Fascinating is just the first name when it comes to Square. My legs start moving and I wish I was transferred to a party scene at a festival somewhere so I could enjoy it fully. And I don’t even like to dance.

I could start some kind of description of their music by calling it high-speed ska. But it’s ska like you’ve never heard it before. Rock, punk and a lot of other influences perfect this to a mixture I have never heard before. Brass players that have to work real hard, a great rhythm section, nice guitars and a singer that gives so much that I can hear the sweat pouring.

They have released two albums before and a third album is being released the 21st of November. Here you can listen to some tracks from the album.

L-l-l-let Us Into Mama’s House!:

Mr P and His Pushy Machine
HC Bad

Read more about Square on their site and blog
and listen more on their Myspace page

Then it was time again for music with pleasant-sounding southern swedish accent (from Skåne). Torbjörn Hallberg is the artist, and he presents songs in a singer/songwriter style. Many times somewhat mellow songs with nice acoustic guitar arrangements, sometimes sweetened with trumpet playing.

This week Torbjörn is releasing two singles through Tormo Records, “Sommaren” (“The Summer”) and “Minns du hans namn” (“Do You Remember his Name”) (with the bonus track “Hoppas vi hoppats nog”) and you can download the tracks here below. Later this year he’s also releasing a five track EP “01:45”.

Enjoy!

Sommaren
Minns du än hans namn?
Hoppas vi hoppats nog

Visit Torbjörn Hallberg on Myspace

Earlier this year The Search released their fourth album “Saturnine Songs”. An album filled with melancholic pop, beautiful melodies embedded in a nice atmosphere with a big sound. There is a lot of vibes from the eighties in this music and earlier they have often been compared with for example the Cure. And sure, in some songs this is clearly obvious especially in some intros and how it may sound, but to me I find them just as much with one foot in the sound of bands from this century, like for example Doves and Travis.

The Search plays live frequently, and often they perform on stages in Germany, where their record label afmusic is based. And I recommend you to visit afmusic’s site if you want to download the album “Saturnine Songs” ” for free, or buy versions with extra tracks or with the highest sound quality. Or to see where you can buy a CD.

The Search is extremely generous with their material, both the newest tracks and the earlier recordings. On Last.fm you’ll find more or less every song they have ever released, both for listening and downloading.
You can also visit them on Myspace.

Rapunzel:

Listen to a couple of songs:

Distant
Swimmer

Others about The Search: Reflections of Darkness, EvilSponge

I really should be the wrong person to write this post. Because, if I identified myself with anything in the eighties, it sure wasn’t synth pop. On the contrary I mostly found myself on the other side in the discussions that broke out frequently in the group of friends. Discussions that often was about the question if “real” music demanded “real” instruments or not, how music would sound in the future and so on.

So what could I do? Well, I had to dig all good synth songs secretly at home of course. Because it was rather difficult not to give in to all great pop tunes that constantly were delivered by Depeche Mode, Human League, Soft Cell, Vince Clarke, Ultravox and others.

During the nineties this genre more or less disappeared from the main music channels. But a few bands continued to do their thing and could rejoice in the new century when the renaissance of this genre came. One of these bands is Arachnophobias, who let their style of playing form during the big synth wave in the first half of the eighties. And they have kept their style. It may sound a little more modern, maybe a bigger sound, but in all main aspects this is good synth pop with a real retro feeling.

Well, for newer listeners it’s about electropop with catchy, direct melodies, a somewhat mellow ambience and distanced vocals and a lot of old analogue synths.
Arachnophobias will release a new album before this year is over, a 14 track record with the name “By the Shape of My Eyes”, which will be available on
Arachnophobias’ site.

Here’s a taste of the album:

New Years Eve
Two Arms & Four Wheels

Listen more on their Myspace page

The story about Convoj is the story of a band that broke through on the net and on stages all over Sweden in 2004, but where the hunt for the big record deal became more important than to build on the real success they had with their listeners. (You can read their story on Convoj’s Myspace page). Now they seem to have landed and will finally release their debut album “Exceptionnel”, which will be out the 10th of December in collaboration with Wonderland Records.

They deliver an energetic indie rock with their own sound. Franz Ferdinand-edgy guitars form the base of the sound with a an expressive singer that almost sounds like he has turned himself inside out. Songs that are not too predictable, but with catchy choruses. Music that require some attention from the listener, which they certainly deserve.

My Timekeeping Heart:

Follow Convoj in a couple of tracks and judge for yourself:

The Shovel
My Timekeeping Heart

Listen more on Convoj’s page at Wonderland Records