* Luan Mei – Yellow
June is Pride Month and normally in a couple of months time, Brighton welcomes LGBTQ+ communities from across the world to our city. Alas this year, we won’t be coming together. Luan Mei’s second single Yellow tells the true love story between two female artists and Yellow describes how one perceives the other, Yellow being her warmth and energy, like the Sun.
This a shimmering pop song about that feeling where two people are as one. The world blurs and you can only see and feel the one you love and they can do the same. Like its title suggests, warm vibes are here for all to bask in.
Luan Mei says ‘releasing this song during June, Pride month, is an essential step to give voice to all the people from the LGBTQ+ community who are not able to live freely, through making visible all types of love and stories’. Yellow is a testament to the equality of love for all.
Yellow is released on 27th June on streaming platforms
* Dog of Man – Take The Edge Off EP
What have you found during the pandemic? A pair of socks? A newfound enthusiasm for baking? Dog Of Man found their new release, Take The Edge Off! How so, you may ask. Like many bands, plans to record new material this year were curtailed but last year they put down some recordings which weren’t originally to be released but the band has had a change of heart.
The four tracks here show where the band are heading and where they’ve been. Two of the tracks are due to be on their next album and the others from the last album but in different versions. Opener Chaos Reigns is a lament if not a celebration of how randomness shapes our lives, for better or worse. Meatcore turns into a finger-picking delight then mutates into the bastard son of Duelling Banjos with lyrics. Stay Human and Turpentine follow in a similar fashion.
This acoustic almost folky version of Dog Of Man gives another side to this most twisty of Brighton bands. If Gomez and The Urban Voodoo Machine had a bunk up this is what it may sound like. The music is toe-tapping and the lyrics add the sour to the sweetness. A Punk Folk stew to gorge on.
Take The Edge Off? I certainly hope not as Dog Of Man are one of Brighton’s most innovative and listenable bands of the last few years.
Take The Edge Off is available on Bandcamp: https://dogofman.bandcamp.com/album/take-the-edge-off
More Dog of Man on Plugged In Brighton
https://pluggedinbrighton.com/2019/07/14/10-questions-dog-of-man/
https://pluggedinbrighton.com/2018/07/01/new-dog-of-man-ep-musically-transmitted-diseases/
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