The Best Indie Songs of 2015 - Record/Start

Remember the first time you heard Weezer? If it was an outrageously joyful moment read no further. Just press play on Record/Start’s Rock From Afar (Feb’15). This is the same hard edge of indie rock, pop-punk, infused with 60’s surf pop melodies.

Rock From Afar opens with a glockenspiel playing the melody and flows into a hard rocking groove. The rest of the song is there, pack full of sweet as saccharine Beach Boys vocal harmonies and Weezer flourishes. A tune with some sensitive sentiments about wanting to be popular by manipulating appearances, nonetheless it rocks so hard you could bounce a dime off its ass, and sure as shit is one of the best indie songs of 2015.

“Then late at night we jumped the fence and got wasted in the pool

I had so much time for you, girl I wished you felt it too

But damn, one heart flutters, not two"

Rock From Afar is a double A side single from the Brighton one man band Record/Start that is Simon Callow. He is a multi-instrumentalist who has been recording his own music and releasing it since early 2014.

Shit you need to know:

Rock From Afar was touted by this reviewer as the “perfect feel-good anthem with driving guitars and beautiful layered vocals.”

This person thought “The softer touches are what makes the song stand out so much.”

Record/Start's newer influences include M83, The Joy Formidible and Metz.

Record/Start's older influences are 18 Wheeler, Silver Sun, ELO, Led Zeppelin, The Pixies and the Beach Boys.

Record/Start have been compared with Weezer, Waters and PAWS. Other comparisons are Los Compesinos! and early Blur.

Music industry types have a hard-on for this music. Simon was approached by Post/Pop Records, who release The Subways and Ash, to record for them. A Japanese label, This Time Records, also took an interest and released his tune.

Simon played in a Manchester alternative rock band Carlis Star before striking out on his tod.

So you’re looking for more cock-punching hard-rocking tunes by Record/Start?Try Followay or Electric Minds. Make yourself happy you did. The man is a genius.

Whilst reminiscing about Weezer’s Blue Album I was reminded of this cut from the English (albeit formed in New York) alternative rock band Spacehog and their exceptional hit emblematic of the times In The Meantime (1995).

“And in the end we shall achieve in time, the thing we call divine,
When all the stars will smile for me”