photo by Nolan Zangas


The first time I heard the name Hello Mary I instantly assumed it must be the name of a Christian puppet show like the ones put on by the inimitable Tammy Faye back in the day (RIP) on her TV programs (PTL Club, The Tammy Faye Show) with the phrase “Hello, Mary!” being the first words out of the resurrected Jesus’s felt mouth after He has risen from the dead, waking with a start and one hell of a hangover, and then taking a stroll outside his tomb to see what’s up nevermind that pesky giant boulder in the way only to find Mary Magdalene and “Big Mama” Mother Mary right there outside waiting faithfully for Him to whom He speaks the aforementioned salutation.

Anyway, it’s a theory. Except in this case the reality is even better than the theory because in reality Hello Mary is a young and upcoming NYC-based-indie-alt-rock trio whose combined age is probably less than the age of Axl Rose’s oldest hair extensions and, I’ll just go ahead and say it, each one of Hello Mary’s songs to date rocks harder and more convincingly/compellingly than the entirety of Chinese Democracy.  

Take their latest single for instance released just days ago, “Stinge” backed by “Sink in,” or “Sink In” backed by “Stinge,” these things are difficult to parse in the streaming age. But anyway “Sting” comes first in the running order, a song addressed to a mercurial character who “may be the one for good” but who “leave[s] just as it gets fun” which is precisely why “they said I should run” and sometimes “they” know best and yes I realize there's an unreasonably large gap between the Bandcamp embed above and this text which I blame on the new Spotify-people owners.

Meanwhile the music of “Stinge” (definition: a person or other entity who is stingy) ably captures the emotional whiplash of the narrator’s romantic longings and loser-induced frustrations flipping back and forth between the grinding riff of the song’s intro, the jangly shoegazy float of the verses with some nice off-kilter chords, and the bridge section that sounds something like an underwater waltz. 

“Sink In” comes next which is quite possibly a song about the stark reality of the previous song fully sinking in where “it starts to drift and fall away / mostly from saying all I had to say” which I gotta say jumping straight to the fifth stage of grief in the second song is an encouraging sign of psychological health and if this is what acceptance sounds like then sign me up because this song rips starting off with a James Iha-esque alternation between a contemplative riff and head-drubbing power chords (the “sink in” part) before bursting open like an overpollenated flower full of “oohs” and “ahhs” ascending to the heavens (one of my fave musical moments of the year so far) and oh yeah there’s a guitar solo too with heavy reverb and note bending and more oohs and ahhs over some altered chords and it’s a pretty exciting ride and a pretty one too.

Across these two songs Hello Mary continue to hone their appetizing mix of heavy musical dramatics spiked with an enticing sense of play (cuz dammit these young ladies know how to write a catchy hook that’s for sure just see "Ginger" below) and a trippy psychedelia-adjacent vibe (see “Take Something” above for another example) and when you put together this mix of heavy and light and just plain weird it’s not entirely unlike (wait for it…) a bizarro Christian puppet show or a close encounter with Axl Rose’s dreads. (Jason Lee)

Over the past several months Brooklyn-based duo Dahl Haus has been on a new-single-per-month hot streak, and speaking of “hot” this column is the first in a series of DELI columns called Hot Tracks/Hot Takes where we’ll be focusing on recent singles (or heck maybe even a full EP occasionally) sharing off-the-cuff-yet-penetrating-insights and random associations and total speculations related to the song, or songs, in question. 

Got it? No? Good! Because the whole concept is as nebulous as “Silhouettes and Alibis.”

Dahl Haus are self-described creators of “noisy, dreamy music that's Kool Aid, Pop Rocks & razor blades mixed in a psychedelic blender & served in a dirty glass” and first thing I wanna know is where to find one of these psychedelic blenders. (but, please y'all, wash your glasses!) Next thing I’d like to know is “who’s in the band?” and turns out it’s singer/songwriter/producer/bass guitarist/rhythm guitarist Blaise Dahl and lead guitarist Daniel Kasshu aka Mevius. A couple fun facts from Ms. Dahl’s extensive resume: 1) she’s served as touring bassist for Jennie Vee (herself a bassist!) which means that Ms. Dahl is only two steps removed from Courtney Love (not a bassist!) since Ms. Vee toured with Ms. Love during her joint tour with Lana Del Rey (many of LDR's songs feature bass!); 2) As a teenager, Blaise admirable served on two MTV-sponsored outreach programs—one promoting an anti-bullying platform and the other an anti-bias initiative. Again, very admirable, but thankfully she wasn’t picked to play “Laura” in the commercial below because looks like it may have been pretty traumatizing even for a fictionalized portrayal.

