{"title":"Cindy","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eSinger\/songwriter and backup vocalist, Cindy, was born in Englewood, New Jersey. She began singing at a young age and found inspiration from her cousins, the Mizell Brothers, and Cissy Houston. Cindy's career took off when she joined the church choir at First Baptist Church in Englewood and later became a touring singer at just 17 years old. She has collaborated with renowned artists such as Billy Ocean, Chaka Khan, Mariah Carey, Barbra Streisand, Whitney Houston, Luther Vandross, The Rolling Stones, Steely Dan, Dave Matthews Band and Alicia Keys. Cindy's talent extends beyond vocals as she has also written music for Aretha Franklin.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eIn 1982, Cindy gained recognition for her vocals on the Lemelle single \"You Got Something Special\". A year later in 1983, she released her album \"Pump the Nation\" with her band Attitude. Her solo single \"This Could be the Night\" followed in 1984.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eCindy's impressive career includes touring with The E-Street Band as a member of The Sessions Band and returning to tour with them during the Working on a Dream Tour in 2009 until the High Hopes Tour in 2014. She contributed background vocals to songs like \"Shackled and Drawn\" from Bruce Springsteen's Wrecking Ball album and also sang on his High Hopes album. In addition to her collaborations with Spring\u003c\/p\u003e","products":[{"product_id":"why-not-now","title":"Why Not Now","description":"\u003cp\u003e“Everyone’s hoping that nobody sees\/all our little efforts at dignity”\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThis last line of the title track from Cindy’s fourth LP \u003ci\u003eWhy Not Now? \u003c\/i\u003eworks as a slogan for Karina Gill's evolving musical vision. Her music is simple out of necessity and introverted in delivery, but the songs contain vivid worlds and are quietly ambitious. With this latest batch, Gill pulled the process of making Cindy music even more inward. “Some of these songs were first recorded as demos alone in my basement. I think that process set the tone for the record…Maybe it set up a kind of starkness,” she says.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eMoving on from the fixed quartet that performed the first three albums, Gill worked alongside original keyboardist Aaron Diko to develop the songs and they enlisted players from the ever-blossoming SF pop scene to realise her minimalist vision -- members of Flowertown, Telephone Numbers, April Magazine, Famous Mammals, and Sad Eyed Beatniks to name a few. The collective sounds fill out the record perfectly with John Cale-esque viola on ‘August’, lo-fi fairground organs, and a tasteful full-band sound that crops up throughout. ‘A Trumpet on a Hillside’ is the most triumphant Cindy has ever sounded, all ascending chords and a wedding march melody tumbling out of an old synth. Still, some of the best moments are Gill alone, as on ‘Playboy’, just naked guitar and voice, and when the forlorn whistling solo kicks in, it feels like the loneliest star is imploding in a distant galaxy.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eWhile the dream-pop tag is probably still relevant, this isn’t algorithm-fed genre ambience. Gill’s vocal \/ lyrical presence can be as gently momentous as Leonard Cohen or as intellectually potent as any ’79-’80 Rough Trade post-punk. “In writing a song”, Gill says, ”all the disparate parts of being me momentarily correspond, like car alarms and party music momentarily matching beats.” Cindy’s Why Not Now? is that muffled street symphony inside a passing daydream.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eFor fans of Sarah Records, Galaxie 500, Algebra Suicide, Mazzy Star, early Low.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Tough Love","offers":[{"title":"CD","offer_id":50467101933899,"sku":"2013361","price":12.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true},{"title":"LP","offer_id":50467102458187,"sku":"2013362","price":24.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0867\/1120\/6219\/files\/0-2_9bc17928_thumbnail_4096.jpg?v=1727335245"},{"product_id":"cindy","title":"Cindy","description":"\u003cp\u003eCindy don't do many things loudly, but their seemingly sudden emergence a few years back was quite the jolt, their Free Advice LP doing for the current San Fran scene what the Big Supermarket record did for Melbourne a year or two back - ie a totemic outta-nowhere DIY statement of rare vision. As it turns out, though, it's not quite without precedent, since there was actually a self-released debut record from 2018, first pressed in tiny number and initially not moving much further than their immediate locale. A few years on and now trading for inflated prices on the second hand market, Tough Love are re-issuing in order to shine a little light on the band's first steps. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThese ten tracks display the ruminative formation of the minimal indie-pop sound perfected on Free Advice, skeletons of the same ideas with a little less flesh on dem bones, nonetheless struck with a naive wonder, like you're afforded the opportunity to hear the band stumbling upon their own charms in real time. And that is 100% the appropriate word here - charm, a quality perfectly captured in that front cover, too. It's not possible to overstate how endearing this music is, so independent is it of outside influence and free of self-consciousness. Is this the birth of the new Paisley Underground? Or maybe something better...\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Tough Love","offers":[{"title":"Black LP","offer_id":50468475732299,"sku":"2015612","price":24.