Tag Archives: Fresh Juice

Fresh Juice

Fresh Juice 7th July 2025

Lois Levin – Sugar

Taken from her new EP ‘Motions’ released on the Baltic Jazz label, this is a lovely soulful ballad to kick off the new music selections this week. Lois has been slow building a catalogue of jazz inflected songs via single and EP releases for a couple of years that started to catch the attention of 6music and Jazz FM radio DJs and deservedly so. She first came to more widespread attention with a version of The Clash’s ‘Should I Stay Or Should I Go’ on the Baltic Jazz ‘Re:Visioned’ album but it is her own evolving, genre-blending music that is most likely to lead to the answer ‘yes’, this is an artist who should definitely stay!

Dutch Interior – Sandcastle Molds

“My sandcastle molds all came without shovels”. Well we’ve all been there haven’t we? This one slipped past me earlier in the year but maybe I needed the summer months for the words to resonate? That is nonsense of course, unlike this song, a rattling, unsettling, shuffle that mixed inside the buoyancy and horn-burst fanfare of the sound is an uncertain melancholy asking the unanswerable questions. For a band that have been labelled “freak Americana” maybe that is the least that you would expect but let there be no doubt, this Los Angeles based collaborative writing collective are coming up with the goods right now.

Ryan Sambol – Friend Of The Show

This one has an unvarnished folksy singer-songwriter feel thanks to the way the harmonica is used as a lead instrument with the acoustic guitars and piano chords being thumped out all around amidst some gripping building of tension. There is a simplistic raw energy to this one, a primitive purity to an instrumental number that would make perfect talk-over intro or outro music for a radio show (I should make a note of that) but is worth a play in its own right anyway. Ryan released this album of the same name back in February, a record that has old-time blues sensibilities, a departure from the garage rock sounds he produced as front man of Texas cult heroes The Strange Boys in the early 2000’s

Stereolab – Aerial Troubles

The return of Stereolab this year has been a most welcome futurist-retro resurrection. As can be heard on this, the first offering from new 13 track album ‘Instant Holograms On Metal Film’ released on Duophonic UHF Disks and Warp Records, their signature groove driven electro adventurism remains switched on to full power. Founder members Tim Gane and Laetitia Sadier have imprinted their creative vision all over this new work which has led to another instalment of an impressive back catalogue with a real clarity of vision and purpose but above all, brilliant bittersweet music that still somehow sounds like no other.

The Flying Hats – Night Bus

It is brand new retro sounds of an altogether different stripe with this one as we enjoy a live studio version of this Flying Hats debut single. With these chilled soulful reggae and Caribbean vibes this has to be an ideal sound for the hot summer weather. It is taken from the bands album ‘The Return Of The Flying Hats’ released on the ATA Records label. The UK based band were formed by drummer Sam Hobbs and bassist Neil Innes, a cooking rhythm section who both have musical history as collaborators in the rootsy Afro-American dance scene.

Kendra Morris – Dear Buddy

So we retain the easy vintage soul textures on this weeks final selection, a jazzier offering and a ballad that carries some proper emotional weight. New York based Kendra has been ploughing this vintage pathway for a good fifteen years or more now, known for a songwriting style that has the grit and bite of real life mainlined into its veins, leading to favourable comparisons to the likes of Amy Winehouse and Sharon Jones. Like these late-greats, she too has an ear for the modern music world to match her old-school leanings, past collaborators include hip-hop collective Czarface but still it seems to be the straight ahead classicist compositions in her catalogue, as felt right here with ‘Dear Buddy’ (a tune from her latest three-song single ‘If I Called You’), that pack the firmest punch.

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Fresh Juice

Fresh Juice 23rd June 2025

Bruce Springsteen – Repo Man

If there is anyone doubtful that Bruce Springsteen deserves to be mentioned alongside the great writers of the Rock ‘n’ Roll era then this coming week might just press a few of the doubters into submission. He is about to release seven completed albums of previously unreleased, mostly unheard, material at the end of this week and if nothing else, they go a long way to re-writing what now looks like the misconception that Bruce ever really went off the boil or had a quiet patch. His 1990s alone are about to be plunged into a wholesale revision as from what I have heard and judging by the initial reactions he was as inspired and creatively engaged then as at any point in his fifty+ year career. The unreleased albums cover electronic ambience, film soundtrack work as well as out-and-out rockers but the selection I offer up here is upbeat killer country from the record entitled ‘Somewhere North Of Nashville’. I cannot wait for this latest Bruce deep dive on the horizon.

Margo Price – Don’t Let The Bastards Get You Down

I will keep it country with the exciting news that Margo Price, one of the most authentic voices on the US scene these days, has a new album ‘Hard Headed Woman’ out on August 29th. Of this top new tune Margo says “with all that’s going on in the world, I hope this song will be a battle cry for the downtrodden and create unity and action for those facing oppression and hardship”.

