Tomato Flower
Tomato Flower
Tomato Flower is the result of long-lasting friendships and overlapping collaborations that found Austyn Wohlers, Mike Alfieri, and Jamison Murphy (and later adding bassist Ruby Mars) looking for the balance between taut guitars and experimental pop music. The Baltimore-based quartet melds irresistible melodies with rhythmic trickery and unexpected structures, bending genre at will. Math rock, dub, and bossa might flash by well before the outro. Formal constraint becomes an opportunity for play and surprise; the pop form becomes a psychedelic capsule.
Their debut EP, Gold Arc, finds the Baltimore quartet playing with tension between sweetness and destructive heaviness. Conceptually, Gold Arc hungers for an alternate reality, a sustainable paradise, and the desire to be loved constantly. They turn that utopian impulse towards the worldly on the follow-up release, Construction. A companion to Gold Arc recorded in the same time period, this set of dense, knotted pop songs are intricate constructions of their own. The music evokes something sculptural, reflecting the painstaking social processes of material transformation that create physical objects, or coalesces as a monumental abstraction cutting into the skyline.
babybaby_explores
babybaby_explores (the Reasons Why that Gum is Still on the Sidewalk), is a pseudo concept, garage-pop, art-rock project made of three fweaky BFFS from the ghost town clam chowder suburbia Warwick, RI. Utilizing obsolete and low-tech gear, the band makes simple structured danceable songs that pay homage to: musique concrète, European underground synth punk of the late 70’s through the 80’s, anthem music, dada, and the Providence DIY & noise scene.
They’re new album Food Near Me, Weather Tomorrow is due out March 3, 2023 via No Gold.
True Blossom
True Blossom formed in 2017 from the thriving Atlanta underground synth-pop scene. The band released their debut album Heater, a sweet and strange collection of disco, city-pop, and classic indie, last year on Citrus City Records. They followed that with a series of tours up and down the east coast.
Their second album, In Bliss, arrives October 23rd, again on Citrus City. Its surface is all sophistication and light – red lipstick, brushed steel, and lace, but an eerie sadness hangs over the whole affair. Though bits of new wave synth and disco percussion shimmer and glow with warmth, the gloom never quite lifts.
In Bliss was recorded in Atlanta by Damon Moon at Standard Electric Recording Co. Founding members Sophie Cox, Nadav Flax, Adam Weisberg, Jamison Murphy, and Chandler Kelley tracked most of the instruments before Jamison left to attend graduate school in Maryland. Newest member Bonnie Hardie joined the band during the sessions, and her vocal harmonies can be heard throughout.
