Today Bus Stop Dreams release the album “Don’t Forget to Breathe”. And yes, it’s also my own album debut, even if it’s not the first album my colleagues in the band have appeared on. My colleagues are my duo partner Lasse Thomasson and also part time members like Jan Johansen, Sonja Hewer, Ulla Wrethagen, Pär Enqvist among others. I won’t scream any superlatives about the songs but just state that I’m immensely proud over this album that breathes soft classic rock with country vibes, but where there’s also room for beautiful pop melodies and dystopic group cuddles. Here are two songs with lead vocals by German singer Sonja Hewer. The album art was created by the artist Linnea Strid.

Bus Stop Dreams’ site – on Facebook – on Spotify – on Wimp – on Bandcamp

Diamond In the Sky
No Summer Without You

The rock band Giri released their second album this autumn, which is almost six years since their debut album in 2006. They mix quite a few influences on the album, where they from the view of a guitar driven indie rock sound take a peek at more melodic pop tunes as well as at arena rock and even some punk rock. An interesting ingredient is that they have involved the sitar player Stian Grimstad, who both starts the album and finishes it, and has his hands on the colouring of such different songs as the punky “K.T.T.P. and the jazz-pop-rockish “Dangerous”.  Early in the Autumn they released the video tothe song “Lost and Found” which you can watch and download here below.

Giri on Facebook – on Spotify – on Wimp – on Soundcloud

Lost and Found

Pleasantly enough for us who like the indie rock band Obliq, they say they are going to release a new album in January, the first one since the debut four years ago. But you don’t have to wait that long to taste the album; last month they released two singles and you can hear and watch one of them here below, “Ahead of Time”.

Obliqs site – on Facebook – on Spotify – on Soundcloud

Ahead of Time

Victoria Moralez is a new acquaintance for me. She has released the albums “Days and Seasons” and “Translucent” before and as a build-up for the next album she has released two EP:s, the latest one the four-track EP “Game of Fear”.

She moves effortlessly between styles from song to song and mixes influences within the songs, and it’s hard to catch her with a few words. The EP has a retro feeling with seventies-guitars, soul and funk, which she blends with jazz vibes and a sensation of what you could call world music. The last mentioned is especially obvious in the last song “Divide Me In Two”, a spoken word-song accompanied with a banjo in a language I can’t understand. Multifaceted, personal, interesting and if you add the earlier R’nB-fragrant EP “For Eternity” I can imagine that the upcoming album will show us more hues of Victoria.

Victoria Moralez’ site – on Facebook – on Spotify –  on Wimp

Game of Fear

Last Friday Shotgun Crackers released “Lockdown PT. 3”, the third part of their EP trilogy, which will be followed next year with the album “Lockdown”, containing the earlier songs and five new ones. The first part was produced by the band together with Otto Wellton, on the second one they collaborated with Tomas Rusiak and for these two new songs, they went to Göteborg to work with Kristian Anttila. And it’s also Kristian who will help the band with the remaining five songs.

When I first listen to “Lockdown PT. 3” I wince a bit. The earlier party ambience with the energy pumping indie has been somewhat replaced with a bigger, heavier and darker sound with more electronica. I feel a little lost and find myself looking for that special rough Shotgun Crackers-vibe with a big heart, which they have stood for earlier.

At the same time I realise that I have been following the band for a long time now, from when they were just about to finish high school, five years ago, up until now, and neither I as a listener or they as a band want the music to stand still, untouched by what’s happening around them and inside them. The whole Lockdown series, which was started a little more than a year ago, feels all at once as some kind of maturation where they have explored new ground in each part.

The new songs slowly set in my mind, and it feels a little like getting to know them anew, or at least as looking at them from a different perspective. It’s a bigger scene now, and even if I can’t help missing the feeling of standing so close to the scene that I get drops of the singer Fredrik Nilsson’s sweat on me as the band performs, I get very curious of where this is going to land in what’s coming up next.

Since I strangely enough missed presenting the second part, “Lockdown PT. 2”, I have added one song from each part, in reverse order, here below, so you can listen and compare for yourself.

Shotgun Crackers on Facebook – on Spotify – on Wimp – on Bandcamp

From “Lockdown PT. 3”:

From “Lockdown PT. 2”:

From “Lockdown PT. 1”: