On today’s agenda are three songs I listened to a few times for inspiration. I actually had to take a week-long break from writing, thanks to a swamping influx of other work, and it was these little nuggets of music that helped me get back into the groove.

To the artists featured in today’s article, thank you very much! Allow me to repay you in kind. Here’s Mixed-Bag-Mixtape #6!

Haus of Sound

Right after I had murmured to myself, “Huh, very Persona 5,” my mother shot me a side-eye so judgmental that I turned red, mortified, for a full ten minutes. Anyhow, there’s the way to a gamer’s heart.

Cold Shoulder is metal, pun intended. Despite common impressions of the genre, metal music actually requires considerable compositional caution. (Performance, of course, might be another matter.) When dealing with harsher timbres, there exists a razor-thin line between passion and noise – a tightrope to be carefully tread.

Haus of Sound knows this well. From the very first verse, a variety of timbres are employed to balance each other and prevent a one-note sound. The drums are grunge, but the bass is clean. The guitars are distorted, but the vocals possess a clean finish over their raspy quality. The beat is heavy, but high-pitched synths flicker in and out with syncopated emphases… You get the idea.

It’s also crucial to me that rock songs are, oddly enough, melodious. This is the secret ingredient that enables one to rise above the sea of noise – a hard rock tune you can sing along to is an anthem. Cold Shoulder contains within it not one, not two, but three motifs – one per chorus, and one per verse, for two verses. All three are astonishingly memorable. Only memorable tunes worm their way into your ear, and it’s those tunes with staying power.

And finally, we turn to the vocals! Right alongside the motifs, the vocals juggle three diverse characters: bubbling resentment, emboldened declaration, and erratic stress. The starting swagger of the first verse, the subsequent soul of the choruses, and the peak passion of the second verse – all three are characteristically distinct and complement the lyrics' expression perfectly.

All in all, this is what I call a rock single. Their entire album Campfire Stories is stuffed with such bangers, honestly. Do give them a listen!

You can find Haus of Sound’s music on Spotify, or follow their activities on Instagram!

Paul McInnis

Paul McInnis · Afterglow

I hadn’t ever heard of the neo-psyche genre until today! Upon this introduction, I’m fascinated that it sounds like grunge’s chiller-but-perkier cousin, sharing some rudimentary heritage but resulting in radically different products.

When you think of classics like Smells Like Teen Spirit or Man in the Box, their soundscapes are gritty and dark. Afterglow, while possessing a similarly distorted and gritty audio quality, employs a bright soundscape instead, via its Dorian mode. (For all the non-nerds out there, you can think of a mode as a traditional musical scale, modified to extract a specific color or quality. I would describe Dorian as neutral on the warm-cool axis, but bright on the bright-dark axis. Most grunge is cool and dark.) It’s refreshing!

Personally, I also believe that a song deserves credit when it sneaks under your inclination for nitpicky critique and induces you to consume the whole package without judgment. It signals that the work was so cohesive and seamless, so assuredly effortless, that it passively convinced you of its quality. You’ll have to review the content upon inspection, but you can be assured of the craft.

That’s how I felt with the arrangement! It’s all very intuitive, and dynamically so – the drums sprinkle some variety here and there, the bass plays with syncopation, and any would-be empty spaces are quickly filled up by the comping guitars and such. It’s those little things flying under the radar that subconsciously assure you that there are deliberate, intentional humans behind the art that know what they’re doing. Only then can you enter that listening flow-state. What a vibe.

Keep an eye out for Paul McInnis on Instagram, or listen to his music on Soundcloud!

Cleo Cansino

Another kind of music I really appreciate would be stripped-back singles, where there’s nowhere to hide. No flashy effects to make up for a lack of direction. No software to quantize poor timing. No backup to mask poor vocal performance.

Not that Cansino has anything to worry about. With just a guitar and her voice, Serpent Eyes delivers everything she promises – psychedelia, folk, desert noir inspirations; mysticism; and the evocative picture of endless skies. I suspect her all-around strong technique helps accomplish these from the outset – her vocals flawlessly balance raspy, breathy, lilty, and grounded qualities, perfectly embodying the nebulous wisdom of a mystic. The lone electric guitar is kinda reflective of a lone wandering vagrant musing and wallowing by the roadside. I will say, though, that the rounded, dampened timbre and the subdued tonality paint the picture of a desert at dark and not day: barren sand for miles, chilly in the dead of night, drifting along in restless rest.

I also especially appreciate that Cansino doesn’t have to resort to orientalist musical tropes to convey such an image. No need for exotic instruments and scales or exaggerated pitch wavers. It’s not only artistically integrous but evident of technical proficiency; the capability to craft an impression from scratch and not fall back on existing associations, especially when those associations are poor in taste.

All this to say, kudos, Cantino! You’ve earned a new admirer of your artistry, and I eagerly await what else you have in store!

You can catch what Cleo Cansino is up to on Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok, or follow her on Spotify!

Conclusion: Mixed-Bag-Mixtape #6

As I mentioned, I was bummed that I had to take a break from writing for a bit, but I’m glad that these few songs helped get me back into the groove! I love getting to hear and pick apart whatever our indie musicians of today have in store.

If anyone out there has more songs they’d like reviewed, would thoust consider… feeding me our submission box? ;)

And that’s Mixed-Bag Mixtape #6! If you’d like to add on to the conversation, drop a comment below! All you have to do is create an account on iaasmusic.com, and you'll be ready to chime in.