Dayton, Ohio’s M. Ross Perkins has an affinity for blending 60’s British Invasion music with the sounds of American pop standards with just enough of a contemporary veneer to let you know the sound is an homage to the time, not a hint to its release date.

His third album What’s the Matter, M Ross? Takes the introspective look the album title implies, making it his most existential and transcendental album to date. The album blends cosmic psych pop into the mix, sounding a bit like a Harry Nilsson-Gram Parsons-sometimes King Gizzard collaboration made for a nostalgic drive through Laurel Canyon.

What’s the Matter, M Ross? Is out May 2nd.

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Last year, Monophonics bandleader Kelly Finnigan released his second solo album A Lover Was Born, a stellar study in psychedelic soul extending cleanly from the classic Monophonics sound. A song that didn’t make it onto the album was “Keep Me In Mind,” a smooth soul bop featuring Chicago soul legend Renaldo Domino.

While most of the Monophonics and Finnigan’s solo discographies have a prominent neosoul sound, “Keep Me In Mind” is a cover of a 1967 tune by the New York duo Samson & Delilah and distinctly sounds like a love letter to the classic days of solid gold soul duos. The kind that may have wound-up on the soundtrack of an Olsen twins movie in the 90s.

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Austin psych-rock group Queen Serene was conceived during COVID when former Naked Tungs guitarist Sarah Ronen began writing her own music following the band’s dissolution, but soon realized she preferred creating in a group. Now the group is filled out with Charlie Cassells, Dave Pohly, and co-songwriter Galceran.

Queen Serene’s sophomore album 2 feels out the space rather than filling it like their straight-ahead psych rock debut album did. Leaning into thick-curtained, shoegazey layers, “In A Rut (I’m Stuck)” is a departure from the group’s collaborative songwriting, being one fully written by Galceran during his own COVID rut. But it’s the more cutting edge of shoegaze, providing a trippy, dissonant deluge to get you in the Psych Fest mood.

Queen Serene plays an Austin Psych Fest late night show tonight at 13th Floor opening for SUUNS.

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Welch trio The Bug Club have been continuing the traditions of garage rock since 2016. Short, punchy songs with humorous lyrics and catchy hooks bulk out the group’s discography, and under the freewheeling rollicking is an understated seriousness to their musicianship. Aside from the wild wall of sound that makes the trio sound like a group of six, there’s a metronomic tightness to their seemingly carefree illusion.

As wild as the energy of their studio sound is, to see the trio live is a total mind bender. The frenetic energy of their songs is matched by the kinetic energy ricocheting across the stage, infecting their audiences with their pinball machine vigor.

The Bug Club is currently on tour supporting both their current Sub Pop album On The Intricate Workings of the System and teasing the upcoming Very Human Features out this summer. Their Austin stop brought them to Studio 1A where they made our Friday afternoon feel like anything but a day at the office.

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Austin’s Larry Llodra has fronted a couple of Austin groups including noise rock band UVH. Llodra’s new project Roaring Sun is a hard turn from the hard, fuzzy songs of UVH, opting for a bristly, folk rock sound. The debut album Turn and Wave is melancholic and tender, raw and unflinching. The project was born after Llodra left the corporate 9-5 grind after a health scare for a cross-continental journey to get a hard reset on life and a renewed sense of direction.

“View So Blue” details Llodra’s first brush with lightness and optimism after seeking a fresh start, sitting on a flight heading towards the first leg of his journey, reveling in that first feeling of hope after bucking the burnout.

Turn and Wave is out today, and Roaring Sun’s FREE album release show is THIS SATURDAY, APRIL 26TH AT THE CACTUS CAFE with Jeff Gallagher.

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After over fifteen years of making and releasing music, Austin’s David Ramirez considered hanging up his music career, but he rescinded that notion following the outcry from his fans and a prolonged tenure of soul searching. After all, when raw emotion and critical self-reflection are consistent tenants of your music, sometimes that process can feel like it’s working against the goal of healing.

Four years after his album Backslider, Ramirez released All the Not So Gentle Reminders last month. The album reflects the time following the dissolution of his long-term relationship, whirring through several sounds and moods, sometimes crooney and emotive, sometimes raucous and freewheeling. You’re there on the journey with him.

