Every Wednesday, the ugly hug shares a playlist personally curated by an artist/band that we have been enjoying. This week we have a collection of songs put together by Philly-based composer, multi-instrumentalist, producer and Founder of Dear Life Records, Michael Cormier-O’Leary.
Along with contributions to beloved projects such as Friendship and 2nd Grade, Michael also leads the remarkable chamber folk ensemble, Hour. Following the critically acclaimed release of Ease the Work, Hour recently announced the arrival of Subminiature, a live tour document curating two years of DIY show performances and offering a culmination of the project’s seven years of dynamic work.
The first snippet shared from Subminiature is lead single, “At the Bar Where You Literally Saved Me from Fatal Heartbreak (Live at Philamoca, Philadelphia, PA, 4/12/24”, accompanied by a live concert video directed by Matt Ober. Watch below.
Michael put together a playlist of some of his favorite film music, a lot of which has inspired Hour in many ways. Listen below!
Hour is made up of many familiar faces from the Philly scene and beyond, with Subminiature featuring players such as Jacob Augustine, Jason Calhoun, Em Downing, Matt Fox, Peter Gill, Lucas Knapp, Evan McGonagill, Peter McLaughlin, Keith J. Nelson, Erika Nininger, Abi Reimold, Adelyn Strei
Set to be released on Valentine’s Day of this year, Hour will celebrate Subminiature with an extensive month-long tour across the U.S. You can preorder Subminiature now, including a limited edition cassette and CD run by Dear Life Records.
Written by Shea Roney | Photo by Michael Cormier-O’Leary
Built upon a vivid display of collaboration and curiosity, Amigos Imaginarios is an experimental duo composed of Arbol Ruiz (Paris via Columbia) and Caleb Chase (Worcester, MA), whose blend of stylized structures, pressurized electronics and sweet flavored twee had offered quite the impression on their first two records, Pick Flowers (2021) and El Jardin Encantado (2022), both released via Bud Tapes. Now Amigos Imaginarios announce their forthcoming LP titled Ice Cream, and to celebrate have shared the first single from the cycle called “Voy corriendo”.
In just 90 seconds, “Voy corriendo” is both a subtle and sweet affair amongst the electronic tinkerings and unruffled harmonies that Ruiz and Chase use to create a green patch of charm and sustainability within its bizarre, and almost dilapidated presence. With a title that roughly translates to “I’m running” or “I’m on my way”, “Voy corriendo” flows with this whimsy of wonder, remaining both playful yet poignant in its short, and oddly charming life – like a beloved children’s toy at the end of its battery life, whose charisma is wearing down despite remaining true to its colorful demeanor and purposeful responsibility for play.
Ice Cream marks the first Amigos Imaginarios project that was made in person, having been a fully collaborative project only through email up to this point.
Along with the single, Amigos Imaginarios also shared a music video featuring a 2000% saturated video with a collection of adorable dog clipart. Watch “Voy corriendo” here!
Ice Cream will be released January 10th via up and coming Brooklyn tape label, TV-14 Recordings. You can preorder a cassette now. Check out the rest of TV-14’s catalog here.
Today, Brooklyn-based singer-songwriter Avery Friedman shares her long awaited debut single, “Flowers Fell”. Having frequented bills with artists such as Sister. and Dead Gowns for the past year, Friedman has consistently left an impression on those that have caught her sets, oftentimes performing solo, creating a space in which her vivid imagery and tender melodies greet new ears with welcome and understanding. Produced by James Chrisman (Sister.) and with contributions from Felix Walworth (Told Slant, Florist), “Flowers Fell” plays to the in-between moments as Friedman defines new beginnings.
Photo by Mamie Heldman
“Flowers Fell” begins in a reverberated haze, rearing guitars and diluted vocals hold their breath, awaiting that very first line that Friedman drives out— “The flowers fell off when I was asleep / But it’s okay ’cause now its all green” — blindsided, but not disappointed. Soon the chorus becomes definite, Friedman’s vocals wield both strength and tenderness as the melody leads with its whole chest and instrumentation follows in a potent groove. “How long can you mourn for something that was always supposed to blossom into something stronger?” Friedman asks in a statement — a combination of both grief and vitality. As the song begins to close out, the ghosts of distortion and the swarming of sonic fixations underneath begin to blend, holding the surrounding static accountable as a full picture begins to clear up.