James McMurtry – The Black Dog And The Wandering Boy

This is the stand out title track from the new James McMurty album ‘The Black Dog and the Wandering Boy’, which is out now on New West Records. James is widely considered, by those in the know, to be one of the most under-rated songwriters playing in the country-rock scene and that is an opinion that his quietly floating around since the 1980s. Well if he is new to you or this new music prompts a return, this is a fine album to get into so check it out but meantime, the clip featured here is a recent (lo-fi audio quality) live outing.

Kristina Murray – Watchin’ The World Pass Me By

This new laid back, care free and real world baiting cracker is a proper country lament taken from Kristina’s latest album ‘Little Blue’ out now on Normaltown Records. The video leans into some cheesy literal interpretation and is all the better for it, showing an artist not taking herself too seriously whilst delivering a song that under that lush veneer packs a bit of a punch, reflecting as it does on the tough reality of those creatives who have to fight to reach their potential in an industry that can kick down on those less fortunate unable to buy their way in with looks, wealth and the right contacts. Luckily for us, there are still a wealth of artists, like Kristina, who do it for the love of music and creative expression.

Wednesday – Elderberry Wine

The alternative pockets of US country are also alive with promise and talent in 2025. This is especially true of North Carolina rockers Wednesday, led by Karly Hartzman with guitarist MJ Lenderman, bassist Ethan Baechtold, drummer Alan Miller, and pedal steel player Xandy Chelmis, who I was raving about on these pages a couple of years ago after they released the still superb ‘Chosen To Deserve’. Here they are recently making their national television debut in the US and their first airing of new 2025 music.

Ringo Starr – Time On My Hands

And in the end… the best new country album of 2025 might still have been made by Ringo!!!

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Fresh Juice

Fresh Juice 16th June 2025

Ron Sexsmith – Don’t Lose Sight

Canadian songwriter Ron continues to evolve and refine his craft with another new album called ‘Hangover Terrace’ set for release in August. His music can be as laid back and sleepy sounding as that weary expression he seems to perpetually wear on his face but that should not obscure the fact that his stock is song composition of the highest order. Ron can command the channels interlinking the major and minor keys with a melodic stitching that is deceptively advanced and the end result is frequently a song, such as that heard here, that was waiting for the right artist with enough range and dexterity to pull it into existence; don’t lose sight of the great songsmith’s still in our midst.

BC Camplight – Where You Taking My Baby?

BC Camplight is the performing identity of songwriter Brian Christinzio and he has used this platform to heart-wrenching effect in recent times to produce a piano-led style of confessional indie-rock that seems to delve deep into the mental, emotional and psychological core of his very being. That journey is clearly still unfolding on the new, soon to be released on Bella Union, ‘A Sober Conversation’ album in which, as heard here, among other concerns Brian deals with the trauma of re-connecting to loved ones following therapy brought on by fall outs, lost contacts, misunderstanding and hurt. If all this sounds heavy going though do not turn away, for his flare on the piano and ear for a tune in general make the music of BC Camplight a reliably deep, entertaining and ultimately rewarding experience.

Girl Group – Yay! Saturday

This is taken from Girl Group’s debut EP ‘Think They’re Looking, Let’s Perform’ and is buzzing with the same kind of feminist, hook driven pop energy previously heard from Wet Leg or Lily Allen. They are a relatively new five piece who, on this evidence, are alive with ideas and capable of painting vivid audio pictures that present animated versions of the lives they and their peer groups experience, in this case a long night out that gets messy. It is worth noting too that they are all singers and each member contributes to the writing too, so potentially the ideas will never be in short supply with a well of creative energy like this, there is a lot of promise here.

Night Beats – Behind The Green Door

And the beat goes on with another fine release from an ever dependable name in psych-inflected bluesy rock, Danny Lee Blackwell’s rollin’ and tumblin’ electric circus that is the Night Beats. ‘Behind The Green Door’ is the bands latest single and is out digitally now and on limited 7″ vinyl. Even though the backbone of Night Beats music is always retained, the primitive beats and the ubiquitous green fuzz of the guitar, there is always something different to delight in as well, on this occasion a decidedly Lynch-like panorama and a widescreen cinematic sound that could place this in the soundtrack to some obscure sixties b-movie, if not for the fact that it belongs firmly in the here and now as well.

Kathleen Edwards – 6 O’Clock News

The news that Kathleen Edwards is releasing a new album called ‘Billionaire’ on August 22nd produced by Jason Isbell and Gena Johnson, is very welcome indeed. It is described as harking back to her very first album, ‘Failer,’ with razor sharp lyrical observations and relatable real life tales. Two new songs, ‘Save Your Soul’ and ‘Say Goodbye, Tell No One’ are ready to hear online already and I will get to them soon enough but for now, let’s enjoy this recent live performance of the opening track from that aforementioned brilliant 2003 debut release.

