‘Popular’ music in Singapore currently falls neatly into two categories. One, smooth urban electro-soul that reflects the entitled materialistic extravagance of the nation’s youth and two, atmospheric dreamy indie pop that is a contradiction of faux-art pretensions and grassroots endeavour. FERS is firmly in the latter camp.
Dream-pop
PoP RECOMMENDS | POP POWER !!! : JENNIE VEE – SUFFER
It’s not too difficult to place Jennie Vee’s influences. The atmospheric, banks of guitar style on new EP Suffer are highly reminiscent of 80s/90s dream pop / shoegaze.
LIVE NEWS: SONGS FOR CHILDREN AND OTHER SOUNDS PRESENT FAZERDAZE LIVE IN SINGAPORE!
Indie pop songstress Fazerdaze (a.k.a. Amelia Murray) and band brings her dream pop agenda to Singapore on Friday, October 20th.
THE LISTENING BOOTH | POP POWER!!! : WHITE FEVER – EVERYONE’S GOT THEIR PRICE
London dark indie-pop band White Fever release their new EP Concrete on 29th September.
THE LISTENING BOOTH | POP POWER !!! : BRIGHT BOY – VENUS
Just got alerted to this single release from Bright Boy.
SINGAPORE MUSIC SPOTLIGHT | POP POWER : AMBERHILL – FOREST
Nothing against millennial urban electro-jazz-pop but sometimes all you really want is real music with real instruments that touch your heart and soul. For real.
PoP RECOMMENDS | THE NEW ROCK N ROLL : LIGHTCRAFT – ANOTHER LIFE EP
Dream pop merchants Lightcraft maintain their life-affirming joyous indie rock ministrations with a new EP that fulfils all the promise expressed in 2013 album, Colours of Joy.
ALBUM REVIEW: COMET CONTROL – CENTER OF THE MAZE
Background Comet Control were formed in 2013 around the time Toronto band Quest for Fire announced their breakup. The band includes two former members of Quest for Fire – Chad Ross, on guitar and vocals, and Andrew Moszynski, on guitar – as well as Nicole Howell, on bass, Jay Anderson Continue Reading
ALBUM REVIEW: GREYS – OUTER HEAVEN
Background Toronto quartet that somewhat traded off an early reputation as punks/noiseniks on debut EP – Repulsion – into something a bit more expansive than a ‘genre’ stereotype.
ALBUM REVIEW: BRASS BED – IN THE YELLOW LEAF
Background Hailing from Louisiana, Brass Bed started out in the mid-2000s parlaying the influence of 70s power pop into sophisticated music. Now pared down to a trio (Christiaan Mader, Jonny Campos and Peter DeHart), In the Yellow Leaf is the band’s fourth LP.
ALBUM REVIEW: THE HIGH VIOLETS – HEROES AND HALOS
By J Quigley Background The band formed from the ashes of legendary Portland favourite, the Bella Low, who played regular gigs with other local psych bands like The Dandy Warhols. After the Bella Low breakup former members Clint Sargent (lead guitar, vocals), Luke Strahota (drums/percussion) and Violet Bianca Grace picked Continue Reading
ALBUM REVIEW: HOLY WAVE – FREAKS OF NURTURE
Background Based in El Paso, Texas, Holy Wave (Kyle Hager, Dustin Zozaya, Julian Ruiz, Joey Cook, Ryan Fuson) is riding the wave (!) of the contemporary psych-rock revival. Strengths Adept at combining sympathetic elements of psych-rock, shoe-gaze and dream pop, the music on Freaks of Nurture will appeal to a wide Continue Reading
ALBUM REVIEW: SOME KIND OF ILLNESS – S/T
It has taken a while for Some Kind of Illness to release their debut full length album but it’s definitely worth the wait! Consisting of brothers Mark and Paul Hinks, SKOI encapsulates a myriad of genres that have captured the lovers of indie-alternative rock for decades.
ALBUM REVIEW: DEAFHEAVEN – NEW BERMUDA
It seems like a disservice to Deafheaven to simply describe the band (George Clarke, Kerry McCoy Daniel Tracy, Stephen Clark & Shiv Mehra) as a Black Metal outfit. Sure, the music carries all the hallmarks of the extreme metal genre viz. fast tempos, shrieking vocal style, heavily distorted guitars played with Continue Reading
LIGHTCRAFT – COLOURS OF JOY
Released at the very beginning 2014, Colours of Joy, the sophomore album from Indonesian indie band lightcraft is quite the thing of beauty. Whilst its live dynamic is waves of shoegazey dreamy noise pop, the sonic agenda on this album is more lilting, more subtle and ultimately more graceful. And this Continue Reading