, Ben Dancer and David Pullen, better known as JOYYA, hail from the small village of Wylam in Northumberland. You might think that means they would deal in intimate folk or hushed torchlight songs, but instead their move to the big smoke has energised them to make buoyant electro-pop tunes. Case in point, their first single ‘Seven’, a shimmering slice of synth goodness built on pulsing electronic beats and smooth vocals. It’s thoroughly JOYYA by name, JOYYA by nature. (Eugenie Johnson)

Hailing from Slough - hardly the UK’s most glamorous holiday destination - duo SUGARHOUSE make breezy, sunny indie-pop that’s more suited to seafront drives with the windows down. There’s little deviation from your standard indie-pop formula on debut track ‘Love Anyone Else’, but the track hits in all the right places. Every vocal melody and guitar hook is smooth as silk, and the interplay between members Charlie and Connie is infectious. For close, sweaty days like these, SUGARHOUSE provide a blissful soundtrack. (Will Richards)

If Howling Bells singer Juanita Stein’s current solo output is treading a twilit, Americana-tinged path, then former bandmate and brother Joel is headed down an even dustier road with his own new moniker, Glassmaps. Like a swaggering, chilled-out take on The Black Keys’ riff-led roots rock, ‘Summer Rain’ is a no-frills stomp that’ll have you kicking the heels of your cowboy boots down into the sun-baked earth (wait, are we not actually in the Arizona desert?), and one that proves his big sis’ ain’t the only one with a stellar set of vocal pipes. (Lisa Wright)

Tags: Smerz, Listen, Features, Neu, Neu Bulletin