“Flowers Fell” is accompanied by a music video, directed, filmed, VFX, and handwritten lyrical text by Nara Avakian. Watch it here.
You can stream “Flowers Fell” on all platforms now.
“The first two years that we were performing,” Beckerman recalls, “the nerves were pretty unmanageable before every single performance because I had the worst stage fright,” a level of exhaustion still remnant in the corners of these memories as she speaks. “But I feel like I’m finally getting to the point where I’m not getting butterflies just from waking up that whole week before I perform — I’ve grown a lot, thank goodness.”
Daneshevskaya is the project of Brooklyn-based artist, Anna Beckerman, whose namesake derives from her own middle name, one in which she shares with her great-grandmother. Having since released her debut album, Long Is The Tunnel late last year via New York label Winspear, an album in which presence and perspective become intertwined within her own story, Beckerman’s writing has always been one to cherish self-discovery. As she continues in her career, “the more I write lyrics, the more I get closer to what I’m really trying to say,” she conveys, speaking towards her practice. “I don’t know what it is I’m trying to say, but I think I’m getting closer.”
Today, Daneshevskaya returns with “Scrooge”, the first bit of new music since Long Is The Tunnel and a revitalization of an earlier song she recorded and released under the project name back in 2018. Fractured by the cruelty of romantics, Beckerman and collaborators set a benchmark for retainment, where stillness isn’t an option as melodies coincide and collapse, strings gasp at the vivid imagery at hand and playful keys tiptoe around as if not to disturb the surface. Although the lyrics have not seen any changes – the emotion still fervent and raw – “Scrooge” becomes a moment of admiration for what was left untouched, while still recognizing how far she has come since.
The ugly hug recently sat down with Beckerman to discuss “Scrooge”, looking past the “cringe” of earlier works, and what she has learned from an openly collaborative career.
Photo by Madeline Leshner
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
Shea Roney: I can’t believe it has already been a year since Long Is The Tunnel was released. Are you still riding the high from the attention that album received?
Anna Beckerman: I get so much anxiety from releasing and promoting music that I feel like it took me a while after it was released to be like, ‘oh, wait, I’m proud of that! I’m excited, and I’m proud.’ It’s so crazy to make music and then see people I don’t know posting stuff about it and telling other people to listen to it – so it took me some time to get over myself and enjoy what I had made.
SR: You have a new single called “Scrooge”, which is actually a newly recorded version of an older song released a handful of years ago. What made you want to return to this song now?
AB: Yes, it was released back in 2018. We had worked on the song and I think we submitted to maybe a hundred SubmitHubs or whatever, and got like a hundred rejections. We always really liked it though, I remember being really proud of it. We all saw that we had this opportunity to re-record the parts of it that always bothered us and give it another go and see if it would reach more people, especially now that we have more support releasing it. Going into it, we knew we wouldn’t record it that same way now, where it had been done kind of chopped up and with different people, so it was nice to get to make it in the way that felt right, and work with the people who I wanna work with.
SR: Although it is a fairly older song, do you feel like it still resonates with you on that same level?
AB: I feel like my whole life has been making stuff and then looking back on it a few years later and thinking, ‘I can’t believe I ever thought that was cool’ [laughs]. I can’t imagine having as much access to showing people things as kids have now. I was making the stupidest, most indulgent, disconnected and self absorbed stuff, but showing it to no one because there was nothing to do with it. Oh, God, the YouTube videos I would have to look back on if I had had that kind of access back then. But that being said, it was convenient that it was the first thing I ever made and somehow I don’t look back on it and think that I would never make this now. I probably would make something like that still, or even, maybe I’ll never make something like that again, because it was something I did, and now it’s done. But I still have a lot of respect for it, and the lyrics don’t make me cringe, which is a true test.
SR: I fully believe you need those cringy moments though. Little testaments to keep yourself in check.
AB: Oh, yeah, you gotta remind yourself [laughs]. I also took a bunch of poetry classes in college, and I feel like the whole point of those workshops is to just make cringy stuff. Sometimes I do go back and read what I wrote when I was a freshman in college, and I just think, ‘…oh.’
