Our New Music Playlist features new releases from local bands, plus selected tracks from some of the touring bands coming to the Calder Valley this year.
Claudia Fenoglio – Julia
Julia is the first release since Fenoglio’s debut EP in 2023 and emerges as a late-night confession of heartbreak, temptation and the struggle to let go, with influences such as The Japanese House, Etta Marcus and Samia.
The song opens with a gentle melody that sets a reflective tone. It reminds you of driving late at night on the motorway, with each street light flashing by on every beat. Fenoglio’s vocals are emotive and clear, furthering a sense of longing and introspection – something that Claudia “hopes people can relate to.”
Claudia tells us the track was “written about wanting someone or something you know you shouldn’t. It’s about romanticising a bad situation that isn’t good for you, but going about it anyway. I’ve been through this and it sucks, so I hope it’s something people can relate to.”
The lyrics tell a poignant story, painting vivid images that resonate with the listener. The arrangement is minimalistic, allowing the emotional weight of the lyrics and melody to take centre stage. As the song progresses, subtle accompaniments add depth without overshadowing the core elements. Overall, Julia is a beautifully crafted piece that showcases Fenoglio’s songwriting and vocal abilities, and would be perfect for listeners of The Japanese House, Soccer Mommy and Ryan Beatty.
Review of ‘Julia’ by Niamh Robinson
Lands & Body – Dark Mild EP
Andy Abbott, one half of Lands & Body, is well known across the northern alternative music scene and, in fact, the international DIY gigging network. Now living in the Calder Valley, he regularly puts on gigs in the region under the moniker ADRA Promotions. And as ADRA or Andrew DR Abbott, he has a number of excellent solo releases under his belt, not least last year’s Music For Psychiatric Wards And Fluid Structures.
Alongside all that, he and drummer James Islip have been crafting riotous nuggets of noise together for over 20 years, previously as That Fucking Tank, now as Lands & Body. This is the first release in their latest guise. Their sound may have simmered down somewhat with the passing of years but it remains strikingly in sync with their original ethos – underground energy, crunchy rock rhythms and fluid jazzy/jam feels.
Recorded by Mark Simms at Electron Studios in Sunderland, the three tracks that make up the Dark Mild EP are electrified versions of songs off Andy’s 2020 acoustic album Erewyrehve, “a concept album reimagining Bradford as a post-capitalist utopia”.
Despite its West Yorkshire theme, there appears to be a distinctly transatlantic vibe here. Perhaps it’s the crackling guitar noodlings and their likeness to Jim O’Rourke or early William Tyler. Such looping melodic patterns form a kind of twisted Americana spliced with desert rock blues. The set-up is reminiscent of San Fran’s boozy-blues-rock stalwarts Two Gallants. Although there’s also a reference point closer to home in South Yorkshireman, Bobby Lee, and his swampy folk-psych.
Opening track Theme From Erewyrehve boasts a drone-ish underbelly beneath slabs and stabs of gently prickly guitar, while Homeward Unbound ups the tempo and rattles along with thrust and abandon, stirring in some vaguely Celtic folk-roots ingredients as it goes.
The closer, Red Sky Over Erewyrehve, is more cinematic, elongated, not just in its actual length (clocking in at 7’45”) but in its desire to stretch the ambient horizon into more epic, spacious, inviting realms. There are nods here to the psych-rock of Ghost Power and Boston band, Sunburned Hand Of The Man, the jazz-lite of certain Psychic Temple collaborations and even the cosmic pickings of Andrew Tuttle or Yuzo Iwata.
It’s got DIY energy, for sure. Frayed edges and free-hand sketches. But take a closer look and you soon realise not many could actually do this themselves. It’s accomplished and considered – and a natural, organic evolution of the duo’s sound from those post-millennial early days of TFT.
Warm Parts – Special Square EP
Special Square, the debut EP from Warm Parts, hits your ears on April 23rd. Ahead of its full release, the synth-driven, post-rock, kominische dreamers from Todmorden have dropped the opening track, Mangle. It’s a kaleidoscope of krautrock escapism that blends the purposeful momentum of a good old-fashioned motorik anthem with the minimal, melodic wooziness of Slowdive. The track is defined by its swirling dervish of guitars and lifted by some outlandish theremin-styled hypnotism.
A salvo of might, Mangle sets the tone, with Warm Parts’ repertoire on full display. The rest of the EP pulls out particular skills. Light showcases the band’s guitar-jam tendencies, while Square is built on rhythm and Aeroplane points to a more futuristic pulse with the synth appearing high in the mix.
This will all feel reassuringly familiar to lovers of 90s shoegaze – Ride, MBV, Chapterhouse and all. They also share plenty of common ground with more modern outfits like Déjà Vega, Miami Deutsch, Beak and The Ludic Dream.
Warm Parts – Rachael Elwell (synths, theremin), Dan Smith (guitar) and Bryn Hand (drums) – entered the public domain last year, playing a bunch of well-received support slots at local haunts The Golden Lion and The Puzzle, among others.
Follow the band and keep an eye out for more gigs in 2025. Meanwhile, devour the EP!
Jumble Hole Clough – Up The Wooden Hills To Heckmondwike
No sooner had the proverbial ink dried on our review of Jumble Hole Clough’s last release, the chaotic jazz-pop-punk of Potpourri or Popery?, when he unleashed another genre-dodging beast of an album into the world.
This time, the restless spirit otherwise known as Colin Robinson has served up something a little different. Up The Wooden Hills To Heckmondwike comes in four monstrous parts, each an epic in its own right, swerving through all manner of emotive head-spinning tricks and thrills.
As before, there are plenty of psychedelic micro-trips and it is awash with electro experimentation. The usual influences remain too, everything from Ween to Tom Waits and back again, but they’re given more space in which to play.
The many narratives – dark fantasy, dream vision, nursery rhyme, futuristic, rural – build and concede gradually and more freely than before. This allows for plenty of detailed touches, both digital and analogue, and it’s when the two combine that JHC comes in to his own, compressing familiar worlds into something quite new.
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