Edith Frost – That’s What It’s Like To Be Lonesome

And to finish things off this week, here is another highly rated artist who has made a return in 2025, but this time it is someone who has ushered herself back into the ring with very little fanfare or hullabaloo. Edith Frost was one of the essential American Singer-songwriters around the start of the 2000’s earning herself deserved comparisons to singers like Elliott Smith but her new album ‘In Space’, which I am going to be checking out for the first time this coming week having only just come across it way below the surface, is her first in nineteen years. Here she is posting on her own YouTube channel a cover version of an old Jean Shepard song and it is as lush and moving as I always recalled Edith to be a couple of decades ago, it feels good to come across her once more.

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Fresh Juice

Fresh Juice 9th June 2025

The Milk – I Need Your Love

Top new retro soul tune taken from this now well established band’s fourth album ‘Borderlands’. The only thing that gets in the way of music that references another era is if the style outweighs the substance but if, as is very much the case here, the backbone is a great song then things really do start to happen. I first caught sound of The Milk back in 2012 when their anger fuelled ‘Broke Up The Family’ really spoke to a personal situation unfolding for me at the time but real class tends to be permanent and thirteen years later, here they are proving to be one still tasty milk that has definitely not gone off with time.

Natalie Bergman – Dance

Add this insistent little beast to the quite fertile crop of grainy, sixties go-go inspired alternative girl pop splendour currently abounding, most recently witnessed here in the hands of Lael Neale. The thing I cannot escape with Bergman’s music is that underlying current of sorrow and melancholic reflection which even manages to seep through on a groove driven dance number like this one. Delve deeper into her back story and some unspeakably tragic events are not too far from the surface, events which she was working through during the healing hymns of her last album ‘Mercy’ but here the life and light at the end of that tunnel feels like it is within touching distance. New album ‘My Home Is Not In This World’ is coming soon on Third Man Records.

Richard Dawson – More Than Real

Speaking of hymns, this really does have that sombre meditative quality that prompts a listener to stop and just listen, to absorb and reflect. Taken from Richard’s latest album ‘End of the Middle’ released on Weird World / Domino which to these ears is a work of outsider genius. Richard’s style is akin to that of a primitive painter, you know the kind that get dismissed by people saying “I could do that”, but his uninhibited melodic lines and wayward form defying structures cut straight to both the minutiae and emotional core of everyday and, as in this song, overwhelming real life traumas and situations. I find it impossible not to be moved by the identifiable realities he touches upon in his work and believe him to be a genuine national treasure.

Jorja Smith – The Way I Love You

A real change of pace with this one and the first of this weeks new music recommendations that could be placed in terms of its club friendly sound alone in the modern era. I feel that there is a lot of new R&B with roots and echoes in urban grime culture that loses me with an over produced, all-too-clean sheen airbrushing out a lot of the human heartbeat that makes soul music so special. But there are artists for whom that complaint does not apply and Jorja Smith is one, even with the face-slapping, bass driven, studio template this track is built around. There is still that jazzy voice carrying it, the punch and pull of Jorja’s authentic, un-contrived personality pumping everything that you hear which all serve to make this tune impossible to ignore.

The Horsenecks – Baker City Blues

This duo are an Oregon based husband and wife duo comprising Gabrielle Macrae (fiddle, guitar, bass, vocals) and Barry Southern (banjo, guitar, dobro, vocals) and they play an old time fiddle and bluegrass grain of country-folk. So much of the new music I feature these days might have a style that harks back to a long gone era (like the old soul sounds of this weeks opener or the many sixties garage and psych bands I play) but the thing that always bumps an act up into current relevance is if they are creating something wholly new and original within that framework. That is what the Horsenecks do here, playing a classic sounding tune newly written by Macrae which also appears as the opening track on their forthcoming ‘In The West’ album released on Tiki Parlour Recordings.

Robert Forster – Strawberries

I have just returned from a couple of days of rural escape in North Norfolk during which a meal in a village pub was rendered excruciating by an entitled, middle-class family invading the dining space of everyone else in the room due to their need to set up a phone tripod and film themselves dining and playing cards for Instagram, wilfully unaware as to their invasiveness on the evening of others. They even roped in bar staff to take photos. The mother spent so much time exacting her camera angles and poses that none of her meal was spent actually interacting with her own children, one of whom felt the need to apologise on his mothers behalf to an elderly couple and attempt to explain to them what Instagram is. Anyway, I say all this because this charming new film by Robert Forster and his partner does nothing more than address the very middle class problem of identifying the person who ate all the delicious strawberries. It is delightfully charming and I could not wipe off the cheery smile it put on my face, taken from Forster’s new album on Tapete Records.