Photo by Madeline Leshner
SR: You have always written with such vivid imagery, but this song feels unique, in that it deals with varying moments of proximity and presence. You build this focus from a very intimate lens that feels very hands on, yet you manage to create this growing distance between yourself and “Scrooge”. Was this a challenging feat when writing, and why did you want to tell the story this way?
AB: I think in general, when I listen to music, I really like lyrics that are kind of familiar, but also feel strange. When writing this song, I was just really sad [laughs], so when I have a loss or something leaves my life, I feel like I have a rush to write things down so that I remember. A lot of the first EP, Bury Your Horses, I was dealing with how weird it is to know someone and then not know them anymore, and how that is such a bizarre feeling, even more so than feeling something sad or melancholy – I just feel like it’s so weird. I don’t know, my brain just couldn’t really wrap around it, so I feel like the lyrics are a way for me to put it all out there and just be okay that it’s weird.
SR: The character himself, Ebenezer Scrooge, is textbook villain, but is also a very dynamic character. What was the inspiration of choosing him as a placeholder for someone you knew personally?
AB: Part of it was that it fit into the amount of syllables that I needed [laughs]. I wish that there was a more interesting explanation, but I just thought of the first thing that comes to mind when I think of a villain, or someone who’s just clearly a bad guy, even though I was kind of aware while I was in it that this person isn’t actually bad, even though I was so upset and hurt – it almost felt fake.
SR: EB-EN-EZ-ER.
AB: Yeah, it has more syllables than most other villains. What’s that one? Thanos? That’s not good. And it was interesting, because the chorus of the song I had written before my breakup was about being with someone, and then seeing them from a different lens and then feeling that distance from them. And then we broke up, and I was like, ‘no, this still applies [laughs], it still works. I still feel what I said.’
SR: Did you find yourself grappling with the honesty of persevering those feelings that this relationship brought out while writing this song?
AB: I always struggle with being scared that my lyrics will be too specific and they’ll end up seeming precious or something. But I also don’t want things to be so vague that they don’t resonate with people because they’re not specific enough. I was also really angry when I wrote this song and the song itself obviously isn’t – it’s very ‘La la’ indie folk, so it doesn’t come across super angry. But I always loved the Elliott Smith songs where he’s really angry but it’s kind of a cute song, and it takes a few listens to be like, ‘oh, you’re really pissed right now.’ It’s like a little bit of that, and also just thinking that if this person hears this song, maybe only they’ll know that I’m angry. Everyone else might think it’s a cutesy song, but the person who I wrote it about will know that I’m angry. In that way I was trying to be honest.
SR: Your work up to this point has been a very communal effort, bringing in a lot of friends to help contribute and create this rather spiritual effect in your music. What kinds of things have you learned from your collaborators that you hold dear to your heart as you go on?
AB: First of all, nothing I’ve ever done in music I could have done without the amazing musicians all around me who can do everything. I’m very aware of how lucky I am to have people I get to make music with, and who genuinely want to be doing it. I think that’s the only thing that has kept me in music for so long now. That being said, the best thing you can get from someone giving you feedback is not always the feedback, but the way that they look at music as what sticks with you. The next time you make music, you’ll have a little voice in your head of one person saying ‘maybe you could try a different voicing’, and then there’s another person saying, ‘do you need that many words?’ All of those voices are me, but they’re also a product of the people that I have worked with through the years.
Watch the music video for “Scrooge”, directed by Madeline Leshner, here.
“Scrooge” was made with the help of co-collaborators Madeline Leshner, Artur Szerejko and produced by Marcus Paquin (The Weather Station, The National, Julia Jacklin). You can now stream it on all platforms.
Daneshevskaya will be headlining Brooklyn’s Baby’s All Right on Friday, December 13th. Get tickets here.
Earlier this year, the Philadelphia instrumental ensemble Hour released their latest album, Ease the Work, a collection that soars with dynamism and passion, striking both communal and critical acclaim across the board. Made up of ten multi-instrumentalist who perform and record live, Hour is composed and produced by leader Michael Cormier-O’Leary (Friendship, 2nd Grade, Dear Life Records). Today, the group returns with two new songs “Saturday After Payday” and “Absence is a Heady Spice”.
Photo by Michael Cormier-O’Leary
These two songs were recorded as part of the Ease the Work recording session at the Greenwood Playhouse on Peaks Island, off the coast of Portland, Maine, in which the group had to take a ferry to get to with an entire studios worth of equipment. The songs were ultimately left off of the album, yet remained a solid pairing to be released at a separate time.
