Kula Shaker – My (life in) music lists

Playlist: New tunes from 2024, part one

Well, hello there. Did you miss me?

Yes? No?

It’s been a minute (or over a month) since I last posted to these pages. This hiatus wasn’t planned. Life just happened to get in the way, as it has a habit of doing.

My intention was to post this first part of my annual playlist of new tunes just over six weeks ago. The playlist was put together, vetted, and reviewed near the beginning of April, and yet, I didn’t have the words to go with them.

Indeed, 2024 has been a mixed bag so far, good times and bad. Stuff has happened, life has moved on, and yet, I’m not sure I can point to anything specific or any detail anything of note for the first three months of the year. Nevertheless, if I look back at the previous year for comparison, I gotta say things are an improvement, right?

Right.

Well, at the very least I can point to music as a constant in the pro column. There has been some brand new discoveries, as well as new stuff from old faves. The music has definitely been there. And for that, I am grateful.

This will mark the sixth year running that I’ve done this exercise of sharing the best of the new music that has caught my ear during the year in playlist format. As I have for the last few years, I’ll be doing a separate part for each quarter of the upcoming year. This first part here is made up of twenty five songs from albums released between January and March and all things being equal, you ‘should’ see twenty-five more songs from the spring months at some point in late July.

So without further ado, I’ll present the music that has helped keep me going over the first three months of 2024. Highlights include:

Starting at the midway point in the playlist, we have “Caesar on a TV screen”, a single by British indie buzz band The Last Dinner Party and listening to it, it’s obvious that they are worthy of all the hype heaped upon them
Speaking of expectations, lots have been heaped upon the new album by Liam Gallagher (Oasis) and John Squire (The Stone Roses) and in my opinion, the results have been mixed but on certain singles, like “Just another rainbow”, we have seen these expectations realized
The Jesus and Mary Chain are a band that are revered for very good reason and their latest fits right in with some of their best, “JAMCOD” is just a perfect example of how excellent this band still is
Dan Boeckner has wowed the indie music world with the various projects he has unleashed over the years, like Wolf Parade, Divine Fits, Handsome Furs, and Operators, and “Don’t worry baby” is just one of the many great tracks on his debut solo album
Closing things off with “Peace sign”, the first single released off “Interplay”, the latest and very excellent album released by shoegaze icons Ride

Here is the entire playlist as I’ve created it:

1. “Literary mind” Sprints (from the album Letter to self)

2. “Sometimes, I swear” The Vaccines (from the album Pick-up full of pink carnations)

3. “No caffeine” Marika Hackman (from the album Big sigh)

4. “How lost” The Fauns (from the album How lost)

5. “Gone” The Umbrellas (from the album Fairweather friend)

6. “Say goodbye” Future Islands (from the album People who aren’t there anymore)

7. “I got the fear” Torres (from the album What an enormous room)

8. “Change my mind” NewDad (from the album Madra)

9. “Waves” Kula Shaker (from the album Natural magic)

10. “Language” New Model Army (from the album Unbroken)

11. “Caesar on a TV screen” The Last Dinner Party (from the album Prelude to ecstasy)

12. “Hollowed out” Ducks Ltd (from the album Harm’s way)

13. “House of self-undoing” Chelsea Wolfe (from the album She reaches out to she reaches out to she)

14. “Terrible news” Middle Kids (from the album Faith crisis pt 1)

15. “I want to be with you” Lime Garden (from the album One more thing)

16. “The spark” Elephant Stone (from the album Back into the dream)

17. “Water underground” Real Estate (from the album Daniel)

18. “Bubblegum dog” MGMT (from the album Loss of life)

19. “Just another rainbow” Liam Gallagher & John Squire (from the album Liam Gallagher & John Squire)

20. “JAMCOD” The Jesus & Mary Chain (from the album Glasgow eyes)

21. “The summer of hate” The Dandy Warhols (from the album Rockmaker)

22. “Don’t worry baby” Boeckner (from the album Boeckner!)

23. “Lover’s leap” Elbow (from the album Audio vertigo)

24. “Evil spawn” Waxahatchee (from the album Tiger’s blood)

25. “Peace sign” Ride (from the album Interplay)

Apple Music fans can click here to sample the above tracks as a whole playlist.

And as always, wherever you are in the world, I hope you are safe and continue to be well. Above all, enjoy the tunes.

If you’re interested in checking out any of the other playlists I’ve created and shared on these pages, you can peruse them here.

100 best covers: #62 Kula Shaker “Hush”

<< #63 | #61 >>

When I sat down to write this post, I was framing it as cover of a song by Deep Purple but then, I quickly learned that theirs was a cover as well. Indeed, the song was originally written by Joe South and was performed by his friend Billy Joe Royal in 1967, though Joe South himself recorded and released a version of it the following year. It is obviously a great tune. Royal’s original, as well as a cover the same year by Australian band, Somebody’s Image, the famed Deep Purple cover in 1968, and our feature today, the one by Kula Shaker in 1996, were all hits for their respective artists. You can’t argue with that.

You also can’t argue with that ear worm hook. The nonsensical lyrical line would be instantly recognizable to anyone: “Na na-na nah, na-na nah, na-na naaaah!” (If that doesn’t ring any bells, just press play on either of the embedded YouTube videos below.)

Billy Joe Royal’s original (as I just recently discovered) is a classic, soulful, rock tune, indicative of its time. It’s got plenty of layers – rumbling bass, horns, tambourines, dancing guitars, backing vocals – and yet, it feels quite insular due to its production. In fact, if you listen to the stereo version available on Spotify, the weird mix puts the tambourine at a higher level than the guitar at times. And at just under two and a half minutes in length, it pales in all ways to the heavy psychedelics in the four plus minute cover by Deep Purple, all whirling hammond organs and bongo drums and fun.

Even though theirs is shorter, you kind of feel that Kula Shaker was aiming for more of the same feel of the Deep Purple cover than that of the Billy Joe Royal original. Recorded as a stop gap single between their wildly successful debut album “K” at the end of the Britpop blaze of glory and their sophomore album that unfortunately came too late, Kula Shaker’s “Hush” was a rage of 60s psych rock that incorporated within it, a decidedly 90s alternative guitar rock sound. It didn’t mine the Indian spirituality and traditional eastern folk that was the band’s hallmark in the late 1990s, instead going for the jugular with straight ahead rock. It’s a driving drum beat, screaming organs, raging guitars, and Crispian Mills letting his voice breathe right out there with the best of them that have covered this song.

This may be an unpopular take but given how taken I was with Kula Shaker at the time, how could I not love this cover better than all the other versions I have heard? (The Deep Purple cover is a close second though…)

Cover: