Listen/Download: SCOUT - "Answering Machine" (Replacements Cover)

We're thinking that we just might make Friday the perfect day for a weekly cover song and what better way to kick this brainchild off than with this ultra-cool version -- and free download (!) -- of The Replacements' "Answering Machine" from SCOUT, the NY duo fronted by songwriter and vocalist Ashen Keilyn. Atop some initial acoustic strums, Keilyn and guitarist Steve Schiltz (Longwave) slowly turn up the heat to a gentle simmer, Keilyn singing her lamenting ode to frustration with "how do you say goodnight to an answering machine?" With a sound falling somewhere between Aimee Mann and Chrissi Hynde, Keilyn and SCOUT made their long-awaited return to the studio with the recently released All Those Relays. More DC love here.

SCOUT - "Answering Machine" (Replacements Cover) Free Download

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RADAR: Elenowen

Josh and Nicole Johnson are Elenowen, a Nashville-based folk/pop duo who have, not surprisingly, drawn comparisons to the sweetened Americana songcraft of The Civil Wars. "We strive to maintain a certain vulnerability in our music," says Josh, adding "We think it creates an intimacy that's totally connected to the music." It would be easy to point to the couple's marriage as a basis for the heartfelt lyricism and endearing vocal harmonies that shine through songs like "Flying For The First Time" and "Blood and Bones" (both co-writes with fellow Music City songwriter Trent Dabbs). But there's also no denying the special chemistry at work throughout the Elenowen five-song self-titled EP dropping May 29 via Dualtone. Watch the "behind the scenes" video for the song "Bittersweet" below...

Elenowen - "Flying For The First Time" (from the Elenowen EP)

Elenowen - "Head To My Heart" (from the Elenowen EP)

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Jesca Hoop - The House That Jack Built

Jesca Hoop - Another head-turning collection of adventurous art/pop finds Hoop collaborating with three producers -- Shawn Everett and Blake Mills along with Tony Berg, who partnered with Hoop on her acclaimed 2010 album Hunting My Dress..."a drop of blood in the can from each of us rendered a more radical sound," observes the eclectic songstress // Release: The House That Jack Built (June 26, Bella Union) // Sounds like: Hoop's headspinning House has a dramatic, angular design that might not fit some tastes but we find the unpredictable combination of twisting, prickly melodies and bold, theatrical flair a welcome antidote to the mild, mainstream pap parading as "alternative" pop...as we noted on Hunting, these are "miniature vocal sonicscapes of startling originality, building songs that flit and dart, build and then break down again all against a backdrop of stark guitar runs, boldly progressive time measures and a tiny grab bag of head-turning production surprises"...watch the "Born To" video below...

 

Jesca Hoop - "The House That Jack Built" (from The House That Jack Built)

Jesca Hoop - "Born To" (from The House That Jack Built)

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Listen: Barna Howard - "I Don't Fall Much, Anymore"

For a powerful folk time warp it doesn't get much better than Portland-based songwriter Barna Howard. We've been meaning to post up "I Don't Fall Much, Anymore" from Howard's self-titled debut album for while now, a deceptively simple and haunting song of stark relief and flickering campfire shadows that could easily bookend with the best: Dylan, van Zandt, Prine. Can a song get any more honest and true than this?

Barna Howard - "I Don't Fall Much, Anymore" (from Barna Howard)

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REDUX: Mayer Hawthorne

Praised by the likes of John Mayer and Justin Timberlake, the old school pop and soul of Michigan-raised singer and songwriter Mayer Hawthorne has a lot in common with much of the "retro" Motown style that's been reinvigorated over the past few years. But unlike many of his peers, Hawthorne's brilliantly inventive sound transcends the studio sonic wizardry with songs that don't just sound authentic -- they feel, well, mighty real. Hawthorne's most recent How Do You Do (Out Now, Universal Republic) expands the nostalgic R+B scope of his earlier works to encompass a broader swath of classic pop and rock elements. The sultry soul of songs like "Get to Know You and "The Walk" still dominate the revivalist spirit but other songs are sprinkled with 70's pop signatures ranging from ELO, Chicago and -- most notably -- Hall and Oates. No wonder that Hawthorne sat in with Darryl Hall for a performance of his "Dreaming" (video below), the sympatico pop/soul harmonies and ear candy melody are practically ripped from the back pages of Hall's blue-eyed-soul songbook.

