NYS Music 202​2

Category: New York Singles

  • VRSTY Share “Hush” Video

    New York City based band VRSTY (pronounced “Varsity”) have shared their newest music video for their song “Hush.”

    VRSTY
    VRSTY consists of Joey Varela [vocals], Javy Dorrejo [bass], Chris Cody [drums], and Paul Gregory [guitar].

    The vocals of Joey Varela and sound from Javy Dorrejo [bass], Chris Cody [drums], and Paul Gregory [guitar] provide the bands one of a kind musical genre, a unique fusion of R&B with vocal elements of post-hardcore sound. The new video “Hush” does the band justice showing these different musical elements.

    Welcome Home is the band’s debut album, which has accumulated six million streams in less than a year and yielded the head-turning singles “Shameless” and “Massive.” 

    “‘Hush’ is definitely one of my favorite songs on the entire record,” says Varela. “It’s also one of the most different songs simply because it’s more uplifting and fun rather than dark and moody —my usual mood! Writing this song was incredibly therapeutic for me yet also super scary. Because it was so different, I wasn’t sure if anybody was gonna like it. However when Welcome Home dropped, it ended up becoming a fan-favorite. I just hope it makes people feel the way it made me feel when I first wrote it.”

    “Welcome Home is an incredibly personal album to me,” Varela shares. “I know everybody says that, and hey, maybe they’re not lying when they do. I sure as hell am not. It was definitely a task, at first, trying to figure out how to phrase or sing something without getting too personal. But somewhere along the way, I threw that idea out the window and decided to say exactly what I felt. You won’t find me trying to sound cool or using any fancy wordplay. It’s just me in my rawest form, saying exactly what I’ve felt or experienced over the years, which is what has made me who I am today. I think if anybody ever wants to get to know me, this record will give you everything you need to know. No secrets. Just me.”

  • Brooklyn-Based Band Forever Honey Drops Newest Single “Number One Fan”

    Forever Honey, a Brooklyn-based Indie Rock group is once again expanding their discography with the release of their newest single “Number One Fan.”

    Forever Honey

    Forever Honey is composed of Liv Price (lead vocals, guitar), Aida Mekonnen (lead guitar, vocals), Steve Vannelli (drums, keys), and Jack McLoughlin (bass, production). They are known to blend different sounds, stories and emotions to relate to their fans.

    Their newest song came to be from personal experiences and the title of it is meant to be literal. Forever Honey created a song that expresses the point of view of social media users scrolling through the various platform. The group focused on the everyday thoughts, anxieties, and pressures from using social media.

    “Number One Fan,” in particular, is our least abstract/most literal song, lyrically. The entire thing is about scrolling through instagram and seeing the highlights reel from everyone’s life. You know people, deeply, in the least meaningful ways; you fall in love with the least accurate version of someone.

    Forever Honey

    The group also discussed, during the beginning of the pandemic everyone was focused on TikTok and Instagram, which is where the lyrics from “Number One Fan” originated from.

    Despite enduring obstacles, as a result of the pandemic during the debut of their first EP Pre-Mortem High, Forever Honey still managed to grasp an audience and make a name for themselves within the music industry. Their first live show took place in the Summer of 2021, following the release of their single “Satellite” and ever since Forever Honey has continuously elevated their skill set.

    To learn more about the band and their upcoming work visit their official website.

  • Gooseberry Drops Titular Song In Anticipation Of Debut EP “Broken Dance”

    In anticipation of their debut EP, Broken Dance, set to release on May 6th, Gooseberry has dropped the titular track of their forthcoming project. The Brooklyn band, consisting of Asa Daniels, Evin Rossington, Sam Rappaport, and Will Hammond, is slowly building an underground following.

    Recently, the band placed in the Final Four in NYSMusic’s March Madness 2022 bracket, and their newest release continues to highlight their talent.

    Gooseberry Broken Dance
    Gooseberry

    Gooseberry’s music is a magnificent blend of soulful R&B and indie-pop. Their newest release continues to showcase this amalgamation. The titularly titled track, “Broken Dance,” features a happy yet inquisitive piano roll. Accompanied by a melancholic violin and intimate lyricism, the track wonderfully captures the antonymic feelings of intimacy and loss.

    The four-piece talent will also be touring the American Northeast. In New York, they will return to the Bowery Electric on April 14th and to Brooklyn’s Knitting Factory on May 21st. Additionally, the band will also pass through the Finger Lakes region and will play at Grist Iron Brewing on June 11th.

    TOUR DATES

    04/13 – O’Brien’s – Boston, MA

    04/14 – Bowery Electric – New York, NY

    04/16 – Transparent Clinch Gallery – Asbury Park, NJ

    05/21 – Knitting Factory – Brooklyn, NY

    06/11 – Grist Iron Brewing – Burdett, NY

    Gooseberry is set to have an exceptional 2022, for more information on the band and to pre-order Broken Dance, visit gooseberryband.com.

  • Queens Band, The Forms Cover “Latch” by Disclosure

    Queens based band, The Forms, released a cover of “Latch” the popular Disclosure song featuring Sam Smith.

    The Forms is a band from Queens, NY composed of Alex Tween and Matt Walsh
    Photo by Noah Kalina

    “The core composition is so strong that the song would probably work in any format, but hopefully our un-electronic version will highlight what Disclosure and Sam Smith accomplished with their remarkable work,” said Alex Tween.

    In The Forms cover they swapped out the electronic production for the physical instruments featured in the song.

    Apart from Sam Smith’s voice and Disclosure’s harmonies, the original song was entirely composed of synthetic elements seemingly, so for our take we used all physical instruments (rhodes, hammond organ, piano, drums).”

    The group tried to reverse engineer the song and draw out its “weirdness”.

    “’Latch’ is definitely one of the weirdest and most complex songs ever to break through to the mainstream,” Tween said. “The chords are so strange and unique, the slow triplet rhythms virtually unheard of for a dance track, and the lyrics are so subtly subversive that it is truly an astonishing achievement that it made the Top 10.”

    The Forms on a beach front
    Photo by Noah Kalina

    The Forms is a two-person band composed of Tween, who plays piano, guitar, and provides vocals, and Matt Walsh. The two have known each other since high school. They released their debut album together back in Feb. 2003. The Forms are currently work on an album that will be released in 2022 with Steve Albini of Electrical Audio.

  • Morningsiders Unveil New Album “I’ve Got a Song”, Premiere First Single “Hang the Cedar”

    NYC indie band Morningsiders have returned to unveil their newest album I’ve Got a Song, along with the release of their new single ‘Hang the Cedar’, a song detailing the struggles of finding identity within a friend group. 

    Morningsiders

    The folk-pop trio recorded the single with the help of well-known producer Peter Katis, who has also worked with The National, Interpol and Sharon Van Etten. The song came together after the group realized that they had a piano pattern that would work perfectly as a verse. Building outward from the verse resulted in a cohesive story and smooth melodies. 

    ‘Hang the Cedar’ captures the difficulty of developing a personality while navigating within a friend group. It can be an added challenge when you consider how those around you view you, but the Morningsiders are here to help you along.

    Morningsiders
    PC : Shervin Lainez

    “It’s like all of a sudden you have a chance to meet yourself, but also to reinvent and curate in a way that you couldn’t before.”

    Morningsiders

    Morningsiders is comprised of Magnus Ferguson (vocals/guitar), Reid Jenkins (fiddle/vocals) and Robert Frech (piano). After forming in 2012, the group has gone through a number of member rotations before landing on their current three man dynamic. They first gained national attention after their song ‘Empress’ was featured in a Starbucks commercial featuring Oprah Winfrey and have kept this momentum going with an ever changing musical sound and inventive approaches. 

    Fans can listen to ‘Hang the Cider’ on all streaming platforms.

  • King Vagabond Releases New Single, “Rule The World”

    New York’s entirely independent alt-pop, King Vagabond released their debut single on a platform that helps to build a kingdom for the queerdos with their brand new single “Rule The World” along with music video which premiered on March 27th.

    Throughout the COVID-19 pandemic while the world seemed to be falling apart, King Vagabond looked thoroughly for a long time into a different path that could help them to create a natural flow of creative subconscious which led to the creation of their debut single.

    “That’s what ‘Rule the World’ is all about. It asks listeners to unsheathe their swords—the ‘weapons’ they keep hidden—and lean into them hard. Only after you face, love, and own every part of yourself can you become the ruler of your world.”

    -Joey Dean

    The duo behind King Vagabond are familiar with the NY area since Joey Dean (vocalist) is from Hudson Valley and Niko Vaude (producer and guitarist) is from Queens. The inspiration to create the duo came after their previous band of seven years that ended at the start of the pandemic which as a result created King Vagabond. King Vagabond mission is to help build a kingdom for those wandering the shadows, searching for light. Before the creation of the group, they have performed with massive pop artists like Shawn Mendes, Charli XCX, and Todrick Hall, and festivals such as Vans Warped Tour.

    The single, “Rule The World” comes from 80s-inspired synths with gritty guitar leads. A queer misfit and a catholic Egyptian-American became a turned rockstar tells a tale of poetic triumph with their songs to create an alternative sound introduced into pop and electronic.

  • NYC-Based Indie-Pop Singer Aubrey Haddard Announces New Single and Album

    NYC-based indie-pop singer-songwriter Aubrey Haddard announced her second LP, Awake And Talking, out August 16. She also shared the first single from the project “Just A Wall” along with a music video.

    The album is about Haddard’s self-examination and how she navigates love and her relationship to art. Her biggest influences for the album came from the greatest songwriters of the 90s, like Oasis and Björk. With her writing partner and multi-instrumentalist Charley Ruddell and drummer Josh Strmic, they all wrote the songs in rehearsal spaces and Haddard’s childhood upstate home. She spoke about the album, and the deep meaning it has for her.

    Awake And Talking is about seeking a sense of purpose. It challenges perception – how many ways can you look at the world before you find your place in it? It is about destiny and the journey to self-acceptance. And, like anything I create, it is about my own personal experience over the past few years. This record makes me feel powerful and confident in the face of uncertainty and it brings me a lot of joy to know that it could offer a sliver of that to anyone listening.

    The new single “Just A Wall” is bold and emotional, with mesmerizing electric guitar riffs as she proudly sings the lyrics “Now that you’ve gone and shattered the glass…Whose arms do you run to?”

    Aubrey Haddard, photo by Emmysu.

    Aubrey Haddard’s new album Awake And Talking is out August 16, and her new electrifying single ”Just A Wall” is out now.

  • Dee Snider Releases Video in Support of Ukraine

    Twisted Sister singer Dee Snider releases new video for his song “Stand” in support of Ukraine.

    Dee Snider
    Photo Credit: Randy Frieder

    The video is retitled “Stand (with Ukraine)”. The new version includes live footage from the conflict currently going on in Ukraine.

    About a week ago, it hit me that the song “Stand” from my last Napalm Records album, ‘Leave a Scar’, fit the crisis in Ukraine perfectly. I just couldn’t get around how well the lyrics resonated. So, I had a couple of incredibly talented people, Scott Pitek and Steve Sage Goldberg, cut together a new video using some live concert footage and news clips. The result is devastating.

    Dee Snider

    The idea for the new music video came after someone reached out to Snider to tell him that Ukrainians were using Twisted Sister’s “We’re Not Gonna Take It” as a battle cry.

    “About a month ago, someone on social media told me people in Ukraine were using Twisted Sister’s ‘We’re Not Gonna Take It’ as a battle cry and asked if I was cool with it,” said Snider. “Of course I was.”

    Snider gained significant media attention after a tweet endorsing the use of “We’re Not Gonna Take It” as a pro Ukraine anthem went viral. Since then, Dee Snider contributed to relief fund World United Live to raise awareness and money for the victims of the conflict in Ukraine.

