Back & Forth

Coffee Kingdom

Music toys with time. Or, maybe songs reflect back that time is always toying with us. The world of a song takes hold of us like an eternity to be lost in, with its repetitions and variations, but ultimately, as with everything else, it has a start and then ends. And there’s no place to lose time like San Francisco, where there are no seasons and all the seasons occur within one day; where the fog takes the space where your plans might have been; where there’s insane wealth all around and everyone you know and love is hanging on at the periphery and making art on any given Tuesday night. About Glenn Donaldson’s new record, "The Town That Cursed Your Name," he says, "I realized as I was piecing it together that it's a song cycle about trying to live while also feeling called to make music." It’s a double life when it works and a deeper doubleness to mirror the Gemini nature of songs themselves. "The Town That Cursed Your Name" contemplates this problem with wryness, generosity, and the micro- and macroscopic realness Donaldson is known and loved for.

Whereas the 2022 collection "Summer at Land's End" was a softer, gauzier world, "The Town That Cursed Your Name" is heavier, with fuzzed lines running through. "Leave It All Behind" starts out with an amorphous whine but quickly launches into something both supremely melodic and buzzing at the edges. "Here Comes the Lunar Hand" is an impressionist geometry that seems to capture the album’s themes without telling you how. Lyrically, Donaldson embraces the earnestness of his heroes Paul Westerberg and Grant McLennan. Sonically, late '80s college rock is filtered through song-forward lo-fi acts like East River Pipe and House of Tomorrow-era Magnetic Fields. Like the images that accompany his releases – flowers and residential street scenes are pushed to the breaking point with color – Donaldson’s songs are at the same time dazzling and lurid, beautiful and burdened, not unlike life as a musician around here.

In the liner notes, Donaldson dedicates the record "to everyone who ever tried to start a band in the Bay." There will be many knowing smiles at his title "Too Late For An Early Grave." But, this dedication captures something else about the particular strain of sincerity that laces the city water supply – the front man around here is on stage under those lights evincing the fervor not of the pop star but of the biggest fan.

-Karina Gill

The Town That Cursed Your Name

The Reds, Pinks & Purples - Life in the Void

Under Utopia

Everything We Need In The World

Space For Love / A Path To You is the third chapter of FOXTROTT’s series of musical diptychs, started last Spring.

Through the two new pieces, FOXTROTT reaffirms her distinct sound and creates a sonic universe oozing with warmth, refined production and soulfulness. FOXTROTT pursues her quest to blur the lines between electronic and organic, masculine and feminine.  Space For Love is a radiant, forward-moving declaration of love. “I come to you with nothing but space for love. Here, close to you, growing in a place of enough.” The second piece, A Path To You,  is a highly meditative instrumental track, luminous and entrancing –  a perfect Spring companion.

About the series of diptychs:

With her new series of independently released double-singles, FOXTROTT throws away the rulebook and wants to take us along on her journey. “I love the short form of the diptych in music, where one piece resonates with the other, in a dialogue. It’s a mini-universe of its own. After a few years navigating the music industry with its ups and downs, I wanted to reconnect with spontaneity, ease and the joy of sharing music. By moving away from more rigid structures, I feel a renewed enthusiasm. Honestly, I feel like I am just getting started.” 

About FOXTROTT:

MH Delorme, also known as FOXTROTT, is a producer, vocalist and multi-instrumentalist born and raised in Montreal. Her genre-defying, unique experimental pop has been making heads turn since the release of her first EP “Shields” in 2013. With her Polaris Music Prize nominated LP “A Taller Us” (2015) and her trilogy “Meditations I-II-III” (2018), both released on esteemed UK imprint One Little Independent Records, Delorme has worked on building a musical universe of her own, pairing intricate, raw yet elegant productions with a strong sense of melody and commanding, soulful vocals. In 2022, she releases the first two iterations of a series of diptychs. The independently released The Motion / Looking For Your Love and Take it Back / Go for Joy, has garnered support from Benji B on his BBC Radio1 show, and tastemakers across the globe (Lefto, Le Mellotron, CBC radio, etc.), as well as significant playlisting support on streaming platforms. In the last years, her work has garnered support from the likes of the BBC 1 & BBC 6 (Lauren Laverne, Annie Mac, Jamz Supernova, Don Letts and more), international press (I.D, Dazed, The Fader, Line of Best Fit, Nowness, etc) and has taken her to perform in London, New York, Paris, Berlin, Tokyo and beyond. 

She has also worked with Redbull Music Academy as a studio mentor, is currently teaching production classes for Women on Ableton Live. In 2021, she participated in BBE Records’s critically acclaimed tribute album to David Bowie, “Modern Love” with her version of “Chant of the ever circling skeletal family”. Over the last few years she has applied her skills as a film composer, scoring multiple short and feature films.She recently won “Best Original Music” at the Canadian Screen Award for her work on “Sugar Daddy” (Dir. Wendy Morgan, 2021). Her most recent scoring work is on the feature film “Mà Sai Gon” by director Khoa Le, premiered at Visions du Réel in April 23. 

Throughout her own releases and in her work as a film composer, producer and collaborator (Ouri, Jean-Michel Blais, Cadenza, Pierre kwenders and more), FOXTROTT flows effortlessly through different musical worlds without ever losing her distinct signature, at once accessible and deeply insular. The answer seems to lie in the way she relates to music: “I try to forget about it all, I aim to hear something I haven’t quite heard before. I am not really interested in copying codes. My relationship with music is inside out rather than outside in.”

Buy on Bandcamp

Exclusive Premiere:  FOXTROTT "Space For Love"

⚡️ Listen on all platforms: idol-io.ffm.to/sholto-vampire
⚡️ Buy the album on Bandcamp: https://sholto2.bandcamp.com/album/the-changing-tides-of-dreams
⚡️ Listen to the DeepMatter Catalogue: sptfy.com/ifE1

Vampire

SHOLTO - Vampire

The second single off of Beeef's upcoming third album.

Recorded by Jeremy Mendicino at Lane Gibson Studio
Mixed by Julian Fader
Mastered by Alan Douches at West West Side Music
Artwork by Bailey Elder

Observational Eros

Swifty (63)

Say It's You

Ein neues Leben

Blindside

Hardwire

Tommy & Linda - EP

Beach Bums

Live in another world 📡

◇ MGMT: LB@285.Group
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Everything We Need In The World

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