Feel good hits of the 25th July

1. 'Honeymooning Alone' - Bat For Lashes
Taken from her typically spellbinding fourth LP The Bride, a concept album that's set to be one of the subjects for discussion when we record Episode 7 of Sounding Bored this evening. The record has a whole narrative arc, but it's no surprise to me that one of its bleakest moments is my current stand-out.

2. 'Elevator Operator' - Courtney Barnett
Sometimes I Sit And Think, And Sometimes I Just Sit might be old news to most people, but I'm still playing it to death. The album opener has recently been released as a single, and the accompanying video features a feast of cameo appearances from the likes of Sleater-Kinney, Jeff Tweedy and The Drones (the latter dressed with delicious incongruity as businessmen, sharply suited and glued to their phones).

3. 'Parasaur' - Maiians
Local groovemeisters with the most Holy Fuckesque song on their debut, which I've just reviewed for Nightshift. As for the video - well, any excuse for a food fight.

4. 'Bovina' - Turing Machine
The drop on 5:06 is one of the best things you'll ever hear, I promise.

5. 'Punks In A Disco Bar' - Beach Slang
Missing Japandroids (or The Replacements, for that matter)? Don't fear, Beach Slang are here with tracks like this, taken from a forthcoming second album that's not only called A Loud Bash Of Teenage Feelings but that also features the tracks 'Wasted Daze Of Youth' and 'Young Hearts' back to back.

6. 'The Kiss' - Judee Sill
I've been meaning to listen to some Judee Sill for a while, but it was this Toppermost article that finally pushed me into doing so - and I'm pleased to report that 'The Kiss', a track covered by Bonnie "Prince" Billy back in 2004, is pretty special. She's somewhere between Natasha Khan and Karen Carpenter, and her fondness for religious imagery, background in church music and bookish appearance are deceptive - as this Observer piece reveals, her life was plagued by tragedy and drug addiction, her talent sadly squandered or at least frustrated.

7. 'Ice Cream And Sunscreen' - Martha
As has been pointed out elsewhere, given that Martha hail from the County Durham village of Pity Me, surely they should be an emo band rather than politically engaged pop-punkers? The quartet, about whom I was tipped off by fellow Sounding Bored podcaster Niall, are playing an Oxford show next month - if I'm lucky, I might just get along.

8. 'Monoliths' - Maserati
Very definitely in the same ballpark as Turing Machine, with whom they shared a drummer (the late Jerry Fuchs, also occasionally of LCD Soundsystem, The Juan MacLean and !!!), and US labelmates of Mono and Explosions In The Sky (among others) on Temporary Residence. An album purchase is required, methinks.

9. 'War Pigs' - Black Sabbath
It doesn't matter how many times I listen to this song - I just can't get over how monumentally shit that ending is.

10. 'I Was A Teenage Werewolf' - The Cramps
The Cramps are such an oft-quoted reference point that I thought it was high time I went back to the source. In the main: frantic, scratchy, messy, primal renditions of 'Johnny B Goode' (though 'I Was A Teenage Werewolf' is a little different - slower, for a start). It's not hard to see why the likes of The Birthday Party, Jon Spencer Blues Explosion and The Jesus & Mary Chain were so fond of them.

And here's the Spotify playlist (minus Maiians, and with Turing Machine's 'Bovina' conjoined to the previous track on the album).