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Fresh Juice

Fresh Juice 2nd June 2025

Deradoorian – Set Me Free

Angel Deradoorian first gained wide reaching attention as part of Dirty Projectors, especially for her contributions to their outstanding 2009 LP ‘Bitte Orca,’ but it is as a solo artist that her ethereal honey has been allowed to mature into something quite mysterious and lush. Her debut ‘The Expanding Flower Planet’ in 2015 is a fascinating starting point, bringing strands of art-rock and Kraftwerk-esque electronica to the table so it is superb news to report that this evolution continues with a third solo record released on Fire Records entitled ‘Ready For Heaven’. Of the album she says it “is partly about watching humanity erode. It’s about mental struggle, and it’s avowedly anti-capitalist. I mean; would we have all these identity labels we have to live by, if we didn’t live in a capitalist world?” Whilst this outlook might sound rather bleak in tone, it would be a whole lot worse if we did not have redemptive music of the kind created by Deradoorian to help us get by.

Robert Jon & The Wreck – Better Of Me

Sometimes it feels like the biggest present day, and certainly highest selling, country albums do not really sound like country at all. The production is a pop one in all but name and to these ears, a hint of token fiddle and a quick slide guitar drive-by do not a great country album make. Luckily, scratch the surface and there is still some authentic shit-kickin’ southern rock style country to be found as heard here by these Orange County amped-up troubadours. The quintet have been harvesting this good stuff since 2011 and are about to release their tenth LP and on ‘Better Of Me’ they say “it’s a rollicking, heartfelt track about staying true to yourself and moving forward — and will be featured on our upcoming album ‘Heartbreaks & Last Goodbyes’, we are so excited for you guys to hear this one!” They can afford to be excited too, people are going to love this one!

Ewan Currie – Big Pine Key

Where did this one spring from? It is positively fizzing with hot sunshine-pop vibes and a classy production that references the Beach Boys, High Llamas and Stereolab with just a splash of tropicalia, a light breeze of exotica and a flashlight of psychedelia. A little internet research tells me Ewan is best known for his work as the frontman of The Sheepdogs and BROS although I confess these names are not on my radar yet. However, this could be the trigger that is about to change all that because ‘Big Pine Key’ is from an equally superb new album called ‘Strange Vacation’ which is available now on Right On Records.

Tanita Tikaram – This Perfect Friend

Often when an artist has big mainstream chart success early in their career, as Tanita did back in 1988 with her first release, they never reach those heights again because that early burst of inspiration was the pinnacle of their potential and post-success, the motivation that originally pushed-on is lost forever. This is certainly not the case with Tanita Tikaram; if anything the 37 year old ‘Ancient Heart’ record represents her more primitive and unrefined mode for the work she has produced ever since has reliably matured to form a catalogue that is quite outstanding in the eloquent, fervent sophistication of its writing. That she has comparatively flown under-the-radar since her debut remains one of the inexplicable injustices of the music industry for Tikaram is genuinely one of our finest singer-songwriters; this is a live rendition of a song taken from upcoming new album ‘LIAR (Love Isn’t A Right)’ which is excellent news indeed.

Beebe Gallini – Begged Borrowed And Stealed

OK so, this is a cover of a fuzzy sixties garage tune probably best known to lovers of that retro movement after it’s inclusion on the 1998 expanded ‘Nuggets’ box set being performed by The Rare Breed. While this quirkily re-named version by fuzz fanatics Beebe Gallini may not deviate too far from the familiar 1966 45 (re-issued in almost identical form a year later under the name Ohio Express), it is absolutely played with the right kind of conviction and all the energy and rough edged exuberance can be felt vibrating out of these grooves newly released on Soundflat Records. There is always a place here for garage rock played with unpretentious attitude and this, indisputably, is a band who do it right!

Ebba Asman – Lately

The sound may be smooth and soulful with a production that is equally Jazz FM approvingly plush but over the top is a vocal that is positively teeming with ache, regret, hurt and loss. Ebba Asman is singing this like she means it which is very often the one element that can lift something out of the realms of background music and into the kind of music that grabs you by the ears and demands an emotional response. Ebba Asman is a Swedish trombonist and songwriter who is on the first rung of the ladder career wise but is definitely showing enough here, with a tune from her newly released ‘When You Know’ album, to mark her out as one to watch.

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Fresh Juice

Fresh Juice 26th May 2025

Sunny War – Cry Baby

Singer Sydney Ward has her latest album, ‘Armageddon In A Summer Dress’, out now on the increasingly reliable New West Records and it continues the astounding cutting edge this folk-punk agitator was showing on her previous, also highly praised, LP from 2023 ‘Anarchist Gospel’. This time around she has continued her exploration of roots music and incorporating a fuller band sound into her work and the end result is some of the best singer-songwriter fare you will find today. But she is authentic too and the side of her music that rose out of her early love of punk, especially the band Crass, can still be detected in her hard line message to listeners to live and act true to their beliefs and not bow down to social pressures. This is a recent live performance of a song which on the record also featured Valerie June…

Louis Philippe & The Night Mail – Pictures Of Anna

To my shame I have only just discovered that this artist, whose music is a lush hybrid of Brian Wilson referencing sunshine pop underpinning finely tuned melodic writing with an ear and eye for a vintage 1920’s aesthetic whilst retaining a foothold in the melting pot of the 21st century, is only an alias; his real name is Philippe Auclair. That name is known to me in an entirely different context as an Arsenal football fan and it is in the world of knowledgeable, classy sports writing that I have encountered his name before. It is clear however that the music world is where the consummate talent lies and latest album ‘The Road To The Sea’ on Tapete Records is one of the must-hear outlier curio albums of the year thus far…

