For the sake of transparency, the following album will be released on yk Records which is the label that I operate, so my bias here is strong.

You Drive is a collaborative project between electronic artist Makeup and Vanity Set and sometimes-Birdcloud, sometimes-solo-songstress Jasmin Kaset. They’ve worked together in the past on various single tracks for Makeup and Vanity Set albums (see “Hand in Hand“) but this new undertaking is presented as an entirely new, unified, project.

The first track from the album, “New”, debuted on Vehlinggo, a synthwave blog known for showcasing albums that exist within the Outrun genre. The track couples the dark, often cold, electronics of Makeup and Vanity Set with the melancholy, often detached, vocals of Kaset. On the surface it would seem this would create a depressive vibe but there’s a hopeful melancholy to it. At least to my biased ears.

Judging a demo is a tricky art as you’re really listening for the potential of a song, rather than a final polished project. Sometimes they end up being better than the final product and sometimes they’re fascinating sketches of some masterpiece that follows.

Listening to the two track demo from Sunroom can yield neither of those results since we have no idea where these songs will go. What we can do is listen to them and hear a band with quite a bit of spunk and a uniquely enjoyable vocal delivery. If they can just manage to maintain that, they’ll be in a good place.

The impetus behind the four volumes of free music from Divora is both compelling and completely charming:

I am just a dude in Nashville who loves creating music. Most of the music on here was composed for the campaigns that I DM for my friends.

If you didn’t catch it, DM in this case means “Dungeon Master” – the all-seeing omnipotent narrator that directs the storyline during a game of Dungeons and Dragons. So, not only is this guy responsible for world building, character development and narrative arcs, he’s also providing a soundtrack for it.

Take your pick between storylines – Special Boy, Maternal Instincts, Born from Blood or just some General Battle Music. All of it has a nice fusion of modern electronic undertones mixed with the expected sweeping themes you’d associate with Knights, Orcs, Dragons and other medieval & fantasy elements.

It should also be noted that the music works quite well when just sitting at your desk traversing the tubes of the Internet, in search of the ever elusive Work Distraction.

“A Beautiful Noise” is the lead track taken off of the forthcoming Charlie Smyth album, The Way I Feel. It’s a collection of songs written and recorded with Smyth’s wife Kalee and produced by Andy Gibson (Hank III, Nashville Pussy) that waivers between a subdued old-school country record and upbeat Southwestern influences. During the former, there’s plenty of acoustic guitar, a bit of pedal steel, occasional fiddle and a focus on the lyrical storytelling.

“A Beautiful Noise” (and other tracks like “Shore” or “Don’t Let the Stars Get In Your Eyes“) turn up the energy a bit, showcase some horns and harken back to a time that feels more Old West than it does Front Porch strumming. Neither of those is meant to be preferential to the other, just a remark on the variety of styles contained with the record.

Smyth is also a visual artist with a body of work containing a smatter of smeared colors and indistinct shapes in a sea of textures. He’ll be celebrating the release of the record at The Local on Friday, July 13th. Let’s hope he brings the horns.

Sad Baxter’s upcoming full-length, So Happy, is due July 20th on Cold Lunch Recordings. Over the past few months, they’ve shared videos for Baby, Love Yew, Sick Outt, a 615 Sessions that includes a cover of Nirvana’s “On a Plain” and now they’ve released a video for Believe Me, another track off said upcoming album.

Stylistically, the video calls back to the bands goofier side as they act as judges for a talent show with various absurd (and legitimately funny) performances from a host of oddball characters. However, one of those characters is a vaguely out of place “beauty” queen with blue hair that just can’t seem to catch a break. It’s heartbreaking comic relief in the context of the video but, if you’ll allow me this indulgence, is also a nod to the forelorn and melancholy vibe of the band. On the whole, Sad Baxter is a Rock band (capital R) but there’s always something underneath the surface of their songs hinting towards a depressive or frustrated narrator. Maybe I’m projecting or maybe I’m reading too much into the nu-grunge style but it adds a weight to the songs that makes them much more relatable, as they seem to come from an authentic place.

I applaud the band for all the promo running up to this album and can’t help but wonder what they’ve got up their sleeve after it’s released. Four legit videos before an album release should be more than enough to have you take notice and mark your calendar for the 20th. I sure have.

