Baker's Dozen: Leno Banton, Young Nudy, and Bands Whose Older Albums I Like More
Baker's Dozen is a thing I usually do for paid subscribers, but today it's free. If you like what you're seeing here and you'd like to get one of these weekly, please click the button below to subscribe, it's $3/mo or $30/yr. If you decide to stay a free subscriber for now, I won't be mad either—just happy anyone reads it at all. (Paid subscribers, don't worry—there'll be a second Baker's Dozen for you on Friday, too.)
Duckwrth, "Super Good"
Another one from Donsky's 2020 best-of that I thought sounded good. My wife asked me "Who's DUCKWRTH?" when I put this on in the car and I said "I don't know" because, well, I don't know, and also I'm trying to get better at saying "I don't know" instead of trying to offer an answer when I'm asked something that I don't, well, know about. So, yeah. I don't know.
Psychedelic Porn Crumpets, "Mango Terrarium"
Psychedelic Porn Crumpets are one of those bands I've heard about for years but haven't been too interested in listening to because, I mean, that name. It's not great! I'm not proud of letting bad-name bias get in the way of me listening to music I haven't heard, considering that I strive to be open-minded in my listening habits—but, also, it sounds like the type of band that would play at a Gov't Mule-headlined festival, so I just assumed that their thing is not my thing. Turns out their thing is my thing, though! This is the best track from their most recent album, no wheel-reinvention going on here although there's a pleasing Tame Impala-alike sound to it (they are Australian, of course).
Nana Yamato, "Gaito"
Cool record, has a Deerhunter-y gait at times (their cleaner-sounding side, that is), dusky indie that contrasts a few different moods overall.
Leno Banton, "Piña Colada"
The latest EP from Jamaica-hailing Leno Banton is pretty solid, I love this song the most. Really dig the punchy synth line, he sounds amazing on the hook too, production is in general some wild stuff.
Dehd, "Push the Crowd"
I typically like the kind of thing Dehd does—slack-sounding but deeper-than-it-seems indie rock of the Galaxie 500/Yo La Tengo tradition—but despite them releasing a breakout LP last year, I wasn't too into it. Can't explain why, would typically be a mark for it. But! I like their record from 2019 way more, this song is great, you can hear the YLT-iness of it all. The moment when the vocals drop out for a brief spell after the bridge is my favorite kind of indie rock moment.
BandGang Lonnie Bands, "Ghetto Moshpit" [ft. Rob Vicious]
"We don't argue on computers." I do! KOD is a fairly solid project from BandGang Lonnie Bands, it's also from 2019 because I'm constantly listening and re-listening to stuff through byzantine systems I've created for myself partially to generate an ever-expanding timeline within these playlists. (If you are a regular reader, you already know this because I've explained it in some form before; if not, now you can stop scratching your head about why there's songs in here from, like, 2019.) I chose this track to highlight because I love that high-pitched synth squiggle that comes in midway through the chorus.
Loma, "Don't Shy Away"
I love Loma's Don't Shy Away, aka one of my favorite Radiohead albums since In Rainbows. (I kid! Kind of.) But seriously, when I think of this type of music as sounding like Radiohead I also think, "What do we mean when we say that music sounds like Radiohead at this point?" Circa the early-mid 2000s, "sounds like Radiohead" was so identifiable because so many bands were copying what was then an obvious OK Computer-y blueprint of huge guitars and some level of high-pitched angst being expressed; even the fucking Smallville theme song sounded like Radiohead. Now when I think of "music that sounds like Radiohead" I think of ornate, complex, well-mixed atmospheric rock that may or may not have some disparate electronic elements in the mix. Hey, I guess you could say "sounds like The National" is kind of the "sounds like Radiohead" of the late 2000s-on, huh. OK! I like The National now, so that's ok too.
Domo Genesis & Evidence, "Shaq Carried Kobe" [ft. Phonte]
From 2018. Domo Genesis is more or less exactly where we all expected him to be nearly a decade after the initial wave of Odd Future hype: A young old head making old head-y music with old head-y guys like Evidence and Phonte, occasionally boring but occasionally just enjoyable to listen to. Call it "Curren$y Syndrome" I guess, that guy likes to smoke weed too.
Shabason, Krgovich & Harris, "I Don't See the Moon"
Nick Krgovich has long been someone who I've been interested in since his work as part of No Kids and P:ANO, over the last five or six years he's reinvented himself as a sort of jazz-pop impresario riding the post-Kaputt wave. (As a brief aside, I once asked Dan Bejar what impact Kaputt had financially on his career as Destroyer as a whole, since, y'know, it was the biggest Destroyer record to date; he laughed and said it made no difference. The more you know!) I'm notoriously Kaputt-agnostic but enjoy this sound when it's pushed to blissed-out zeniths as it is here, Philadelphia as a whole (including the cover of "Philadelphia") is well worth your time if you haven't heard it already.
Young Nudy and Pi'erre Bourne, "Call Dat Bitch Homicide"
I have more trouble spelling "Homicide" than I thought I would, it turns out. No matter. I've posted about Young Nudy here before, still need to check out the project from this year but he's one of the great post-"Magnolia" masters of video game-sounding rap, aided of course by the inventiveness of Pi'erre Bourne as well as Pi'erre's many imitators at this point.
Caribou, "Like I Loved You (India Jordan Remix)"
If you're a regular BD reader you know that I've been sharing my faves from the Caribou remix record for a minute now; if you're a long-time reader you know that I've also mentioned India Jordan around these parts in the past too. Every few years we get a producer who is just flat-out gifted at making engaging, complex, and melodic dance music—no gimmicks, no scenes, no memelord-bait pseudonyms—and India Jordan is the producer of the moment in that sense. They work magic here, as with a lot of selections from the remix LP it's more engaging than what Caribou himself has been doing with dance music lately. (Dan Snaith, I beg of you, get behind the kit again and go nuts with the psychedelia stuff again! You're an amazing DJ at this point, but after Our Love and the latest one, I'm just not sure your approach to this kind of music is working for me at the moment.)
VanJess, "Boo Thang" [ft. Devin Morrison]
VanJess are criminally underrated at this point, classic example of a solid R&B act angling for attention within a major label system increasingly unable to break artists with its own tools. My wife pointed out to me recently that their latest release aligns a bit with the type of production that Disclosure have been doing for R&B and pop acts, and I think that tracks; this song wouldn't have sounded out of place on the last Chloe x Halle record, which Disclosure had their paws all over a few tracks of.
Sinai Vessel, "A Must While So Near"
We're getting a new Death Cab album soon I believe, because when I interviewed ol' Gibbard last year (or was it earlier this year? Too lazy to check) for Stereogum he mentioned that the band more or less had a new one in the can. As a sidebar, he also said to me in that interview that you had to hand it to some Republicans for not opposing the certification of the election, which, I mean, Jesus Christ dude. I love your songwriting but, like, get your head back in the real world for a second. Anyway, as something that sounds extremely Death Cab-y this Sinai Vessel song is probably better than anything off of the last three Death Cab albums (although, to be fair, "No Room in Frame" and "Your Hurricane" are both late-period classics). Whole Sinai Vessel record is pretty solid in general too.