    “At [World United Live] we have been beating the drum for the free world to come together not only in support of Ukraine and condemnation of Putin, but in sending a message to the Russian people that they are misinformed and not being told the truth,” explained Snider.

    The organization is planning a benefit concert in support of Ukraine that it hopes will be the world’s largest.

  • Marco Benevento Announces New Studio Album, Shares “Marco & Mimo”

    Marco Benevento has announced a brand new full-length studio album, Benevento, which drops June 10th via Royal Potato Family. Accompanying this exciting news, Benevento’s newest single, “Marco & Mimo,” is available for streaming now.

    Additionally, Benevento has announced that they will be touring this April and June with a stop at Abilene Bar and Lounge in Rochester.

    Marco Benevento

    “Marco & Mimo,” the first single from the album, contains three songs. On it, Benevento blends groovy funk bounce with psychedelia, creating a beautiful blend of these two formative 80s genres. The vocals on the tracks further transport you into this window of time Benevento creates, transporting the listener back forty years. The single reeks of personality only Benevento can create and his talent shines through. My personal favorite, Winter Rose, has snappy instrumentation, mind-bending keys, and entrancing vocals that make for a magnificent listen.

    The entire album was recorded in Woodstock at Fred Short Studios during the pandemic, and the sounds emitted from Marco & Mimo pay homage to Woodstock’s iconic psychedelic culture and history.

    In addition to his new album, Marco Benevento has also announced a list of upcoming shows:

    4/7 – Cambridge, MA – The Sinclair

    4/8 – Burlington, VT – Higher Ground

    4/9 – Fairfield, CT – Stage One

    6/22 – Rochester, NY – Abilene

    6/23 – Pittsburgh, PA – Thunderbird

    6/24 – Cleveland, OH – Beachland Ballroom

    6/26 – Rothbury, MI – Electric Forest Festival

    7/1 – Scranton, PA – Peach Music Festival

    7/3 – Quincy, CA – High Sierra Music Festival

    9/3 – Portland, ME – Ghostland Festival

    Tickets and limited edition bubblegum pink and classic black 180-gram vinyl are available at marcobenevento.com.

  • Say She She, Brooklyn Based Trio Release New Single “Blow My Mind”

    Brand-new Brooklyn-based trio, Say She She, have released their sophomore single “Blow My Mind.” The song follows their debut single and video “Forget Me Not” – both tracks have earned early support from KCRW’s Morning Becomes Eclectic. Both tracks will be released together as a 45 via Colemine/Karma Chief Records. 

    Say She She Brooklyn Trio
    Photo by Milton Arellano 

    Named as a silent nod to Nile Rodgers (C’est chi-chi!: It’s Chic!”), Say She She, an all-female “discodelic” soul band. Their unique sound is inspired by late 70’s girl groups with the three strong female lead voices of Piya Malik (featured in El Michels Affair, and backing singer for Chicano Batman), Nya Gazelle Brown, and Sabrina Cunningham.  

    Say She She's single “Blow My Mind.”
    Artwork by Alyssa Boni 

    The Brooklyn-based three-part harmony girl group have been making their way throughout the New York City scene for a couple of years now.  Their sophomore song is about returning to reignite the fire of a former flame/love you still have. “‘Blow My Mind’ is about a love that you can’t seem to get rid of and you can’t quite get enough of,” explains Say She She member Nya Gazelle Brown.  

    The pandemic inspired the band, after spending time recording their LP on old tape machines in the basement studios of friends, the Summer of 2022 will see their much-awaited debut album. As they raise in popularity, their songs have garnered over 8.8 million streams, you will not want to miss out on this dynamic trio. 

    As Say She She, they have appeared in Brooklyn Paper and Bushwick Daily. Separately, the members of the band have been covered in: The Rolling Stone, The New Yorker, Billboard, Pitchfork, NPR, Pop Matters, Paste Magazine, Brooklyn Vegan, American Songwriter, have toured extensively with Chicano Batman as backing singers doing everything from Coachella to Tiny Desk, and performed at Gilles Peterson WorldWide Awards in London.

    Listen to “Blow My Mind” HERE 

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