Special Friend Announce Clipping
If you consider yourself a fan of great indiepop then today’s news of a new LP from Parisian popsters, Special Friend, should be a nice little treat! The duo waste no time building in infectious moments, dropping this snappy rhythm and jangling riffs instantly make your body wriggle with joy. Erica’s vocals have a punctuated delivery, while Guillaume weaves his own lines into the mix, each voice complimenting the other. They toss in a nice little fuzzy riff every now and then, as they don’t want to give your ears a cavity from too much sweetness. Clipping is now on my list of hotly anticipated records coming out this year; it drops via Skep Wax, Howlin Banana and Hidden Bay on March 20th.
Honestly, I thought about foregoing a year-end list this year. I mean, if you read our site, you know what we love. But, list making can be fun, especially if you really really love music. My criteria was simple, and not based on what I think is “best,” but rather looking at the stuff I listened to the most, and eventually bought (or was gifted). Popular locals for my Nathan Wrapped have me living on an island in between San Francisco and Australia; label of the year would be Trouble in Mind (congrats to Bill and family!); genre would be: most awesome. Again, this is one man’s personal tastes, take it for what its worth.
There was a ton of great music dropping last week, which seems to be the norm for this Spring…not that we mind one bit. I tried to give some love to our Austin friends like Jana Horn and Letting Up Despite Great Faults, who both dropped new releases…and new tunes from Batty Jr. and Born Twins too, so keeping the ATX alive. It was good to hear new stuff from Estonia’s Pia Fraus, who’ve always crafted great landscape shoegaze. New stuff from Cindy and Beach Fossils wasn’t a bad way to slide into the week either, but we closed it out with a fun feature between My Favorite and Holy Wire. Check it all out.
Not too long ago I raved about “Pastel,” the first single from