The musical influences of Sugar World – Katryn and Ryan from Los Angeles – go back all the way to Black Tambourine, who in the early 1990s hid their plain indiepop behind layers of fuzzy shoegaze. I love Black Tambourine – who doesn’t? – and I’m really in love with Sugar World’s latest single White Noise (a pre-release of their upcoming album Supercassettevision). Compared to Black Tambourine, the song is both more twee and noisier, a combination that works really well in practice. I look forward to that full album that Sunday Records will release later in the year.

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The other day, I was talking on Bluesky with Slumberland’s Mike Schulman about the Just A Taste compilation of early singles from Australia’s Summershine label he released back in 1995. All excellent jangly indiepop from down under despite no household name among them, not even for most indiepop fans, though I mentioned The Sugargliders here before. My favourite song on the compilation is 1,000 Years, a beautiful jangly love song by Perth’s The Rainyard. That version isn’t online, this version called 1,000 Days is and I am glad I can share it.

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In the early years of this century, I was pursuing a career in mathematics. At one of many seminars I attended, I may have run into Dan Snaith, who was doing the same, in a similar field (unlike me, he did finish his PhD). Now Dan is, according to Wikipedia, a “composer, musician, and recording artist”. He does so under various names, with Caribou probably the best known. I love Cabirou’s indietronica – indie in spirit, techno in body – and this Broke My Heart in particular; it was one of my favourite songs from 2024. 

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I saw earlier music by The Paranoyds (of Los Angeles) described as “synth punk”. That seems accurate, but on this song (from a just released EP) the synths are less prominent. Punk it still is, but more of the cute indiepop variant (there are ooo ooo backing vocals!), the one that I could imagine being released on K Records. If this kind of music is making a resurgence (this month only, I wrote about Josie, The TSG and Heather the Jerk, all of whom sound vaguely similar), then I’m all for it.

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I often forget what an incredibly unique band Young Marble Giants were. Active for just three years, they released only one album (1980’s Colossal Youth). On Bandcamp they self-identify as ‘post-punk’, a label that is fitting (the prominent bass line in particular), except that this is post-punk stripped down to its minimalist core, creating very intimate music. It makes you understand why generations of indiepop bands mention the Welsh band as an influence. Just like minimalist punk may be the best punk (Beat Happening, anyone?) minimalist post-punk is the best post-punk. And YMG were so good.

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I’m not necessarily proud of it, but these days I find myself regularly singing “Fighting makes you feel strong / Killing really turns you on”. From a song called Death Destruction Mayhem. Huh? My excuse: it is a really catchy song by hardcore punk band Ceremony, from just north of San Francisco. Like, really catchy, showing that hardcore punk is just pop, except sung with a bit more anger. The band has a history on Matador Records, so are no strangers to the indie world, but this song is from an upcoming album on Relapse, which feels a more natural home.

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I am – I may have mentioned this – very song-oriented and with a song comes someone singing. Or rapping, or mumbling even, but still: a human voice. John Girgus (he was in Sarah Records band Aberdeen) has a human voice, I know from some of the other things he released under the name Legendary House Cats. But under that name he also put out three albums with instrumental songs, of which Out Of Reach is my favourite. Field Mice-y synthpop where you expect someone to start singing any moment, except at the end you realise you never missed it.

(After writing this blog post, I discovered there is a non-instrumental version of the song too. Oh well.)

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I have never been to Peru, but I read atlases so I know the country has a huge coastline. I guess people surf. I know for certain there is a band that plays surf garage rock. Manganzoides they are called and they just celebrated their 30-year anniversary with a compilation Dosis completa on local Buh Records (who are worth following if you’re into heavier indie from Latin America). With its catchy reverb going straight back to Dick Dale, this Musaraña, originally from 2001, is my favourite. You might like it too.

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No matter in which order you put the words ‘indie’, ‘pop’, ‘garage’ and ‘punk’, it applies to Heather the Jerk: raw, simple, lo-fi and full of energy. Heather the Jerk is the solo-project of Heather Sawyer from Madison, Wisconsin but because it is 2026 you can sound like a full band on your own, including ooo ooo ooo background vocals. Heather the Jerk released a full-length cassette in February of this year, but those five months since count as fifty punk years, so here is 74 seconds’ worth of new song, just released as a digital single.

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The girl from Broken Social Scene’s 2002 song Anthems For A Seventeen Year-Old Girl (“Used to be one of the rotten ones”) will be in her forties now. Time goes fast like that. The song by the Toronto collective (who are still making music, even though it never again got this good) is timeless though. Dreamy, mesmerizing and the right kind of repetitive – the one that makes you play the song again and again. “Park that car, drop that phone, sleep on the floor, dream about me”. And so on.

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“SEO wet dream”, @ (pronounced: ‘at’) describes itself on its Bandcamp. That is true, but I did end up finding that Bandcamp so we’re all good. We’re also good about the music: a duo making acoustic folk-pop whose influences go all the way back to that folk duo from sixty years ago, but whose more eerie songs could also have been released on K Records. And on this Autosmile, which was just released as a single, they remind me a bit of The Softies. I love this. Don’t @ me. Or maybe do.

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The TSG is a new band fronted by Taylor Stewart, who also plays drums in The Tubs. The latter have gotten reasonably popular recently (reviews on Pitchfork, a Wikipedia page, that kind of stuff), which you’d expect from their fairly polished janglepop. The TSG is not that: raw, simple punk pop that focuses more on making it to the end of the song than on colouring within the lines. And if I’m honest, that’s how I often like my music best. They just released their debut 7” single on London’s Gob Nation of which this Ramones-y Alright is my favourite.

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My favourite Rolling Stones song is Mother’s Little Helper (which is about, to quote Wikipedia, “the popularity of prescribed tranquilisers like Valium among housewives”) but whenever I listen to it, I can’t help thinking of Cresoxipropanediol En Capsule by the late French actress Ginette Garcin, which I like a lot more. In it Garcin, who died in 2010 aged 82, lists a series of fictional medications with long names that she takes whenever she isn’t feeling well. In a glass of sugar water and, probably, with a strong french r.

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Pa pa pa pa pa pa. If you start a song like that, it can’t really go wrong. The Story Of A Fool (As Told By The Fool Herself) certainly doesn’t go wrong. 91 seconds – I counted – of bouncy happy indie punk pop. Josie is from Copenhagen, Denmark, though with members from all over Europe. They list Shop Assistants and Talulah Gosh as their influences (this song reminds me in particular of the former) and have been a support act for Shonen Knife. I can imagine why Shonen Knife would be a fan. I am a fan.

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It is very much not the end of summer here in the Northern Hemisphere and the way things are going with climate change, summer won’t be gone until November, but I’m really enjoying this Summer’s Gone by Oakland’s Twin Bloom. Jangly-but-melancholic indiepop that borrows heavily from Bay Area music from both the past six and past sixty years. Local label Dandy Boy (a favourite here) also mentions Teenage Fanclub as a reference and that’s not a million miles off either. I hope I get to hear a lot more music by the band. Preferably before the summer is gone.

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Bleka Dödens Minut (a band with members from various other Swedish bands) is named after a 100-year old Swedish poem but, as far as I can tell, the eponymous song doesn’t follow the poem’s lyrics. Nor does the music sound as grim as the name, which apparently translates to Pale Minute of Death, or statements like “Life is pain. Get used to disappointment.“ suggest. Rather, this is in-your-face jangle pop that gives you some extra energy at the end of a long day at work. It does that to me anyway.

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I can’t believe it was seventeen years ago that I flew to Berlin to see the Lucksmiths‘ last ever European gig; they have now been a former band for longer than they ever were a band. Of all the bands I love, the Lucksmiths are somewhere near the very top. There are many songs of theirs that I absolutely adore and in recent years I have grown very fond of this cover of a song by fellow Australians The Sugargliders. The original is pretty great already and, I recently learned, is on YouTube. But this version is hauntingly beautiful.

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Beyond ‘favouriting’ the odd song on a music app, I had not paid proper attention to North London’s The Leaf Library until last week. This despite their ‘electric drone pop’, as they call it themselves, really being my thing. Sure, this kind of music, also known as ‘heirs to Stereolab’, can easily become a bit monotonous and hide in the background, but the Leaf Library sounds fresh and exciting even on their fourth album (After The Rain, Strange Seeds, just released on Fika Recordings), of which this Still & Moving is my favourite song. Totally my thing.

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The Chutes are Kenny and Erika, husband and wife from San Francisco (they’re named after a former amusement park in the city), who are about to release their self-titled 7-track debut album on local Dandy Boy Records. This Scraping the Last Bits of Light has been pre-released as a teaser and it really makes me want to listen to the other six songs: upbeat, confident indiepop with call-and-response vocals that befit a married couple. The duo appears to have a history in the local hardcore scene but, no disrespect to punks, there’s very little anger here and I like that.

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Another reunion: after a 32-year break, Heavens to Betsy is playing live again. Heavens to Betsy was Corin Tucker’s band before she formed the better known Sleater-Kinney. I’ve always had a weak spot for them and in particular the quiet, atypically introspective punk of this White Girl, written decades before George Floyd’s murder made some white people confront their inner racism, at least for a while. I hope they play it during their reunion gigs, but even if they don’t it’s worth listening to several times in a row. Especially today.

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