So, what are you listening to these days?

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Mendalla said:
Finally, Jacob and dodie with a performance of "Summer Rain"
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And I was unfamiliar with the song when I posted that, but it's a Jacob Collier original, with Madison Cunningham and mandolin virtuoso Chris Thile appearing on his original recording.
 
The Canadian rock band Saga were a big thing for a time in the seventies and eighties ("On the loose", "Wind him up"), part of a wave of Canadian hard rock that happened in that era. Original Saga guitarist Ian Crichton has a new project coming out that is quite interesting (he's also still a part of the current incarnation of Saga along with his brother, original Saga bassist Jim Crichton).

 
Ah, Violet Orlandi. So happy she's back releasing regularly. This week is a cover but it's a beauty, her latest take on a song by Swedish rockers Ghost. This acoustic version of "Mary On A Cross" is a thing of beauty and she makes full use of her alto range here. Beautiful song, beautiful voice.

 
Long before Grammy awards, sold-out tours, and bestselling records, Laufey was a fifteen year-old singer-pianist appearing on Iceland's Got Talent. And she was already quite poised and professional on stage. Nothing like seeing the beginning of what now looks to be a great career.

 
Six years later, attending Berklee College of Music in Boston, Massachusetts. This song later appeared (in its full version) on her first EP, Typical of Me, in 2021 and on her live album A Night at the Symphony in 2023. I don't think she or Berklee realized that less than four years later, she'd be an award-winner hailed for introducing traditional jazz vocals to Gen Z.

 
And the "Goddess Edition" of Laufey's Grammy-winning Bewitched came out today. Four songs plus everything from the original release. This penchant of the modern music industry for putting out multiple editions of the same album gets annoying but I'm not about to complain about new Laufey. The first single from the Goddess Edition, the eponymous "Goddess" was an amazing song. Along with the album today came the lyric video for "Bored".

 
And some Chinese prog with a Canadian connection came out today. OU's second full album Frailty is produced by Vancouver wiz kid (he sings, he plays guitar, he writes, he engineers, he produces, he makes julienne fries) Devin Townsend. Both OU and Townsend record for the Inside Out record label which is how they connected.

 
This is only up for a few more days apparently, but it's a nice introduction to Laufey if you have an hour before Friday to give it a listen\view. She performs a selection of her songs in the Barberini Museum in Potsdam, Germany along with sharing her musings as she tours the museum. Her thoughts on music, art, and the relationship between them are an interesting insight into her as an artist and the performances, all solo with no backup group, are exquisite.

 
Mendalla said:
Long before Grammy awards, sold-out tours, and bestselling records, Laufey was a fifteen year-old singer-pianist appearing on Iceland's Got Talent. And she was already quite poised and professional on stage. Nothing like seeing the beginning of what now looks to be a great career.

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Damn, looks like it got hit with a copyright sting. Oh well.
 
Along with the raft of new metal I talked about in the metal thread, we got a new song from American singer-songwriter Malinda. This is the second one from her this year and both draw heavily on her love of Irish music. Nothing said yet about a new album but if songs keep coming at this rate, I'll expect one later this year or early next.

 
New VOCES8 today and it's a beauty. It's also something you don't often hear from them, a composition by two members. Text is by soprano Andrea Haines, music is by tenor Blake Morgan. If you go to YouTube, the description has some notes on the piece by Blake along with the poem by Andrea that is the basis for it. They are joined in this performance of the work by students from their US Scholars program and the vocal quartet Lyyra, who they have been promoting heavily of late.

 
Lots of interesting new music came out while I was away. Here's some highlights.

Dutch metal mezzo Simone Simons dropped a second single from Vermillion, her upcoming solo album. Unlike the first which seemed pretty solidly in her usual symphonic metal world, this one moves in some different directions, even if metal is inevitably part of its DNA give Simone's history and that of her collaborator Arjen Lucassen.


And her compatriot Charlotte Wessels continues the road to her third solo album. She's got a solid band behind her and is putting out some great music. One wonders if her former band Delain is regretting losing her because she may actually be better now than in her years with them.


From a slightly different part of the musical world, we have pop-rock violinist Lindsay Stirling teaming up with Sarah Blackwood of the Burlington, Ontario pop group Walk Off The Earth for her latest single. Lindsay is a great violinist and dancer but doesn't sing so has a history of enlisting some terrific vocalists for her songs.


