Songs To Brush Your Teeth To (2nd March)
This week I tried something a little different in choosing my new music recommendations for Songs To Brush Your Teeth To.
Normally I pull my tracks from all sorts of places – past favourites I know have released new music, things that appear in my social feeds, my inbox, community radio, recommendations, support acts at live shows etc etc. And it takes me HOURS. Now I don’t mind that, I enjoy listening to new music and I get more from it than just curating this list for you, but I wanted to see if it really needed to be that time consuming. So this week, I just drew on my social media network: friends recommendations, new followers or favourite artists current favourite artists.
There were a couple of reasons for this. Firstly, and mainly, it was to prove a point to myself. I often over complicate this list like my life (well my entire reputation) depends on it. I overthink it, and I nitpick between 30 songs, all of which are already heavily curated by the time they’ve reached my shortlist and quite frankly are all deserving of a spot. So I wanted to try and be a little freer and a little faster with it.
Secondly, there’s been a lot of discourse about the use of AI, in music, in finding music, and really just in general. And one of the main arguments used is the ‘time saving’ benefits of this, so I wanted to try and show that it really isn’t that time consuming to find new music by real people by yourself. I think the process of finding these songs took me less than 15 minutes and I think they’re all great. I worry they’re a bit ‘samey’ in some ways – they’re all female singer/songwriters for one, but then I remembered some festivals have been putting the same all white male bands on their line up for the last 20 years and I quickly got over my worries.
BB Sabina – In between
I love the haunting vocals on BB Sabina’s In between. Coming out of my Ethel Cain haze after her awesome gig this is exactly the kind of music I needed to hear. It’s got these powerful guitars and the track itself almost feels angry, but then there’s this contrast of the very evenly delivered, somewhat restrained vocals. The result is something between a hymn and a rock anthem and I absolutely loved it.
Find out more about BB Sabina here.
Aaliyah Bise – Talk Too Much
I really enjoyed this new release from Aaliyah Bise – Talk Too Much. It’s a very 90’s inspired pop track with such an infectious rhythm. It’s the most fun sounding song on this week’s list as it’s such an upbeat song musically, but the lyrics definitely carry some sadness. It struck me as one of those tracks you can put on when everything isn’t going quite right and you just want to dance it out, or put yourself in the mood for a night out; when you don’t need to hear “everything is perfect” but you still want to have fun.
Find out more about Aaliyah Bise here.
Emmy Ryan – A Place To Call Home
Continuing with the down to earth folk pop journey I’m currently taking, I stumbled across Emmy Ryan’s A Place To Call Home – a sad reflection on the challenges of life for many at the moment. Primarily focused on the cost of living crisis right now, it candidly speaks on the realities of this and it has lovely lyrical moments like “on old Kent Road the sun don’t seem to shine as bright as it does up in Mayfair”. I also really loved the banjo riffs than carry the undercurrent of the song.
(This isn’t a new track, but it still felt very relevant and it’s new to me and I make the rules about how this list works)
Find our more about Emmy Ryan here.
MAY-A – Taste My Tongue
So many people in my circle have been raving about the new MAY-A album Goodbye (if you call that gone), and there’s definitely several tracks from the release that could have taken this spot. I went with Taste My Tongue as it was the track that stood out to me on my first listen on the album. I love the moody guitars, the dreamy elements and the flow of the lyrics from short choppy, almost chanted sections to these big slowly swooning lines.
Find out more about MAY-A here.
Alayna – Tiny Spaces
I played this to my partner and he said “this sounds like your kind of music” which means sad girl folk tinged (in case you are wondering). My listening history will prove that’s a lie, but I did really enjoy this release from Alayna. It’s very soft edged and stripped back. I like how it’s talking about love sitting in tiny spaces, the everyday, and it’s almost as if the track makes itself reserved and small so that it doesn’t break that spell of gentleness. As if it can’t be too bold or it’ll overwhelm that idea of the love that just sits there through the every day moments. I haven’t had a chance to listen yet but this definitely makes me keen to hear the rest of Alayna’s recently released sophomore album, Set Her Free.
Find out more about Alayna here.
So, after the fact I decided to check my inbox and I found that two of these songs had actually been pitched to me this week (which is roughly where I usually end up. 2 songs come from pitches in my inbox, the rest come from elsewhere). It’s not a rule, it’s just what typically happens. Anyway I thought it was interesting that I went around this totally differently and probably came up with a fairly similar result to my usual process. Happy listening 🙂
All our Songs To Brush Your Teeth to can be found on our playlist for new music:
Apple Music and Spotify versions of the playlist here.
Let us know in the comments which track is your fave!