Playing with a tempered progression, “Saturday After Payday” begins with a steady piano, undeterred with its direction as a string quartet and an electric bass add a firm, yet suave voicing. The track was recorded live by an eight piece iteration, and is “indebted to the work of some classic French pop arrangers, most notedly Jean-Claude Vannier.”
Like the old family heirloom pianos, “Absence is a Heady Spice” holds weight within the simplicity and unevenness, each note played is met by a release – the tension of the sticky keys relieving pressure from the years of use on the piano’s inner workings. “Being the only solo piano piece in a collection of compositions for large ensemble,” Cormier-O’Leary says, “I thought it was funny to name the piece “Absence is a Heady Spice”. Like, ‘where’d the band go?’”
“Saturday After Payday” and “Absence is a Heady Spice” are now available to stream on all platforms. Purchase the two songs here.
Hour is made up of Jason Calhoun (synth), Michael Cormier-O’Leary (guitar, percussion), Em Downing (violin), Matt Fox (viola), Elisabeth Fuchsia (violin), Peter Gill (bass), Lucas Knapp (radio effects, field recordings, piano), Evan McGonagill (cello), Peter McLaughlin (drums), Keith J. Nelson (bass clarinet, clarinet), Erika Nininger (piano, rhodes) and Abi Reimold (electric guitar).
Having since moved out of Chicago earlier this year, a place in which the beloved and defined community was considered home for quite some time, Elijah Berlow has recently set off to write the next chapter in his life. Today, the now Vermont-based songsmith and multi-instrumentalist returns with his newest single, “Harvest Fields”, the first release since his 2022 EP, Put Out Fires. With a rich and thorough musical upbringing, learning the traditions of Americana music and literature, Berlow’s music is reflective of his life’s journey, both acknowledging the stories of how far he has come, and not forgetting where he has left to go.
With rolling instrumentation, “Harvest Fields” plays from the roots of a feel-good folk groove, both sincere and eager, as guitars swirl with heart and melody, a piano voices its gratification and percussion leads with full hearted faith to the unknown ahead. Following an ecstatic guitar solo, Berlow sings with gracious deliverance, “And we scraped up our knees / And we ran us around / Said that nothing can get better / Unless it can be found” – full of bewilderment and study, the understanding of both time and maturation as life continues on. Soon, Berlow and co. round the corner, elated trumpets soar before dropping out, the melody of a guitar, sparingly and lone, plays to the open sky – cherishing the newfound clarity that Berlow has to offer.
About the song, Berlow shares, “this song encapsulates the effort of betterment, the bereavement of not being witnessed within ones full capacity, steeped in naturalistic metaphor yet also a dialogue between a course of action, wild yearning and one’s own obscure place within the repeated seasonal cycles.”
“Harvest Fields” is accompanied by a music video shot and edited by Esteban Alarcon. Watch here.
Growing up in Eau Claire, WI, Adelyn Strei is a songwriter and multi-instrumentalist, who has spent the last decade expanding and defining her rich and improvisational type of folk music, mainly through arranging and performing her friend’s music and releasing under her previous moniker, Adelyn Rose. Now based in Brooklyn, Strei is preparing to release her new record, Original Spring, set to be released November 15. Today, she shares the third and final single before the release, “Clouds In Your Eyes”.
Bare, yet empathetic, “Clouds In Your Eyes” builds upon the opportunity of open spaces. As tinged guitar strings rattle and a sullen piano begins to find its voice, step-by-step, new textures form underneath Strei’s footing as they play out with gradual depth. “To know her was to love her / To love her was the natural way”, she sings, candid and clear, holding on to every word with thoughtful phrasing and cherished presence. Carefully, amongst ghostly echoes, tempered effects and a flurry of woodwinds, vivid and unique – like the song’s natural plumage – she repeats, “Sun in the shadows and / Clouds in your eyes / You say to let it”, gradually fading into that same open space where it began.
About the single, Strei shares, “Clouds In Your Eyes’ completes the 48 minute arc of the album. The guitar and drums together have a determined resolve, carrying lyrics about loss, but the kind of loss that feels like wonder and gratitude,” she continues, “[it’s] very much a feet on the ground/eyes on the sky kind of song.”
