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Ramona Falls - "I Say Fever"
Ramona Falls is the solo project of Menomena's Brent Knopf and various collaborators in New York and Portland. His debut Intuit is out 8/18 on Barsuk, but "I Say Fever" surfaces in this week's Drop.
What's the significance of saying "fever"? Each time you sing it, there's a discordant moment. The word has multiple and sometimes contradictory meanings. That word was right for the song because it implies being bodily possessed by some kind of transforming experience, either for better or worse. Sometimes people talk about the point at which a fever "breaks," and the relief returning to normal brings. But this moment in the song is about being in the throes, before the fever has broken, servile to its whims, wondering where it will take you. Lyrically, it fits with other words that comprise a puzzle. Emotionally, I hope it conveys a spirit of both panic and resignation. If I had to liken it to anything, it'd be the feeling that precipitates a drastic change in the weather, a rapid darkening of the sky.
Evan Voytas - "I Run With You, Spirit Animal" Video
Los Angeles-via-Pennsylvania multi-instrumental singer and home recordist Evan Voytas -- sort of a more clean-cut Ariel Pink -- creates strange synth-pop/space-disco outings that feel danceable but private and insular. The idea's explored in the video for his most recent single... (more)
Dr. Dog - "Shadow People" (Stereogum Premiere)
Dr. Dog have been a band for over a decade now, Philadelphia-based throughout. Their hometown hasn't factored much into their sound, which throws back to the Beatles-era of the classic rock school, or their themes and lyrical schemes. That's changed... (more)
Joanna Newsom - "Kingfisher"
We've heard the stylistically diverse "81" pastoral and jazzy "Good Intentions Paving Company" outing. Now, after adding the gorgeous 9-minute madrigal/short story "Kingfisher" to the Have One On Me tracklist, the only thing to be sure of is that the... (more)
Under Byen - "Alt Er Tabt" Video (Stereogum Premiere)
Onetime BTW Under Byen's fourth album Alt Er Tabt ("All Is Lost") is out in April. The Denmark group's followup to 2006's Samme Stof Som Stof definitely has an anguished, although not done-for feel. In their new form, they're without... (more)
Archie Bronson Outfit - "Shark's Tooth" Video (Stereogum Premiere)
Four years after the worthy Derdang Derdang, London's Archie Bronson Outfit are set to followup that last LP's dark blues/rusty grooved garage rock with a long-awaited third album, titled Coconut. On production is sorta-ex-DFA-dude Tim Goldsworthy, whose stellar C.V. includes... (more)
