The duo Degrees, hailing from Tranås, is back with a new album, “Dream On Dreamy”. Compared to their EP “Pt III”, which I wrote about last year, they don’t hold back on anything this time. It’s grand pop from the beginning to the end, bombastic enough to fill out the sound space on any big arena.

Last time I called it synth pop, but I feel now that they have passed the limits of where I would place them just within the electronica spheres, even if these intruments are still central. It’s grandiose pop with a lot of warmth and melody on this even and strong album. An album which reach a crescendo in the 8 minute long “Idiot Dreaming” and then takes us down to dreamy soundscapes to the finishing track “Dream On Dreamy”.

You can listen and download the album on their Bandcamp page. You can also visit their site, their Facebook page or listen on Spotify. Here’s a song and a video from the album:

At Least Rock & Roll Won’t Leave a Hole In My Back

United We Stand, hailing from Halmstad, started out a couple of years ago, and released this spring their debut EP “Been There, Done That”. There are six tracks with variety, that sometimes make me think of Royal Republic’s dance-inspired rock moves, sometimes of american pop punk and maybe sometimes of The Hives. Energic party rock would sum it up well, I think.

Folloe the band on their site and listen on Spotify.

I Am Your Ecstasy
Break Me

Richard Janson lets us in to view some of his musical creativity. He’s a bass player who also produces music in varying genres. Often it’s about instrumental tracks, which sometimes makes me think about film music. Here below you’ll find a couple of songs and if you’d like to listen to more songs you can visit Richard on Myspace.

Schhhh
Memories

The howler monkeys in Alouatta was a great discovery in the early days of this blog. Now they’ve finally presented a follow-up, the EP “DIY”. And more, they also promise a new full length album in the near future.

And they don’t disappoint me. It’s head-on, energic, messy rock, maybe with some more retro vibes from the early seventies than before, and with Karl Buhre’s special vocals in the front, like he’s a kind of frenetic reincarnation mix of  Hendrix and Lynott.

You can find Aloutatta on Facebook and you can listen to the EP together with the older tracks on Spotify.

DIY

A Dutch musician that has moved to Sweden may ring some bells. A. S. Swanski, though, produces music in quite different genres than the late Cornelis did. Here it’s about electronica, of the experimental kind, on the border to ambient, often with industrial vibes and sometimes with a feeling of mystique.

The song here below, “The Assassination”, was largely inspired by the parliament elections in both Holland and Sweden last year, and is a part of an EP with the same title. Presently he’s working on a full length album, to be released later this year. You can follow A.S. Swanski and listen more on his site.

The Assassination