Matthew Nowhere (ft. Lunar Twin) – Transforming

Here is San Francisco’s Matthew Nowhere’s latest video shot in California and Italy and it’s electronica is so lush behind the stirring, cloudy singing of Lunar Twin’s Bryce Boudrea. Nowhere says the video “is deeply resonant and captures something ineffable about the experience I was trying to convey with the song itself”. This is delightfully modern sounding in the way that futurism appeared in the 1980s, as such it has the human touch production feel that pioneers like Kraftwerk and Arthur Baker injected their work with. Matthew Nowhere’s debut album is out now…

Lavinia Blackwall – The Making

The new album of the same name from former Trembling Bells chanteuse Lavinia Blackwall is released this week and you can ensure you collect a copy of the vinyl LP on her bandcamp page. Lavinia is the living, breathing essence of that late sixties, early seventies gothic folk sound and she deserves some wider recognition for the songs she creates continue to expand that particular canon and find a home in our modern day musical landscape. And she is sincere too, there is no fakery on display here, Lavinia’s musical DNA is sourced from period Pentangle, Steeleye Span and Fotheringay albums and the like from which a sublime old-England magic still rises, as can be heard and bathed in wondrously here…

Sam Amidon – Big Sky

It’s a talented artist who can remove all trace of Lou Reed from a Lou Reed song and still end up with something fresh, deep and mesmerising but that is exactly what Sam has done here. It is a track that appeared on his ‘Salt River’ album, released earlier this year on River Lea, in which Sam approaches the use of synthesised textures and modernism from the perspective of a folky campfire setting to come up with an album that is impossible to pigeonhole and easy to become entranced by. As for the ‘Big Sky’ song, it was originally kind of buried as the closing track on Lou’s 2000 album ‘Ecstasy’ and a real up-tempo rocker to boot but, as with all the best writers, Reed’s work contains multitudes and Sam has found an altogether more mystical realm for the piece here but no less legitimate; in fact it has the potential to be the definitive version people refer to in years to come…

Emma-Jean Thackray – Maybe Nowhere

Taken from her second album ‘Weirdo’, a record which has been recorded and written amid tragedy after Thackray unexpectedly and suddenly lost her long term partner. It followed her 2021 album ‘Yellow’ which had received widespread acclaim for its bold jazz futurism and eloquent groove based explorations. All things considered, it would have been entirely understandable if her subsequent work had taken an introspective turn but, although you could argue it still has, she has instead stared her trauma down with an intentionally earth pounding, afro-jazz swinging, indie-dance grooving explosion of an album. It can be heard clearly in this tune, that sense of loss and confusion burns through every layer of sound, but the need to squeeze every last drop out of the life you still have stands tall as well, this is brave and beautiful stuff…

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Fresh Juice

Fresh Juice 19th May 2025

Kassi Valazza – Your Heart’s A Tin Box

The warm hazy country shimmer in Kassi’s music certainly caught my attention in 2023 with her wonderful ‘Kassi Valazza Knows Nothing’ album and she has pushed on further up and further in with this years ‘From Newman Street’ LP. That same analogue tone remains but do I detect a little more bite and punch this time? That jumps out of this song with an opening lyric that seems to pull its own limbs out in frustration at the state of the music business now. Honestly, if I won the lottery I would make sure artists like Valazza are worrying a lot less about making ends meet and just focusing on their craft as they should be. You hear too much these days about artists playing sell out shows and still running at a loss and I guess this song is evidence that Kassi endures similar battles. What we fail to understand is that the real artists are in it because their craft is a calling, they do not see it as a ticket to wealth and luxury. They just have to make their music. We should be glad that Kassi Valazza is doing just that, this is the authentic sound of country in 2025 and it is pretty damn marvellous…

My Morning Jacket – Half A Lifetime

Jim James and his rootsy rocking band are reliably dependable when it comes to new music. There may not be reinventing the Southern rock templates they perpetually swim around in but their music is full of crunching melodic groove and to this day, every time they put out a new record (as they have here with ‘Is’) you can be sure there will be at least a handful of classic sounding pop/rock hooks to stimulate the senses of the listener…

Greentea Peng – Raw

Here is another artist who I have raved about in the past, in this case around the time of her stunning ‘Man Made’ debut LP back in 2021. Well, Greentea Peng has now released ‘Tell Dem It’s Sunny’ and in addition to reporting on it being a sharp, confident and attention grabbing step back into the ring, it is also thrilling to observe how her sound is evolving. Where before I would say the dominant vibe was a dub heavy throbbing rumble, in 2025 there is a real soul in the voice breaking out of these tracks and the music itself, as heard on this undeniable live clip, is a tasty mix of trip-hop and jazzy motions. Dig into this right away…

