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Talkhouse

Kristian Mattson performs as The Tallest Man on Earth. His latest album, I Love You. It&#8217;s A Fever Dream. was released April 2019 via Dead Oceans.

The Tallest Man on Earth

Music

Kristian Matsson (The Tallest Man on Earth) Interviews Pharis And Jason Romero

NIIKA (FKA Good at Bad), conceived and fronted by Russian-born Chicago native Nika Nemirovsky (guitar and voice), is a genre-bending, continent-crossing, soft explosion of intimate indie, soul, and dirty pop. Nika wrote and recorded much of her music in Australia, but is currently holding a close focus on the blossoming creativity of her Chicago ensemble. The live show is a lush bath of ardent vocal performance, cradling harmonies, and seamless groove changes, which align like aural punctuation around Nika&#8217;s vivid storytelling and deep, organic vulnerability.

NIIKA

Hear First: NIIKA’s Close But Not Too Close

For 19-year-old Jordana Nye, kaleidoscopic bedroom pop songs aren’t merely outlets for observations, but ways to endure and embrace turbulence. Listeners will hear in full when she re-releases her treasured debut album Classical Notions of Happiness with three brand-new songs on March 27 via Grand Jury Records. 
Growing up in North Beach, Maryland, Jordana was surrounded by music in the most devout sense of the word. Her father, an organ player at the local church, encouraged her to learn piano from a young age. Instead, she found herself drawn to the violin, which she played for years before eventually switching to guitar. Classical Notions of Happiness is the culmination of a decade of practice and a slow delve into the expanses of SoundCloud.

Jordana

On Being a Virtuoso, with Jordana and TV Girl’s Brad Petering

For Albuquerque, New Mexico new wave/synth-pop band Lindy Vision, family casts a shadow over everything. The trio — comprised of three Black Native sisters, Dorothy (Dee Dee), Natasha (Na), and Carla Cuylear — has spent the last six years honing their unique sonic palette, a mix of dark ‘80s new wave, bouncy synth-pop, and ethereal indie-rock that has drawn comparisons to Santigold, M.I.A., Devo, Yeah Yeah Yeahs, and more. In that time, their music has landed them on bills supporting Spoon, Durand Jones and the Indications, A Tribe Called Red, Magic Giant, and more.
On their new EP, Adult Children Part II, Lindy Vision continues to create sweeping, synth-heavy soundscapes that provide a foundation for their introspective, emotionally raw musings on adult life after a tumultuous upbringing.
(Photo Credit: Cougar Vigil)

Lindy Vision

Lindy Vision Are Healing Past the Trauma

Kevin Barnes is the frontman and songwriter of the seminal indie-pop band of Montreal, who thrill fans with compelling live performances, delight critics with their constant innovations, and continually showcase their musical evolution by drawing from a different set of influences for each album. You can follow of Montreal on Twitter <a href="https://twitter.com/xxofMontrealxx" target="_blank">here</a>&nbsp;and on Facebook <a href="http://Facebook.com/ofmontreal" target="_blank">here</a>.

Kevin Barnes

Navigating Work and Romance with Of Montreal and Locate S,1

An influential fixture on the East Coast DIY scene and beyond, Sean Sprecher has been creating profound and sincere music that deals with unhappiness and its absurdity in equal measure since 2007. He has been performing under the name Bad History Month since 2013, transitioning from Fat History Month, a name he used when playing as a duo with drummer Mark Fede. Despite a career marked by sporadic disappearances and the often deliberate avoidance of public attention, Sprecher was already a cult figure in DIY circles in 2017 when the release of his first album as Bad History Month, Dead And Loving It: An Introductory Exploration Of Pessimysticism, brought him to wider attention, drawing praise from the likes of Pitchfork, Stereogum and NPR who described the album as an exercise in &#8220;high grade introspection&#8221; that functions &#8220;like message meant to be folded into a square, tucked into a pocket, and returned to in solitude during times of distress.&#8221;

