The Single Life: Twerps, The Gooch Palms & More

Even as the stream of new music slows to a yuletide trickle before it again gushes out in a new year’s flood all over your shoes, there’s still enough about to cover many of pop music’s traditional subject matter: love, romance, politics, growing up confused in Glasgow, and even a last minute festive standard if you’re getting sick of that damn Michael Buble Christmas album.

Locally, there seems some reboots and new starts with some potential. Sans Parent are a couple of chaps from the now-defunct Hungry Kids Of Hungary falling in with Andy Bull cohort Alex Bennison to make a scrappy racket which may well appeal to those with an interest in the previous things of their various resumes. Coming Back For You (Rare Finds) should find itself a warm corner on various community radio playlists.

Ditto Food Court, whose ‘garage fuzz’ has seemed destined to happen for a while now. Signing to one of them proper and professional booking agencies, a new year’s tour with Catfish And The Bottlemen (English bands still often taking the prize for toweringly absurd names…), and the offhand swing of new tune On The River (Habit Music) suggest the Lego blocks are falling into place.

And Twerps melodic jangle has become increasingly assured as well. The foundations were laid with the Underlay EP, with Shoulders (Chapter Music) being the first sample of the luxurious shag pile for a 2015 album which should already be on many lists of things to look forward to. Meantime, let this nuzzle your neck.

Others are already setting their sights further afield. We’re apparently only going to get one more local go-round before The Gooch Palms forsake the duo’s Newcastle native land to – shall we say, given Leroy’s penchant for sometimes pantless performance – ‘crack’ America. Trackside Daze (Urinal Cakes Records) woots and yells punkishly in your face in the manner that will delight a certain element of the US audience, and scare the bejesus out of the other percentage. Pack your nice undies, kids – you never know who you’ll be showing them off to.

More local boys making good The Griswolds have already done a few slogs through them United States, building the audience old-school stylee with a sound that manages to make synth-driven pop a bit of muscle and swing. If You Wanna Stay (Chugg/MGM) is commercial, sure – but also happens to be good.

A slightly more subtle eccentricity from Father John Misty, a cunning plan to include kittens in the promotional video for the idiosyncratically titled Chateau Lobby #4 (In C For Two Virgins) (Sub Pop) sidelined for budget considerations – internet-savvy cat-wranglers being an expensive breed, apparently. So, he grabs his wife and his iPod, makes everything look just wobbly enough to be somewhere on the line between cheap and arty, and provokes even more questions about what he’s up to for the upcoming album, and just how much tongue is in how much cheek.

More serious concerns for Of Montreal, the sometimes hummingbird-like attention span of Kevin Barnes settling on the inspiration from the late Egyptian journalist/activist Bassem Sabry (Polyvinyl). There’s not much middle-eastern – or indeed, Middle-western – in the tune, Mr Barnes happily admitting his musical muse for his next album is more New York circa 1979, so the touchstones are band like Television and Talking Heads, possibly from before when the latter discovered African polyrhythms and funk.

For a band who’ve long seemed to articulate adolescent-to-young-adult heartache and angst – even as the members headed well into their 40s – for Belle & Sebastian’s Stuart Murdoch to call Nobody’s Empire (Matador) ‘one of his most personal songs ever’ is a big call. The words are of tossing and turning in a university-town bedsit, as obscure objects of desire are dwelt on through lonely nights. Let us all look wistfully into the middle-distance and make nostalgic noises for a time that probably never happened in the first place. Sigh.

And maybe going from Rodeo to Radio (Lost Highway), Ryan Bingham is maybe into that grey area between Americana alt.country and what mainstream country might be evolving into. Hopefully. Brave enough to still wear the big hat, but aware enough to know some people are going to think it ironic.

And a late contender in the often godawful festive season standards market has the genuinely soulful voice of Sam Smith emoting through Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas (Capitol). Whatever you think of the form, at least consider that every time you hear this is one less time you have to listen to that new version of Do They Know Its Christmas? That’s got to be some sort of plus.