Song of the Day

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March 31, 2023

Steel Gemini: “Twin Flames”

By: Jack Anderson

For wannabe solo acts, the endlessness of electronic music and accessibility of home studios offers an appealing amount of autonomy; rather than recruit a rag-tag rhythm section or accompanist and tease out tunes take after take, you can hunker down, sequence all sorts of sounds out, quantize if needed, and call it a day. And like Toro Y Moi’s Chaz Bundick with his dance alter ego Les Sins, Austin producer-singer Joy Baldwin’s been intermittently stepping away from the guitar-pop court of King Air to reign over retro synth tones, samples, and loops as Steel Gemini.

Steel Gemini pairs Baldwin’s penchant for sassy and accessible pop formulas with ’80s-style drum programming, alternative-inspired chord progressions, and a ton of LFO love. Contrastingly titled, “End of It All”, Steel Gemini’s debut single dropped midway through last December. Just before SXSW, Steel Gemini’s second installation “What Would Your Girlfriend Say” cemented Baldwin’ as ‘s coquettish creativity within the electro-pop crowd. There haven’t been any overt suggestions of a full Steel Gemini record release quite yet, but we’ll buddy up and throw elbows the second there are.

Today Steel Gemini torched us with brilliantly bombastic 808s, Timbaland-derived MIDI choices, club-ready snaps, hazy harmonies, and untethered melodies with the hot to the touch “Twin Flames”. Only way to get burned by “Twin Flames”? By not cranking it all the way up and letting the bass rattle you right out of the work week.


Episodes

February 4, 2025

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We love a side project, don’t we? Especially when ace collaborations are involved. For a couple of years, Ley Line’s Emilie Basez and Kate Robberson have been creating music as a Her Mana, honing an even earthier and more ethereal sound with the same incredible complex guitar noodling, harmonies, and wide range of world instruments […]

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February 3, 2025

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After many years of winning the hearts and ears of Austin music lovers both as a solo artist and as a member of the psych outfit Acid Carousel, Gus Baldwin’s name has been in the mouths of bookers and promoters for years, and more recently, he formed Gus Baldwin & the Sketch. And while it […]

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January 31, 2025

Glassreel: “Myself Included” [PREMIERE]

Winnepeg’s Glassreel is a masterclass on the hard-to-nail trifecta of layers, technique, and breathing space. Nothing is simple, but everything is effortless. Following their 2022 debut Lustre, the group returns with “Myself Instead,” a song that shows the further fine-tuning, cohesion, and boldness the quartet has been building on. While the Belle & Sebastian and […]

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January 30, 2025

Lola Tried: “Degrader”

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January 29, 2025

Valley Flower: “Run Buddy”

Rolling into Austin like a quiet, yet alluring fog from the Midwest and Appalachia is Valley Flower, a groovy bluegrass quintet that brilliantly weaves in those regional influences to offer something a little different to the stalwart, homegrown scene here in Austin. And 2024 was very fertile for Valley Flower. They opened for several national […]

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January 28, 2025

Yahtzee Brown: “Take It Back”

I know you’re already fantasizing about your first road trip of 2025, so here’s a new add for that tried and true playlist. Austin’s Yahtzee Brown takes a myriad of inspirations to create his own brand and generation of country-psych, or what I prefer to call Cosmic Country. And while the songs of Townes Van […]

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January 27, 2025

Skateland: “Postcards” (Recorded Live in Studio 1A)

As Love Austin Music Months enters the home stretch, let’s visit a recent Studio 1A from an old friend. Skateland played our Free Week Show in 2023, and the next month he was our Artist of the Month ahead of his debut EP New Wave Revivial. In the almost two years since, he’s played SXSW […]

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January 24, 2025

Kirk Smith: “Julian”

Kirk Smith has been kicking around Austin and our airwaves for some time, and last Friday he released “Julian.” “Julian” opens with a melancholy, bossa nova shuffle, setting the stage for a worried heart. But it’s not love, it’s sadness for someone you watched from afar decades ago. Lamenting the tale of a John Bender […]

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