Windy Pop Weekender – Sunday

Julia Steiner writes songs, sings, and plays guitar in the Chicago indie rock band Ratboys. She’s been writing whatever pops into her head since 2006 and has no intentions of stopping.

When the world — and his previous band Star Tropics — crumbled in the early days of the pandemic, Chicago’s Loren Vanderbilt began rebuilding himself through song. Daydreaming to the chime of IRS-era R.E.M., Felt, The Railway Children, New Order, and 90’s staples like Ride, Pale Saints and Slowdive, he fell backwards in time through records as a means of escape. To break away from the present and embrace the nostalgia of musical eras gone by, Loren formed Humdrum — a band built around his favorite elements of dream-pop, indiepop, shoegaze, and new wave.

On his debut album, “Every Heaven”, Loren establishes himself as a talented songwriter and master of melody across 10 tracks brimming with jangly guitars and lovelorn vocals—all punctuated by the pulse of a driving beat. A deeper listen reveals a juxtaposition between the album’s carefree melodies, and its sobering truths about the life, loss, and the questions of being a queer 30-something artist. With “Every Heaven” Humdrum has presented 10 songs that speak to life’s dynamic moments. And they can’t wait for you to hear them.

Holy Pinto is the indie-rock group led by songwriter, Aymen Saleh. It originally began in his hometown of Canterbury, England and now based in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. After settling here by way of touring-happenstance, the sound grew from its pop-punk origins into multi-genre-influenced indie– the songwriter tradition donning a multitude of colourful clothes.

Nectar is an indie punk band from Champaign, IL founded by vocalist, songwriter, and guitarist Kamila Glowacki in 2014. Now joined by drummer Jake Mott, bassist Isabel Skidmore, and guitarist Ivan Catron, Nectar has stayed true to their punk and DIY roots and created a fully realized version of Glowacki’s quick and catchy beginnings. Their debut full-length, Knocking at the Door (Infinity Cat Recordings, 2018), introduced their energetic, melody-driven sound and earned praise from Bandcamp for songs that “would have been perfect on the soundtrack for the movie Clueless.” Their sophomore album, No Shadow (Lauren Records, 2022), continued to hone their sound — a vibrant mix of powerpop sweetness and punk grit — capturing what The A.V. Club called a “wonderfully infectious sense of breezy, distorted joy… where blissful harmonies meet pealing riffs and major-chord sweetness.”

Emily Jane Powers plays rock and roll music with her friends. Over 20 years, her music has evolved from rough-edged bedroom pop, lushly orchestrated folk, searing guitar-forward rock, and back again.