Father John Misty – I Guess Time Just Makes Fools Of Us All

Not exactly a new one as it appeared on the Father John Misty album released late last year, ‘Mahashmashana’, but it is new to me and jumped out of the radio speakers the other day demanding some attention and love. The Misty baroque chamber pop aesthetic remains, as you would expect, but it is just such a head turner when an artist can occupy this space with songs that sound so simultaneously fresh but also like they have been around forever (well since 1971 or thereabout anyway). Sometimes it happens that a songwriter stumbles on a bit of low hanging fruit, a title that surely has to have been used before but it is available and they then tack a brilliantly crafted new song to it, which seems to be what has occurred here…

St Vincent – Violent Times

While the Fresh Juice weekly offerings were away for a time on this site, I guess I missed quite a few releases and tracks I would have loved to have featured. So, here is another recent live performance by an artist whose 2024 album ‘All Born Screaming’ has subsequently won Grammy awards but even more significantly, remains a worthy inclusion in this weeks Fresh Juice half dozen. I personally do not believe St Vincent to have fallen short with any releases for more than fifteen years, which basically covers the whole of their career. Annie’s execution of art-rock presentation alongside beautiful, sometimes abrasive, occasionally challenging but always worth listening to music makes her one of the definitive artists of the early 21st century period in music. Digitally witness her in action on late night TV here…

Wet Leg – Catch These Fists

Finally for this week another selection from the recent highlights of music on TV file. Wet Leg have reawakened and sound like they will not be among those who suffer from underwhelming second album syndrome. Their debut record was three years ago but from what I can see here, the time has been well spent pushing their sound into far rockier, a lot edgier and even a possibly more violent realm? Obviously if you perform on TV with an angry zombie sitting at the back of the stage then you are consciously not presenting something too cute but the jagged edges on display with this one suggest that new Wet Leg album could well be worth waiting for…

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Fresh Juice

Fresh Juice 12th May 2025

Galactic & Irma Thomas – Puppet On Your String

Irma Thomas is the goddess of New Orleans soul music, in fact you can go even further than that and claim she is the true queen of soul. It seems barely comprehensible that she was making classic R&B as far back as the fifties and can still, in 2025 at the age of 84, be involved in a collaboration project like this and deliver vocals with that voice still sounding as devastatingly wonderful as it ever did. She has made an album with fellow New Orleans chameleons Galactic called ‘Audience With The Queen’ and it is possibly already the essential soul release of the year. If you don’t know Irma Thomas then I urge you to go deeper, music does not get much better than that which has her name attached to it; maybe start with ‘It’s Raining’ and then move on from there but do not ignore this, a 2025 pleasing teaser for sure…

The Waterboys – Hopper’s On Top

Mike Scott’s Waterboys have just released a concept album built around the life, work, reputation and legacy of Dennis Hopper and despite my initial reservations, it has proved to be a well structured, frequently deviating and surprising journey in song and sound. I think my initial caution might have had something to do with this video, packed with magic carpet riding cliches and literal lyrical representations but then I have to remember, it is often the direct route that Mike Scott takes with his writing that results in so many songs that I love. And so it is here, if Mike wants us to know he thinks Hopper was a genius he’s not going to subtly weave it into a poetic yarn with indeterminate meaning, he is just going to come right out and sing it; but then love, sincerity and focus are all ingredients that have fed into the greatest Waterboys tracks of our lives and that is no different here, genius!

Samantha Crain – B-Attitudes

Taken from her new album ‘Gumshoe’, this track seems to be about the feeling you get when the idea of finding your own home, your own little space in the world speaks to you the loudest and you set about realising it. That is definitely something I am experiencing in recent times after finally settling in a town and a home that feels like me. Samantha is dependably addictive here, clearly still in command of her easy fluency in singer-songwriter craft that has been under serious threat in recent years, not least after a car accident left her unable to play her guitar, an injury that thankfully she was able to find a long path to recovery with. Here is a singer working out her life stuff through music that is regularly a thrill to hear…

Neil Young & The Chrome Hearts – Big Change

This is Neil’s first release backed by the Chrome Hearts, taken from the forthcoming album ‘Talkin To The Trees’. It feels absurd that in such unsettling economic and political times, especially in the US and Canada, that it is still the old guard like Neil Young who are planting their flags in the protest ground. He is whipping up a storm here, offering a rallying cry of big change in a moment when it’s inevitably going to come along anyway whether you like it or not so you might as well try and fight for something good to emerge. Like the late great Phil Ochs, Neil Young really cares a lot and badly wants his music to get inside folks heads and make something happen. Unlike Phil though, he can accept that the preferred option may not necessarily arrive and so can console himself with the visceral thrill of a loudly cranked guitar and amp to get him through the day. Whatever it takes…

