All the best new Bay Area music to buy today for Bandcamp Friday [Nov 2021]
Guapdad 4000 and King Woman to perform at Noise Pop Fest; Chime School keeps the jangle pop train running; Lolo Zouaï rides a "Scooter"; plus hippie throwbacks
So much music goodness on my radar:
1. Today is Bandcamp Friday, meaning my favorite online music marketplace (which happens to be based in Oakland) is waiving its revenue share to help support artists. Bandcamp started holding these promotional days at the start of the pandemic lockdowns to generate additional revenue for artists, who had lost the opportunity to make money touring. The site is continuing to host Bandcamp Fridays on the first Friday of every month through the end of 2021, so see below for some of the best new music to buy today from local Bay Area artists.
2. The Noise Pop Music & Arts Festival unveiled the first wave of artists that will be playing its week-long takeover of venues around the Bay this Feb 21-27. While the fest doesn’t focus on local acts, Oakland is so far well represented by rising rapper Guapdad 4000 and doom metal fiend King Woman. Badges are on sale now and tickets for individual events go on sale today at 10 AM, with more acts to be announced later.
3. FALL MASS, White Crate’s first live ambient music showcase, is taking place this Sunday in a small, shaded backyard in West Oakland. Read our interviews with the three artists performing: Shipwreck Detective, Joel St. Julien, and Leila Abdul-Rauf.
Peace,
ronny
THAT BANDCAMP NEWNESS
A photograph isn’t a picture of something real, it’s a fake; the lens and developer has already rendered the subject into something the eye can’t actually see. Walter Benjamin was on about how reproduction devalues the aura, of the original, but I read it as a benefit; a rule even, for making interesting art. Whether it’s music, photography, film, writing, whatever, you wanna devalue the shit out of that aura, because in doing so, you’re creating something that doesn’t actually exist.
If you had asked me a year ago what I thought of jangle pop, I wouldn’t have known what you were talking about. But now that I’ve opened my eyes and ears, it seems like a week doesn’t go by without a Bay Area artist or band releasing new music in this more than 50-year-old classic rock style. The quote above is from Andy Pastalaniec, who spoke with Week in Pop for the exclusive premiere of the debut self-titled album for the new jangle pop project, Chime School. It’s nostalgic yet novel, and definitely worth a listen.
“Recording myself in solitude in my basement was really fun.” A month after releasing their third album 1:2, SF four-piece Cindy released Standard Candle Demos on Paisley Shirt Records, including seven demos that could end up being full songs for the band.
“Frantic jazz bounce and wah-funk bayside vibes on the flip.” Professa Gabel and Brycon teamed up for a new SF rapper-producer project called Corner Booth, and released “This or No?” b/w “Slow Water,” also featuring Monk HTS and Ozer.
“The joy of playing music, the joy of experiencing music, the joy of storytelling and poetry, the kind of singular joy and extended ecstatic moment that only a real ‘band’ can express in just that way.” Oakland psychedelic rock band Howlin’ Rain released their joyously be-here-now sixth studio album, The Dharma Wheel.
Inspired by groundbreaking albums like A Seat at the Table by Solange and The Chronic by Dr. Dre, Nothing Lasts Forever is the new full-length album from Oakland rapper Kevin Allen, featuring a bunch of great Bay Area artists: JANE HANDCOCK, Ian Kelly, Rexx Life Raj, Guapdad 4000, and more.
Lalin St. Juste, a Haitian-American singer-songwriter and bandleader for the Seshen, released four-track R&B EP behind my eyes, the first release on Black-owned indie label 7000COILS. Next Friday, the artist will be joined by Oakland’s Kah Liberation and SF’s Rocky Rivera for a performance livestreamed from Bandcamp HQ as part of the Local Sirens: Women in Music Performance Series by Women’s Audio Mission.
After offering it as the perfect end-of-party drop at their DJ sets over the past year, Oakland groove house producer (and, full disclosure, my buddy) Moto Tembo finally released this labor of love, a 10-minute edit of “San Francisco (Be Sure to Wear Flowers in Your Hair)” by Emile Mosseri, Daniel Herskedal, Joe Talbot, and Mike Marshall, originally featured in the 2019 film The Last Black Man in San Francisco.
Nate Manic released The Best of Bad Advice, featuring five of their favorite tunes from Bad Advice Inc., a label the artist ran focusing on “quirky, techy, and groovy” house.
“Full of pop songs and some left turns.” Glenn Donaldson’s chamber pop project the Reds, Pinks, and Purples released “Don't Come Home Too Soon,” the first single from the group’s upcoming fourth album Summer At Land's End. Out January 28.
