Happy New Year! Either again if I've seen you or for the first time if this is the first time you've been here reading the blog. If you're hear reading this in June or something, just ignore the Happy New Year bit.
A little late writing this, as my intention had been to do it last week on Friday so I could call it the "Fairly" New Music Friday, however all in service of an excuse to point you in the direction of a few musical delights that you may have missed in the lead up to Christmas and the New Year. It can get very distracting fighting through the carols and the (Mariah) Carey's.
So here you go - all the links are to Spotify or YouTube but you will almost certainly be able to find these on your personal choice of streaming service.
Superbird burst on the scene in 2019 with debut single Cola Bottle Fizz released almost exactly a year ago. A bouncy colourful funky pop delight, it was picked up in the summer to be the theme tune for the Sara Cox Weekend Breakfast Show on ITV and set the scene for a pretty impressive year for the trio. A further 5 singles followed on throughout the year, keeping the band momentum going with impressive consistency - culminating in Think You Got Me released in December. With more music planned for 2020 and having already started back out on the live scene, expect to hear more funky fun tunes to keep you smiling.
Chris Sims is another artist who kept the music coming with impressive regularity during 2019, with a great selection of acoustic rock tracks (produced with collaborator Cameron Sanderson) that were finally collected as the December released I've Seen Heaven EP. A very active live performer, Chris also promotes other acts and events under his Sinnerman Presents banner.
Daniel Lumley didn't release loads of new music in 2019 but the two tracks that did come out made a great impression. Colour Blind came out right at the end of the year, a re-working of one of his early compositions that first appeared on the Dusty Wagons EP Signs. Beautiful artwork on this, and preceding single On the Run by Belle Illustrations who may pop up again!
Elliot Porter's debut album Lanes was released early in 2019, but recent single release Lights of Piccadilly has an appropriately festive feel to it. A video for the single was filmed in London over the Christmas period and was filmed by one Daniel Lumley. And yes, the artwork is another beautiful Belle Illustration job. You'll also have seen their work on recent Track of the Week Numb by Zoë Phillips.
I'm not exactly sure when this one from MIRI came out but I only just recently heard it - and it's a cracker. A tricky year for MIRI due to some non music related issues and it's great to see a return to music releases from one of our most interesting and dedicated artists.
Cambridge based Datum Plane have gone through a bit of a line-up change and a rethink about their musical direction in the lead up to 2019. So far the results of that have been the singles Let Them Roll released in the summer, and the December release Colorado with a video that was filmed in the the actual American state. As we joked when I interviewed the guys recently, next single may be more conveniently titled Solihull.
It's always fun when you come across an artist who just seems to simply enjoying themselves with the music they make. John Wheatley strikes me as one of those - perhaps he slaves tirelessly over every aspect of his work but what comes out seems come with a friendly wink and single release World War III is a great example. Or perhaps it is an all encompassing dissertation on the state of the world in 2020. What do I know?
Also, an huge amount of effort clearly went in to creating this stop-motion video to accompany the song.
And finally (for now), the lead out single from the upcoming football themed new album from Minnie Birch is a wonderful reworking of the Billy Bragg song God's Footballer complete with fan interviews and stories blended in to the track. Looking forward to how the rest of the album shapes up, due for release in late spring.
So there you go, just some of the tracks released over the last 2-3 weeks from the end of 2019 through the beginning of 2020. Sign up and follow on the BIG Sound Machine for more new music updates soon.
If you have new music to let me know about, drop me a line or use the uploader at www.bigsoundmachine.org