Bear's Den - crow, 2019

"Crow" by Bear's Den is a nostalgic elegy remembering the loss of a father figure. Full of bittersweet gratitude, the harmonic aspects of the track are a beautiful complement to the melody and lyrics sung by Andrew Davie with such pure emotion."

The Digital Age - galaxies, 2016

"What I can hear and feel in Galaxies is a band that is searching a bit for a new identity. There are some risks and creative choices taken that definitely work, and some that don't. But the times when it is really dragged down are when the band elects to make safe, accessible musical choices rather than ones that add to the intended experience."

Vini Reilly - home recording live, 2020

"There is YouTube footage from 2020 of Reilly playing in his living room and it’s not the work of a three-time stroke victim you may expect. But it’s still not good enough for Reilly. “I carried on and on after my strokes and I got to a level, but it’s not even close [to where I was],”

Horsebeach - pure shores, 2024

"Tried my best to do this absolute banger some justice. Here's my 3rd single from the upcoming LP, it's a cover of the track 'Pure Shores. Streaming on all the usual places and link in bio ofc. Hope you like it x"

Fancy Animals - circles, 2024

"a sound with ample entrancement, hypnotic and dreamy while still retaining a punchy melodic fervency — especially apparent in the gorgeously shoegaze-y “get inside,” closing plea."

The Jesus And Mary Chain - girl seventy-one, 2024

"Our creative approach is the same as in 1984, just come to the studio and see what happens. We came in with a lot of songs and let them run their course. There are no rules, it’s a sort of telepathy, we’re those strange twins who finish each other’s sentences."

Still Corners - crystal blue, 2024

"The genesis for several of these songs comes from dreams. Every night she wrote down the dreams she could remember. During the recording, I would pull out my dream journal and sing over various music loops that Greg had prepared. This repetitive nature felt like a trance."

Crosby Stills Nash And Young - teach your children, 1969

"In 1971, "Teach Your Children" was the final song in the movie Melody."

Dave Matthews Band - mercy, 2012

"Dave Matthews Band’s video for “Mercy” embraces the song’s themes of unity and harmony (...). According to the band, 14,334 people provided original photos and videos for the inspirational clip, a James Frost-directed mash-up video that features only glimpses of the band and focuses on the fans."

My Sad Captains - don't listen to your heart, 2017

"since i started the blog, i've got to know some great bands and from time to time we talk through email or myspace or facebook... i like to call them friends because i'm an easygoing person and it's not very hard for me to make friends (through virtual medias. face to face i tend to be a bit shy). i like to think my sad captains is a band-friend of the blog. so i'm more than happy when i get news from them... they're releasing a free song taken from their album here and elsewhere, (released on stolen recordings) called 'you talk all night'. a very mellow and soothing tune. there' also a video for the song that is so simple but so well filmed that you can let your imagination flow with the images and build a story from it."

Layzi - close two u, 2024

"I’ll start with the keys and then start writing. I’ll add the chords, and then some notes on the guitar"

Van Morrison - glad tidings, 1970

"The style of Moondance stood in contrast to that of Astral Weeks. Whereas Astral Weeks had a sorrowful and vulnerable tone, Moondance restored a more optimistic and cheerful message to his music, which abandoned the previous record's abstract folk compositions in favour of more formally composed songs and a lively rhythm and blues style he expanded on throughout his career."

Jayz - empire state of mind, 2009

"There was a first phone call, and Jay hit me up like, 'I feel like I have this record that's going to be the anthem of New York. The piano, the way the style [is], the whole flow, and it couldn't be the anthem of New York without you.' Obviously, I'm very grateful to him for reaching out to me and for that type of ability to represent my hometown, like, that was crazy. So we went to the studio. I went to the studio, and [...] I fell in love [with the track] from the jump."

Still Corners - beginning to blue, 2013

"Their offering of their own little dream-pop world in a dark corner of the Austin Convention Center comes with its own pseudo-psychedelic slideshow, and singer Tessa Murray's voice has more than an echo of the late Trish Keenan in her heyday."

Tom Waits - coney island baby, 2002

"This album is all rich, complex, mysterious, dark tomes about the concussion of hatred against love. The sound is not quite industrial or grating, but there is a discord to these songs, almost a physical discomfort."

Bill Ryder-Jones - satellites live, 2015

"Ryder-Jones, pitched to the right of the stage, could alternate between looking feverishly involved or coolly relaxed. His guitar parts were simply stunning. Nobody outside the tight-knit group could have guessed he was wrestling with demons, until in 2005 he briefly stopped touring with the band, citing a stress-related illness."

The Band Of Holy Joy - to leave or remain, 2017

"To say the Band of Holy Joy were an anomaly on the late-1980s indie scene is to wallow in understatement. All around, bands took to flared jeans and trundling Madchester beats, but the Band of Holy Joy made an oompah din on brass and accordions while singer Johnny Brown sang affectingly of London lowlife in a drunken Geordie wail. It was charmingly incongruous, as if Brecht and Weill had turned up in the middle of an episode of Byker Grove."

This Mortal Coil - kangaroo, 1984

"In 2018, Pitchfork ranked It'll End in Tears at number eight on its list of "The 30 Best Dream Pop Albums".

The Waterboys - red army blues, 1984

"The song tells the story of a Soviet soldier in WWII who somehow survives the war and comes in contact with American troops. Joseph Stalin felt that troops who were taken prisoner were weak and traitors to the Soviet state and that troops who came in contact with Allied troops were in danger of being Westernized. So after the war, many Red Army troops who had been held as POWs or had much contact with western troops were considered a threat to the state and were sent directly to the gulags where many would die while working and starving in forced labor camps. We’re talking in the millions here."

El Perro Del Mar - wipe me off this earth, 2024

“As the feelings of grief and loss wear off, you enter another realm of guilt. The guilt of not mourning enough, of going on living though someone’s gone. This song is about the ghost not accepting that it’s dead. I realised I was actually thinking like this which made it increasingly difficult to move on. I’d stayed on with the dead. I think it’s a common thing and it’s such a dark place to be in. You can’t really reason with the dead. That’s something I’ve come to understand.”