by Dan Goldin (@post_trash_)

Welcome to FUZZY MEADOWS, our weekly recap of this week's new music. We're sharing our favorite releases of the week in the form of albums, singles, and music videos along with the "further listening" section of new and notable releases from around the web. It's generally written in the early hours of the morning and semi-unedited... but full of love and heart. The list is in alphabetical order and we sincerely recommend checking out all the music we've included. There's a lot of great new music being released. Support the bands you love. Spread the word and buy some new music.

*Disclaimer: We are making a conscious effort not to include any artist in our countdown on back-to-back weeks in order to diversify the feature, so be sure to check the "further listening" as well because it's often of top-notch quality too.

CLEARANCE | "Haven't You Got The Time?"

Chicago's Clearance make fuzzy pop songs in wide-screen, there's a larger-than-life feeling to their sun-soaked melodies and the fixating charm throughout their sophomore album, At Your Leisure. The song's are steeped in pop senses, but they eschew tradition structures and simplicity for nuance tucked in every corner, jabbing right when you expect them to go left, and speeding further into an oncoming wall when you think they just might go around it all together, remaining accessibly in tact all the while. "Haven't You Got the Time?," the album's third single is a great example of this, building a gracious jangle while cruising forward on a steady beat, pushing the song's expected limits with an infectious bridge and a barn burning twang that kicks up the dust for good measure.

DAUGHTERS | "Satan In The Wait"

Daughters are back!! We've been waiting for this moment for about eight years now, ever since the noise rock chameleons released their self-titled masterpiece then called it a day shortly after. Well, it's finally official, the Rhode Island luminaries will release a new album later this year on Ipecac Records and the first single (while hinted that it's not necessarily a sign of whats to come) is a slow sprawling piece of noise rock entrails, disorienting and unnerving without ever really exploding. The tension just builds and Daughters knowingly push it toward the edge, but pull back into horror themes, and hypnotic dirges. For a band that has never released the same record twice, their sound is still evolving all these years later, but the deranged feelings of unease are Daughters through and through. Bring the filth, bring the weirdness, we're clamoring for more. Welcome back Daughters.

EXHALANTS | "Latex"

Way back in the summer of 2016 (you remember, the beginning of the end) Austin's Carl Sagan's Skate Shoes released one of our favorite records of the year... and then they broke up. Never to be stagnant for too long, two of the three members regrouped as Exhalants, a modern day noise rock and post-hardcore behemoth, channeling the bile of David Yow with the sharp calculated attack of Unwound and Tar, converging that intensity and intelligence together with blunt force trauma. Their demos hinted at something special. Their upcoming self-titled debut makes good on that promise, a colossal record that's every bit as brutal as it is brilliant. Lead single "Latex" is as good a starting point as any, a song that cuts like rust across soft flesh, ripping through the band's chaotic chord progressions and the heavy pounding rhythms. It's a song that winds itself in circles, exploding in its own corrosive wake with incredible surging distortion and a cavalcade of drum fills.

LALA LALA | "Destroyer"

We've been expecting big things from Chicago's Lala Lala since we first heard 2016's Sleepyhead album, an exceptional record of downer rock songs that resided somewhere between lo-fi slacker grunge and bedroom pop confessions. The band (which once featured both members of Date Night) did some touring with Girlpool, Palm and Frankie Cosmos, and now they're getting ready to release their Hardly Art debut album, The Lamb. The first single, "Destroyer" is everything we've come to love about the project, grim pop structures with Lillie West's stark and confessional lyrics. The song takes a relatively skeletal approach in the opening verse, soaring into the propulsive hook, and back again into the doldrums of the restrained yet beautifully crafted verses. It's a strong first showing from an album we're heavily anticipating.

