The Beths

On The Beths’ new album Expert In A Dying Field, Elizabeth Stokes’ songwriting positions her somewhere between being a novelist and a documentarian. The songs collected here are autobiographical, but they’re also character sketches of relationships and more importantly, their aftermaths. The question that hangs in the air: what do you do with how intimately versed you’ve become in a person, once they’re gone from your life?The third LP from the New Zealand quartet houses 12 jewels of tight, guitar-heavy songs that worm their way into your head, an incandescent collision of power-pop and skuzz. The album’s title track “Expert In A Dying Field” introduces the thesis for the record: “How does it feel to be an expert in a dying field? How do you know it’s over when you can’t let go?” Stokes asks. “Love is learned over time ‘til you’re an expert in a dying field.”‘Expert In A Dying Field’ is out now via Carpark Records and Ivy League Records.Website | Instagram | Twitter | Facebook | Spotify | YouTube | Soundcloud | TikTok

NiiTO

Based out of Raleigh-Durham, NC, NiiTO has spent the last few years crafting a unique sound while becoming more in tune with themselves and the people of this world. With heavy influences from a variety of genres, they’ve stumbled upon a sound that blurs the lines between R&B, Rock, Pop, Soul, Funk, Jazz, Blues and more. “The more genres we can absorb… the more people we can spread love to”Website | InstagramDottie InstagramJamal Sutton Instagram

Hot Mulligan

Odie Leigh

Beginning with a bet between friends to see who could go viral, Odie Leigh’s musical journey has always been a bit unconventional. Hailing from suburban South Louisiana, where Lil Wayne and Tim McGraw carry equal reverence, Leigh’s musical influences are as contradictory as the area she grew up in. Singing in school choirs and church praise bands as a child, Leigh didn’t find her voice until 2020 gave her the solitude to create her own sound, free from the judgment and influence of the New Orleans music scene.Once described as “folk-misfit,” Odie Leigh’s songwriting reflects an earnest and fervent search for identity through the confusion of growing up culturally-adjacent in an area with so much history, tradition, and faults. Guided by the classic folk, blues, and country music that floods the southern soundscape, and shaped by her self-taught finger-picking style, Leigh’s music is an eclectic glimpse into feeling stuck in all of life’s in-betweens.Website | Instagram | Twitter | TikTok | Spotify | YouTube | Soundcloud

Jesse Malin, Kevn Kinney

Released in 2003, ‘The Fine Art Of Self Destruction’ was the debut album by New York based singer-songwriter Jesse Malin. “It wasn’t named for drug or alcohol abuse,” he states. “It was more about a personal wreckage when I looked back on my life, from my parents’ divorce to failed relationships, broken up bands, dropping out of school, crashing cars, breaking things. It was more of a spiritual journey in some sense. This record is definitely one of my favourites.”To celebrate its 20th anniversary, ‘The Fine Art Of Self Destruction’ was reissued on 17th February 2023 in expanded form with a bonus disc of the album reimagined and re-recorded with Malin’s longtime band. The bonus material was produced by Derek Cruz and engineered by Geoff Sanoff, who worked on Jesse’s recent ‘Sunset Kids’ and ‘Sad And Beautiful World’ releases.A video for a new version of the album song ‘Brooklyn’ entitled ‘Brooklyn (Walt Whitman in the Trash)’ that honours New York in days of yore has been directed by Catherine Popper and Vivian Wang. “Cat and Vivian have a great sense of beauty, art and decay,” Malin adds. “‘Brooklyn’ is about beginnings, those early days of innocence and big dreams that often collide with irreversible mistakes and regret. We try to find ways to accept the mistakes and look back with laughter, forgiveness and love.”Following his teenage years in the pioneering hardcore band Heart Attack and his 20s fronting the wild and beloved D Generation, Malin took a cue from his songwriting heroes and was ready for a chance to stand alone. His solo debut was recorded over six days in New York City, live and raw.Website | Instagram | Twitter | Facebook | Spotify | YouTubeKevn Kinney is an acclaimed Rock and Folk singer, songwriter and performer most widely known as the founder and frontman of the Atlanta-based rock band Drivin N Cryin.An accomplished musician, poet, and painter, Kinney has released multiple critically-acclaimed recordings over his 30+ year professional career including the gold-certified album Fly Me Courageous. He is well-known for his collaborations with the Allman Brothers’ Warren Haynes, REM, and Grammy Award-winning producer Paul Ebersold, among others.Executive Producers of F/X Network’s hit TV show Archer asked Kinney to produce 12 tracks (five of which were pre-existing DNC/KK songs and three were written anew for the series) for season 5 debuting January 13, 2014.Kevn Kinney has just released his first solo record in more than a decade, also his first vinyl since 1990’s MacDougal Blues. Featuring R.E.M. co-founders Peter Buck and Bill Berry, as well as Brad Morgan of Drive-By Truckers, Laur Joamets (Drivin N Cryin, Midland, Sturgill Simpson) and more, the star-studded Think About It has its roots in the introspective solitude of the pandemic, and also the passing of Kinney’s old friend, the iconic oddball musical/improvisational genius and lighting-rod philosopher Col. Bruce Hampton.Instagram | Twitter | Facebook

