Hello world,
Here’s your latest FP Picks update .. loads of great new music as always inc trx fm WENCH!, Geese, Wyldest & lots more. If you like what you hear please follow and share this playlist, it helps us keep doing our thing by getting the algorithms on our side. Also please support the artists featured in any way you can!
Until next week
Helen (Futureproof) x
Mên An Tol – Not Ideal
London five-piece Mên An Tol have shared their uplifting new single Not Ideal, taken from the upcoming EP This Land and produced by Carlos O’Connell of Fontaines D.C. Frontman Bill Jefferson says: “To burn with desire and keep it quiet is punishment. So I wrote Not Ideal, it’s the feeling of unrequited love set to classic pop tune. It’s a live favourite without people even hearing a recording of it so we wanted to get that right. Going into the studio with Carlos felt like a great marriage, he totally understood the soul of the song and with his production and playing took it to the level it called for.” Carlos added “It was a real honour and a pleasure to work with Mên An Tol. A talented and promising band.”
bar italia – Cowbella
Feisty trio bar italia are back with their cutting new single Cowbella – grungy, gritty, and a bit sexy. It comes with a chaotic video bathed in neon colors involving a sort of sweat shop, some robberies, and prison. Blending a motorik Bloc Party drive with a fuzzed out vocal and guitar pairing, bar italia are bolder and weightier than ever. The shifting vocal lines between the trio keep things dynamic and fresh, with Nina Cristante’s equable tones contrasting to the wild exaggerations of Jezmi Tarik Fehmi. A sparkly and psych-inflected coda closes the track with a bright openness reminiscent of early 90s Sonic Youth.
The Clause – Elisha
The Clause have shared their upbeat new single Elisha, taken from the upcoming debut album Victim Of A Casual Thing. Vocalist Pearce Macca states: “Written like a diary entry that was never meant to be read, Elisha is a bittersweet anthem about the one who never really let go of my heart. It captures the ache of still being tethered to my first love. Despite trying to move on and trying to feel the same way about someone else, nothing’s ever stuck. I’m clinging onto teenage memories like an addict who can’t get clean. Writing Elisha was a way of saying all the things I’m not brave enough to say out loud. It’s about feelings that have etched themselves onto my skin like a tattoo, only to wonder if this was all just my fantasy and doubting if they ever really felt the same at all?” With its earworm guitar riff, shimmering synth textures and great lyrics, we’re loving this catchy indie anthem.
FLEECE – Chequebook
Montreal rockers FLEECE have dropped their banging new single Chequebook – an infectious, summery anthem with punchy guitars, soaring choruses and powerful lyrics. The band’s Megan Ennenberg states: “It feels really good to get loud and call out unchecked greed. The kind of greed of people in power who are hot for hoarding wealth while so many go without. It’s angry, sassy, and meant to throw a punch at the illusion that success should come at the expense of others. It shouldn’t.” Known for their genre-blurring sound, melding alternative pop, indie rock, psychedelic textures, and jazz, FLEECE has long balanced dreamy introspection with biting critique. Chequebook marks a new tonal shift for the band: more direct, more urgent, and more self-assured than ever.
Humour – In the Paddies
Glasgow’s Humour recently dropped their new single In the Paddies, taken from their forthcoming debut album Learning Greek. Frontman Andreas Christoloudis states: “In the Paddies is from the point of view of a character who summons various members of the dead throughout history to rise in a muddy field and asks them what it would take to allow their souls to rest peacefully.” The album combines lithe riffs, throat-stripping intensity and a crushing take on the fabled loud/quiet dynamic. The track doesn’t rip through you like previous hits Yeah, Mud! or lead single Neighbours, but Humour prove their versatility here packing In the Paddies with the same level of technical ability and punch while also toning things down.
LAWN CHAIR – War Machine
Berlin-based indie punks LAWN CHAIR have shared powerful new single War Machine, taken from their debut album You Want It! You Got It! and it’s a taut, emotionally charged single that channels raw energy into a poignant tribute to frontwoman Claudia Schlutius’ father, a Vietnam vet and Alaskan fisherman. Fusing jagged guitars, electronic flourishes and searing lyricism, the track captures the band’s signature blend of punk urgency and art-rock edge. Recorded between late 2023 and late 2024, the album draws on themes of identity, disillusionment, and absurdity in modern life — with sonic nods to grunge, post-punk, and art-rock, interwoven with a playful experimental edge.
Wyldest – All It Would Take Is A Phonecall
Singer-songwriter Wyldest (aka Zoë Mead) has shared the captivating new single All It Would Take Is A Phonecall and states: “This song is about the loss of communication in relationships – particularly with reference to family ties. Those are particularly interesting to me as I’ve experienced and seen in others within the western world, family bonds can sometimes become default, whereby parents, children, siblings can easily become strangers, however this invisible expectation of a bond holds people together, despite the cold reality of a bond that perhaps once existed fading into nothingness.” The single marries skeletal guitar lines and airy production with Wyldest’s weightless vocal, channelling the emotional precision of early Cat Power or Sharon Van Etten.
Geese – Taxes
Geese announce third album Getting Killed with soaring new single Taxes. The meditative track kicks off with some tribal drumming, as frontman Cameron Winter croons: “I should burn in hell/ But I don’t deserve this, nobody deserves this.” According to a press release, the album “obliterates any expectations the band has set with their discography to date … After lighting the fuse with the beguiling post-punk experiments of their 2021 debut album Projector and the rollicking cowboy rock record follow-up of 2023’s 3D Country, Getting Killed examines the wreckage of blowing up those ideas and picking up the pieces to form their own bold and exacting vision.”
NewDad – Roobosh
Irish rock band NewDad have dropped their new single Roobosh, taken from the upcoming album Altar and it’s NewDad at their most self-assured and unapologetic yet, airing frustrations and embracing rage. Blending angsty gut-punch vocals with a catchy pop-sensibility, frontwoman Julie Dawson adds: “Roobosh is just about being fed up. I wanted to write one song for the album that allowed me to shout, to get out all my frustration. Women get angry and we are expected to contain our rage but on this song I just allowed myself to go there. I wanted a song where I could moan and scream cause we all need to do that every once in a while and honestly it was just a bit of fun, letting myself get angry when I never allow myself to.”
WENCH! – Be Tame
Warren Records‘ feisty punk trio WENCH! are back with their creatively named 4 track EP: Relaxing Rain Sounds For Baby Sleep. Fuelled by female rage, the EP deals with issues close to the band’s heart, like confronting what we’ve been conditioned to accept, embracing the emerging LGBTQ+ landscape plus kicking against societal pressures & calling out predatory men. Be Tame is a protest track about rejecting societal demands for constant restraint. It’s about slamming your foot down, shaving your head, being ‘difficult’, ‘unladylike’ & no longer wanting to pretend, while recognising the adversity many face when trying to embrace their truest self. The band state: “The EP is truly ‘Wenchy’… raw, unfiltered & certainly not polite! Riot Grrrl punk at its best!!
You can check out the whole playlist here. Please follow the socials below for our weekly updates and share about the place!
