This visit to the Singles Bar brings some great music, ranging from a 90s influenced alternative pop tune, to a strange slice of prog that sounds like it should score a folk horror film, to a brilliant soul tune with a timeless quality and even a hard electronica number that marks the pinnacle of work from cult act. You’ll find a couple of names making their return to the SB this time around, but the selections are anything but predictable! As always, we hope you find something new to enjoy!

*

Billed as a “love song to the 20th Century”, Laptop’s ‘Indie Hero’ is an alternative pop banger in every sense. From its opening salvo of huge harmony vocals, through its punchy rhythm and powerful, retro synths, the number oozes a smart and almost knowing coolness that gives the pop number a genuine spark. It might not be as quirky as their earlier ‘I Don’t Know’ – an absolutely flawless alt-pop workout – but it’s definitely a little more commercial. The broader vocal provides far more of a radio-friendly hook, whilst a very gentle nod to ‘Odelay’ era Beck in the melody department really helps to make the track to feel like something from a previous era…in the best possible way. If you’ve found a love for Laptop previously, this is set to be in heavy rotation.

Here’s some 90s nostalgia of a different kind from Parisian band Dewey. The relatively new arrivals whip up a classic shoegaze sound on the brilliant ‘Jinx’. From the opening notes, a solid drum part powers a fine groove, and a wall of guitars chimes against a solid bass. It’s far more melodic than a lot of the genre’s pioneers – there’s definitely a slither of indie melody contrasting the semi-woozy feel that the likes of My Bloody Valentine wouldn’t deem necessary – and the way a busy and almost otherworldly keyboard line layers the melody with something a little busier definitely gives the performance far more of an uplifting quality. It’s possibly still introspective enough to not make a huge impact on first listen, but over time, a great riff and repeated hook will hopefully convince you that this band’s retro sound has the makings of something great.

The Gold Needles serve up a very familiar sound on ‘Crescent Moon’. From the outset, a strong rock-pop melody is augmented by a bluesy lead guitar, whilst a very natural lead vocal is fine fit, even if it isn’t the most melodic. Fairly quickly, the band’s sound – an unexpected marriage of John Hiatt and Walter Trout – takes hold in such a way, you might even think you’ve stumbled upon a deep cut from 1990. Rarely a band to take too much of a pedestrian route, the Needles elevate things further with the help of a few chorus harmonies that tip the hat to more of a power pop influence, and an instrumental break rocks things up a little with the help of a Thin Lizzy inspired twin lead. Hearing everything together, it works, and somehow, it’s familiarity ends up being its greatest strength. If you fancy hearing something that plays like an old Bob Harris favourite – at least in the days before the “Whispering” legend turned more of his attention toward country music – then this is definitely worth checking out.

Continuing a run of great releases, Brat Farrar sound like a force of nature on ‘Tower of Lies’. From the opening notes until the last, the track hits hard with a razor sharp rhythm, hammering through some fierce garage punk that takes the spirit of the early Hives and smashes it through the heart of Aussie punks The Saints to create something utterly thrilling. Joining the ferocious riff comes an equally repetitive lyric which proves to be as catchy as hell, and with everything drenched in a wave of distortion, it creates the kind of track that garage punk fans will absolutely love.

It’s always a thrill when a brand new artist absolutely nails a classic sound, to the point where the listener could mistake their recording for an archive release. This single from new soul artist Brother Wallace is certainly a case in point. The track has a brilliant analogue sound that allows the bass and keys to really punch through, but the vocalist also maintains a captivating presence with the kind of huge vocal that calls back to Arthur Conley and Otis Redding. Combining that with a really punchy horn section bringing a superb melody throughout, this sounds like the ultimate tribute to the Atlantic and Stax sides of 1967. An absolutely stunning track.

Stretching out to almost eight minutes, progressive rockers Raibard aren’t thinking small with ‘Postscript’, but barely a moment of the epic track feels wasted. Growing from a scaled back melody that blends an indie-folk guitar melody with a Scott Walker-esque vocal, the track takes in jazzy chords set against a very 70s rhythm, heavy beats that seem more attuned with old Tuatara records, Zeppelin inspired rhythm guitar work, and even a Doors-like darkness. By the time everything descales enough to reveal a string-led melody that evokes old mellotron sounds and a few more 70s prog melodies, those who like this will likely love it. With everything shrouded with an ominous tone, this recording doesn’t have a particularly accessible quality, but the band are clearly hoping their fans will be on board so they won’t be too reliant on word of mouth to bring new ears to the track.

Skinny Lister’s ‘Down On Deptford Broadway’ album was terrible. The band’s faux Pogues folk punk schtick sounded completely forced, and the bulk of the songwriting was poor. A few years down the line,‘Tumbling Into Something’ is a single that’s far more accessible. The slow tempo makes for a great atmosphere, and the acoustic instrumentation backed with subtle percussive elements taps into a fine folk sound. A soft vocal is hugely sympathetic to the track’s laid back feel, gliding effortlessly over flowing piano and strident bass, but it’s the more traditional elements here that really catch the ear: accordions and whistles really accentuate a Celtic quality and there’s something lurking at the heart of the track that feels more influenced by Mike Scott than Spider Stacy. It’s still hard to imagine these guys being anyone’s favourite band and, unfortunately, the accompanying album reverts to drinking songs and sub-Pogues dirges in record time after this, but briefly, it’s nice to hear Skinny Lister tackling something with an actual melody.

In the first quarter of 2025, The Null Club released ‘Slip Angle’, a really abrasive single that blended electronica and post punk to create something really arty. As the year pulls to a close, Null Club mainman Alan Duggan-Borges is back…and with something even more challenging. ‘Overgrown’ (featuring lax vocals from Miss Grit) opens with deep drones before exploding into a world of hard beats, creating something that sounds like something Winx might have dropped in the mid 90s, or an Underworld remix aimed at the hardcore market. It’s more concerned with setting a repetitious groove in place than anything else, but the way the track builds brings enough of its own atmosphere before settling into a full on attack where a huge sounding, retro club oriented rhythm pummels the listener into submission. Blending dance and electronica with a pinch of the industrial, the bulk of the track certainly doesn’t hold back. If that’s not enough, the coda confronts the listener with distorted loops and handclaps, taking the once sharp sounding rhythm somewhere almost atonal, and by the time everything descends into a wall of white noise, Alan clearly knows that the six minutes have taken his audience from unease, into euphoria and back again. It won’t entertain the dance averse, but what ‘Overgrown’ does, it does brilliantly.

November 2025