
Patty PerShayla & The Mayhaps – Spill
Similar artists: Larkin Poe, Gary Clark Jr., Rival Sons
Genre: Classic Rock, Garage Rock, Blues
Patty PerShayla & The Mayhaps understand how much power there still lies in the humble blues-rock riff and deliver it with the single “Spill.”
Guitar riffs are rarely on the radio anymore. It’s a strange time, not least because for most of the history of pop music, the guitar riff was an integral part of most of the songs that attained mass appeal. Has it all but disappeared because it got old-fashioned?
Judging by the legion of fans that still attend concerts of new rock groups building their reputation on the quality of their guitar-based songs, there’s reason to believe that, for the moment, this powerful format has merely gone underground in a bid to regroup and reassess.
Patty PerShayla & The Mayhaps’ “Spill” is a tune constructed around the swagger practically built into the blues-rock format. It’s a tune that plays with tension. It features expressive vocals and a top-notch production. Most importantly, it will help feed the public’s existing passion for these kinds of sounds.
Nik Dandelion – PACiNG
Similar artists: Connan Mockasin, Soft Hair, Yellow Days
Genre: Lo-fi Rock, Indie Pop
Nik Dandelion uses music to present himself as an old-timely figure of style and good-natured humor. The retro angle suits the artist.
There’s no way that we can see the past as it really was. That’s one of the reasons why most of us have such a hard time coming to terms with it. Either we idealize unimportant events or attempt to soften the blows of terrible things that once happened.
Music has an amazing power to help us recollect the past, but it too acts as a filter. We love, especially in recent years, retro sounds and aesthetics. We would appreciate them even if we didn’t live through the time in which they were initially in vogue. They survived the past and therefore must have something to teach us about it.
Nik Dandelion’s “PACiNG” is based on smooth retro sounds processed through modern production techniques. For the most part, Dandelion gets by on charm, whispering lines confidently over a sun-soaked instrumental. It’s a song that could’ve been performed in any musical decade under the right kind of treatment. It’s both old and hyper-modern.