White Rose Motor Oil – Hit In The Face

If the previous track feels like a bit of a slap in the face to shake some action, then this tune is the soundtrack to the moment of impact and the reverberations of all that follow. It is a rollin’ and tumblin’ rockin’ rockabilly thunder crack of a tune that revs its engine delightfully with every repeat of the “you’re gonna get hit in the face” chorus line. They are a red hot duo from Denver with a fire lighting zipper of a female vocalist and a love of playing fast and loud. Together they surf the waves between cowpunk and garage rock which is a pretty exhilarating place to be if you can manage to catch it, so do not miss out on this one…

Silver Synthetic – Rosalie

A couple of years ago Silver Synthetic caught my ear with a debut album that occupied a very pleasing little side street situated between the late period of the Velvet Underground and seventies FM country rock. It was a lush sound that they played with belief and proficiency and it is a welcome return that I flag up here as the band offer similarly breezy Americana on a brand new song, which also happens to be the title track of the new Silver Synthetic album…

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Fresh Juice

Fresh Juice 5th May 2025

Jeffrey Lewis – Sometimes Life Hits You

Here is some welcome new music, accompanied by a UK tour I should add, from a US cult songwriter whose superb DIY aesthetic, whose biting satirical lyrics and observational dexterity, not to mention his effortless facility to grab an earworm melody or hook, has seen his catalogue grow to near iconic status. He is pitched somewhere between the English whimsy of a Robyn Hitchcock or the charming outsider wackiness of a Jonathan Richman without being too much like either. He comes packed with visual stimuli as well thanks to a prolific dedication to creating comic book art. Jeffrey is a one off basically, criminally under-rated to this day but to paraphrase the mans own ‘Cult Boyfriend’, even if he never fully makes it out of the club gig circuit you can guarantee there will always be some people in the know who are really going to love his work. I count myself among them…

Oracle Sisters – Riverside

I was previously writing about this trio on this site in 2023 when their debut record caught my attention thanks to its subtle reliance on quiet melodicism and gentle contours of lift and abandon to grab the listener, rather than more blunt attention grabbing techniques. Later that year I would catch them at the End Of The Road festival and was rather blown away with how their delicate charms could still command the attention of a sizeable crowd and convincingly occupy a large main stage. They are back in 2025 with a new album called ‘Divinations’ and continue to display their deceptively modest musical loveliness here, down on the riverside…

Joy Crookes – I Know You’d Kill

I first encountered Joy Crookes by accident back in 2016 when she was supporting Benedict Benjamin in a small London club venue aged just seventeen. I remember writing back then about how much promise she showed as well as noting an impressively eclectic blend of influences from soul to jazz to hip-hop, all collected up in a joyous melting pot all of her own making. Today Joy continues tapping into a retro soul groove and summoning the vocal style, a little of the attitude too, of Amy Winehouse which is wonderful to hear nine years down the line. How great, not to mention important, it is that there is still space and time for an artist like this to grow and find their own voice. Joy Crookes is really starting to deliver now…

Lael Neale – Tell Me How To Be Here

I have written about the new Lael Neale album over at KLOF Mag a couple of days ago and correctly, I believe, identified it as the must-hear new release of the week. On the record, ‘Altogether Stranger’, this track works as the emotional centrepiece in a dizzying and yet refreshingly concise collection of songs that meditate on various states of belonging and isolation. As before with Lael, the sound is a heady mix of Velvets drone and minimalism with a definite retro pop sheen and an all encompassing shimmer. See exactly what I mean with this…

Blake, Butler & Grant – Bring An End

This new trio of old hands are Bernard Butler, a celebrated guitarist with numerous credits to his name but most notably Suede and McCalmont & Butler in the nineties; Scottish songwriter James Butler, best known for fronting the band Love & Money in the mid-eighties to the nineties and Norman Blake who is, of course, best known as the ever-present front man of Teenage Fanclub. I caught the trio last summer when playing an ear catching set at the Cambridge Folk Festival and noted then how well their newly composed material sat alongside well known hits and covers. This track demonstrates exactly what I was talking about and can be heard on the new self titled album, already released on 355 Recordings…

Alabaster DePlume – Invincibility

Taken from the new ‘A Blade Because A Blade Is Whole’ album and as a complete work it is quite a different beast to what one might expect from a jazz saxophonist. It is far more geared towards the poetic composer and even activism strain of DePlume’s work as the entire album plays like something of a healing mechanism for the troubled modern times we live in. Not quite a protest album, certainly not a political statement but a meditation on the feeling of, well, everything not being quite right with the world and as the title itself ponders, if something is not whole it cannot fulfil its intended purpose. Oh and I probably should warn you, as wonderful as the video below is, it is definitely a bit of a heartbreaker so tread carefully…

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Fresh Juice

Fresh Juice 28th April 2025

Echolalia – In The Pub

To mark the regular return of this sites Fresh Juice feature, I would ideally have liked to follow the tradition of sourcing the best video clips to represent the song choice but for this, I also wanted to return with something that has a bit of punch and this certainly has that. Echolalia are Spencer Cullum, Andrew Combs, Dominic Billet, Jason Lehning, Eli Beaird, Jordan Lehning and Juan Solorzano and their debut album is a thing of pastoral beauty and strong songwriting, with each of the four writers among the collective getting an equal portion of the album track space. But tucked away right at the close of the record is this hilariously sparky hidden treasure. Quite out of sync with the remainder of the album, this is reminiscent of a mockney Britpop classic, all boozed up geezerish chat that brilliantly captures the alcoholic fog of an afternoon in a spit and sawdust old English ale house. Maybe its best explained by Spencer Cullum, who for all his current residential status as a Tennessean was actually born and raised in Romford. If that is his voice to the forefront of this track, that kind of explains it all really. Let’s get emotional.l.l.l Terry!!!!

