I wasn't planning on doing another volley of singles until next year, but I've been sitting on a lot of interesting titles, plus let's face it, life is kinda short. This assortment is a pretty good cross section of what I try to feed you these days, but I like to think they're a cut above what I might post on say, a random Wednesday in May. Download links in MP3 or lossless FLAC are available at the end of the post. With that in mind let's proceed.
Waxing Poetics - Hermitage/Return 7" (1984, Celery)
Perhaps the pinnacle of all the singles I've shared in the last 365 days. I haven't featured anything by
Waxing Poetics since '08. This dandy 45 exudes more than a wink and a nod to vintage R.E.M., with "Hermitage" appealing to the same pleasure centers that made everyone's first spin of "Radio Free Europe" such a revelation. As it would happen, two year later Peter Buck would co-produce this Norfolk, VA quartet's debut album, also titled
Hermitage.
The Deflowers - New Day Tonight/Ten Days (1992, Stand Like Cleopatra)
I don't think there's a note by the Deflowers that's passed my ears that I haven't taken an automatic liking to. These Seattle denizens bore a far greater resemblance to Buffalo Tom than Mudhoney, and were all the more stimulating as a result. A thoroughly winsome mix of melody and sophisticated song-writing chops. Check out their even more cranking Shiny New Pony album and other assorted releases from the link above.
Square Root of Now - But She's a Nice Girl/Dream Belief (1984, DeWeese Music Prods.)
I've been besotted with the
Square Root of Now's 1987
Bent Around Corners LP ever since I happened upon it sometime in the early 2000s. And why shouldn't I be obsessed with that album's often surreal but consistently sublime reinvention of new romantic synth-pop? SRN were kind enough to bequeath us that one mesmerizing full length, but there was a single that preceded it, and here it is. They hadn't quite fully grown into their sound at this point, so to speak, but this was a solid start, especially the jaunty A-side.
- two days wide/disappear (1994, Mallbunny)
Evidently this one's so scant that even the mighty Dicogs isn't providing an entry for it. A co-ed quintet from the college town of Ithaca, NY,
Beatrice Blinded's take on dream pop was heavy-handed to a fault, and no doubt why they needed to employ multiple guitarists plus a pedal/effects-board the size of a small canoe. Think the first Lilys album and some of Velocity Girl's nascent shoegaze forays. A little formulaic by todays standards, but B/B were something of an anomaly in their day.
Nu-Este - From This Side of the Window/If You Want (1982, Intense Intents)
This was another ace discovery this year. Nu-Este were from Philly, and by my estimation the gentlemen in this trio must be hovering around 60 y/o or thereabouts these days. All the accumulating years aside, this is really smart, edgy post-punk sporting an artful flair that thankfully doesn't do so at the expense of eschewing some poignant melody on the driving, mid-tempo "From This Side..." Vaguely reminiscent of Mission of Burma and Middle Class, Nu-Este opted to volley their tunes at a somewhat milder pitch. As coincidence would have it, our fellow blogsters at Systems of Romance did a piece on this single a couple of years ago, but the rip you're getting here is completely unique.
Whooping Cranes - Hope/Stopped Breathing (1986, Zip)
I did an entry on the Whooping Cranes
That's What I Need album one whole decade ago, so it's about time for a follow-up, eh? The band's skittish aplomb and endearing quirkiness on both of these two verbose tracks should've slotted in like a glove on college radio. The Cranes sounded like they were grazing on the same plateau as contemporaries Agitpop and Nixon's Head, if those names happen to ring a bell. Really nails the dual creative/charming bullseye, and I'm very much liable to revisit their aforementioned follow-up LP for dessert .
Seattle was more than kind to a clutch of raucous guitar bands during the early-to-mid '90s, but the Emerald City had no pity on the seemingly neglected Deflowers. Swampy, angst-addled grunge rawk wasn't quite their bag, but the quartet's riff-savvy crunch more than compensated for that soon to be played-out trend du jour. Shiny New Pony is a wellspring of unabashed power pop, frequently propelled by a punky fervor. The most accurate comparison I can conjure up is one of The Deflowers east-coast contemporaries, Lotion, but Husker Du wouldn't be off the mark either. This album was recorded and mixed by one Kurt Bloch, of Fastbacks fame and many other production credits. The Deflowers followed up Shiny New Pony with Fin, a comparatively tamer affair. If you enjoy this disk (and I think you will), please partake in my earlier Deflowers post for a bitchin' single they released in 1995.
Someone recently inquired if I had 
