The playlist: new bands – Boy Scout, Pesky and more

Soleima – My Boi

As though to prove that Denmark is the new locus for alt-pop greatness, here comes Sarah Mariegaard, AKA Soleima. She used to be the sole female in the Danish hip hop group Flødeklinikken, and now she’s making solo records such as My Boi, which is so irresistible it reminds me what a perfect medium the three-minute single is. She sings over a burbling bassline and synth shimmers in a voice like a sugar-sweet take on Björk’s idiosyncratic chirrup. It’s less Mills & Boon, and more like Misery, starring Petite Meller: “I want to lock you up in my house, swallow the key like the perfect spouse – I don’t care if they bring me down, cos I need you,” she coos, a tad menacingly. Older readers might be reminded of Clare Grogan or Theresa Bazaar. Meanwhile, the video shows Soleima in all her faux innocent, gap-toothed glory. A creepily cute star is born.

Pesky – Keep Me

From someone pretending to be young, or at least someone playing with notions of innocence, to a proper young band. Really young: they’re 12. In fact, of the seven members, two of them are 11, so they make Charlie Belle look like Charlie Watts. They’re from Ulverton in Cumbria, but they make a guitar-pop noise as though they’re from 1992 Seattle, only, you know, not yet teenagers, and not old enough to know about abjection and self-loathing. Actually, their debut six-track mini-album, released in a couple of weeks by Fierce Panda, is called Smells Like Tween Spirit, and it does the strangest thing: it uses grunge and shoegaze, forms normally known for their, respectively, nihilism and ennui, and invests them with vim and brio. “You’re like a fire burning in my soul, all the sparks are flying,” sings Megan Cooper like Miki Berenyi’s kid sister who’s downed too many M&Ms. Sweet. Or rather, sweets, lots of them.

Boy Scout – Bitter Blue

As though to confirm that James Blake, Drake and the Weeknd are three of the most influential male artists of the past half decade in the field of noir-ish electronica-R&B, here come Boy Scout, a London duo who are inevitably being described as “mysterious”. Slow and lushly solemn, with handclaps but more of an end-of-the-night requiem than a party anthem, Bitter Blue has our heroes murmuring mournfully over a nocturnal dreamscape with echoey atmosphere to spare and enough disruptive FX to make sure it doesn’t slip into comfortable boudoir soul. It’s the follow-up to debut single Get Me By, which featured in an episode of Made in Chelsea. Not that they’re celebrating. As the production half of Boy Scout said recently of Bitter Blue: “We were both talking about how easy it is to get caught in this cyclical, adolescent and unfulfilling lifestyle. The track was kind of a homage to our combined regrets of the last few years.” If George Michael wrote Careless Whisper today, it might sound like this.

Iris Gold – Goldmine

If you were wondering who the unknown artist was supporting Blur at their British Summer Time Hyde Park gig in London last weekend, it was Iris Gold. Her debut foray, Goldmine, is so cheekily infectious, with such a hummable likability, it threatens to be a novelty one-off, although there are signs that there will be more where this came from. Think kooky with a kick; Macy Gray circa I Try, only more “London”. Turns out, though, she grew up in Freetown Christiana, an autonomous commune in Copenhagen surrounded by Jefferson Airplane, the Doors, Mamas & the Papas etc. Not the countercultural heroes themselves, you understand: their music. Anyway, hip-hop pop you can whistle along with.

Cristobal and the Sea – Sunset of Our Troubles

CatS are a London-based group with members from various European territories (including Portugal, France, Corsica and Spain) whose music would suit idle listening in whatever sunny location you intend to holiday in this summer. Tuneful, with a rustic, semi-acoustic charm, full of woah-oh-ohs, Sunset of Our Troubles did initially remind me of Mumford & Sons, but then I noticed they’re on City Slang, who I trust implicitly with my record collection, if not my life, and I realised it couldn’t be. Then I read comparisons between their music – which includes elements of bossa nova, Afropop, folk and rock – and that of Animal Collective (they’re produced by Rusty Santos, who’s worked with AC, Grizzly Bear and Beach House), and suddenly they seemed ever cooler. Now I can’t wait to hear the rest of the songs on their five-track debut EP Peach Bells, and forthcoming debut album Sugar Now.