Italy
Track: Dead Miranda (fka Unruly Girls) launch an excoriating sonic rocket with ‘Your Slice of Pie’: a blistering debut.
Italian electro-punk noise merchants Dead Miranda have shrugged off their outer shell of Unruly Girls and emerged like a dark gothic vampyric butterfly from the pupae of their former selves. Their new single ‘Your Slice Pie’ is a sonic assault of distorted, shredding guitars, ominous dark synths and an insistent percussion that hammers and claws …
News: Italy electro-fuzz anarchists Unruly Girls are now Dead Miranda, but the sonic brilliance remain the same.
We here at Backseat Mafia have been following closely following the career of Luca Zotti in his various guises, from Sweet Jane and Claire back in 2014 (see our review of their album ‘Sticky Caramel Mind’ here) to the recent Unruly Girls (see our review of 2020’s ‘Epidemic’ here). Throughout this time, there has been …
PREMIERE: Stream Bebawinigi’s intense, experimental second album ‘Stupor’ and read a track-by-track guide
Virginia Quaranti’s second album as Bebawinigi is a wild ride, firmly rooted in the worlds of the experimental and avant-garde, yet simultaneously welcoming and compelling. Melding classical composition with metallic intensity and even finding time for a detour into repurposed film soundtracks, it doesn’t defy description so much as offer enough twists and turns that …
News: Italy’s magnificent Stella Diana are back with news of new album ‘Nothing To Expect’ and with another atmospheric slice of gothic shoegaze in new track ‘Sleepless Girl’.
It’s been a while since we last heard from one of Italy’s most exciting bands coming out of the burgeoning psych/shoegaze scene in Italy over the last five years. Stella Diana have made a triumphant return with the shimmering and atmospheric single ‘Sleepless Girl’. Stella Diana excel in creating a chilling sonic architecture to their …
Premiere: Italian darkwave maestros Ostara’s Bless unveil the stark and beautiful video for industrial gothic sounds of ‘Fear Of The Neglect’
The single ‘Fear Of The Neglect’ from Italian group Ostara’s Bless has a luscious, layered industrial stomp with a barbed-wire spine and a dark ominous insistent thrum. We are honoured to be able to premiere today the rich and beautiful video for the track that comes off the band’s epic ‘Masculine/Feminine’ double album. The track’s …
Album Review: CLUSTERSUN’s Avalanche is a magnificent, mesmerising and eviscerating piece of gothic shoegaze magic
‘Avalanche’, the new album from Italian shoegaze behemoths, CLUSTERSUN, clearly sets out its sonic intent from the very beginning. ‘Desert Daze’ is an aural buzzsaw, tilting along a thundering rhythm section with sonorous, razor sharp guitars and impassioned vocals. It is a wall of sound filtered through by flange, reverb and feedback that leaves one …
EP Review: Italian shoegaze outfit 7Mondays release sky-scraping debut EP ‘Sent’
Italian duo 7Mondays have just released their debut EP ‘Sent’: a collection of three songs that draw strongly on a shoegaze sound tempered with a touch of emo and post punk rock. The EP is topped and tailed by an intro and outro effects. Opening track ‘What’s Best to Die For’ is a shifting, changing …
EP: Brenso – Demo EP
Brenso (from Bologna’s slang BREve + inteNSO — Short + Heavy) formed in Bologna in 2019. The band defines its music as post-covid, over-the-counter rock, influenced by the many sounds and experiences of its members: from Grunge to Desert rock, through punk, hard rock and 1970s psychedelia. The Demo-EP ‘Brenso’ was recorded in a one-day …
Premiere: Milano indie giants The Ghibertins reveal their exciting new single ‘20149 – Milano’, with announcement of a new album for 2022.
Backseat Mafia is honoured to premiere the new vibrant and cinematic single from Italian indie rockers The Ghibertins – a visceral and sinewy track that has an endless vista, wider than the sky, and is just as immersive and mesmerising. It’s an anthemic, emotional roller coaster that is bold and magnificent. A punchy and scything …
Track: Little Suspicions deliver a breath of fresh air with the assured single ‘Lime’
There is a cool and assured swagger to ‘Lime’, the new track by Little Suspicions, that gives it a bright and fresh vigour. The attendant element of theatricality – crooning vocals, a kind of sixties gloss to the thundering reverb-soaked guitars, sweeping strings and doo-wop backing vocals – gives this track an indelible sheen. Of …