Features Tracks: Charli XCX, Real Estate, & More

Another week of 2014 gone (blimey, how time flies) and another flurry of new releases to wrap your ears around. Unless you’ve got a speed dial to Professor McGonagall, who can transfigure you into an all-absorbing sponge at a moment’s notice, it’s tricky not to let a few pass you by. Don’t worry too much, though, because the DIY writers have your back! They have combed every nook and cranny of the internet, and unearthed - among other things - a piece of punk yé-yé partly about sneezing, Real Estate’s latest hot property, and so much more.

Charli XCX – Allergic To Love (Snuffed By The Yakuza)

If the last year’s proved anything, it’s that Charli XCX is somewhat of an illustrious musical chameleon. Her last single ‘SuperLove’ might’ve been a mushy electropop ode to all things lovey-dovey, but her time upon infatuation’s cloud nine seems to have been immensely short-lived if bratty and abrasive new track ‘Allergic To Love’ is anything to go by. Originally whipped together by Swedish maniacal punk fiends Snuffed By The Yakuza, the paradoxical pop maiden takes the edgy buzz-saw riff of the original, peppers it with a plethora of hand claps then hellishly wails over the outcome for an abrupt, high octane one minute and eleven seconds. Topped off with the ingenious, sneeze-imitating hook ‘HA-HA-HA-HA-HA-HA-HA-HA-ACHOO!’, ‘Allergic To Love’ is an addictive concoction that’ll have you revelling in snot-ridden romantic disdain rather than reaching for the antihistamines. (Joshua Pauley)

Real Estate – Talking Backwards

Real Estate are the kind of band my Mum would rather embarrassingly label ‘Nice Boys’. They’re the musical equivalent of snuggling in 15 Tog duvets, sipping warm cups of cocoa and spending lazy afternoons in front of Countdown. That’s far from a criticism – I love doing all three (especially at once) – but you’re hardly going to start getting any expert-at-Guitar-Hero metal shreds or pounding bass solos from the New Jersey fivepiece. They’re just consistently really, really good; and ‘Talking Backwards’ is no exception. It’s more lush than Stacey West commenting on a freshly mowed lawn, featuring the kind of heart-achingly quaint riff that defines their breezy seaside tunes and makes them such a joy to listen to, with its three minutes absolutely soaring by. ‘Talking Backwards’ is so tasty that there’s a danger you might accidentally start adopting phonetic reversal. ‘Atlas’, album upcoming their for stuff Promising.(Kyle MacNeill)

Merchandise – Begging For Your Life / In The City Light

Rejoice! Merchandise have signed to 4AD! Instead of pictures emerging of Carson Cox & Co. chinking wine glasses and guzzling down champagne, though, they have celebrated by sharing an edit of a forthcoming 12” single entitled ‘Begging For Your Life / In the City Light’. Originally appearing on a split tour cassette with Chelsea Moving Light, this excellent track replicates Merchandise trajectory to where they are today. It begins with a dark and lurching rhythm that likens to the DIY outfit’s early days lurking in the shadows, before an incredibly groovy guitar riff chugs into life and propels the song to a dizzying ending, which we imagine feels like the bombardment of increasing interest they have attracted over the last couple of years. Their new album ‘After The End’ can’t come soon enough. (Samuel Cornforth)

Young Fathers – Get Up

Party anthems usually manifest themselves as a year progresses. There’s the Pitbull-stamped WKD donk that’s been such a staple of the past 24, tragic months. But songs about getting “druunk in the cluuuub” weren’t that obvious back at the turn of the decade. Something’s stirred. Suddenly, giant all-embracing anthems have a new face. And they’re here to put the fear in pop. Young Fathers sing about dealers, the “co-co-co-cabana”, spitting a hundred non-sensical phrases within three minutes of heady noise. ‘GET UP’ is the closest they’ve come to writing a song suited to clubs instead of scary crack dens. And it’s capable of changing a few things, namely chucking Pitbull out of the charts, head first. (Jamie Milton)

Elephant – Elusive Youth

Hands up if you like fractured, wistful pop as evocative as the unmistakable salty-tang of fresh sea air. Pop-duo Elephant deliver oodles of such delights on their new track ‘Elusive Youth’. I haven’t got the foggiest how you can possibly wear a city as a crown, but it’s a piece of wonderful imagery that should have Philip Treacy - the milliner who created Princess Beatrice’s atrocious Royal Wedding hat - running for the design studio. A soaring, ever-so-bittersweet well behaved slice of disco-slowdance, it’s yet another indication that Amelia Rivas and Christian Pinchbeck’s forthcoming debut album will be such laid-back listening that you’ll need a horizontal listening hammock to fully absorb it. (El Hunt)

Ava Luna – Daydream

‘Daydream’ is one extended jam from Ava Luna, hotfooting its way through jerking guitars, breathy vocals and actual, literal screaming. That doesn’t even include the off-balance horn sections, the punchy rhythms that are so Talking Heads ‘Remain in Light’ it’s difficult to imagine anyone but David Byrne fronting the thing. Instead, on a take from new album ‘Electric Ballroom’, this Brooklyn band create the kind of track that only comes around ‘Once In A Lifetime’. (Jamie Milton)

