Camellia Hartman & The Soulful Saints "Return The Favor" (Dala)

Rejoice! Camellia Hartman and The Soulful Saints are back with a soulful stroller to caress away our cares. "Return The Favor" is another classy, nuanced affair with enough 60s sunshine pop embellishments to warm the heart. The lyrics are endearingly sweet e.g.

"Hold me nearer
Kiss me sweeter
I'll be sure to return the favor
Love me tender
Always remember
That I'll be sure to return the favor"



For now, "Return The Favor" is available only as a download but there's talk of it being paired with Camellia's certified smash from 2017, "Breathin' Hard Over You", on a 7" in the near(ish?) future. Just sit back and watch the soul DJs and Shacks fans elbowing each other outta the way to snap up a copy!

Jerry Naylor "City Lights" (Kent)

One of the down sides of labels such as Kent using generic sleeves for their releases (or, more accurately, their various series of releases) is that middle-aged dumplings such as Not Unloved can forget which ones they already have when rifling through the 7"s at their local record shop. Thankfully, the lovely staff at Monorail Music ensured that Jerry Naylor's effervescent "City Lights" reissue didn't pass me by as would have been the case had I been left to my own devices. It's irresistibly upbeat with a great production (trumpets!, strings! etc.). If anything can lift the gloom of spring, 2018, "City Lights" can. It came as something of a surprise to learn that Naylor was one of Buddy Holly's backing group, The Crickets.

Kent have paired "City Lights" with Johnny Praye's strident"Can't Get Too Much Love". Another winner, it  had Not Unloved (unwisely) dusting off the old falsetto to sing along with the backing vocals - not pretty!

still buying 7"s

It may not be the most cost-effective way of consuming new music in 2018 but the 7" is still Not Unloved's preferred format and there really are some ace 45s around at the moment. New Zealanders The Shifting Sands released a mighty fine lp on Fishrider a few years back but their new single is even better. "Zoe" - also through Fishrider - is all languid jangles and recumbent twangs that waft from 1967 on a warm psychedelic breeze. What elevates "Zoe" above majority of the stoned psych-outs around at the moment are its heart and its emotional content. Essential.

Polytechnic Youth is a fine label even if it does have a slightly manic release schedule which means that keeping up with its output is nigh on impossible unless you've got the disposable income of Elon Musk. From the recent batch of three 7"s, The Detox Twins 45 is the one that tugged at Not Unloved's purse strings the most. It's a prime slab of what those with The Knowledge called Dark Wave or Minimal Wave but which sounds to me like 80s Goth. It'll sound ideal blasting out in dingy basements in Berlin.

Sergeants Mess recently unleashed their meaty second single, "Well That's Another Fine Mess" (Spinout Nuggets) in February. "Couldn't I Be Yours" is a pitch perfect explosion of mid-60s British Mod that thunders along (thanks in no small part to Wolf Howard who has drummed for many a Billy Childish group) obliterating everything stupid enough to get in its way. If it doesn't pack dancefloors at Mod nights the world over I'll...er...write to my MP. You best believe it!

Keeping with the Mod theme, Crocodile Records' latest transmission is ANDRÉ M's cool-struttin' "Kenzy's Choice". It's a pleasingly concise Hammond-led instrumental which stomps along like a bunch of shady gangsters on their way to smash up an East End pub. Anyone who has ever happily tapped their loafers to Kent's tremendous Mod Jazz series of lps should seek it out immediately!

> Samples of both sides are here. 

> Get it here