PBNSOTW

Wow. What a great week for new music. Seriously hard to choose, some stuff that didn't make the list this week would have easily made it into previous lists.



First off is Kat Edwards and Best Bad News. "Oh if I could only read off your script/Maybe it'd tell me somethin' I didn't know before." Great lyric, and Kat's voice is at once effortless and pleading. Wonderful chord structure in the chorus, mix uses a lot of very subtle modulation effects extremely well.



The Beths get on the list twice in three weeks. When You Know You Know is your typically strong Beths lyric and melody in the key of E, but the real attention grabber is the bass leading in the verse: C#m, Ab/C, E/B, F#/A#, A. Beautiful. It's miles ahead of where you would expect a band with just eight years together to sound.



Hooten Hallers. That's a new one for me, but they've been around since 2007. Heal It is a little pull-yourself-up-by-your-own-dang-bootstraps ditty that features bass saxophone holding down the low end and a bari sax solo. Maybe just a tad overcompressed in mastering, will still make your day better.



If you're not familiar with Madison Cunningham, listen to Hospital and you'll want to hear more. "Checking in to a hospital/Where the nurse is church and state/The cure has got that oxygen/We're all looking to taste." Not pretending to understand the layers here, but the song is a pleasure. The tape saturation on the vocal is a little distracting.