It’s here! All the best music from the Bay Area in 2024. Or at least the best of everything we listened to (there was a lot).
In this second of four parts, we’ve got selections from the likes of French Cassettes, Jammy, La Doña, LaRussell, Magic Fig, Marbled Eye and Mild Universe, spanning a wide spectrum of sounds – raw indie emotion, whimsical power pop, smooth drum and bass, high-quality hyphy productions, prog rock flair, Mills-influenced experimentalism, and more.
French Cassettes – Benzene
If you wanna know how long French Cassettes have been around, lemme give you an idea: I remember listening to them on my iPod.
Granted, this would have been in the dying days of the device, around 2010-2011, but it goes to show what absolute stalwarts they are of the local scene. After going dormant for a few years, they’ve slowly crept back into the local music world. They’re here again with another full-length, Benzene, out today on Tender Loving Empire Records. It’s an ebullient work: Tracks like opener “Fast Held Hand” and “White Noise” call to mind 2010s British rock—anthemic enough to fill a stadium, but when you listen a little closer, dripping with raw emotion. Others are classic French Cassettes with unabashedly feel-good, sunny-day, guitar-based pop tunes. It’s a trip back to the early 2010s, and comforting to know they’re still alive and kicking.
French Cassettes are one of vanishingly few bands that have stuck it out through every iteration of the hand-wringing over whether music in San Francisco is dead or not, and we don’t celebrate those kinds of bands enough. They just keep making music, their own way, trends be damned.
— Jody Amable
Goodnight, Texas – Signals
Not yet reviewed by White Crate.
GENRES: folk, country, americana
Ismay – Desert Pavement
When I first heard “When I Was Younger I Cried” off of Ismay’s debut record, Songs of Sonoma Mountain, it stopped me in my tracks. I’ll never forget that totally stunned feeling it gave me; it was haunting and desperately lonesome in the way that every quality American folk song is.
On their second full-length, Desert Pavement, Ismay (Avery Hellman) reaches for a sound more upbeat and forward-looking, but still swooningly beautiful. While Songs of Sonoma Mountain was a gentle masterpiece paying tribute to the rural expanse of Sonoma County where Ismay lived, Desert Pavement inches toward the city with rock and roll and even power pop influences, as well as a healthy dose of whimsy – most notably in “I Called You Up,” with its fuzzy ‘90s guitars, and the fun, imaginative romp of “Stranger in the Barn” (check out the utterly delightful video here).
There are still plenty of references to the natural beauty Hellman surrounds themselves with (palominos, doves, rams) in the North Bay, but with Desert Pavement expect a record that is a little more produced and polished from an artist giving themselves a little more—wait for it—free rein. (I’m so sorry.)
— Jody Amable
Jammy – Boysareout
The Carquinez Bridge doesn’t get enough love. Actually a pair of bridges, it connects the East Bay with Vallejo—two regional powerhouses for hip hop. Thankfully, the artwork for Boysareout sets the record straight. Released by Text Me Records, the new EP by Jammy (with features by P-Lo, Nate Curry, and BxRod) booms and blasts its way down the highway, all cold asphalt and door-rattling bass. Yes, it’s hyphy-inspired, but there’s also a nice surprise in the closing track “Nuke,” whipping up Jammy’s bars into a crisp and clubby UK garage banger.
— Ronny Kerr
King Kooba – “Smoking Room”
Not yet reviewed by White Crate.
GENRES: electronic, club, drum and bass
La Doña – Los Altos de la Soledad
Not yet reviewed by White Crate.
GENRES: latin, corrido, cumbia
LaRussell, P-Lo – Majorly Independent
Not yet reviewed by White Crate.