Mayer Hawthorne - "Dreaming" (from How Do You Do)

Mayer Hawthorne - "No Strings" (from How Do You Do)

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Watch: Mrs Bishop - "Broken Wings"

Mrs Bishop is actually brothers Oscar and Hugo Bishop, a cherubic sounding duo from Sweden, schooled in England and now based in Australia. Melding high, ethereal vocals -- think Jonsi meets Brian Wilson -- to an electronic pulse of synth beats and plush keyboards, the pair recently released their eponymous debut EP along with the dreamy video for lead track "Broken Wings". So sweetly turned it makes your teeth hurt, "Wings" is a pop souffle that wins you over through the sheer force of its heavenly melody and an instrumental bed so luxurious you simply want to crawl under the covers. Indulge.

Mrs Bishop - "Broken Wings" (from the Mrs Bishop EP)

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Regina Spektor - What We Saw From the Cheap Seats

Regina Spektor - First new studio album in three years from the Brooklyn-based, ivory-tickling performing songwriter is also a reunion of sorts with Mike Elizondo (Fiona Apple, Eminem) who co-produced four songs on Spektor's 2009 album Far...most songs were cut with just Spektor on vocals and piano and then she and Elizondo added in layers of additional instrumentation with the goal of making each song stand alone in both style and sound // Release: What We Saw From the Cheap Seats (May 29, Warner Brothers) // Sounds like: Spektor has always balanced the unpredictable and playful with the pensive giving her songs a rambunctious theatrical edge while holding the melody front and center...less  stridently pretentious than Fiona, more left-of-center and spry than Tori, Spektor manages to appeal to mainstream pop sentimentalists while giving a subtle wink to the indie hipster elite...

Regina Spektor - "Firewood" (from What We Saw From the Cheap Seats)

Regina Spektor - "All The Rowboats" (from What We Saw From The Cheap Seats)

Stream the full album at NPR

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RADAR: Lilly Hiatt

We're pleased to report that the singing and songwriting gene has once again emerged intact with Lilly Hiatt and her band The Dropped Ponies. The daughter of master songcraftsman John Hiatt, Lilly has been honing her own particular brand of countrified folk/rock and Americana the past few years with guitarist Beth Finney and now with the addition Jon Radford (Drew Holcombe Band) on drums and Jake Bradley (Over the Rhine) on bass, she's assembled a potent and promising outfit to flesh out her songs. The band has been signed to the New West label off-shoot Normaltown Records and will be releasing their Doug Lancio (Patty Griffin)-produced debut album Let Down in September. Check out the Rosanne Cash-styled jangle-meets-twang of "3 Days" and "People Don't Change":

Lilly Hiatt & The Dropped Ponies - "People Don't Change"

Lilly Hiatt & The Dropped Ponies - "3 Days"

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DC May 22 New Release Recap

John Mayer's fine new Born and Raised is certainly the biggest name out there for releases this week but let's not forget some of the other fine songwriter offerings also vying for your attention including the latest from  Nashville's Natasha Borzilova, L.A.'s Robert Francis, Seattle's Shannon Stephens and the Hoosier piano/pop of Jon McLaughlin. We've also got some great new music from around the world including the much-buzzed stateside debut from Aussie songstress Kimbra (who's all over the Gotye hit "Somebody That I Used to Know"), Scotland's legendary Blue Nile frontman Paul Buchanan and another Scottish import and DC fave, art-poppers Admiral Fallow. Read more about each below and peruse our full DC list of new releases below...

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Watch: Lianne La Havas - "Is Your Love Big Enough?"

Size, it would appear, matters -- at least when it comes to the dimensions of love being measured via the latest video from rising Brit star Lianne La Havas. The title track from her forthcoming August 7 U.S. debut via Nonesuch, "Is Your Love Big Enough?" is a fizzy swig of jazzy, uptempo pop/folk with a solid rhythmic right cross and the quick-cut documentary-styled video -- live shots, adoring crowds, backstage antics -- does a good job of giving us a sense of La Havas special on-stage charisma and her impressive musical chops. More DC love for La Havas and her Matt (Aqualung) Hales-produced album here and here.

