Matthew Hemerlein - Gyllenhaal Sandwhich

This song we initially listened to because its title reminded us of Jake Gyllenhaal and we're shallow, but it ended up being entirely brilliant. It has a gorgeous string beginning that morphs into a type of Japanese club waltz, like you could dance into it and never find your way out. Matthew Hemerlein has that Andrew Bird vibe, with unexpected string instrumental and the lyrics of someone who has exuberant amounts of inspiration. The whole song feels very mysterious, with vocals that sound like ghostly whispers and layers of relentless depth in its music. Gyllenhaal Sandwhich is like an abandoned mansion you could explore for days.

Glitter Pox rating: 90% contagious

Hope you catch it,
The Glitter Pox

Hey Ocean! - Alleyways

Hey Ocean! is one of those feel-good bands that make you like people a little bit more. They're like a giant flannel blanket of music, their sound is so freaking comforting. There's a cleanness to their songs, but the vocals have that Ray Lamontagne thing, when a singer is able to somehow project their voice as both smooth and gritty; it's like putting bells on a rhythm stick. They play so well together, too - if you check out some of their music videos, it's easy to see they're tight-knit and and that they genuinely enjoy making music, which is kind of important. Thumbs up.

Glitter Pox rating: 67% contagious

Hope you catch it,
The Glitter Pox

Niki & the Dove - The Fox

Favorite lyrics: I've grown a handsome tall tree, mother/ And I want to bear a fruit for you/ And I've carried your fears and your hopes, father/ I will concur them for me and you

The Fox is 80's Cyndi Lauper meets indie orchestral genius. It has a slow-motion, window smashing effect that's consistently hypnotizing with the vocals, which switch between playful, sultry, and serious. It just has such a huge sound, with atomic-bomb bass and a continuous beat that seems almost irregular, like an off-kilter chase. Some music sounds confined into a certain space, and other music sounds like it has the entire world to fill up. This song is the latter, making The Fox straight audial addiction.

Glitter Pox rating: 97% contagious

Hope you catch it,
The Glitter Pox

Reptar - Sebastian

'Sebastian' has a spacey intro that dead-drops you into an island's heatwave. It's both breezy and chaotic, with such a back-and-forth pacing of peacefulness and disorientation that you don't know whether to listen to it on a hammock or while running for your life. Midsong, the vocals get funky, away from the springy happiness of the beginning melody, before flipping back into the same summer-swim vibe as the start. It's like the switch from a murderous deathglare to a genuine smile, that transition. It makes the vocals entirely unpredictable; sometimes the lyrics are blurred together and other times they're enunciated or shouted through gritted teeth. The music's the same way - it has a really tribal feel, with that quirky as hell Oberhofer similarity, but even though it's so wildly everywhere, the percussion grounds the song. There's so much going on in it that when the last note hits, you're left hyperaware.

Glitter Pox rating: 79% contagious

Hope you catch it,
The Glitter Pox

Tigertown - Lions and Witches

The melody that starts Lions and Witches is the liveliest intro in non-electronic music you'll hear all week. The same melody makes it's way back into the chorus but it's layered under these magically dreamy harmonies that weave in between drumbeats with a really ethereal adventure sound to them. There's an innocent curiosity to the whole song that's replicated by the otherworldly lyrics and Narnia-ish vibe/reference, like you can almost feel yourself parting leafy tree branches to see something new behind them.

Glitter Pox rating: 60% contagious

Hope you catch it,
The Glitter Pox

Cheers Elephant - Get Ya

Get Ya! switches between bored monologue and self-proclaimed insanity. It's like the song's having sets of glorious mood swings, the pacing changes so often but so naturally. Compared to some of their other songs, like 'Leaves,' with a hyperfast melody and slow vocals, or 'Doin' it, Right,' with straight poprock sass, this band obviously likes to experiment with different sounds. Get Ya has this solidly independent, unconventional feel - all bands obviously have inspirations, but it seems like Cheers Elephant has their own definable thing, especially in the coffee-sipping to cavalry-leading vibe change this song has.

Glitter Pox rating: 73% contagious

Hope you catch it,
The Glitter Pox

Low Roar - Help Me

Favorite lyrics: Bones made of glass, I'm starving for someone to feel my blood, my skin.

This entire song is like an echo; the vocals barely pause, long notes running into each other like a string instrument that effectively leaves traces of itself behind. It has the cathartic sadness of bands like The Antlers, with a song that destroys you but leaves you comforted in some kind of numb way. Musically, there's a definite tide to Help Me, with slow strums pulling into the crescendo of overlapping voices before edging out into wariness. The percussion is what makes this embedded song the 'special version' and it adds an element that takes it from sad to soulful, though the acoustic version has just as much impact. Both versions have this eroded intensity, with a sleepy, hollowed melody that's impossible not to sink into.

Glitter Pox rating: 85% contagious

Hope you catch it,
The Glitter Pox

Devin - You're Mine

Favorite lyrics: Oh, they gotta tear the hooks out my heart / So it keeps from breaking

This song is perfection for a punk swing-dance. It has an old fashion edge to the music, but the vocals are so strung out and high energy that it's also fully modern. It has the hotshit checkmark apropos for a good stereo-blasting song, one that makes you feel like everything around you is instantly breakable and you're the one to break it.

Glitter Pox rating: 71% contagious

Hope you catch it,
The Glitter Pox