OPTIGANALLY YOURS | "Hope In Your Eyes"

Originally released earlier this Spring as part of the Rob Crow subscription box from Joyful Noise Records (a collection that includes many incredible releases to come), Optiganally Yours came out of retirement with O.Y. In Hi-Fi, the long awaited and heavily anticipated third album, an exceptional record (and our Album of the Week) that has the duo sounding better than ever before. It's a new shinning moment for the band and Crow, an artist that has never lacked shinning moments. Released to a wide audience on July 20th (because this record is simply too good not to get a full release), the band shared "Hope In Your Eyes," an intricate pop song that layers vocals, lush harmonies, and of course, the optigan, used to create an atmospheric background that's steadily rising, building into a crescendo of Beach Boys-esque glory.

OVLOV | "TRU" LP

Go figure, Ovlov have delivered another masterpiece. Am is a cult classic in its own right, but TRU basically doubles up on all the band's fuzzy pop magic and gives it a fresh coating of sprawling noise pop perfection. As everyone knows, a band is only as good as their drummer and Theo Hartlett absolutely demolishes the record, keeping time but dazzling with every colossal fill, both expected and unexpected, leaving the dense framework for Steve Hartlett and Morgan Luzzi's twin shredding. Each song sticks like melting candy, forever sweet and impossible to ignore. It's pop music at it's best, with its fair share of muscle, emotion, humor, and the looseness of a band excited to make some new music after five years without a record. This one is a classic in the waiting, and it only gets better with time.

PIG DESTROYER | "Army Of Cops"

Maybe it's the times, maybe it's just me, but I've been listening to a lot of Pig Destroyer this year. The Virginia based band's extreme dismantling of grindcore, thrash metal, and noise rock is abrasive and ugly, furious and demonic, and it's just what we needed. Its been six years since the fantastic Book Burner, but the DMV's most brutal metal experimentalists are set to return with Head Cage, a record that promises to be as dark and nasty as the come. Lead single "Army of Cops" is aggressive in most unfriendly of ways, full of lacerating bellows and an onslaught of dense drums that tear between destructive pummeling and a sludgy groove, the song pulling the band into smoke beyond the chaos; a more accessible territory, at least for the moment... but then again, we're still talking Pig Destroyer.

SAUNA YOUTH | "Percentages"

Ever since we first heard Dreamlands back in 2012, we've been in love with London's Sauna Youth, hell, I even like the pun name. The band announced their third album, Deaths, will be out this September via Upset The Rhythm and first single "Percentages" has placed that record at the top of our "most anticipated" list. Doing what they do best, the single is chaotic and vault tighter punk. The introduction's discordant guitar attack stabs with a mischievous abandon, riding atop the motorik groove and just gnashing its teeth all the while. The band's rapid pace and jerky riffs recall this year's Lithics album (another stunning example of post-punk done to perfection), but there's an unpredictability that Sauna Youth achieve in a small window, whirling a tornado one moment and diving into the scuzz the next.

SCHOOL DAMAGE | "Assimilate"

Melbourne, Australia's School Damage are getting ready to release their sophomore album, A To X, just as Summer is ending but the bubbling post-punk band's sound is perfect for the sweltering heat. Featuring members of Chook Race and the always exceptional Ausmuteants, the quartet's sound definitely comes somewhere between the Flying Nun fuzz pop of the former and the deranged Devo-inspired futurism of the later, it's the really the best of both worlds. Their new single "Assimilate" and it's cereal themed lyric video deal with feelings of being and outsider and self-imposed isolation. Taught and punchy, it's a great moment of pop detachment and a fantastic introduction to their upcoming record.

WASHER | "The Scab"

Washer's own Kieran McShane (drums) made a video for "The Scab," one of the endless highlights from last year's sophomore album, All Aboard, a partly conceptual, partly tour video clip that brings new life to one the band's darkest songs. The duo contort chords and expectations, brooding and sputtering with jagged riffs and stop/start rhythms, a jarring display of the band's shouty fuzz punk and garage pop capabilities. The video features a robot named CODY who has made his way to earth and is seemingly just hanging out and being cool. There's also footage from the band's tour with Yazan and Bethlehem Steel, Steve Hartlett (of Ovlov/Stove) breakdancing, and a crab... what more can you want.

Further Listening:

July 09 - July 15:

July 16 - July 22:

Fuzzy Meadows: The Week's Best New Music (July 9th - July 22nd)