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Talkhouse

In a time where positivity is hard to come by, The Happy Fits are here with their transportive, sunny second album, What Could Be Better, out August 28. Turning a love for the Killers and Violent Femmes into their own compact pop songwriting, the New Jersey-based trio started as a casual summer project for high school friends Calvin Langman, Ross Monteith, and Luke Davis before going off to college. After their debut EP, 2016’s Awfully Apeelin’, took off on Spotify during their first semester, school stopped looking like the natural next step. Following their 2018 full-length Concentrate, The Happy Fits have further honed their ambition for What Could Be Better’s collection of crowd-pleasers.

The Happy Fits

Music

Calvin Langman of The Happy Fits is Playing Pickleball Like There’s No Tomorrow

Dave Stewart is one-half of the legendary pop duo Eurythmics.

Dave Stewart

Dave Stewart of Eurythmics Talks About Quarantine Recording, Bahamas Living, and His Latest Collaboration

Joshua Epstein and Daniel Zott have been making music as JR JR — formerly Dale Earnhardt Jr. Jr. — for a decade, playing electronic-tinge indie-pop that slots nicely next to bands like MGMT and Portugal The Man. The band’s latest single is “The Gambler,” a song inspired by a particularly horrendous trip to Las Vegas.
(Photo Credit: Pamela Littky)

JR. JR.

Josh from JR. JR. Recommends Ip Man Movies For a Brain Break

Handsome Ghost is the Massachusetts duo of Eddie Byun and Tim Noyes. Their 2014 breakout single “Blood Stutter” racked up 20 million streams, and their debut album Welcome Back followed in 2018. Their second album, Some Still Morning, will be out on Photo Finish Records on September 18, 2020.

Handsome Ghost

Introducing: Handsome Ghost’s “Sunday Best”

Art Feynman (aka accomplished recording artist and producer Luke Temple) stitches art-pop, Nigerian highlife, worldbeat, and other lesser-known genres into a musical quilt that displays his unmistakable guile and eccentric songcraft. On his sophomore album Half Price at 3:30 (out now on <a href="https://smarturl.it/ls8g04" target="_blank" rel="noopener" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://smarturl.it/ls8g04&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1594406618320000&amp;usg=AFQjCNFBBoLnjNsvhRwgMZDfYkAMTAa3mA">Western Vinyl</a>) he delivers songs that side-smile while pointing out the emotional sinkholes that whirl beneath the most overlooked, seemingly commonplace scenarios. As effortlessly as he inhabits his Art Feynman character he also slips into the lives of other personalities, both living and fictional. Where previous entries in the Luke Temple discography — including his well-liked former group Here We Go Magic — have utilized organic timbres even while sailing far from the guitar-and-drums shore, Half Price sees him employing drum machines, slightly glossier production, and even autotune with a tasteful balance that suggests these tools have been in his kit all along. The result affectionately evokes guerrilla recording predecessors like Francis Bebey, Arthur Russell, and Haruomi Hosono in musicological detail, yet it’s Temple’s hard-won creative voice that resounds over top of it all facing Half Price forward instead of nostalgically backward.
(Photo Credit: Aubrey Trinnaman)

Luke Temple

A Deep Dive Into Music Theory and Lyric Writing with Luke Temple and Buck Meek

Your favorite musicians, filmmakers, and other creative minds one-on-one. No moderator, no script, no typical questions. The Talkhouse Podcast offers unique insights into creative work from all genres and generations. <a href="https://pod.link/Talkhouse" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Subscribe now</a>, and explore more illuminating shows on the <a href="https://talkhouse.com/category/podcast" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Talkhouse Podcast Network.</a>

Talkhouse Podcast

Having toured since her teens, Katie Harkin&#8216;s reputation as an in-demand multi-instrumentalist has seen her pass through thirty countries whilst writing and releasing three critically acclaimed records with her own band Sky Larkin. Her work garnered the attention of friends and fellow former Leeds dwellers Wild Beasts, with whom she worked across their Smother tour, and reverberated across the pond to urgent cult trio Sleater-Kinney, who recruited her as a touring member upon their triumphant return to the live stage. Most recently, Harkin has performed across North America with Jenn Wasner of Wye Oak&#8216;s solo project, Flock of Dimes and across the UK with Low. Now, (as she unveils her debut solo project) the collaborator steps out as the singular, her new setup giving further platform to her idiosyncratic, muscular guitar-playing and revealing a body of work that is equally propelled by a life on the move and anchored by her romance for the North of England.

Katie Harkin

Podcast

Julien Baker (boygenius) Talks with Katie Harkin (HARKIN, Sleater-Kinney) on the Talkhouse Podcast

James Petralli is the frontman of White Denim, a band from Austin, TX. Their album World As A Waiting Room is out now via Radio Milk Records.

James Petralli

White Denim Planned and Executed an Entire Lockdown Album

FEELS is a noise punk band from Los Angeles. Their second album, Post Earth, was released via Wichita Recordings in 2019.
(Photo Credit: Jeff Fribough)

FEELS

The Way We Get By: FEELS’s Amy Allen Is Dabbling in Circus Arts

Tenci began as Jess Shoman’s bedroom-folk project in Chicago in December 2018.
With the help of Spencer Radcliffe and Tina Scarpello it quickly became something more fully-formed. By spring of 2019 they’d recorded their debut My Heart Is An Open Field, which is out now via Keeled Scales.
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The current lineup of Tenci includes Chicago musicians she met playing some of her earliest shows. Curt Oren plays saxophone, flute, and guitar. Isabel Reidy (of Izzy True) plays bass, and Joseph Farago (of Joey Nebulous) plays drums. They’ve added a depth and playfulness to the songs that have made them even bigger and full of life.
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(Photo Credit: Ashleigh Dye)

Tenci

Tenci Will Never Get Sick of Love Is Overtaking Me

Holding fast to the emotional honesty of Playing House (2017), Common Holly’s sophomore record, When I say to you Black Lightning is a look outward; an exploration of the ways in which we all experience pain, fear, and self-delusion, and how we can learn to confront those feelings with boldness.
The record is more experimental than Brigitte Naggar’s debut. It is rougher, looser, louder and more atonal. It feels edgy, but still kind. WISTYBL ditches fear without losing vulnerability, and trades in sadness for the healing powers of anger, and the strength of observing, recognizing and confronting. Through its 9 labyrinthian yet catchy tracks, shaped sonically by the seriously unique visions of Devon Bate, Hamish Mitchell, and Naggar herself, the album observes the complexities of mental health, the precarity of life, and the challenges of finding strength in the face of grave misunderstanding. 
(Photo Credit: Alex Apostolidis)

Common Holly

Checking In with Little Kid and Common Holly

Black Belt Eagle Scout Talks with SASAMI (and Guest Host Vagabon) on the Talkhouse Podcast

REBELMATIC is easily one of the most important modern Black Punk/Hardcore bands playing and recording today.  Their appearance at Afro-Punk in 2017 was lauded by many for being a saving grace of a festival many felt had left it’s Black rock and alt roots.
REBELMATIC fashioned themselves from the rubble of the New York heavy rock scene abandoned by gentrification and the unlikely infiltration of pop music on the NYC underground&#8230; and quickly found themselves a refreshing addition to New York nightlife. They have become an iconic band with fans including HR of Bad Brains and Angelo Moore of Fishbone.
A writer once described REBELMATIC as “James Brown in a mosh pit.”  The band shares Brown&#8217;s soul, rhythm, urgency and social awareness wrapped in a Punk aesthetic.