Let’s meet the neighbors, the Darling New Neighbors! This Texas-trio has just released their second album, “Rocket”, on their own label. The music is a strange combination of rough rock with sharp guitars, folk and indiepop, and sometimes they take a step into the 60-girlgroup territory with sha-la-la’s and shubidu’s.

The press-release kind of takes the words out of my mouth when they write that they hear bits and pieces of stray influence in the Darling New Neighbors: “the soft-hard derby crash of the Pixies, new comers like The Vivian Girls and even indie slack auteurs Beat Happening come and go in fleeting glimpses”. I very much agree, but if you expect to hear something that sounds like The Pixies, Vivian Girls or Beat Happening, DNN is not it, – not at all, – but as the press-man says, you can hear the influence “…come and go in fleeting glimpses”.

Darling New Neighbors are not new at all, and have been around since 2004 when Elizabeth Jackson, a classically trained violinist met “bluegrasser with a heart of rock-and-roll” Amy Moreland. Drummer Karl Lundin, who also sings on a couple of songs, became the band’s third member recently.

After hearing Saint Etienne’s cover of Neil Young’s “Only Love Can Break Your Heart”, I was sure that I would never hear a better version of the song. I think I have now:

MP3: Darling New Neighbors – Only Love Can Break Your Heart

MP3: Darling New Neighbors – Stars