Song #1: “Silhouettes & Alibis” (Release date: 9/17/21) — Forgive my obvious ‘90s bias here but the first couple minutes of S&A hit me like the Throwing Muses/Slowdive/PJ Harvey mashup (Stories From The City, Stories From The Sea era on the latter) I never knew I needed so naturally that’s a good thing. But then a little over halfway through the song suddenly turns a corner and walks right into a wall of stone, stopping short on a next-to-last-sounding-note, before getting all dizzy-headed with an extended outro that opens with a strummed guitar floating in space and then a haunted funhouse organ before a drum fill bursts the song open like an overripe piece of fruit with layers of guitar and emotive lead vocals and ghostly backup singers entering the picture (or at least they sound like ghostly backup singers) before, again unexpectedly, concluding with a “jazz hands” style guitar chord. Hot-cha-cha-cha!

Key lyric: “I built a prison of my own / in solitary walls of stone”

Song #2: “Helium” (Release date: October 1, 2021) — Dahl Haus is a band unafraid to deploy its full array of flange pedals plus all their chorus and reverb and digital delay and overdrive and tremolo/pan pedals and maybe even some wah-wah when it’s called for. This one is the woozy drunk-in-love song of the bunch—think Cocteau Twins meets Bloodwitch and you’re on thew right track—and thus it works well as the sweet gooey marshmallow cream sandwiched between the other two singles plus it’s got a highly melodic and (it sounds like) heavily chorused bass part which also contributes to the weightless, woozy vibe.

Key lyric: “Surrender to the sweet delirium / Your love's like helium / Helium / Gravity's undone”

Song #3: Dreamscape” (Release date: November 19, 2021) — This is the seduction song but a song that warns against being seduced at the same time where “tangled sheets can tie you to this space” (thanks for the warning!) and just when it seems to be about over "Dreamscape" suddenly transforms from a shimmering dreamscape into a woken-with-a-jolt raveup in the vein of a surf or spy movie soundtrack right after the line “who knows if love is real?” (these kids got a talent for sudden transitions!) which makes you realize the whole dreamscape scenario was maybe a bit of a bait and switch when you’re left “looking for salvation / from daylight's rude awakening” which is exactly why you’re advised to buy black-out curtains before listening to this song.

Key lyric: “I charmed you like a snake in the grass”

Look for more hot tracks and more hot takes coming soon! (Jason Lee)

Between the name of the band and the name of their new single (released just today!) and the photo above and the video below, I’m not sure I’d wanna meet Knifeplay alone in a dark alley.

But I would wanna listen to “Hurt Someone” alone in a dark alley because it's perfect music for a dark isolated place (whether interior or exterior) but at the same time perfect music for a place that’s ethereal and womb-like and otherworldly, with the steam rising up from a gutter nearby that catches the blue and pink light cast by neon signs just outside the alley while also diffusing the glow of dancing red and orange flames burning in the multiple unattended garbage bins that dot the landscape of Philly's grittier neighborhoods, or at least they do if you believe what you see in the movies, like in pretty much every Rocky movie where there’s at least one flaming garbage bin to be seen in the requisite jogging-through-the-streets-to-the-strains-of-horn-driven-disco scene.

You can probably tell I’m going for a cinematic vision here and it makes sense because Knifeplay makes widescreen-worthy life soundtracks with layer-upon-layer of oceanic guitars and hovering strings/synths and rhythms like a steady undertow that’ll make you wanna swim out to sea so far away that the rest of the world fades away from view. (or it’ll make you wanna hang out in a dark alley at night, I really need to pick one metaphor and stick with it!)

Anyway, Knifeplay is a six-piece made up of Alex, Johnny, Jack, John, Max, and Tj (no, I have no idea how to pronounce the latter) and according to the official press release released by their record label Born Loser Records it’s “their first new piece of music in nearly three years. Engineered by Philadelphia’s Jeff Zeigler, Hurt Someone offers a dark yet empathetic view of a character who fits right in with the world they’ve crafted in song since their early EPs” and there you have it.

And while you’re at it, you should head to your nearest streaming service asap and check out the single's B-side as well (“Ornament”) which is hardly ornamental because if the A-side is ethereal and amniotic, this instrumental B-side is the side that’ll actually make you feel like you're about to be stabbed to death in a back alley because the track ratchets up the nervous tension with a delicious-yet-demented-sounding dissonance until it builds up and up and up to an almost (almost) unbearable climax and then suddenly jump-cuts to black. (Jason Lee)