Listen: Sophia Knapp – Times Square (feat. AOP)

Brooklyn songstress Sophia Knapp has teamed up with Swedish maestros AOP to provide the crispest new slice of psych-tinged pop on the Record Store Day release list. The split “7 is comprised of AOP’s ‘Sweet May’ – on which Knapp guests – and her own composition, ‘Times Square’, where the Stockholm duo kindly return the favour.

Mattias Gustavsson and Martin Fogelström (of Dungen and Life On Earth! respectively) have imbued ‘Times Square’ with a bold Nordic flavour befitting of their past credentials with jangling tambourine taps, fluttering keys and charming swirls of polished guitar sprinkled throughout. The finale, a maelstrom of thumping toms and warm synth drones, edges the track into progressive poptronica territory familiar to countrymen, This Is Head; Knapp’s majestic cooing slowly fading away into layers of wondrous fuzz.