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Ian McGlynn - Now We're Golden

Oversized, 70's-and-80's-styled pop/rock melodies are the preeminent forte of one Ian McGlynn, an old-school, piano-playing singer/songwriter who mostly ratchets up the heartfelt keyboard pop and balladry of his earlier albums for a dense jolt of art-pop grandeur on his new album Now We're Golden (June 5). Co-writing with creative partner Chris Newkirk and working in the studio with producer Ken Stringfellow (R.E.M., Posies), McGlynn heads straight for soaring choruses and punchy, theatrical tunecraft on songs like the wall-of-sound drama of "Gold Morning Mend" and gorgeously rendered album closer "O Friends of Mine." Listen to how he and Stringfellow update the classic pop harmonies and orchestral embellishments of "Falling Towards Heaven" into a glittering sound that's simply timeless. Watch the Rumpelstiltskin-inspired video for "Gold Morning Mend" below...

Ian McGlynn - "Gold Morning Mend" (from Now We're Golden)

Ian McGlynn - "Falling Towards Heaven" (from Now We're Golden)

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RADAR: Edmund II

Brooklyn-based Edmund II -- aka Edmund Pellino -- has created an atmospheric solo debut that falls somewhere between the lush, shimmering guitar chord washes of shoe-gaze and the more Floyd-ian elements of the grand-art progressives. Nothing's hurried and everything rings with a stately peal on Floating Monk (June 26), a dark, dreamy collection that draws upon influences of exploratory bands like Sigur Ros and Tortoise while still grounded with hymnal vocal melodies and pop sensibilities. As his bio puts it, "heavy in all the right places." Check out the two-chord majesty of "Rosella" and intricate fret work of lead track "Riptide". Stream the full album here.

Edmund II - "Riptide" (from Floating Monk)

Edmund II - "Rosella" (from Floating Monk)

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Listen: Erin McCarley - "Elevator"

Erin McCarley revealed some rhythmic quirky bits on her fine 2009 debut album Love Save the Empty but her new song "Elevator", a preview of her forthcoming fall album My Stadium Electric, takes that element into overdrive. "From late night percussion sessions, to angry bird sound making (you will hear in the intro), to major laughter eruption because of ridiculous lyric writing, to dancing our asses off, the studio was a Brazilian circus while recording 'Elevator'", writes the Nashville-based McCarley. Look for the booty-shaking, dance-centric video coming soon. The Elevator EP drops June 26.

Erin McCarley - "Elevator"

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John Mayer - Born and Raised

John Mayer - "more organic, more natural lyrics and chords and artful simplicity," says Mayer of his long awaited fifth studio album and first since his controversial "really dumb" interviews a couple years back...produced by veteran Don Was (Bob Dylan, Bonnie Raitt) the new project includes backup from Allman Brothers keyboardist Chuck Leavell along with Graham Nash and David Crosby...originally scheduled for release last fall, B+R was delayed when Mayer was diagnosed with granulomas (found next to the vocal cords) a malady that has also led to his spring tour cancellation // Release: Born and Raised (May 22, Columbia) // Sounds like: the hat, jean jacket and facial hair should have been the giveaway -- this is Mayer time travelling back to Laurel Canyon, circa 1972...the dense and graceful (if somewhat calculating) commercial art/rock of 2009's Battle Studies had a distinctly hip, urban attitude while Born and Raised is a quietly invigorating irony-free escape to thoughtful and equally compelling Neil Young-styled folk/rock with an acoustic, rural feel (cue the harmonica)...

John Mayer - "Queen of California" (from Born and Raised)

John Mayer - "Shadow Days" (from Born and Raised)

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Listen: Sons of Fathers - 'Burning Days'

We first tipped you Texas natives David Beck and Paul Cauthen and their Sons of Fathers last year with the release of their eponymous debut album of Americana and Lone Star folk/rock. As the lead track off their upcoming August album Big Diamond Waltz, the Sons' new "Burning Days" ups the ante in a big way, further expanding the duo's original acoustic sound to the power and depth of a full-fledged band, helped in no small part by a rough-hewn mix (still unmastered) from Jack White studio dude Vance Powell (Blunderbuss, The Raconteurs). The trademark harmonies are still in abundance but "Burning Days" also swings with a loose, soulful swagger and sharper electric edge.