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0867\/1120\/6219\/files\/test_ec247edd_thumbnail_4096.jpg?v=1728860675"},{"product_id":"swan-lake-ep-2","title":"Swan Lake EP","description":"\u003cp\u003eCindy is to release a new six song EP called Swan Lake via Tough Love. The title isn’t a nod to the folktale or ballet in any real way, but to the fact that it all has ended up in the collective imagination as an object, vaguely recognizable, a little suggestive, and mostly blank. Karina Gill, Cindy’s songwriter, likes to make use of that kind of resonance to connect sound and experience.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe six songs on this EP continue the stripped-down habits of previous Cindy releases, while adding a few departures and left-turns. Cindy likes to work at the essentials and the elements here say exactly what’s needed. In other ways, these songs present a soft filigree that’s unusual for their recordings. Oli Lipton (Now, Violent Change) on guitar and Will Smith (Now) on bass play counterpoint melodies to Gill’s structures. Staizsh Rodrigues (Children Maybe Later, Almond Joy, Peace Frog) sings vocal harmonies that both offset and deepen Gill’s voice and delivery. There are playful drums by Mike Ramos (Tony Jay, Sad Eyed Beatniks) and coolly elaborate guitar lines from Stanley Martinez (Famous Mammals, Violent Change, Non Plus Temps).\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eGill’s songs strike this balance too: almost nonchalant reporting tied up in unexpected knots. A ride in an elevator connects up with questions about peace and\/or the nature of things; the title track wonders about associative thinking and associative feeling; The Bell is an account of one of those times when everything makes sense but you can’t explain it; and there’s the scene of a party viewed with admiration for how friends can love each other. As Gill herself says:\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\"People have told me that they can’t quite identify my influences. Me neither. The foundational layers of music of the past and my past have been metabolized like breakfast and turned into more me, sorry to say. But I experience the music of people I’m connected with and it impacts me in the moment. There’s the music I’m around – April Magazine, Sad Eyed Beatniks, Violent Change, Katsy Pline, collaborating with Mike on Flowertown – that I can feel a direct line from. Then there’s music that is being made far away but feels close, like Lewsberg, specifically, for this EP. \"\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Tough Love","offers":[{"title":"Black 12\"","offer_id":50471008829771,"sku":"2217106","price":19.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0867\/1120\/6219\/files\/Swan_Lake_-_EP_bba37d35_thumbnail_4096.jpg?v=1727387859"},{"product_id":"46054","title":"1:2","description":"\u003cp\u003eFor fans of Sarah Records, Galaxie 500, Algebra Suicide, Mazzy Star, early Low. Cindy is a band built around the singing and guitar playing of Karina Gill. She became a musician only recently, having sat on the sidelines while ex-partners and friends made their stabs at it. Gill describes a chance encounter with an abandoned Squire Strat left in the basement by a previous tenant, “mummified in electrical tape with the remnants of a burrito on the head stock”, that led her to begin carefully strumming her way through simple chords and making her own songs. After one interesting self-released LP, still finding their footing, the band made the masterful and buzzed-about \u003ci\u003eFree Advice\u003c\/i\u003e, which went from a limited cassette on local SF label Paisley Shirt to vinyl pressings on Tough Love (UK) and Mt St Mtn (USA).\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eCindy’s third LP arrives in quick succession, the quietly devastating \u003ci\u003e1:2.\u003c\/i\u003e Jesse Jackson on bass, Simon Phillips on drums and Aaron Diko on keyboards weave the perfectly thin web behind Gill’s slow Velvety strums and murmured melodies. The rhythm section brings the crude flow, while the keys add subtle and surreal counterpoint to the withering world Gill depicts in her lyrics. “Songs tie together seemingly disparate things by the logic of mood,” Gill tries to explain. This isn’t dream-pop sunshine bliss; half-closed black drapes hang on the window where the narrator stares into the middle distance. “Sometimes you say you’re feeling small\/You plan all day for your own funeral”, she intones in Party Store. Gill has a way of halting her phrasing that makes it feel like her thoughts are gently tumbling into the abyss. It’s this unsettling quality mixed with the hazy atmosphere that makes Cindy’s new LP 100% addicting and the perfect antidote to comfort listening. \u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Tough Love","offers":[{"title":"Blue | LP","offer_id":50500146790731,"sku":"1127161","price":24.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true},{"title":"CD","offer_id":50500151083339,"sku":"1127160","price":12.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0867\/1120\/6219\/files\/dfd9ad97-288a-4d1c-9546-b69adb8dfc8f_thumbnail_4096.jpg?v=1727775671"},{"product_id":"free-advice","title":"Free Advice","description":"\u003cp\u003eTough Love have partnered with West Coast imprint Mt St Mtn for the release of \u003ci\u003eFree Advice\u003c\/i\u003e, the instant slowcore \/ dreampop classic by San Fran four piece, Cindy. \u003ci\u003eFree Advice\u003c\/i\u003e offers a somber-yet-uplifting take on sobered dream pop. Imagine if Galaxie 500’s \u003ci\u003eOn Fire\u003c\/i\u003e didn’t have a guitar solo or if \u003ci\u003eThe Trinity Session\u003c\/i\u003e was stripped of its folk and blues roots; it’s just pure mood. Like sitting in a half-empty movie theater that’s playing Alphaville or Wild Strawberries and watching patron’s heads briefly illuminated from the screen; \u003ci\u003eFree Advice\u003c\/i\u003e (and all of the Cindy output) transfers you to these momentary worlds. The songs on \u003ci\u003eFree Advice\u003c\/i\u003e are these moments in mood: Phillips and Jackson’s rhythms create the foundation, while Diko’s keys rise and fall. Gill’s guitar rattles, vocals brood, and lyrics create these narratives that depict observers, not necessarily wronged rather, cautious and investigative of the world around them.