We sometimes wonder what the average number of records released in NYC per year is... does this city produce 5-10 records per day? We think it does, and it's The Deli's duty to cover as many of them as possible. Soooo... to meet this challenge we are using this blog entry to briefly mention a series of up and coming NYC artists who are about to release a new album.
Electronic combo The Qualia (pictured) play catchy pop that sits somewhere between Wall of Voodo, New Order and The New Pornographers. They'll celebrate the release of their EP "Memorial Gore" on July 8 at Pianos - this is a band to keep an ear on.
Gentle and playful orchestral pop quartet Suzy Sellout (picture below) will release their debut EP, “The Great Why Not?” on June 21 with a show at The Duplex (61 Christopher Street, NY).
The Lingering Doubts is a one man project serving a rather intimate folk-pop sound with occasional dreamy atmospheres that at his best sounds like a less convlouted version of our UK hero Robin Hitchcock. We also hear some delicate Violent Femmes influences in there at times. The CD release party was at Pianos on14th - in conjunction with Greg Garing's release, a local blues crooner who sounds like a sane version of Tom Waits.
On the rock-er side of things, sounding like a mix of early Foo Fighters, Husker Du, and Weezer, NJ based Stuyvesant is also celebrating a release: these guys surely know how to induce uncontrollable head-banging with their up tempo guitar pop-rock. Their full length "Fret Sounds" was released on June 14 on Dromedary Records. The Young Presidents (also on June 14!) released their debut album "Freedom of Speech", a classic Rock'n'Roll affair with influences from the Alt Rock of the 90s.
And finally, NYC veteran pop-rock songwriter Emily Zuzik (who recently also worked on a Moby record) is about to celebrate her 8th release "The Wild Joys of Living" with a show at the Living Room on June 25. She sounds to us like a female version of Tom Petty.
We've always been big fans of Luke Temple, and it's good to see that, together with the Here We Go Magic crew, the man is keeping at it with increasingly beautiful records and videos. The band's new album "A Different Ship" (stream it here) will be out on May 8, and betrays at least a partial return to Luke Temple's more intimate and melodic sound from his solo repertoire - in this regard, lend a ear to "Hard to Be Close," "Alone but Moving" and "Over the Ocean". This is welcome news for fans like us who always thought that in most HWGM material Luke's noteworthy songwriting skills seemed a little sacrificed on the altar of textural experimentation. This doesn't mean that the band's signature hypnotic, impressionistic sound is lost - it's just that these two elements work together better than they did in past records, and this is what makes this album one of the NYC highlights of the year so far. Indeed, this collection also features songs more in line with the band's past releases ("Make Up your Mind", "I Believe in Action"), which follow on the steps of brainy-pop icons like Brian Eno and The Feelies, but there's definitely a balance here, also betrayed by the almost perfect alternation of melodic songs and less traditional ones.The just released video of "How Do I Know," telling the story of a rejected dancing robot that ends up revitalizing an older man's appreciation for life, seems to reflect on this brain/heart, mechanic/organic dichotomies and somehow bring them to unity. - PDG
