Danny Barwick has been on my radar for a hot minute. One quarter of his 2017 Distance EP was a song called ‘Flickering’, good enough that I included it in my 2017 Unearthed Staff Picks and juiced it for months afterwards. It had all the elements that I’ve come to understand as part of Danny Barwick’s brilliance. Fizzing synths, his (sorta) deep voice and most notably, perfect piano lines. Every song is built around a gorgeous key section in such a way that I’m a whole bunch of certain that his writing process surely starts with just mister Barwick at a piano. Don’t misunderstand me here, Danny’s records might have some beautiful elements but so often they’re just outright sinister. The production on this newest single ‘Milkolka’ is more threatening than that letter from Allianz I received when I forgot to finalize a third part insurance claim, strings demented and mishapen, synths stabbing wildly like prison shanks in the dark. Seriously though, you gotta make sure you submit the claim or else you will get a sinister letter with the heading ‘Intention To Sue’.

‘Milkolka’ is the first taste from his next EP releasing by the name ‘Tigers’ which I expect we’ll get to hear in 2019.

So I’ll tell you what my mum has been telling me for at least two decades: You need to pay more attention to HAIRCARE. I’m gonna edge out on a limb here and suggest that you probably haven’t listened to this band before today and if you have, well colour me impressed and proud. Today they received the Sound Doc seal of approval which industry estimates have valued at anywhere between 6-11 Spotify streams. This is only single two for HAIRCARE so we’re not kilometers deep into a storied career.

I was put across this Perth four piece yesterday morning having been told that they’d made fans out of some of Perth’s musical top tier and I’ve not stopped listening to their newest single since. ‘Blinding Cordoned States’ is full of lo-fi synths, tender guitar parts and a vocal from old mate that hits you with all the urgency of The Walkmen. The chorus pops like an overinflated balloon and I quite simply haven’t been able to sit down since the first time I heard it. This is actually really bad and I urgently need someone to send help, my legs are be fixed in a literal state of living rigor mortis. You’re not hearing me, please stop reading this and send a doctor I’m in an incredible amount of pain.

 
Harrison Rae lives in Sydney having moved here from Boambee (up near Coffs way) and as a special dowry gift to the city of Sydney he bears this moody dee n bee signalling ambiater. It pans across your dome in its quiter moments, slices with percussive scissors and then merges the two together artfully. From how I understand it, the move to Sydney has guided his music into more frenetic realms just as he’ll do for your good self if you’d kindly hit play below.

It’s released through his own label Club Moss, launched just this very year but if you’d like more, he has a slightly less angular seven tracker in the form of Vitamin B.

When I’m told that I have to listen to a certain track through headphones I pointed avoid listening to that thing on any sort of phones, head or otherwise. In fact the last time someone demanded my earphone experience I actually forced the band to immediately dissolve so if you were into At The Drive In, I’m really sorry. And so, I’m not going to say it here because I don’t presume to direct my mostly-masters-and-doctorate-holding-readership about their listening medium but you know I’m thinking it now. Surely you have to know that.

Sometimes it’s easy to grow accustomed to some of the talents in your own backyard and I think Anatole suffers for that. In this buffet-style music market you can never stop discovering some sometimes the desire for the new can push you away from appreciating what you already know. And what I know is this- Anatole is remarkably gifted. If you can imagine a tallboy filled with about 85 different levels of drawers? In terms of electronic music, you’ll find Anatole right up in that top one. He’s a masterful, meticulous producer lacing organic bones with electronic sounds… or maybe it’s electronic bones with organic sounds? Listen closely.

Can’t make Too bold a statement about an at with only one song to their name but this feels like a band who have chosen their cognomen wisely. Whether it’s the optimistic warmth of a love interest or the overwhelming press of bodies in a crowd, im hearing all sorts of titular Ultracrush sounds whenever I hit go on this track of theirs ‘Swimming’. It is yes, the first track they’ve ever released. They’re a Sydney five piece out of Camperdown only one song in and I’m wholly in their corner. The song itself signposts some Newcastle lineage and reportedly they’re from Lake Mac and Central Coast, but that’s all besides the point. Hit play here and then Let’s Talk.

As someone with a pair of kids who just holidayed outside daylights savings time, I’ll tell you here and now, I’m no fan of a time change. Getting up pre-dawn each day? That blows and I recommend it to no one. The multiple time changes in this song though, well they’re just fine by me. This is a band who channel the heady nostalgia of Bored Nothing, the airy whimsy of Beach House, the groove of Radio Dept and fill them with small town specifics to make something genuinely moving. I even found myself looking up the Council Street fig trees because the lyrical energy drew me in real close and I couldn’t not know after that.

Bonus: here’s the vaporwave remix of the track you neither knew you needed nor had.

They’ve got an EP on the way but given I can’t find a date for it I reckon we’re looking at 2019. Well here’s this- Ultracrush are my favourite new Sydney band.