01 Mar 2024 5 min read

5 Bandcamp Friday Picks

It's happening... again. It's that first Friday of the month when Bandcamp doesn't take any commission. To celebrate we have a little discount at the end of this email.

This little bonus newsletter of music recommendations is partly to help those of you who don't know much about my music taste get to know me at the same time as finding someBandcamp releases to delve deeper into.

Please share some of your recommendations in the comments or in this thread (there's also 1000+ community picks to explore).

HEEMS x LAPGAN x SAUL WILLIAMS

"How does my accent sound when I'm dying?" has to be one of the refrains of the year so far. This track feels like it's been pulled from a late 90s OkayPlayer compilation but then falls away.

This is from a new album by Himanshu Suri, better known as Heems, the New York rapper who was once a member of both Das Racist and Swet Shop Boys (the project with Riz Ahmed aka Riz MC aka the lauded actor from Rogue One, Four Lions, Sound of Metal, etc)

Heems’ new album Lafandar is a full-length collaboration with Lapgan, an Indian American producer from Chicago. The album features collaborations with Kool Keith, Open Mike Eagle, Quelle Chris, Fatboi Sharif, Sir Michael Rocks, Sid Sriram, Your Old Droog, Blu, and Abhi The Nomad.

But I wanted to draw your attention to his short and sweet track with Saul Williams, the incredible slam poet who we championed in the early days of DiS. Williams has become a potent, important and eloquent af voice in these dark & stormy days we're living through but somehow his rich tones remain a swinging beacon of hope.

MASSIVE ATTACK x FONTAINES DC x YOUNG FATHERS

Today is your last chance to order this special release in support of in support of Médecins Sans Frontières / Doctors Without Borders (MSF) emergency operations in Gaza and the West Bank.

Flying blind as we're yet to hear the music but given their talents, this is sure to be exceptional, here's some details about it:

The reverse sleeve of the 12” features words written on a hospital whiteboard in Gaza by Doctors Without Borders medic Dr Mahmoud Abu Nujaila – words which went viral on global social media - depicting the desperation of medical professionals and civilians in Gaza. Tragically, Dr Nujaila was killed in a strike a few weeks later.

"WHOEVER STAYS
UNTIL THE END
WILL TELL THE STORY,
WE DID WHAT WE COULD.
REMEMBER US"

3D (Massive Attack) said:

"The hourly scenes of horror in Gaza, with hospitals and schools bombed to dust and innocent civilians, journalists and doctors killed in unspeakable numbers has been made so much worse by more than ten weeks of abject political failure.
We're in awe of the Doctors Without Borders medics who place their lives on the line to help innocent civilians in Gaza. The ceasefire EP is a tribute to them, and their incredible ongoing work in truly indescribable circumstances. We stand in solidarity with the people of Palestine”

HAMMOCK

Hammock is one of my favourite ambient-drone artists.

He has some of that orchestral string magic about his work, which is how 2019 record Silencia opens. It's a graceful slice of a slow sci-fi movie has one of those opener. Everything feels hyperreal when the music is playing and time feels as if slows.

I mentioned Hammock on a recent edition of the Drowned in Sound podcast and a few people - including Bruce Daisey from the brilliant Eat Work Sleep Repeat podcast - asked me what the track was that I was discussing.

LAURA-MARY CARTER

Just before DiS went on hiatus in 2019 we hosted a party at the Ace Hotel in London's Shoreditch. It was a really special evening, with Rhian opening the show (who went on to form Wet Leg a few months after). This was also the first solo show from Laura-Mary Carter from punk-rock duo Blood Red Shoes.

Her debut EP has a country twang (the sort you hear in Jenny Lewis or M Ward or the brilliant solo records by Howling Bells' Juanita Stein) with that desert melancholy you get in a Wim Wenders movie. My absolute favourite tune on the record was debuted at our night. It's called 'A Town Called Nothing' and has that bloodshot-eyes after a night of tequila and 7% pale ales, hungover in Joshua Tree, hoping a plate of eggs will save you (reader, it won't!).

This was released on Blood Red Shoes' Jazz Life label.

DROWNED IN SOUND OFFER

Ok, our fifth choice is something I love so much I released it. So I'll save the praise for other journalists below. It's an album of reworkings by The Anchoress entitled Versions, and to celebrate St David’s Day (and Bandcamp Friday) you can get a 10% discount on this release and everything else in our Bandcamp store using the code “stdavidsday”

We only have few copies remaining of the eco-mix edition of Versions by The Anchoress. Every record is a unique artefact, as the eco-mix process uses elements left over from other pressings. Grab yours before they're all gone.

Praise for Versions

“Beguiling and insightful. This covers collection of tracks by Radiohead, REM, Depeche Mode, Nirvana, the Cure and more is so illuminating.” ★★★★ - THE SUNDAY TIMES

“The Anchoress again proves a singular talent, even on others’ work.” ★★★★ - RECORD COLLECTOR

“A symphony of synths, emoted with intensity… The polar opposite of the renditions common in cloying John Lewis ads.” PROG

P.S. Heard of of these? How about Mannequin Pussy that we recommended in our February music recommendation newsletter, their new album was released today