Bad History Month

Bad History Month and Rick From Pile Are Learning To Chill

Kendl Winter and Palmer T. Lee are two kindred spirits who first met on the banks of the Mississippi while touring the Midwest festival circuit. Born and raised in Arkansas, Winter found herself drawn to the evergreens and damp air of the Pacific Northwest, as well as the boundless music scene of Olympia, Washington. She released three solo records on Olympia-based indie label, K Records, and performed in ramblin’ folk bands and anarchic punk bands before serendipitously meeting Palmer T. Lee in 2013. Lee had built his first banjo when he was 19 from pieces he inherited and began cutting his teeth fronting Minneapolis string bands before convincing Winter that they should form a banjo duo. Now, as The Lowest Pair, they have recorded and released five albums together, relentlessly toured North America, and ventured to the UK twice, playing over 500 live shows over the past five years.
After each releasing solo albums via Conor Oberst’s Team Love Records in 2018, Winter and Lee began working on The Lowest Pair’s forthcoming 10-song set, The Perfect Plan. As a songwriting team, the duo tends to see artistic sparks all around them — in poems, people, ideas, experiences – and throughout the process of writing these new songs, they felt the need to push their creative limits. They turned to producer Mike Mogis of Bright Eyes who took them to ARC Studios in Omaha, Nebraska, and set them in a soundscape backed by a slate of session players that lifts the album from simple folk into spirited Americana and beyond.
(Photo Credit: Sarah Kathryn Wainwright)

The Lowest Pair

Hear First: The Lowest Pair’s The Perfect Plan

When he co-founded the instrumental band Balmorhea over 10 years ago, Rob Lowe (RG Lowe) had no idea that its introspective instrumental music would be heard by millions of people, or that it would offer the opportunity to travel and perform around the world. After years of success in the world of neo-classical music, Lowe took a sharp turn when a casual conversation with a friend in Marfa, TX planted the idea in his head that he should challenge himself to write a pop album. Having spent years in church choirs and musical theater as a kid in West Texas, he knew he could sing, but would have to teach himself how to write the type of pop songs he was interested in creating. This eventually manifested in his 2017 debut, Slow Time, which Stereogum called &ldquo;impossibly smooth.&rdquo; Three years later, Lowe is returning with his sophomore album, Life of the Body, out May 22 via Western Vinyl.&nbsp;
(Photo Credit: Claire Cottrell)

RG Lowe

RG Lowe and Jess Williamson Talk Releasing Albums in the Midst of a Pandemic

CMON is Josh da Costa and Jamen Whitelock, a duo that met in New York where they created the band Regal Degal in 2009. Now based in Los Angeles, they’ve continued their musical partnership recording and performing as CMON. The debut album Confusing Mix Of Nations sprang from time spent combing through old demos and retooling them into spaced-out dance music featuring twangy guitar riffs, analog drum machines, and lush synth textures. Uninhibited by the limitations of a typical rock band, CMON embraces technology to construct a hybrid sound inspired by the past, present, and future. CMON’s music is built for heady crate-diggers and cutting-edge partygoers, perfect for both headphones and the club.
(Photo Credit: Kathryn Vetter Miller)

CMON

Checking In with Ariel Pink and CMON

Las Nubes’ undeniably catchy songs transition from melancholy dream pop to blistering punk rock as easily as their lyrics do from English to Spanish.  Recently named “Best Band” by the Miami New Times, the core trio of Ale Campos (guitar/vocals), Nina Carolina (bass/vocals), and Emile Milgrim (drums), along with rotating live members Steph Taylor (The State Of), Gabriel Duque (Zeta), and Cuci Amador (Afrobeta), have become one of “South Florida’s most beloved bands &#8211; a distinction they’ve earned through hard work and infectious hooks.”
The band’s debut album, SMVT, released via the SRR Label in summer 2019, and has retained constant momentum through rigorous promotion, engaging social media, one-off events, and multiple tours. To date, Las Nubes has shared stages with Shannon And The Clams, Jens Lekman, The Coathangers, Sheer Mag, Mark Sultan, Torche, and more. Most recently, they were invited to perform as Iggy Pop’s backing band for a GUCCI x Snap event celebrating the debut of Harmony Korine’s 3D short film Duck Duck in December 2019 during Miami Art Week.
(Photo Credit: Gabriel Duque)

Las Nubes

Hear First: Las Nubes and Palomino Blond’s Split EP

Mav Karlo is a new project from Menno Versteeg, a Toronto musician and the founder of Royal Mountain Records. His debut full length as Mav Karlo will be released in the summer of 2020.
(Photo Credit: Calm Elliott-Armstrong)

Mav Karlo

Wolf Parade and Menno Versteeg on the Economics of Being a Musician

As former frontwoman of the critically acclaimed New York-based group San Fermin, KAYE (Charlene Kaye) has played network television and has toured with St. Vincent, Arctic Monkeys, alt-J, and others. She recently released &#8220;Closer Than This,&#8221; the first single from her upcoming album, which earned praise from Rolling Stone, NPR, FLOOD Magazine, and more.
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interview