Pulp – Spike Island

Talking of Britpop, this a welcome return from some veterans of the era. Pulp have reformed and are set to release their first new album in 24 years and there is something that feels rather good about this one. It could be that the vast majority of nineties indie band resurrections rarely bring anything to enhance their legacy, more often merely adding fuel to the detractors argument that Britpop was a musically backward looking, conservative misstep. But for all that I can see their point, that is not how I remember it thirty years ago. I was rather swept up in the waves of optimism splashing in from the likes of Blur, Supergrass and the Charlatans. That unfiltered ambition Oasis spouted I got right behind, I wanted all that bland generic boyband shit shoulder barged out of the pop charts by acts writing great pop songs. I remember a time when the radio was reliably peppered with a drip feed of memorable tunes; I am inclined to think Pulp have revived just that on ‘Spike Island’. This is a song on regular radio rotation right now and every play grows on me a little more, just as a killer pop song should. It makes me feel Britpop is ripe for a reassessment, if people think its legacy is merely laying a platform for a band like Coldplay to exist then think again, the industry built the Coldplay monstrosity, Britpop’s incubation was from a far more musically inspired place as we are brilliantly reminded here with Pulp

The Pale White – Final Exit

The Pale White are set to release their ‘The Big Sad’ album, a record that the band themselves say looked like it might not come out for a time. We should be gratified they did find a way to set sail on this ship. Their sound may be out of step with that of a new rock band in 2025 but the feeling of being outsiders they project, something which is heavily emphasized in both this song and video, is offset by some wonderfully inviting and invigorating music. They are not quite a repro of the past even though those late sixties reference points are audible, neither are they a one dimensional rockist assault despite a tendency to grab hold of you and wrestle your senses to the floor until they submit to The Pale White energy. There’s something happening here…

Ty Segall – Another California Song

An artist like Ty Segall makes the others all look like also-rans, especially in terms of his creative work ethic. He has yet another new album coming out on the 30th May called ‘Possession’ and is just about to complete a series of solo acoustic dates which have kept him occupied for most of the past three months, but he won’t be out of view for long as from 5th July he’s off on a full electric band tour that will take care of the largest chunk of the summer. As can be heard here, even when he’s playing with just an acoustic guitar, there is still a kind of liquid energy pumping through every second of his playing and he continues to knock out good songs too. Could he be a little too prolific perhaps? I am as guilty as anyone of paying less attention to an artist who is always producing over one making a rarer, occasional appearance. But ignore Ty Segall and it’s you, the listener, who misses out. You have been warned…

Villagers – I Want What I Don’t Need

Taken from the most recent Villagers album ‘That Golden Time’ which has been out for a while but is being toured right now and well worth investigating by anyone with an ear for acoustic singer-songwriting played by a genuine craftsman. Villagers are the performing name for Conor O’Brien who has been playing under this banner, following the break up of his first band The Immediate, for fifteen years now. In that time he has deservedly won acclaim for the economical poetic flare in his lyric writing in addition to the delicate, refined touch and tone of his guitar playing. Both are on full display here in a song that is a potent reflection on the impulses that drive an individual to passionately achieve the gratification of desires that will ultimately be rendered meaningless whilst acknowledging he will go after them all the same. This is song composing as a very real art form.

Ringo Starr – Look Up

We will end this return edition of Fresh Juice with one more welcome return to the saddle from a much loved pop cowboy with the title track from his latest record. Obviously I have a massive Beatles bias which runs through all my music writing but I have never really had the blinkers on, especially where the solo albums of Ringo are concerned. But this one, with the production muscle and co-writing chops of T-Bone Burnette in its arsenal as well as a cast of top drawer country and bluegrass names like Billy Strings, Molly Tuttle and Alison Krauss among the credits, is credibly being hailed as Ringo’s best ever solo album. Even on the gushing vinyl liner notes written by Elvis Costello, the suggestion is put forth that the ‘Look Up’ album is the natural follow up to ‘Beatles For Sale’. Well that particular claim might not stick but this is as strong a selection of songs that Ringo has ever sung as a solo artist and how great is it that we can still hear a Beatle in this fine a voice in 2025? Did the Beatles era every really end? This one argues persuasively the magic is still alive in ’25….

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