A new year is new world. This past year has been one of rediscovering my excitement at finding new music. I’ve been to more concerts this past year alone than in the previous decade. I’ve also bought and listened to more music than previous years, some of which I’ve posted here. But there is much more out there to find. Poprock Record got off the ground four months ago and posting once a week has proven a challenge but not for a lack of material. I’ve posted on some of my favourite new artists like the Vaccines, Good Old War, Daveit Ferris, Gregory Pepper, Ezra Furman, Family of Year, Tally Hall, Ike Reilly, and Together Pangea but there were so many other discoveries that I haven’t had time to write about like Bleachers, Sunday Sun, Farrah, Dylan Gardner, Summer Fiction, Titus Andronicus, Salim Nourallah, Faded Paper Tigers, and so many more. What I find striking is how out of sync my list of discoveries is with both commercial and indie end-of-the-year ‘best of’ lists. So I think I’m on to something here, a niche that is going largely uncovered by other sources. Tell your friends!

Instead of rehashing stuff that has already appeared here, let’s start off the new year with some new music: Quiet Company. An apropos discovery for the kind of new year’s eve we were having here at Poprock Record headquarters. Kids were in bed, husband was on the phone with relatives, Game of Thrones episode was cued for later consumption and I was working my way through the PopMatters blog’s “Best Songs of 2015” playlist when I stumbled across this band. A needledrop tour through their five albums worth of material reveals an amazing cache of great creative poprock songs. We’ll return to give the band a fuller treatment in future but for now here is a song from their most recent release, Trangressor, and one from the previous year’s release, the EP Other People’s Hits. “Understand the Problem” kicks off with a great fun-fair-esque organ fill that is just the first of a number of great hooks in the song, while their cover of Pedro the Lion’s “When They Get to Know You They Will Run” shows up the rockier side of the band’s sound.

Find Quiet Company’s website and Facebook pages here.