When the pilot episode of Network 77 dropped last month, I was rather intrigued by the Muziekpop segment featuring the band Creamer and their performance of “Drugs No More.” The video is equal parts cheesy local broadcast and 70’s green screen effects but the song is a finely tuned gem heavily influenced by Queen. The only problem? The band seemed to be from Texas, so I couldn’t spread the gospel!

Fortunately, it turns out that the band moved here and recorded an entire album to be released… sometime. The first single is a dash melancholy, a dash earnest and entirely infectious. If they manage to put together 12 songs in this vein, we’ll have a helluva great album on our hands.

PERF is a live, in-studio, performance record from Justin and The Cosmics that frontman Justin Collins informed the Nashville Scene was the result of a long-time effort to “capture what we do at our live show for a long time, and I think we finally may have done it.” It’s certainly got a lot going for it as it was recorded by Wilco member Pat Sansone at the infamous Ardent Studios in Memphis. That, in and of itself, is enough to make someone take note.

But what if that person, hypothetically, had never seen Justin and The Cosmics perform live? What if, perchance, the listener was only familiar with the band through seeing their name on the marquee at The Basement? What if, theoretically, the listener assumed that based on the band name that the outfit was a jam-band style outfit focused more on guitar solos than anything else? Well, dear reader, that listener would be in for a surprising treat.

Despite my lack of previous familiarity, the album is eleven great tracks of throwback Rock n’ Roll. Not in a Chubby Checkers kind of way but in the way you imagine bands pouring their heart and soul into a performance; resulting in a sweaty, nearly possessed, endeavor.

Like most live recordings, it’s best experienced top to bottom. Diving right in to track five isn’t going to give you context on the prior proselytizing to the audience. Start at track one and tell me by the time you hit “Sunkissed” at track seven you aren’t wishing you were there to see this.

In early June, we got a sneak peek at Commander Keen’s latest full-length with the track “When David Bowie Passed Away“; a bombastic burst of foreboding rock with unhinged, distorted, vocals. Now the album it belongs to, Dying in the South, is released everywhere and we can hear how that tracks fits into the larger context of the record.

Even with a cursory listen, it’s easy to hear that Commander Keen is going for the throat with the output of energy from the record. The first five tracks, including “David Bowie”, are an onslaught of sweaty rock fused with influences of snarling punk and anthemic chorus lines. Once you hit “Woodcutter”, presumably the end of Side A on the vinyl, the pace slows down a bit for a fleeting moment before it completely unravels on the next track, “Bible Belt”, and continues to maintain that pace until the slow burning album ender, “Kings of Tennessee.”

Maybe I’m being presumptuous but looking at track titles like “Low Budget Dreams”, “Mountain Dew Capital of the World” and the titular “Dying in the South” seem to tell the story of a band from a small town feeling hindered by their surroundings. It’s a story that any band – from the outskirts of Cookieville or not – can relate to. The South is considered a Conservative home base with rampant racism, misogyny and homophobia running rampant, not to mention crushing poverty for many. Being a rock band raised in that environment can result in plenty of angst and a desire for a cathartic expulsion towards the world around you. Throughout the record there’s a sensation of palpable frustration through the lyrics – both in terms of content and their delivery – and I can only hope this means that Dying in the South is a call-to-arms to escape the confines of the Southern stereotype.

The folks over at No Country for New Nashville premiered a new song from ONLY off their forthcoming full-length album. We’re big fans of the Language EP (particularly the rallying cry of “We all die!” in “July“) and this new track, “Jerk”, seems to extend that post-punk musical style but with the additional of female vocalist Josephine Moore. It’s a nice change of pace and I hope it hints towards some dual vocalists in the larger release.

About a year ago, we stumbled on Jonesiii from the Moon‘s The Moon is Watching Us, a collection of hip-hop songs with a dark and slow burn style.

He’s been following up the album with some one off singles, the latest of which is “N y L,” a proper companion to The Moon‘s style. I’m, admittedly, not the greatest resource for speaking on the good or bad attributes of hip-hop but Jonesiii has consistently delivered beats and lyrics that are a bit foreboding but mixing in some spacey or light element to keep it mysterious. Such is the case on “N y L”, a keyboard twinkle keeps and some legitimate singing keeps the song from going too far down the rabbit hole.

It should also be noted that the video is beautiful. Directors Hope Carter and Anime Sunset should be very pleased with their results here; as each shot is a well-framed, intentional, beautifully lit presentation.