Hiatus Rewind (Part 2)

Bored In Pittsburgh recently returned from a bit of a break, and recapped some of the work that was submitted while we were away.

Part 2 of the recap will highlight music–released over the past few months–that was sourced from the depths of Pittsburgh Bandcamp. As always, there is so much great stuff coming out of the city that it is impossible to capture it all, but here goes:

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Bring Her – Comfort In the Shame

You can imagine this self-described sorrow-wave duo (whose latest album was released on Philly’s Knife Hits Records) creating their pummeling synth dirges while frowning, stock-still, in front of a giant Goya painting.

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vireo – moss longing

Quirky, chirruping folk music that splits the difference between acid-fried lab experiment and naturalistic campfire singalong.

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SUN TURRET – With Life Again

While some internet-y music purposely scrubs itself of all human personality, this 20-tracker renders emotions and experiences in bold color with the wide-eyed curiosity of a child wielding a Microsoft paintbrush.

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Bossy – Protect the Homies, Vol. 2

Bossy and his collaborators didn’t just dig through crates for this one, they tunneled; the result is a collection of sumptuous raps that eschew knocking drums in favor of faded, satiny texture.

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Bri Dominique – music for the kind hearted

This lo-fi sonic journal entry wanders across musical styles–breezy bossa nova, carousel ditties, string-assisted jazz–to chronicle a night of anxious isolation.

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Mila Moon – And I Wait

Haunted, insular recordings–wispy to the point where a gust of autumn wind could blow them away–interspersed with a few off-kilter rockers.

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The Universe Online – Angel High School

Blown-out cyborg ballads that mournfully stutter-step their way toward a gloriously ghoulish singularity.

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Tetsu Mineta – Early Scenes (unread #276)

Unread releases everything from kazoo freakouts to wallpapery drones to eccentric blues; the label’s latest is a series of guitar explorations from Japan’s Tetsu Mineta.

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MIRAKLER – Mirakler

Squealing, apocalyptic hardcore that conjures hellish visions out of weed smoke and pages ripped from sanitized American history books. The lyrics to “The Shootist” read like Cormac McCarthy gone metalhead.

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Andrew Muse – I Call My Jockstrap Jacques b/w Club Kid (Shake It!)

These two tracks gesture toward traditional forms of club and R&B music, then proceed to don alien antennae, flip those genres the bird, and twerk all over them.

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Sleeping Witch & Saturn – The Divine Madness of Spring

Don’t be lulled by the gleaming onyx sheen that coats the music (which spans soaring anthems and spooky lullabies alike); this album plunges you into a scuzzy, nocturnal underworld full of switchblades, ghosts, and fading dreams.

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Glam Hand – Shrink

A gentle, psychedelic reimagining of 70s-era garage music; the sticky melodies and jangly guitars are there, but they’ve been given a benzo and slipped, dazed, into a warm reverb bath.

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Mani Bahia – Inferno

An assured debut that spikes lush, bouncy production (handled largely by Bahia herself) with jazzy keyboard and bass accents. Bahia, voice layered in precise harmony, reflects on relationships both inter- and intrapersonal.

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Same – Does It Go Any Faster?

Same let it rip this time around, spending less time laboring over details and more time cranking the distortion and volume knobs; the resulting music is crunchier, woolier, and more urgent than ever.

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Trovants – I Hope Your Town Has Good Bands

You might find several of Trovants’ members slyly conjuring mischief with How things are made (more on them later) and Watererer; this half-hour, one-track release (recorded live and then dubbed over) sees them in cinematic mode, unfurling tectonic plates of guitar, synth, vocals, and trumpet that meander and loom like atmospheric beasts.

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TOBACCO – Skids and Angels

The Pittsburgh area’s resident garbage robot fractures his warped, dusty sound into intricate jitters; it’s like Boards of Canada overdosing on gas station energy drinks.

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Astrology Now – See God

Astrology Now takes flower-power signifiers–dreamy vocals, sighing harmonies, twisty riffs–and injects them with a healthy dose of fuzz.

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Cutting Ties – Dead Nerves

“You’re fuckin’ dead.” So begins Cutting Ties’ latest release, followed by a clamor that sounds like a sword being unsheathed and whacked against every available hard surface. The perfect lead-in for several songs’ worth of merciless, growling metalcore.

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Lem – Songs We Forgot

You might expect an album with tracks named after baseball players–Mantle, Wagner, Berra, Clemente–to contain jock jams or good ol’ boy drawls, but Songs We Forgot spiderwebs its way through phone-recorded fragments, fingerpicked guitar, and hushed mumbles.

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Thoth Trio – Thoth Speaks

The ibis-headed Thoth was the ancient Egyptian god of, among many other things, hieroglyphics. As the composer and bandleader of his avant-jazz trio, Ben Opie uses squalls of sax and clarinet to paint mystic symbols upon a canvas of drums and bass. Note: This album was recorded in 2007 and only released on Bandcamp this year.

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How things are made – spotted lantern fly in the mattress factory

Recorded, appropriately, live at the Mattress Factory and in the presence of a cursed lantern fly, this improvised work evokes a humid jungle teeming with trickling waterfalls and strange birds.

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Anne Eliza – I Wish You Well

Slow-burning, soulful piano pop adorned with subtle electronic flourishes, like Norah Jones meets The Postal Service.

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Landon Thomas – Won’t Stay Home

This five-song EP hearkens back to the R&B glory days of the mid-2000s, a time when you couldn’t turn on the radio without hearing a dapper, velvet-voiced romantic crooning his heart out across the airwaves.

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Echo Lightwave Unspeakable – Egress

This masked figure’s bent circuits are a bit less pitiless this time around; the atmosphere remains unsettling, but grainy melodic walls sneak their way into the mix, contributing to a bleary undercurrent of calm.

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saltlick – this is the last one, thank you

An aptly-titled swan song from this DIY emo act, this album alternates between sprightly, wry angst and crushing, slogging despair.

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NASTY NANCY – Fantastic Inferno…..Fuck You! EP

The mastermind behind hip-hop powder keg Invader Lars tackles crusty, buzzsawing punk with the same level of gleeful ferocity.

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Brother Bluebird – Roman Candle

A lonely stroll through through a wintry landscape; snarls of acoustic guitar litter the ground like dead branches, and Brother Bluebird weaves plaintive earworms that mingle with the falling snow.

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Danny Rectenwald – canyon

Guitar meditations that are as technically dextrous as they are painterly and evocative. Brings to mind the wide-open sprawl of the American midwest.