2024 was a great year. Real Gone celebrated its fifteenth anniversary. It was the website’s most successful year to date. We picked up a lot of new supporters and covered a wealth of new music. Our detailed reviews continued to be popular with the readers, and our Singles Bar really caught the attention of those looking for a quicker fix of new music.
Tag Archives: koyo
The Real Gone End of Year Round-Up 2024
It’s been another great year at Real Gone. We’ve reviewed countless albums and EPs. We’ve covered a record number of gigs (with Simple Minds and Deacon Blue being particular standouts), and gained support from a wealth of new labels and PR teams. It’s also been the first full year online for our popular Singles Bar – allowing us to take a look at various individual tracks and submissions – which has provided a massive extra stream of traffic.
It’s been a superb twelve months for music, and it’s time to shine a light on the many talents we feel have helped to make our site interesting. We’ve featured a wealth of new stuff. As usual, rock has provided the backbone of Real Gone’s musical interests, but we’ve really gone all out to try and promote some of the most interesting things from other genres, which has made picking favourites a little harder this year.
Watch: ‘Stoneman’ – a brand new video from KOYO
KOYO’s third album, ‘Onism’, (released November 1st) saw the experimental band evolving. The featured material captured many of the complexities of past works, but by introducing a heavier edge in places, the band’s alternative sound embraced more of a post-rock aesthetic. Despite the confident changes and the fact that bits of the material drew from a huge pool of influences, the record proved that KOYO were keen to forge their own musical path.
KOYO – Onism
As a band, KOYO have always been purveyors of interesting rock music, but trying to pin an easy identity on their sound is a thankless task. On their 2017 debut, they jumped between styles, somewhat gleefully, with the semi-psychedelic ‘Lost In The Kingdom’ playing like a lost Jane’s Addiction track overlaid by bleeping new wave keys, ‘Now I Understand’ sounding a bit like a Charlatans deep cut, and ‘Tetrachromat, Pts. 1 & 2’ dipping its toes into a world of contemporary sounding prog, where a complex arrangement was joined by Hawkwind-esque sax work, creating a trippy feel, augmented by a melodic metal undertone. Their 2020 release (‘You Said It’) saw them experimenting with shorter songs and a punchier sound, but for those willing to invest the time, the best songs still conveyed a sense of adventure, with the title cut blending modern indie sounds and a pinch of post rock crunch. Better yet, the album standout ‘Obelisk’ worked a huge art rock sound, where jerky rhythms collided with huge metallic riffs and trippier passages reminded listeners that the band who’d shared ‘Lost In The Kingdom’ just a few years earlier were still there…somewhere.
THE REAL GONE SINGLES BAR #69
Welcome back to the Real Gone Singles Bar, the place where we explore some of the individual tracks that have landed in our inbox over the past few weeks. This time, we have what we believe is one of our most adventurous selections to date. We’ve brought together a couple of downbeat songwriters, a slab of soul with a very dark and arty core, a couple of great rock tracks, and even a track that blends a singer songwriter’s personal side with an almost prog rock grandness. As always, we hope you find something new to enjoy!
*