Finest New Indie Music This Week: Chat Pile, Touché Amoré

Indie music has grown to incorporate a lot. It’s not simply music that’s launched on impartial labels, however speaks to an aesthetic that deviates from the norm and follows its personal weirdo coronary heart. It might probably come within the type of rock music, pop, or folks. In a way, it says as a lot concerning the folks which can be drawn to it because it does concerning the people who make it.

Each week, Uproxx is rounding up one of the best new indie music from the previous seven days. This week, we bought new music from The Treatment, Chat Pile, Scowl, and extra.

Whereas we’re at it, join our e-newsletter to get one of the best new indie music delivered on to your inbox, each Monday.

Chat Pile – Cool World

Every thing is fucked up, and the 4 members of Chat Pile are effectively conscious of that. It’s a merciless world we dwell in, and the Oklahoma Metropolis noise-metal specialists made an album about it known as Cool World. Their 2022 debut album, God’s Nation, abounded with immediately memorable strains about Grimace from McDonald’s and the ever-worsening housing disaster in the US. On its follow-up, Chat Pile air some extra grievances, particularly ones about Israel’s ceaseless, brutal violence towards Palestinians, the predatory nature of the army industrial complicated, and the inseparability of home and worldwide struggles. It’s all set to the grimiest, grittiest music on the market, with basslines that hit like sledgehammers and guitar riffs and drums more durable than concrete. “No method out,” screams Raygun Busch on the album nearer. He could also be proper, however at the very least we’ve Chat Pile to channel our collective anger.

Touché Amoré – Spiral In A Straight Line

Since their 2009 debut, Touché Amoré have rightfully turn into post-hardcore legends. With each throat-shredding scream, frontman Jeremy Bolm packs an album’s value of emotions right into a single couplet: “Is it sufficient / To name it off,” he yells within the refrain of opening observe “No person’s.” Spiral In A Straight Line, the SoCal band’s sixth studio LP, additional refines the high-octane hardcore and emotional catharsis they’ve all the time been identified for. Bringing in collaborators like Lou Barlow on “Subversion (Model New Love)” and Julien Baker on album nearer “Goodbye For Now,” Touché Amoré develop their sonic universe, one surefire anthem after one other.

Ekko Astral – “Pomegranate Tree”

It’s unattainable to disregard Israel’s genocide towards Palestine, one that’s solely getting worse and increasing into different components of the Center East, too, comparable to Lebanon and Iran. America has lengthy been complicit on this genocide, actively funding it and aiding one more Nakba, which displaced over 750,000 Palestinians again in 1948. Jael Holzman and Miri Tyler of Ekko Astral had been raised Jewish, and, as Tyler describes in a press assertion, “the truth that these atrocities are being carried out within the identify of our religion, tradition, and group – effectively, it’s sufficient to maintain us up at night time.” Ekko Astral transmit that fury into “Pomegranate Tree,” the D.C. punk band’s newest single. It’s a six-minute art-rock opus that simmers with rage, grief, and dread earlier than all of it boils over when Holzman repeats again and again, more and more extra intense within the tune’s closing moments, “the district sleeps atoned tonight!”

Jim Legxacy – “aggressive”

Jim Legxacy fused hip-hop, Midwest emo, and Jersey membership on final 12 months’s masterful mixtape, Homeless N***a Pop Music. That file earned loads of deserved consideration with the American Soccer-esque guitars on “dj” and the Miley Cyrus sample-turned Afrobeats bop “mileys riddim.” The rapper, singer, and producer is already again with “aggressive,” his first single for brand spanking new label house XL Recordings. Taken from his forthcoming mixtape Black British Music (2024) (nonetheless no launch date, sadly), it’s proof that Jim Legxacy wasn’t a flash within the pan. He’s right here to remain and make a number of the finest pop music round.

