Saturday Night at the Howff with sarya, Wraiths and The Solid Bond
howff /haʊf/. A favourite meeting place or haunt, especially a pub.
The Howff is Bella’s Boozer, your virtual lounge for the lockdown. Every week we bring you new releases and recommendations for your listening pleasure. This week we bring you new tracks from sarya, Wraiths and The Solid Bond.
Major multi-talented musician and spoken-word poet extraordinaire sarya has been haunting Edinburgh’s (sometimes) somewhat sequestered nightlife scene for a few years now. They could regularly be found traipsing around the town or performing their lyrical poetry down some secret stairway in some dingy bar – often in a fluffy hat, I seem to remember. Having ‘become more musical in 2017’, their adept word-smithery lends itself to intelligent lyrics and excellent song titles and their latest release, ‘i’ll break my heart (so you don’t have to)’ is no exception. The song is a refreshingly healthy take on unrequited love and friendship, and would be very comfortable played out of the speakers of a coin operated arcade machine.
You can hear more from sarya and support their work at their website here.
Speaking of video games, this next release sent me straight back to the SSX Tricky soundtrack from 2001! The *vibes* left me longing to snowboard down virtual mountains in the pixel snow. Wraiths are a producer duo originating from Ayrshire. Acid House right down to its silver, Roland TB303 heart ‘Midnight Son’ is dark, atmospheric and a bit intense if you’re a fragile wee thing like me.
You can hear more from Wraiths and support their work at their Facebook here.
Harkening back to a time before even 2001, if you can believe it, is Glasgow outfit Graham Hanlon & The Solid Bond‘s new track ‘Hold On (For Better Days)’ – a sentiment I imagine we can all get behind. Written by Hanlon during last year’s summer lockdown, the group is a collaborative project that draws inspiration from northern soul and early R’n’B.
You can hear more from The Solid Bond and support their work at their website here.