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Tough Love","offers":[{"title":"LP","offer_id":50512726163787,"sku":"1110276","price":24.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0867\/1120\/6219\/files\/5fe9366c-9522-4477-80a4-a9a82af2e322_thumbnail_4096.jpg?v=1727905738"},{"product_id":"im-cindy","title":"I'm Cindy","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan\u003eDebut album by Cindy is aptly called\u003cem\u003e I'm Cindy\u003c\/em\u003e. Produced by Kai Hugo a.k.a. Palmbomen II. Who exactly is Cindy? If producer Kai Hugo used oblique strategies it would be this question that's been central to his past four years of musical output. First appearing on his 2015 LP Palmbomen II as the titular subject of the track Cindy Savalas, her life has become intertwined with the producer's.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan\u003e\"Following that release, I made a music video for Cindy Savalas, where Cindy came to life through the portrayal by Blue LoLan,' Hugo explains. 'I really felt a connection with this character and went deeper into developing who she was and the world she lived in. The result was the creation of the LP \u003cem\u003eMemories Of Cindy,\u003c\/em\u003e where my goal was to reveal more about Carmel Vista, the town Cindy lived in. Afterwards, I imagined Cindy having her own 'lost' album, as if she had once released a record that was kind of forgotten.' \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan\u003e\u003cem\u003eI'm Cindy\u003c\/em\u003e is altogether different though. It sits at an uncommonly explored intersection between Italo disco and shoegaze - Cocteau Twins and Slowdive are mentioned as influences and you can hear that in the blurred textures and hazy synths of the 13 tracks here. But Hugo also revels in a chance to use his self-created character as a conduit to explore his love of both mainstream pop and its more skewed forms. In many ways the record is as much LoL?n's. It was she who gave the character her voice - initially across 27 tracks recorded with the producer - but her own connection to Cindy runs deeper than that. 'It makes me really nostalgic thinking about everything Cindy went through, she and I have similar feelings' says the vocalist. \u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan\u003e'Cindy is a mix of me and Kai so when I listen to the album I feel like I'm half entering Kai's head and half in mine, with a whole bunch of deep emotions, purity and loneliness that just makes me want to dance and cuddle with all my cats in a disco forest somewhere outside of Carmel Vista.'\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"World of Paint","offers":[{"title":"LP - Black","offer_id":53692086681931,"sku":"R6965-4068","price":29.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true},{"title":"Tape","offer_id":53692091367755,"sku":"R6965-3674","price":19.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0867\/1120\/6219\/files\/f165fd51-b686-937c-9cca-8d6b8adc58ca.jpg?v=1761082722"},{"product_id":"another-country-1","title":"Another Country","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cem\u003eAnother Country \u003c\/em\u003eis the fifth full-length album by Cindy, the San Francisco-based group built around the songwriting of Karina Gill. Recorded, like all of its predecessors, in their hometown and with a consistent line-up held over from their previous record (the Swan Lake EP from 2024), it is replete with the poetry of private vistas, eavesdropped dramas and confusing winds. These are classic Cindy concerns, and yet, as always, contain new mystery and charm to somehow feel like quiet revelations each time. \u003cem\u003eAnother Country \u003c\/em\u003eis both opaque in its intentions and specific in its presentation, and as such presents the kind of truth that keeps the listener on the search for answers just out of reach.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"The title of this record, Another Country, refers to the James Baldwin novel of that name. The book has a kind of drama that makes sense to me. When I look around, the obvious explanations are not enough. The miasma of feelings and ideas that is supposed to account for it all, doesn't. Baldwin washes past that to longings that begin to explain. Cindy songs come out of the x-rays my particular brain makes out of what I see and experience. What you hear on this record is the result of collaboration with the members of Cindy that transforms that shadowy thing into full color, fully fleshed. Each of them, in music, is sure-footed and unblinking, and making this record together felt like, yes, yes, you see what I mean.\"\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Tough Love","offers":[{"title":"LP - Black","offer_id":56694353592651,"sku":"R4389-8831","price":23.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true},{"title":"CD","offer_id":56694353625419,"sku":"R4389-8350","price":12.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0867\/1120\/6219\/files\/Cindy-AnotherCountry.jpg?v=1772642729"}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0867\/1120\/6219\/collections\/test_fe3f35d1_thumbnail_4096_6f993594-dcbe-4a22-aaa2-d8342b405ce5.jpg?v=1727335215","url":"https:\/\/shop.roughtrade.com\/collections\/cindy.oembed","provider":"Rough Trade","version":"1.0","type":"link"}