Mill Valley’s Bright Antenna Records released “Watch Me” by Nashville indie folk artist Margolnick.
SF’s Dark Entries Records released “The Sparrow and the Nightingales” by 80s Hamburg synthpop duo Wolfsheim to celebrate the single’s 30th anniversary. The remastered track also features a clubby remix by Ancient Methods on the flip side.
SF’s Paisley Shirt Records released The Continuous Monument by alt punk band Present Electric.
San Ramon’s Ripple Music released Under the Blood Moon by Salem stoner/doom rock band Mother Iron Horse.
Oakland’s Sentient Ruin Laboratories announced Feral Mass by Ohio death metal band Lucifxion. Out December 3.
SF’s Tompkins Square released “Consolação” and “O Barquinho,” the first two singles from Samba in Seattle : Live at the Penthouse 1966-1968, the first official release of Brazilian acoustic guitarist Bola Sete’s performances at the Penthouse jazz club in Seattle. Out December 3.
“Lots to discover on this new compilation from beloved Oakland zine/label Zum, featuring Body Double, Neil Campbell, Xiu Xiu, and many more.” The 32-track comp Zum Audio Vol 4 made Bandcamp’s New & Notable. Now does anyone know if they moved to LA or…?
THE REST OF THE NEW
“im still waiting for lolo to make white crate.” So said my younger brother a couple months ago. Well, even though no one comes here to catch up on rising pop stars, here you go bro: Lolo Zouaï is feeling “bougie as fuck” on her new single “Scooter”, a trendy and tasty blend of pop and industrial.
LA/Oakland rapper C5 released “Odds Again”, a poppy rap song about an old story: the lady’s mad and so she ain’t picking up the phone.
The Doobie Brothers, whose original Craftsman-style home in San Jose was recently designated a historic landmark, released their 15th studio album Liberté. It sounds like a Doobie Brothers album.
Seems like you’re not doing Bay Area hip hop unless you’re constantly onto the next. Two months after releasing full-length album Corner Store Poetry and a month after the single “Cold Outside,” Tenderloin rapper Dregs One returns with “Player Move.”
Cocaine. Snowball. Picasso. Sounds like a recipe for something. “Snowball” is the latest single by rapper Kavi Picasso, featuring Ally Cocaine.
It’s an East Bay hip hop trifecta on “Again” by P-Lo, featuring E-40 and LaRussell.
East Oakland rapper Rayven Justice released the appropriately titled “Big Chillin”, featuring Trinidadian-American rapper Trinidad James.
Third headbopper third week in a row? Richmond rapper White Dave dropped a video for the single “How Deep”, featuring YoungRichHarlem and Tre Santiago.
Today I learned that “trap punk” is a sub-genre of hip hop. It sounds a bit more pop and less punk than I would’ve imagined but it’s very trap, if “BIG SWAG” is any indication. New single by UK rapper Lancey Foux featuring 24kGoldn.
CLASSICS
One of my favorite longstanding mix series is London’s Late Night Tales, and their newest release is one of my favorite things to come out this year. Version Excursion is a treasure trove, featuring dub reggae covers of songs as diverse as “Love Will Tear Us Apart” by Joy Division and “Sixteen Tons” by 1950s country star Tennessee Ernie Ford, selected by British director and musician Don Letts.
After coming into prominence through his music videos (Bob Marley, the Clash, Elvis Costello, Linton Kwesi Johnson, the Pretenders, the Psychedelic Furs) and documentaries (George Clinton, Gil Scott-Heron, Sun Ra), Letts joined the Clash’s former guitarist and singer Mick Jones in 1984 to form Big Audio Dynamite. Over the past couple decades, he has hosted a show called Culture Clash Radio on BBC Radio.
So what does any of this have to do with the Bay? Well, the second track on Version Excursion is “Black Rabbit,” a far-out reworking of the 1967 classic “White Rabbit” by the legendary SF band Jefferson Airplane. In Letts’ own words:
This next one is a trip, quite literally, from Kingston town to the streets of San Francisco. It was conceived by Prince Fatty, aka Mike Pelanconi, a brother with serious analogue attitude who’s worked with the likes of A Tribe Called Quest, Capleton, The Pharcyde, Hollie Cook and many more. I believe he had some interaction with Hollywood, either spending time there or writing tracks for various Hollywood productions which inspired him to do this - psychedelia meets heavy basslines. Come on!
SHUFFLE ON
Listen to the Lower Grand Radio mix - Recorded Nov 5.