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Talkhouse

Beijing duo Gong Gong Gong 工工工’s raucous debut LP, Phantom Rhythm 幽靈節奏, was recorded live in a room, on open-reel tape, with little more than vocalist and guitarist Tom Ng’s 60-year-old Italian pawn shop guitar and bassist Joshua Frank’s 1970s imitation P-bass. The minimalist group created a drummer-less sound that was more than the sum of its parts, inspired by back-porch blues, Sahelian guitar music, New York no-wave, Cantonese lion dance percussion, and, seemingly most incongruously, techno.
On Phantom Rhythm Remixed, Gong Gong Gong bring to life a concept they’ve planned since the release of their acclaimed debut, curating their favorite China-connected electronic music producers to remix Phantom Rhythm in its entirety. The globe-spanning collaboration features Yu Su (Vancouver/Kaifeng), Zaliva-D, Simon Frank, Howie Lee (Beijing), Mong Tong, Scattered Purgatory (Taipei), Knopha (Xiamen), Wu Zhuoling (Chengdu), Angel Wei (Copenhagen), and P.E. (Brooklyn). The LP will be released by Wharf Cat Records in collaboration with Beijing’s bié Records.

Gong Gong Gong

Music

Best of 2021: Gong Gong Gong Got Inspired By Yu Su This Year

Claire Rousay is based in San Antonio, Texas. Her music zeroes in on personal emotions and the minutiae of everyday life — voicemails, haptics, environmental recordings, stopwatches, whispers and conversations — exploding their significance.
(Photo Credit: Dani Toral)

Claire Rousay

Best of 2021: Claire Rousay Listened to Devin Shaffer Every Day

Lily Konigsberg has been writing songs all her life. Born and raised in Brooklyn, she started playing solo sets around NYC clubs as a teenage, before linking up with Bard classmates Nina Ryser and Ani Ivry-Block to form Palberta. She also performs with Nate Amos as My Idea, and is releasing her latest full-length solo album Lily We Need To Talk Now via Wharf Cat October 2021.

Lily Konigsberg

Best of 2021: Lily Konigsberg Finally Got Into Kacey Musgraves This Year

As lead vocalist of the Bush Tetras, a seminal post-punk band in New York  City, Cynthia Sley produced some of the most distinctive aspects of the Tetras sounds. Sley&#8217;s vocals were half spoken, half sung and in songs like &#8220;Too Many Creeps&#8221; and &#8220;You Can&#8217;t Be Funky&#8221; she repeated simple phrases creating a hypnotic monotony similar to Pat Place&#8217;s guitar rhythms. &#8220;Too Many Creeps&#8221; was a mainstay of the infamous early &#8217;80s New York &#8220;No Wave&#8221; club scene.

Cynthia Sley

Best of 2021: Cynthia Sley Loved White Hills’ Angst This Year

Noah Britton is a Boston-based singer-songwriter and comedian. He has also performed as ACLU Benefit and Request Freebird, and with the comedy troupe Asperger&#8217;s Are Us.

Noah Britton

Best of 2021: Noah Britton Loved the Young@Heart Chorus This Year

Faye Webster’s second full-length 2019 album Atlanta Millionaires Club is a case-study in duality. The instrumentation (a heart-rending mix of pedal-steel, guitars and strings) recalls the country-folk of her musical upbringing but listen deeper and you’ll discover a soulful undertone to her vocal delivery, a spare groove laid down by her rhythm section; a subtle and elegant genre-bending which just happens to make her one of the most compelling young songwriters in music today.
The near-whisper of Webster&#8217;s voice feels like the embodiment of the maxim &#8220;speak softly and they’ll listen harder.&#8221; Singles &#8220;Kingston,&#8221; &#8220;Right Side Of My Neck&#8221; and &#8220;Flowers&#8221; (a brilliant collaboration with Atlanta rapper and Awful Records label-boss Father) are highlights on an album which has landed on multiple end-of-year best-ofs.
Webster’s talent doesn’t lie solely in music, her collection of portraits documenting the Atlanta hip hop scene are near-iconic and have made her a much in-demand photographer. She is also the proud owner of a line of signature yoyos,  a hobby-turned obsession she picked up on the road after a new drummer turned out to have a side-hustle as a yoyo professional.

Faye Webster

Best of 2021: Faye Webster Relates to Erika de Casier’s Love Songs Now

Inspired by the honest writing and timeless melodies of American greats such as Hank Williams Sr. and Joni Mitchell, Esther Rose’s songwriting has been called “The happiest saddest music.” Her 2017 debut, This Time Last Night, caught fire as her listeners tuned-in to a storied chronology of this soulful, heart-worn artist. Her latest record, Safe to Run, is out April 21, 2023 on New West Records.
(Photo Credit: Rett Rogers)

Esther Rose

Best of 2021: Esther Rose Has Been on a Techno Journey This Year

Sloppy Jane is an eight-to-11 piece music project led by Haley Dahl out of Brooklyn, NY (originating in Los Angeles). An ever-evolving lineup of players, friends, and collaborators. Elements of the live show include: laughter, choir vocals, xylophone, saxophone, kazoo, television, slide whistle, vomiting blue dye, a naked body, a rotting suit, guitar, bass, drums, tambourine, ruby red slippers, violent shifts in genre and speed, a make-believe maestro, and a set that does not stop moving once it has started.

Sloppy Jane

Best of 2021: Haley Dahl Is Super Happy About Gustaf’s Big Year

David Castillo is an NYC-based vocalist and producer who performs as Confines. He&#8217;s also the co-owner and booker for Brooklyn&#8217;s Saint Vitus Bar. The debut Confines EP Work Up the Blood is out now via Synthicide.

David Castillo

David Castillo and Igor Cavalera on the Metal-to-Electronic-Music Pipeline

Beatrice Deer is a Quaqtaq-born, Montreal-based singer-songwriter. Her latest album SHIFTING is out December 10, 2021.

Beatrice Deer

Beatrice Deer and Sylvia Cloutier Try to Recognize the Pain

René Kladzyk is the songwriter, producer, vocalist and pianist behind Ziemba. Her latest album Unsubtle Magic is out December 10, 2021 via Sister Polygon.
(Photo Credit: Ian Torres)

René Kladzyk

Colin Self and Ziemba Choose to Feel the Feelings

William Tyler is a composer and guitarist based in Los Angeles-via-Nashville. His new album <a href="http://smarturl.it/goeswest" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Goes West</a> was released by Merge in January 2019, and features contributions from Meg Duffy, Brad Cook, and Bill Frisell, among others. 
(Photo Credit: Chantal Anderson)

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