Sons of Fathers - "Burning Days" (From Big Diamond Waltz)

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2:54 - S/T

2:54 - London-based grrl-ish siblings Colette and Hannah Thurow are the dual creative forces behind this darkly atmospheric U.K. band and their highly buzzed (literally and figuratively) debut album // Release: 2:54 (June 5, Fat Possum) // Sounds like: a gothy shoe-gazing mix of distorted guitars and cool, dispassionate vocals, the Irish-born Thurows signal not so much emotional angst as even tempered ambivalence...a densely layered, mesmerizing production from Rob Ellis (PJ Harvey) lays the dreamy groundwork for the sisters' ten groove-driven songs, tracks that swirl and spiral with tightly-coiled force around an oblique, minor chord melody...while hardly what you'd call pretty music, there's an oddly effective impressionist beauty hiding in the gloomy shadows, most noticeably in Colette's airy/eerie nocturnal voice floating above the fray...

2:54 - "You're Early" (from the album 2:54)

2:54 - "Creeping" (from the album 2:54)

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Listen: Shawn Colvin - "All Fall Down"

For All Fall Down (Nonesuch), her first studio album in six years, Shawn Colvin enlisted the help of friend and versatile musical "buddy", the acclaimed guitarist and producer Buddy Miller. The initial offering of the collaboration comes via the new project's title track, a simply-structured song that, over the course of about three and a half minutes, slowly builds from hand-clapping acoustics to a epic riffed folk/rocker thanks to the shimmering guitar lines from Miller and Bill Frisell, Brian Blade's dynamic drum work and a gospel-tinged sing-along chorus that quickly embeds itself deep into the grey matter. More on All Fall Down -- due June 5 -- here.

Shawn Colvin - "All Fall Down" (from the album All Fall Down)

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RADAR: Jason Myles Goss

For Brooklyn performing songwriter Jason Myles Goss, the qualities he loves most about music are "a good story and a memorable melody" -- two things that are happily in abundant display on Radio Dial, his fourth album due June 17. Entirely self-produced, Goss' new project was recorded in old school fashion on good ol' analog tape with the help of some talented friends including Austin Nevins on guitars and Sam Kassirer on keys, both members  of Josh Ritter's Royal City Band. The result is an album that is both profoundly personal and sonically expansive, reflecting Goss' influences of songcraft-centric bands like Counting Crows and The Wallflowers as well as the more roots-rock and Americana shadings of Wilco and Lucinda Williams. Lead track "Red Letter Man" is a prime example of the Goss style, a Tom Petty-ish guitar jangle chord progression entwined with a soaring, infinitely catchy chorus hook. We're also taken with "Home", a country-rock anthem that kicks with on off-kilter rhythm and Kassirer's rich organ fills.

Jason Myles Goss - "Red Letter Man" (from Radio Dial)

Jason Myles Goss - "Home" (from Radio Dial)

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Watch: Carrousel - '14'

Once we watched the video for "14" from arty-smarty Tallahassee, Florida dream/pop outfit Carrousel, we knew we were on to something good. Taken from the just-released debut album 27 rue de mi'chelle, the track (and charminglingly chaotic video) is all about the "layering dense vocal harmonies, tambourines, 60-ish guitar lines and dramatic piano fills into a dazzling melange of smart, sophisticated art/pop." More DC on Carrousel (listen to "Where Do We Go From Here"), umm, here.

Carrousel - "14" (from 27 rue de mi'chelle)

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DC May 15 New Release Recap

A day late. Sorry. One of those weeks. A fairly slim list of notable DC releases this week but a few nice standouts. New England songwriter Ryan Montbleau heads to New Orleans to record his fine new album of Crescent City R+B/pop, For Hire with some famous local names. Beach House return with the follow up to their fine Teen Dream with the aptly titled Bloom. New DC faves Carrousel deliver one of the more intriguing and promising new albums of sophisticated alt/pop: 27 rue de mi'chelle. And L.A. songstress Meiko is back with The Bright Side, her first new studio album in four years. As always, we've got music to stream and videos to watch, so read below (and link for more)...and check out our larger list, too.

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