Welcome back to the Real Gone Singles Bar, the place where we explore some of the more interesting individual tracks that have landed in our inbox over the past few weeks. Following the festive selection, this collection of tracks returns to “regular programming”, with a slab of garage rock, a pleasingly subtle work from an Irish singer songwriter, a previous release given a huge remix, a perfect pop punk track, and more besides. As always, we hope you find something new to enjoy!
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It’s been a couple of months since Real Gone last visited Boston, but the city has continued to deliver more than its fair share of underground sounds. In this round up, we bring you ten of the more interesting cuts that have landed in our inbox, ranging from blue collar rock, to cinematic pop rock, and even a dash of punk. Those of you who have followed us for some time will certainly recognise a couple of these names by now, but we hope you find something new to enjoy!
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In 2021, The Stripp contributed a couple of brand new tracks to a split EP with Electric Frankenstein. At that point, the Aussie band only had a sole EP to their credit, but their material ran rings around the veteran punk and roll band. Electric Frankenstein still sounded good, of course, but they were no match for the fiery, still new band who’d been paired with them.
A few years on, it seems that The Stripp have lost none of their spark. Released ahead of a full length album, this pair of tunes capture all of the sharp edges and the genuine excitement of their earlier work.
In the summer of 2025, The Rockerati released the ‘Black Book’ EP, a four song release celebrating a retro rock style that built upon the year’s previous single releases in a way that suggested the Brighton based band had reached peak confidence. Their earlier releases had attracted attention from a couple of major rock mags, but there was something about these DIY recordings that came a little closer to sharing a raw and honest sound.
Around the turn of the millennium, the oddly named Drool Brothers delivered a self-titled debut LP that shared a world of different rock and funk influences to create an interesting listen. ‘Fullerton’ somehow managed to fuse baggy-centric rhythms, garage rock guitars, psychedelic elements and semi-spoken vocals without sounding too messy; ‘Happiness Fair’ filled a couple of minutes with heavily treated voices and dance-y beats; ‘Can’t Lick It’ threw a world of fuzz guitar over an upbeat groove and peppered with it with a world of surf tinged melodies and a keyboard sound that felt as if it paid homage to ‘Schoolhouse Rocks’; ‘Blue Velvet Pig Mask’ sounded like a Funkadelic tribute, by way of a rock band deep into experimentation. Better yet, the album’s stand out, the effortlessly cool ‘Lay With It’, worked keys and horns into a soul groove that paid homage to Jr. Walker & The All Stars. There might be many words to sum up such a record, but “eclectic” fit the bill better than most, and while it didn’t always sound like the creative endeavours of the same band, somehow, the Brothers managed to make it all work.