Nova Twins

Asked about what it takes to make it into a Nova Twins song, the heavy alt. rock renegades have a few words that spring to mind. “Power and fight” replies singer & guitarist Amy Love. “Imagination” adds bassist Georgia South. “We imagined this band because we didn’t have any one like us to look up to. That was the fun bit. There were no rules to who we can be.”Nova Twins are the zeitgeist-capturing polymath pioneers that our times have been waiting for. Their debut album ‘Who Are The Girls?’ planted their flag as outliers on a mission. The same fighting spirit is ingrained in their new, Mercury Shortlisted album ‘Supernova’, a piece of work that’s fearlessly itself – once again playing with genre and rich in different moods, textures, and layers, all the while retaining that purity & simplicity of the essential elements: South, Love, bass, guitars, drums, and a whole lot of energy.A clash of ideas from the worlds of punk, rap, pop, rock & beyond, their sound is one that smashes genres and showcases the many facets of the duo, resulting in one of the scene’s fiercest live acts with 2x BRIT nominations (“Best Group” & “Best Rock/Alt”) to their name. Nova Twins reach a very broad church, without diluting what they’re all about.If more artists blazed a trail like this, we’d be celebrating a lot more difference, rather than craving what’s safe and similar. From being “shunned” when they arrived on the scene, now Nova Twins are leading a game all their own. Now, there are no rules.Website | Instagram | Twitter | Facebook | Spotify | YouTube | TikTok

Spaced Angel, Tiger Beach, Weymouth

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Be Loud! Sophie High School Showcase

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Motherfolk

Serious songs from goofy people. That’s what you can expect from diverse, Midwest indie-rockers, Motherfolk. What started out as a writing project among two college friends turned into a fully realized band untethered to genres, with an endlessly bright future. Composed of Bobby Paver and Nathan Dickerson on vocals and guitar, bassist Clayton Allender, drummer Ethan Wescott, and Karlie Dickerson on keys Motherfolk are not only bandmates, but best friends. The band’s close-knit relationship allows each member to be their most authentic self, leaving every ounce of their souls to be poured into each song and high-energy performance. Despite their light-hearted, groovy-rock sound Motherfolk is dedicated to creating a much deeper connection with their fans. They don’t shy away from the taboo, taking on heavy topics with a light heart. The results provide us with music you can dance to, whose impact is felt long after the song has ended.The band’s quirky friendship and social media posts originally drew fans in, but their connection to the music kept those fans around. Since their formation Motherfolk has been on a steady upward trajectory, amassing well over 5 million Spotify streams on their three studio albums and selling out shows while touring heavily across the United States. While COVID-19 halted the band’s year of touring plans, Motherfolk spent the year hard at work, creating and self-producing new music and they came out anew. Late summer 2021 will invigorate fans with new singles adorning the most refreshing and versatile Motherfolk sound to date, leading up to a fall EP release. This next chapter is slated to be the most exciting one yet, don’t miss it!Website | Instagram | Twitter | Facebook | YouTube

Subhumans

Subhumans are one of the most influential bands from the UK Anarcho-Punk scene of the 80’s, filed right alongside Crass and Conflict, and just as relevant today as they were during the darkest days of Thatcher’s Britain. Take your choice in how to label them – Punk, UK82, Crusty, etc, – there lies the attraction and consequent reason for their popularity, the band epitomizes non-conformity and connects with people in many different scenes.Forming in 1980, recording and releasing a series of live and demo cassette tapes on their own Bluurg label, they continued to release music throughout the 80’s – building a powerhouse of a back catalog that completely stands the test of time. Their debut LP ‘The Day the Country Died’ (1983), with its Orwellian influence, is considered by many to be a classic and has sold in excess of 100,000 copies. The second album, ‘From the Cradle to the Grave’, came swiftly the following year (1984), and although the same frenetic pace is in evidence, this marks a significant musical development for the band. In 1985 Subhumans broke up, citing the usual musical differences, although had managed to release a third, maybe ironically entitled, LP ‘Worlds Apart.’ A final EP was released posthumously in 1986, ‘29:29 Split Vision,’ a further demonstration of how far the band had come musically from their initial leanings.Dick Lucas subsequently joined Culture Shock and then formed political ska-punk band Citizen Fish in 1990, both bands releasing many albums, and still playing today. Subhumans had a couple of reunion shows in the nineties, before a more permanent return for the 21st century, including 2 major tours of the US, the first resulting in the ‘Live in a Dive’ LP. The Subhumans then released a further studio album in 2007, ‘Internal Riot,’ again on Bluurg Records. The band is still passionate and angry, illustrated by Dick saying “Being in a band is the source of most of my passion and drive! The live experience of sharing it with people keeps it ongoing, the release of anger, frustration and initially negative/destructive states of mind is a release from the downward spiral of keeping it all bottled up and it feels positive/constructive as a result.”The band have recently written ten new songs, which Pirates Press Records are thrilled to be releasing, and are embarking on a year of touring in both Europe and North America! First a split with The Restarts before a 12” of their own comes out in October of 2019! The social and political commentary of bands like Subhumans forged a path, along with their contemporaries, for punk to change lives and opinions around the world. Sadly the things they sang about forty years ago are largely just as important now, sometimes more so in an age of Trump and Brexit. We can’t wait to hear more of what they have to say about the current political climate, the immense imbalance of wealth and power, and the causes they hold near and dear to their hearts.Instagram | Facebook | Spotify

Genre: Concerts