Brutal Beauty

On Sunday, we did a walk through the Upper East Side to discover brutalist architecture in New York. Elke conducted some research on the web and with ChatGPT after we visited the Barbican Estate in London. The Barbican is a city within a city complex built in the 1960s and 1970s with apartments and facilities for the performing arts.

While our interest in brutalist architecture was recently piqued, I have been confronted with it throughout my life, as the ugly modern style is considered a blight on a city. Once, my grandfather, in his function as a city council member in the southwest of Germany, helped approve a brutalist elementary school building, and my dad used to make fun of it for its unimaginative ugliness.

I’ve never fully agreed to that point of view. I like the geometric shapes of those buildings. I appreciate modern architecture and don’t find that older buildings are inherently more beautiful than contemporary styles. Every style has its historical context, and the beauty of cities like London and New York is a rich melange of many of those historical contexts.

On Tuesday, we made it to the Rooftop at Pier 17 for a concert for the first time. While much of their programming – tribute and legacy bands – is not in line with our musical interests, it is also a stop for some current touring bands. For a good reason: its location at the river, surrounded by the skylines of Downtown Manhattan and Brooklyn, immediately creates a swanky, cinematic experience. The space is broad and narrow, so even though we came just in time for the main act, we had good views from the sides and even felt comfortable walking around without losing connection to the action on stage.

The Kooks, of course, have been around for more than 20 years, and we were introduced to them by their breakthrough album, Inside In/Inside Out, in 2006. While this puts them in legacy territory, they are still very much active, with their seventh album, Never/Know, released a few weeks ago. It was refreshing and energizing to see a classic rock show where four musicians played guitars and drums for an appreciative audience of surprisingly young people who could sing along to many of the songs. Frontman Luke Pritchard even played the contemplative “See Me Now”, Elke’s favorite, which was not easy in an environment that screams “party.”

We went back home and scanned the calendar for more shows, but so far, there is nothing in our range of interests (Tennis performed there already last Sunday). However, there will be late additions to the lineup, so we hope to enjoy this stunning experience once more this year.

glamglare favorites

Listen to glamglare favorites on Spotify, Apple Music, or below on YouTube.

We officially entered the meteorological summer, and this week’s five songs are loosely connected to this season. Our all-time favorite summer track, “Mood Hover” by Connie Constance opens the list. “Seaside,” the brief but atmospheric song by The Kooks, is an obvious fit after their show last Tuesday. Camille Schmidt’s “Wake Up” is from June 2024, followed by “White Sails” from a 2021 collaboration between Sterling Grove and Ellyn Woods. “In a Spell” came out in the summer of 2020, reflecting the mood of that year.

Song Pick of the Day

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• The Manchester band Chameleons will release their first new album in 24 years, and we have been fans for much longer than that. The new single is called “Saviors Are a Dangerous Thing.”
• "Life can get more complicated, but our ability to feel and love grows - life becomes more meaningful and sacred," says Wyldest. Her latest song, "Secret Garden," is about growth after new beginnings and has quickly become our favorite of hers.
• "He broke up with me whilst he was on tour, and that was it, I never saw him again," recalls  Lunar June. That's certainly not the classiest way to part, and may explain why her breakup song “let me love you” is such a catchy, upbeat pop track.
• The third single, “Spit” by Gelli Haha is a hard-hitting analog synth-pop track around words that start with "S." The debut album is set to release at the end of the month.
• After their gorgeous 2024 album Dreamscapes, electronic music duo Eli & Fur are back with a lush new song,” AIR."
• One consequential night out is the topic of the new EP The Long Way Home by London indie rock quartet Slaney Bay. The latest single, “Missed Your Call,” happens near the end of it.
• Cate Le Bon is back with album number seven, Michelangelo Dying, out in September. The first single, "Heaven Is No Feeling," picks up where her stellar last album left off.

New Albums Out This Week

The Norwegian dream-pop singer-songwriter Yndling gets serious about her second full-length album (I'm in the Palm of Your Hand). She presented some of the new tracks during The New Colossus in New York and SXSW in Austin, and is now releasing half of the album, with the rest to follow in the fall. Why not two EPs? I suppose in the digital age, it no longer really matters, and grouping the songs together into one album just looks better. I’m curious if that will inspire more releases like this. In any case, her new songs are a step up from Mood Booster with a bigger, richer sound that beautifully underlines her wispy vocals.

Nine Photos of The Kooks live at Pier 17

For this newsletter, I could’ve chosen more photos from London or Brighton, or images from Sunday’s architecture-inspired walk, but in the end, I went with the show. After all, we’ve mentioned Pier 17 before (and The Kooks—I'm a huge fan!), and the building is even featured on our site’s homepage. Enjoy these impressions from the concert and its atmosphere!