Browsing Tag

Blossoms

archie razed the airwaves with his latest augmented with attitude and style alt-indie hit, Mayalyn

Posted on 20 November 2023

With a voice which resonates with over 155k monthly listeners on Spotify and the confidence to create under the mononym archie, knowing that the name will become synonymous with his anthemic new wave indie aesthetic, it is no surprise to see that the 19-year-old singer-songwriter has hit razed the airwaves with his latest augmented with attitude and style single, Mayalyn.

With a vice-like grip which hits all the provocative and evocative marks, the track that starts with a saturated in delay jangly indie pop instrumental arrangement beneath his raspy croons, reminiscent of the 1975, evolves into a fiery feat of overdriven and modernised rock. With a seemingly infinite sequence of twists and turns, every progression is a revelation with Mayalyn. A revelation which paints its orchestrator as one of the most essential artists in 2023.

The classically trained Scottish singer-songwriter may only be getting started but he’s already giving every other up-and-coming act tips on how to raise the bar with lyrical ingenuity, which goes hand in virtuosic hand with his ear for a melody that will consume you when brought to life with his impassioned intensity.

Mayalyn was officially released on September 22; stream it on Spotify.

Review by Amelia Vandergast

Connor Fyfe has released the stickiest earworm of the year with his new wave indie track, Cars

Posted on 17 November 2023
https://on.soundcloud.com/A1cfi

After becoming the youngest act to sell out Kings Tut in Glasgow and perform at TRNSMT, the 17-year-old Connor Fyfe is already in the habit of making history with his songwriting chops that are as sharp as they are sticky-sweet. His latest single, Cars, gives plenty of clues to how his ascent has been an unfaltering upward trajectory since leaving school in May.

With a bigger-than-Blossoms synth-drenched sound that borrows from the new wave synth pop genre while ticking all the right indie rock boxes, the momentum within Cars is momentous, but the adolescent prodigy knew just when to inject a sense of fragility and vulnerability into his vocal lines to ensure it’s a track that sucker punches the emotional and rhythmic pulses simultaneously.

Co-written with the legendary Ross McNae of Twin Atlantic, Cars pulsates with commercial appeal; each intricately clever chord progression embeds the earworm even deeper while the soulful synergy between the impassioned vocal lines and synthy indie rock synthesis ensures it will deliver endless euphoria.

With the promise that there are plenty more tracks in the pipeline, don’t be surprised if Connor Fyfe is one of the biggest Scottish artists since Lewis Capaldi.

Cars will officially be released on November 17th; stream it on SoundCloud.

Review by Amelia Vandergast

Wynona Bleach deliver distortedly euphoric feel-good Alt-Pop with ‘Glimmer’

Posted on 25 November 2020

Hailing from Belfast, Northern Ireland, Wynona Bleach have, under a previous title (R51), already had the kind of impact alt-rock bands dream of, releasing two critically acclaimed EPs and playing the BBC Introducing stage at Reading and Leeds, supporting Feeder and Alice In Chains, performing on the BBC’s Introducing anniversary show at Belfast’s Ulster Hall, and embarking on a 12-date headline Russian tour before adopting their new moniker and decamping to an abandoned warehouse in central Portugal to record their debut album under the production oversight of The Coral’s Bill Ryder-Jones.

Lead single ‘Glimmer’ is a gorgeous sliver of distorted feel-good alt-pop, all searing-yet-bouncy guitar and thumping bass ‘n’ drums stunningly capped by Melyssa Shannon’s killer vocal take. There’s a touch of the Hayley Williams there, for sure, along with some Smashing Pumpkins, a smattering of Wolf Alice or the Yeah, Yeah, Yeahs, and maybe even the poppy harmonies of Haim in places, with a definite blast of old school swirling, swooping indie like Garbage, Curve or Swervedriver added into the melting pot for an extra measure of cool.

Shannon’s delivery is delicious, alternately fragile and raucous, merging effortlessly with guitarist Jonny Woods’ backing vocals, poppy and dreamy on the verses before the belter of a stadium-anthem chorus kicks ass with its gang-vocal shoutiness, the twin-pronged guitar of Woods and Aaron Black delivering both a crunching, overdriven power-chord belter and an insanely catchy single-note melody over the crashing tightness of Carl Gilmore and Matty Killen’s rhythm section.

Wynona Bleach’s debut album ‘Moonsoake’ is released next month, and available to pre-order now; the self-filmed video for ‘Glimmer’ can be viewed from Wynona Bleach’s website, or via Facebook.

Review by Alex Holmes