Oh, hell, one more. American singer-songwriter (/actor/producer/director/... yeah, she wears many hats) is putting out new material at a fair clip right now, suggesting another album is probably coming though I have not seen an announcement yet. She seems to be leaning harder into her Irish folk influences on these songs, and you can certainly hear that here.

 
Three siblings forming a rock band and hitting it big sounds like a movie or TV series, but The Warning are very much real life. They first came to global attention as pre-teens (ages 9-14 at the time) with a cover of "Enter Sandman" by Metallica. Now 19-24, the three sisters from Monterrey, Mexico are A-list rockstars, with four studio albums and two EPs under their belt. They just released the fourth last week and have been touring and doing TV appearances in support of it. They are currently on tour in Europe but return to North America in the Fall, including 10 Canadian shows in October.

The Warning are a classic power trio (guitar/vocals, bass, drums) and are generally considered hard rock, but covering Metallica early on seems to have put some heavy metal into their DNA and they definitely flirt with metal at times.

Their appearances on Jimmy Kimmel last week:



And the official video for release single from Keep Me Fed, the new album. It's a great video and I love the song.

 
FYI, the blocked video is available if you look it up on YouTube. Title is "S!ck" (that's not a typo, by the way). Not sure why Disney blocked it from embedding and not the other. Both are on the band's channel and you would think they had permission.
 
My earworm du jour is a rather odd song. Japanese kawaii metal group BabyMetal is what happens when J-pop (Japanese pop) and heavy metal have a baby. Three pretty singer-dancers led by vocalist Su-Metal singing melodic pop with metal guitar and rhythm section for accompaniment. They are hugely popular right now but I've been meh on them for the most part and downright irritate with how their fans keep pumping Su-Metal up lists of female vocalists ahead of much better singers. Even in kawaii metal, I prefer the power metal band Lovebites and their lead singer Asami.

However, BabyMetal have put out what may be the catchiest song of any genre that I have heard this year. In partnership with German outfit Electric Callboy, they have released "Ratatata", a lively, melodic piece that may also be, oddly, one of their heaviest numbers. There's glitter aplenty and the guys wear these weird disco ball hats, making this even more disco metal than my previous favourite for that title, "Doomsday Party" by Dragonforce.

 
Looking back, it appears that I have not raved about Lake Street Dive in a while. The US quintet was started by classmates from the New England Conservatory of Music, one of whom has since quit the band. The current band has three of those original members along two newer additions, including the departed member's replacement. Their style is a lively, jazzy blend of soul, R&B, and pop and, as this interview with members Rachael Price (vocals) and Akie Bermiss (keyboard and vocals) suggests, it a very cheerful, upbeat sound. Kind of an odd counterpoint to the metal I listen to, which can go pretty dark when it's death or goth metal.


I discovered the band somewhere around 2017 or 2018 through some material on YouTube, in particular their first appearance on NPR's Tiny Desk Concert. I know I was thrilled when their 2018 album Free Yourself conveniently dropped on my birthday. :giggle: I was pretty much immediately hooked and remain a fan. Rachael's voice alone would have me swooning and the band have incredible talent all-round as both performers and composers.

From their latest album, the title track and the most recent single/video, both quite exemplary of the band's work.


 
From tonight's review of interesting releases on YouTube:

Violinist Mia Asano has been a favourite of mine for a couple years now, I think. Her latest is metal violin cover of the theme from the videogame Fallout 4. While I have no interest whatsoever in the game, it's a good piece of music and Mia's performance is fantastic. And, yes, that weird skull-shaped violin with the baby face on it is a real electric violin. She had it on loan from a violin shop, IIRC, and did a vlog about it at the time.


Back before I became a serious metalhead (c. 2020), one of the few metal artists I would listen to was the great Ozzy Osbourne, original lead singer of Black Sabbath and later a successful solo artist. "Mama, I'm Coming Home" from his sixth solo album in 1991 is a magnificent power ballad. Here, Brazilian alto Violet Orlandi gives a terrific performance of the song back by her regular guitarist Joao Oliveira and her husband Ricardo Gifford on piano.


And I posted the original video of this a couple posts up, but this energetic live performance really highlights what wonderful, if somewhat crazy and chaotic, song "Ratatata" really is. This is from Electric Callboy's set at Resurrection Fest in Spain with Baby Metal joining them live on stage. This song is on my "Energize My Day" playlist on Spotify that I blast in the car on my way to work when I need to be woken up.

 
Stumbled over this singer on my nightly foray through YouTube Shorts. This is her first original song after doing some pretty good covers. And I quite like it. Folky but with a bit of an edge to it as well. Looking forward to more.

 
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