Ramirez recently took off for a tour across the US and Europe, but before departing, he stopped by Studio 1A with the full band to perform songs from All the Not So Gentle Things. One of those tunes was “I Got People,” a piano ballad lamenting the inability to enjoy or appreciate the great people and opportunities surrounding you because the only person who isn’t around is the only one you want.

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Austin singer-songwriter Taylor Rae released her debut album Mad Twenties in 2021, a release that led to a 30-week stint on the Americana radio charts and opportunities to hit the road opening for bands like the Head and the Heart and Band of Heathens.

After a stretch of playing an average of 200 gigs a year, Rae went back in the studio and last week released The Void, an album that turns inward towards reflection rather than external commentary of forces around her. She teamed up with Grammy-winning producer Eric Krasno, who’s worked with groups like Lettuce and Tedeschi Trucks Band, to fully realize her sophomore album that plays with a lot of different genres, reflecting the growth and changes Rae bears throughout the record.

“Cologne” takes a blusier route as a song that began with simply a riff and a line. It’s about yearning in love and missing your partner, throwing on something that smells like them, and watching the clock tick until they can finally pick up the phone.

Playing the 04 Center this Wednesday, here’s Austin’s Taylor Rae with “Cologne.”

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Earlier this year, Austin’s Kirk Smith released “Julian,” a song about a perpetual miscreant making every bad decision and burning every bridge he crosses. While that version sported a bossa nova shuffle perfect for a dark lounge, he’s now paired with local producer Lars Goransson to remix “Julian” for a new crowd.

The remix takes a synth-driven direction, leaving but a trace of the bossa nova soul of the original and replacing it with chill club beat akin to the sounds of the late 80s and 90s. It’ll feel right at home on your dance playlist next to Ultravox and Robyn.

Kirk Smith celebrates the release of the new remix with a free show tonight at Celis Brewery joined by yesterday’s Song of the Day artist, TV Wonder.

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L.A.’s DUCKWRTH has an adept knack for genre-bending around hip-hop, indie, and electronic music, massaging whatever effect he wants to achieve into his mold. His hip, danceable midtempo grooves have landed him the opening spot on two Billie Eilish tours, his music has been in shows like Insecure and Bel Air, and his song “Start A Riot” with Shaboozey was featured on the widely revered Spider Man: Into the Spider-Verse soundtrack.

DUCKWRTH’s third studio album American F**k Boy is a thoughtfully plotted story that unfolds like a book. Broken down into literal chapters, the voices of notable actors like LaKeith Stanfield give interstitial narration throughout DUCKWRTH’s bear-all odyssey juggling multiple romantic interests, generational trauma, his own self-inflicted patterns leading to toxic relationships. Towards the end, DUCKWRTH describes his ego death necessary to grow, reflect, and move on with a promise to do better.

“Toxic Romantic” kicks off the album with a brilliant display of DUCKWRTH’s groovy midtempo, multi-hyphenate style, punctuating the chaos we’ve been dropped into with a garbled guitar riff and DUCKWRTH calling his pathetic self out with a distorted delivery of the cliché “It’s not you, it’s me. I promise.”

American F*cK Boy is out now on Them Hellas/The Blind Youth.

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Brian D’Addario and his brother Michael came onto our radar back in 2016 as the duo the Lemon Twigs and their debut album Do Hollywood, a throwback splash of 60’s and 70’s rock and pop akin to the Beatles and the Beach Boys.

Now after five Lemon Twigs albums, Brian D’Addario has released his debut solo album Till the Morning, featuring his brother Michael as co-producer, harmonize, and lending co-lead vocals on a couple of tracks.  

Till the Morning is an extension of the early prog rock, melodic folk, and such historically released by the Lemon Twigs, but on this album, Brian got to go even deeper into his influences by working with LA poet Stephen Kalinich, who co-wrote songs like “Little Bird” and “Be Still” for the Beach Boys 1968 album Friends.

The title track from Till the Morning is a fun, upbeat nostalgia trip about finding a tantric escape from the endless whirring of dread in your brain, rolling through classic tales and fables and wondering, “are we doomed to repeat? Have we already?” Right now, that doesn’t matter. Those intrusive thoughts can wait til the morning.

Till the Morning is out now on Headstack Records.

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