Kim Gordon – “Bangin’ On The Freeway”

The Collective, the second solo album from Sonic Youth co-founder and visible artist Kim Gordon, is a transparent spotlight of 2024. It was launched again in March, and Gordon has up to date that preliminary launch with a deluxe model, that includes two bonus tracks. “Bangin’ On The Freeway,” the brand new bonus observe, hinges itself on a Jersey membership beat gone haywire. Gordon’s frantic supply of the title and Justin Raisen’s grainy, clattering manufacturing slot in completely with the world Gordon created on the album correct.

Jeff Parker – “Late Autumn”

In 2022, Jeff Parker and his ETA IVtet launched Mondays At The Enfield Tennis Academy, their first double album, a curation of dwell classes recorded on the Los Angeles cocktail bar from which the quartet takes its identify. Parker and his band have a particular historical past with ETA, having accomplished a residency there starting in 2016 till it closed in December of final 12 months. Whereas Mondays was taken from quite a few classes on the bar, the jazz guitarist’s new album, The Manner Out Of Simple, was recorded and blended dwell in a single night time in January 2023. Totaling greater than 80 minutes and comprising 4 discrete items of improvised jazz, The Manner Out Of Simple celebrates the venue that hosted Parker and his ETA IVtet for seven fruitful years. “Late Autumn,” its 17-minute lead single, captures the camaraderie shared amongst Parker, saxophonist Josh Johnson, double bassist Anna Butterss, and drummer Jay Bellerose. From the light guitar arpeggios that slowly yield to a stunning sax solo close to the midway mark, “Late Autumn” memorializes ETA, but it additionally exhibits that one of the best music can itself turn into an act of preservation.

The Treatment – “A Fragile Factor”

New music from The Treatment is the remedy all of us wanted. “A Fragile Factor,” the most recent preview of Songs Of A Misplaced World, has been within the alt legends’ dwell rotation for a few years now, however ultimately we lastly get to listen to the correct studio model. Like earlier single “Alone,” “A Fragile Factor” evokes the band’s darker, icier data like Disintegration or a glossier model of Pornography or Seventeen Seconds with its ethereal piano, chorus-soaked guitars, and sweeping wind chimes. Nov. 1 cannot get right here sooner sufficient.

Youth Lagoon – “My Lovely Lady”

Heaven Is A Junkyard was one of many standout indie rock releases of 2023 and marked the grand return of Youth Lagoon. The Idaho-based musician Trevor Powers saved up the momentum with standalone singles like “Soccer” and “Lucy Takes A Image” this 12 months, and now he’s again with “My Lovely Lady.” It relates a narrative of Powers’ journey to a distant cemetery, the place he discovered a headstone adorned with solely three phrases: “My lovely lady.” Just like the message that impressed its creation, “My Lovely Lady” is concise but no much less heart-wrenching. Composed of sparse piano chords and Powers’ hushed timbre, Youth Lagoon’s newest tune evokes the haziness of reminiscence and misplaced love.

Hey, Ily! – “Wind-Up Toy”

If Brian Eno made music for airports, then Hey, Ily! makes music for Tremendous Smash Bros. The emo five-piece’s newest preview of their sophomore album, Hey, I Detest You!, is a stirring collage of chiptune, post-rock, and math rock. “Wind-Up Toy” shifts gears with the dexterity of an Elite Smash participant, making instrumental prowess and simultaneous style workout routines sound straightforward and fluid. It’s the kind of tune that solely Hey, Ily! might pull off.

Scowl – “Particular”

Even with only one full-length LP to their identify, Scowl are already stars within the hardcore scene. Because of a extensively disseminated hate5six video of the Santa Cruz band acting at a Sonic Drive-In, Scowl have captured the eye of not simply their punk friends however full-on establishments like Taco Bell and Coachella. Freshly signed to large indie label Useless Oceans, Scowl is again with “Particular,” a brand new one-off single harking back to newer teams like Meet Me @ The Altar and Pinkshift whereas evoking legacy heavy acts like Deftones. Cut up between clear vocals and screaming, thunderous toms and chugging guitars, “Particular” would possibly simply be their finest tune but.