GENRES: hip hop, rap, hyphy
Leaving – Liminal
Where are we going? We hardly know where we are. Psychic impressions of this mystery and magnitude imprint themselves on the cerebral cortex for every moment of sound woven throughout Liminal, the latest album by Leaving on Transylvanian Recordings. In comparison to other recent releases from Transylvanian—like the post-punk of Sectarian Bloom and the wily thrash of Molten—Liminal is a calm, ethereal affair, offering ambient-adjacent post-rock megaliths ripe for meditation. You could write to it, or you could lose yourself in its towering tapestry, exploring themes of “desolation, depression, loneliness, introspection, and the shadows that lurk within the human psyche.”
— Ronny Kerr
Lucy Camp – S’Mores Vol. 2
“So I guess I gotta write my pain cuz you btches just be handing me the pencil”
A year since the first volume, Lucy Camp returns with S’Mores Vol. 2, mashing together more gooey beats, sweetly fluid flows, and mind-crunching lyricism. Clear highlight is the single “En El Amor,” pairing an absolutely addicting all-Spanish hook between the Spanglish bars, the artist swiftly rapping about the tangles of love, all buoyed underneath by a pulsing sexy beat. The entire album—featuring productions by Peter Anthony Red, Televangel, and Near Noir—deftly moves across different moods and styles, like fast flows and breakbeat (“Caught Up”), heady ambient techno (“Oscar”), and a lot of 90s-sounding pop and R&B. As good as a faceful of s’mores.
— Ronny Kerr
Magic Fig – Magic Fig
“We want the music to convey a feeling of both childlike wonder and of death, myth and the unknown.” — Muzzy Moskowitz
Some people enjoy red wine, but there’s a special class of people who go further, naming the exact grapes and valleys they want poured into their glass. So too, there are music fans, artists, and bands who can say with precision that they’re especially adherents of the “Canterbury sound,” a style of avant-garde, jazzy psych rock developed in Canterbury, England in the late 60s, early 70s.
Magic Fig is one of those bands. A new group comprised of folks who have already contributed much to the current Bay Area indie rock renaissance—through Almond Joy, Healing Potpourri, The Umbrellas, and Whitney’s Playland—Magic Fig will debut next week with their six-track self-titled album Magic Fig. From steady rising rock rhythms and double laser electric solos (“Obliteration”) to whimsical guitar licks and lullaby-like vocal lines (“Departure”), the album plays with weird prog rock flair while maintaining the easygoing reverie of an ancient child’s fable.
The band members all live in San Francisco but it’s equally an Oakland record since it was recorded at Santo Recording, released by Silver Current Records, and produced by psych rock whiz Joel Robinow (Howlin’ Rain, Once & Future Band). Maybe one day it will be referenced in the Wikipedia article for “Bay Area sound.”
— Ronny Kerr
Mahawam – Hot Pressed
“Hot Pressed isn’t a concept record, but the songs are collectively about choice and getting out of your own way.”
Anyone whose introduction to Mahawam (aka Malik Mays) took place at the 7000COILS-curated WC04 event last month will have been immediately struck by their seemingly effortless feeling and flow, a celebratory and poised outpouring of voice and heart. Now we get the gift of studio recordings: Last week the Oakland songwriter and producer released Hot Pressed, five delectable indie pop songs distilled from 10, and released by queer artist-focused, LA-based boutique label Molly House Records. Exploring what it means to grow up and come into one’s comfort and maturity as someone who identifies as queer, the 15-min EP bubbles and bounces through upbeat wavy bops, culminating in the hyped up ear worm “Lizard Brain.”
— Ronny Kerr
Marbled Eye – Read the Air
“We all grew up on various strains of guitar music, dance, and hip hop, I guess when you smash all these things together, the common denominator is there’s always gotta be a hard-driving rhythm and a visceral intensity that people can hopefully latch onto–no matter how it’s manifested sonically.” — Michael Lucero
Even though it’s made for and by a generation of genre-agnostic music fans, Read the Air doesn’t deviate from its post-punk sonic palette. And that’s a good thing. Marbled Eye’s influences are there though, and it comes through the punchy drum beats and fills, the drawling depressed vocals, and the spacious, alternately vicious and tinkling guitars and bass.