Today, Adelyn Strei shares a music video for “Clouds In Your Eyes”. Watch it here.
Original Spring is set to be released this Friday, November 15th via Brooklyn’s Mtn. Laurel Recording Co. and produced by Dex Wolfe. You can pre-save Original Springhere.
Emerging from mystical excursions of remote stature and excavated from the depths of cherished indie-rock sounds and a determined DIY spirit, Perth, Australia’s new project, Away, Wretched Beast!, shares their debut single, “Juno The First” along with b-side “Miracle Moon” as the precursor of the artistic lore that follows in its path. Built around the one-man project of JV Krauss, Away, Wretched Beast! is also set to release their debut full length, The Great Telescope and Other Stories, December 13th via Brooklyn’s new tape label, TV-14 Recordings.
Battered but faithful, “Juno The First” finds Krauss grifting amongst the melodramatic folk offerings, famous from Elephant 6 projects of past – fresh and still alive – filling the space with rough and warm guitar layers, ghostly church bells and the weight of a dark mellotron that roots itself into the earth. “These four years have been nothing but trouble,” Krauss sings over a swaying progression. But with the crack of a snare, the signal we were waiting for, “Juno The First” erupts into a dance – a tender devotion of escape – as we are caught between a crushing world and what may lie beyond if we just take that first step.
You can listen to “Juno The First” and “Miracle Moon” here.
Hailing from Wiltshire, England, Tom Brown is known for projects such as Teenage Tom Petties and Rural France, proving himself to be a highly effective and cherished voice in the world of underground pop. Today, Brown shares “Dunno”, the debut single from his latest creative endeavor, Lone Striker. Five years in the making, Brown has set the jangle-pop aside as Lone Striker embraces the warmth of wobbly homemade loops, found sounds and moody, wistful arrangements, while still having his well-crafted melodies continue to be a testament to his artistry at hand.
First a drum fill, a sort of laissez faire jumpstart into this dirty, melancholic groove, “Dunno” finds its footing within a clanky backbeat and a curtain of weathered horns, offering an off-kiltered, yet reassuring presence to get lost in. Although Lone Striker finds Brown working mostly alone, “Dunno” also includes the work of Billy Fuller (BEAK>) on bass. Swirling with disillusionment, questions asked and questions left unanswered, Brown sings with a tender clarity, “And I can’t think about tomorrow if the past is gonna be so cruel” – the subtlety in the chromatic digression helping him find his footing as he keeps moving forward. As “Dunno” begins to fade, the layered textures of modulated synths, simple rhythmic movements and those same weathered horns continuing on, Brown has already laid the groundwork for a triumphant rebranding to an already beloved career.
Last month, Devils Cross Country announced their first full length album and shared the fiercely catchy single “San Miguel”, titled after the beloved Filipino beer. The Cincinnati based band nails the divine grit of Midwest post-punk so well you’d never believe the project began in the pristine realms of Zoom mid pandemic, with frenzied hours of Google Drive demo exchanges between initial members Patrick Raneses and James Kennedy Lee. In the last few years, Devils Cross Country graduated the confines of virtual meeting rooms and is now a live constituent in the Cincinnati scene, featuring Spencer Morgan on drums, Connor Lowry on bass, and several rotating collaborators on strings, synths, and stretched samples. Today, they’re back with the second single off Possession is Ninetenths, out via Candlepin on December 7th.
“That person takes again, you let them take again — repetition, a musical act, as an offering. Romantic stuff, weirdly,” Patrick Raneses explains of “Second Sin”, a hazy, slacker rock track that bulldozes notions about ownership. The song explores a relationship with a thief, unfolding a narrative where the act of stealing a possession back and forth yields more fulfillment than possessing it in the first place. Perhaps a commentary on materialism, perhaps an unconventional love song, it’s a maverick of a track both lyrically and sonically.
While its initial melodies have softer edges than the jagged, guitar heavy moments of “San Miguel”, “Second Sin” is sneakily energetic, kindled by surging drum sequences and dense bass lines. Layers of creaky synths, swirling guitars, and warped vocals follow a recipe of twinkling distortion that evokes contemporary Pennsylvania shoegaze, but at its core the track is shaped by local influence, with a grisly sense of Cincinnati post-punk rawness welded into each note.
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