Perfect Pussy – Driver

Syracuse’s Perfect Pussy are known for playing 15 minutes shows so it comes as no surprise that their debut record, ‘Say Yes To Love’, clocks in at a mere 23 minutes. The first track to be unveiled, ‘Driver’, cements why there’s such brevity in their music - Meredith Graves can compress feelings of anxiety, death and pure anger into her distorted vocals in very little time. A few seconds after the static lingers following the band pressing the record button, frantic guitars only let up for Graves to comment “You don’t know shit about me”. She’s probably right. Her voice lurches forward, snowballing into the potent last words - “Before I die!”. The lyrics are often buried beneath distortion and unrelenting guitars, capturing the frustration of yelling into the void because no one will listen. You get the feeling that making music is an exhausting process for Perfect Pussy but one that ultimately has its rewards. (Aurora Mitchell)

Wet – No Lie (Noah Breakfast Remix Ft. Spank Rock)

NYC trio Wet’s dynamic take on minimal pop is subject to all kinds of wild, swerving distractors. If there’s a running theme in their debut EP, it’s the flirting with R&B. Instead of stealing the show, the influence creeps in. It gives subtle nods to Mariah et al without desperately mimicking its heroes. On this all-star remix of ‘No Lie’, produced by Noah Breakfast from Chiddy Bang, R&B is skewed, swerved and flipped around until it breaks into a beat-heavy, crazed rendition that practically opens a window to the future and peers right in. (Jamie Milton)

Fickle Friends – Swim

Yet another gem of a band hailing from the seaside town of Brighton, Fickle Friends are a quintet producing charmingly buoyant pop music in the realm of Mausi and Dive In. Debut single ‘Swim’ is impossible not to love – one of those incredulously catchy tracks that demands a second listen. With its get-up-and-dance energy, vibrant hooks and sunny rhythms which hint at a summer just over the horizon, it’s truly one to shake away those January blues. (Laura Eley)

Cities Aviv – Don’t Ever Look Back

When an artist produces for themselves, they’ve gotta know how and when to let their instrumentals breathe. Cities Aviv knows how to do this in abundance, almost to extremes; but he can get away with it entirely by virtue of being an incredible and unique producer. Focusing his sound around squishy, distorted samples, the throbbing beat to ‘Don’t Ever Look Back’ barely resembles hip-hop in the way his best productions always have. Combining post-punk, soul-tinged hip-hop and a slight touch of that abrasive Death Grips-inspired sound (albeit in a considerably friendlier form). His estranged yelps bounce with a Memphis drip, but the fluttering beat takes centre stage with a subtly persuasive priority.(Joe Price)

DON’T EVER LOOK BACK from rimar villaseñor on Vimeo.

Adult Jazz - Am Gone

Across the two songs that form their debut single, Leeds’ Adult Jazz are practically lecturing in their crafty take on alternative pop. They’re reciting the stuff, reciting the teachings of Our Great Dave Longstreth, all while forging a genre-bending take entirely of their own making. Highbrow it might be, but there’s something special about ‘Am Gone’. Its heart is plugged into soul, smoky bars with the only missing ingredient being a wild saxaphone solo. Everything else is covered, with a thousand chord changes jostling for space. If there’s a more inventive, exciting new band out there than Adult Jazz, answers on a postcard please. (Jamie Milton)

Neighbour – Super 8

Kettering’s Neighbour make the kind of subtly psychedelic music that appeals to an almost purely subconscious part of your brain. Never heard of Kettering? It’s a town in the Midlands where not much happens but bands like Temples and now Neighbour are putting it firmly on the map. Get involved with the psych madness of the Midlands and get to know your Neighbour. (Jack Parker)

BadBadNotGood – CS60

If Wikipedia is anything to go by (it’s not), then BadBadNotGood are a post-bop, instrumental hip hop, jazz, free improvisation, electronica trio from Toronto, Ontario. They are most definitely Canadian, but it’s difficult to pin down their sound to any of these (mostly made up) genres in latest offering ‘CS60’.
After two minutes of varied, meditative build up, an abrupt gush of whopping great bass hits bursts the Zen bubble the track was previously floating in and lands it directly in a murky bog of instrumental heaven.
Call it post-avant jazzcore or progressive dreamfunk or whatever; just know that it knocks hard. (Nathan Butler)

La Dispute – Stay Happy There

As the old adage goes, ‘home is where the heart is’. Not content with offering a ferocious exposé of his heart for the past decade, La Dispute frontman Jordan Dreyer now seems hell-bent on tearing down the walls of his home with introspective third full-length ‘Rooms Of The House’. ‘Stay Happy There’ is the first glimpse at the forthcoming LP, and is a typically snarling monologue of Dreyer’s incensed reaction to the tail-end of a relationship. Encompassing both the personal and the prevalent feelings of such a situation, Dreyer’s lyricism looks set to remain at the forefront of La Dispute’s work. There’s no reinvention for reinvention’s sake here - just a continuation of the post-hardcore poetry that brought both debut ‘Somewhere Under The River Between Vega & Altair’ and 2011’s ‘Wildlife’ seemingly endless acclaim. “Everything is happening at once” ends Dreyer’s monologue, a fitting conclusion to three and a half minutes of unbridled ferocity that only a spurned punk rocker can muster. (Tom Connick)