This is Oakland punk, and it’s been Oakland punk for awhile: Marbled Eye’s quartet is made up of Chris Natividad (also of Public Interest), Michael Lucero, Ronnie Portugal (founder of Digital Regress label), and Alex Shen (founder and manager of the online radio station Lower Grand Radio). Released by Summer Shade and Digital Regress, Read the Air is the second full-length album by Marbled Eye—and it’s one of the tightest punk productions to come out of the Bay this year.
— Ronny Kerr
Margot James – Talker
“What is freedom if you’re not leaving your family in tears?”
Seemingly out of nowhere, Oakland singer-songwriter Margot James emerged with Talker, a seven-track suite of buzzing electric keyboard, gently rocking blues rhythms, and a bright husky voice melodious with introspection and growth. It feels all the more “out of nowhere” because (full disclosure) Margot is a good friend of one of my good friends; I knew she sang and played the piano, but like this?
Recorded at Hand Me Down Studios and featuring a crew of collaborators, none of the songs here warrant a skip: The album opens with the moody slow brooding “Eyes” (paired with a music video filmed in Perugia, Italy), before moving into the ironically light-hearted “Pirouette,” the country dance of “Pinky Fingers,” and so on. Each song a little piece of Margot’s heart, but warm and gentle with the revelations.
— Ronny Kerr
McStravick – Butterflies
Euphoric as springtime, Butterflies is a seven-track album produced, arranged, and recorded by Mcstravick with the help of a few fellow hip hop and soul jazz cats. Featuring a dozen rappers and singers from the Bay, including several contributors to the last Family Not a Group album Rent Check, the release packs a ton of bars, beats, and tremendous talent into a small space. Equipto, a mainstay of SF hip hop since the 90s, flows fluidly and comfortably alongside younger MCs like Professa Gabel, MC Pauze, and Jada Imani. From the tasteful turntablism to the samples, snares, and kicks, it’s all deeply calm and colorful, elevated with Wonka-like wonder.
— Ronny Kerr
Michelle Moeller – Late Morning
“The album is titled as an affectionate homage to slow movers and late bloomers, those who feel perpetually ‘behind.’ Life has a stubborn way of unfolding at its own pace, so let’s go easy on ourselves. There’s much to savor in the process.” — Michelle Moeller
Mills lives on. Recorded between 2021 and 2023 at home and Mills College and released by AKP Recordings in Los Angeles, Late Morning is the debut full-length by Oakland composer and performer Michelle Moeller, showcasing an ear for the unknown and an attraction to the avant-garde. Torquing together prepared piano and electronics (with support from Briana Marela, Wesley Powell, and other collaborators), the album straddles neoclassical studies and experimental ambient soundscapes, simultaneously balancing composition with improvisation. In other words, it’s a bit like life: There’s a plan, one may believe, but often the plan is just an idea that leads to new paths and possibilities. Highly recommended for lovers of solo piano, if you don’t mind the edges giving way.
— Ronny Kerr
Mild Universe – Everything Must Change
Mild Universe wants you to feel good. That’s as evident in their live shows as it is in this record—ten tracks to make you groove, meditate on the interconnectedness of all things, and, most of all, celebrate being alive. The SF-based indie dance collective released Everything Must Change last week, and indeed, nothing is the same. On this self-produced, self-released funky groovy sexy soulful record, bandleader Sam Jones and crew catapult between a kaleidoscope of funk, dub, soul, funk, disco, R&B, and any other textures that might get you in your body and out of your head. This reviewer’s favorite track was “What’s Going On With You?” (featuring James Wavey), a sultry, smoke-filled, horn-punctuated anthem that reels you in with its softness and then seals your fate with a hypnotic repetitive refrain against a snappy snare-accompanied breakdown.
— Ainsley Wagoner
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