Waterstrider, Holger, Miracle Parade [monday Threesome]

Welcome to another edition of Monday Threesome, where this week we’ll primarily be focusing on artists with beat-driven songs. Each of these musicians use rhythms as the root component of their music, whether that means sunny afro-pop guitars and beats or bouncy percussion behind a sad country song.  Enjoy!

Featuring clean yet complex guitar lines and rubbery walking bass parts this, Waterstrider’s (@waterstrider_) music is the perfect indie-pop band for those who love African guitar music or Paul Simon’s Graceland. “Midnight Moon”, for instance, combines lovely acoustic guitar and heartfelt vocals with sunny, biting electric guitar and tribal drums for an excellent musical stew. The band also brings in lush accompaniment from their multi-instrumentalists including flute and synths. The band’s debut EP is available here for free streaming and name your own price download.

Sao Paolo, Brazil’s Holger (@myholger) are gaining critical acclaim for their music and reportedly amazing live shows. The instrumental interplay from this psychedelic-pop band is absolutely outstanding. The guitars switching from clean, picked lines to more rocking, distorted strums, and the keyboards swirling around each song is something to behold.  The multi-vocalist approach also serves the band well, adding great variety from throaty to yelpy, sweet to angry.  They use their Brazilian heritage to great affect, as the African-Brazilian rhythms give a funky, dance quality to the catchy pop.  Their debut full length Sunga is available to stream in its entirety here and to download for 5 dollars.

Boston born Miracle Parade (@miracleparade) (formerly Forest Fires), a primarily country influenced rock band, with acoustic driven songs, may initially seem slightly out of place here. Listen to the drum track on “Sweet Tooth”, though, and it’s clear that the bouncy percussion makes the song. The drums could simply have chugged along, as many rock songs are wont to do, but here they add a wonderful quality to the songwriting. Primarily the work of Christopher Pappas (some other musicians contributed guitars, pedal steel and vocals) and pieced together during various apartment sessions around Boston, there’s an immense, personal quality to each song. It is an impressive achievement, as the songs are full bodied when they need to be, and intimate at other times. Hark! …and Other Lost Transmissions is available for a name your own price download and full streaming here.