Blog with news and merchandise for UK psychedelic pop band The Junipers.
"The Junipers have gifted us with yet another instant classic. Absolutely essential listening for anyone with an ear for timeless pop music."
Great to see a new release from another of our old favourites, this time Leicester’s The Junipers.
I've loved everything they've released, and that status quo remains unchanged here. If anything, they're getting better.
The Junipers are one of those bands whose albums sound very carefully crafted in the studio, but also give the impression that if you wandered into their rehearsal space on any given Sunday afternoon you’d hear something with equal polish. It all sounds so natural and unlaboured that it’s hard to reconcile these guys having to go off and do day jobs as it sounds like they do this 24/7. It’s unjust for someone to do something this well and not be able to earn a full time living from it.
But what does it sound like you ask? A more democratic Wings. A contemporary Honeybus. A more pastoral Teenage Fanclub. Just go and listen to it.
With The Solid and The Hollow, the Junipers have gifted us with yet another instant classic. Absolutely essential listening for anyone with an ear for timeless pop music.
"There are lots of great moments within the songs that evoke a mood akin to a bright summer day"
Robyn Gibson (lead guitar, vocals) says it best, “… it became a kind of nostalgia trip,” and the band’s fifth album keeps those stylistic touches that recall The Beatles, The Association, and The Free Design. “Oneless” is a subtle opener, with Gibson’s gentle vocal leading the way. It’s the template for most of the songs to follow, with the exceptions being the driving bass line lead on the psyche-pop of “When She Turns” and spacey synths on “Fishes.”
There are lots of great moments within the songs that evoke a mood akin to a bright summer day. “She Makes The Sun Shine” is especially buoyant with a rhythm line akin to The Beatles’ “Rain.” “Meadow Song” has a wonderful mix of keys, guitars, and layered sounds, and slowly builds into something great. “Swan” is another breezy melody that wallows in the dreamlike atmosphere, with subtleties in the harmonies that audiophiles will appreciate. If you fell in love with this band from their super catchy ‘Euphonious Trolley’ EP, this album is its spiritual cousin. Highly Recommended.
"The Junipers have never released a duff album. I'm deliberately trying not to mention songs because this is a proper album to be listened to from start to finish. Absolutely essential"
Just as with David Brookings, I return to our very early days, a decade ago, when I reviewed The Junipers' Red Bouquet Fair. I've been with them ever since and enjoyed Robyn Gibson's Bob Of The Pops adventures through the period to now.
A new Junipers album is also a reason to celebrate as they bring my beloved Psych Pop back to life. More recently, the quartet have been as interesting as ever, but been a little more mellow. None of that here, this is a real Guitar album, back to earlier days and a full revelation of how great Psych Pop is.
The Solid And The Hollow not only makes an old man very happy, but is also one of the best psych pop albums for a long time.The whole thing is beautifully arranged, the instrumentals are works of art and show off Gibson's dulcet tones beautifully.
It really sounds as though it could have been recorded in those hazy 60's days when the genre took off. But there are also hints of the late 80s revival. The album offers up both beat and the more mellow, but all are arranged perfectly, providing a dreamlike vibe or a killer Psych Beat.
I'm deliberately trying not to mention songs because this is a proper album to be listened to from start to finish. But as you head over you may want to compare the 60s Beat of When She Turns with the wonderful Piano led closing masterpiece that is Moments Of Truth.
In between you get everything that the band is great at, Mellotron, jangle and stunning mood setters. The Junipers have never released a duff album, but this is more of a Guitar album, a step back to the early days if you like and no one masters Psych Pop like these four. Absolutely Essential!
The 2nd single from our new album The Solid and the Hollow is out now. If you pre-order the album you will receive all the singles taken from the album before the album is released. Pre-order the album HERE.
It's an upbeat track about being in chaotic situations but being happy and having it any other way even if you could change things. It's also about thinking you know what's what and learning that you probably don't, and no one does. No particular inspiration from other bands we don't think, the chord sequence just fell out an acoustic guitar one night, nice when that happens. Hope it's to everyone's taste anyway : )
Lyric video is live on YouTube Watch Here.
We were asked by The Strange Brew Podcast to pick our most influential psychedelic tracks. We've not gone monster rare here or anything, and pretty obvious.. but you can't lie about what has had the biggest impact on you. See the full article HERE.
Twenty years in, Leicester’s The Junipers are still making psychedelic pop that sounds like a Saturday morning radio discovery and a dusty record find in a town centre shop. To follow up their brilliant 2024 album, Imaginary Friends, they release their fifth LP, The Solid and the Hollow, on 24 April.
By their own description it ended up as a nostalgia trip of sorts, imagining how they might have approached music as teenagers, when the 60s and indie records they love were still fresh discoveries. 60s garage, 80s neo-psychedelia and early 90s shoegaze all fed into it, pushing them toward a more guitar-led sound than recent albums. They even went back and reworked a song they wrote as teenagers, ‘She Makes the Sun Shine,’ which became a kind of anchor for the whole record. Having heard it, I can tell you it delivers on every one of those influences while sounding completely like itself, which is a harder trick to pull off than it sounds. If you want a way in, their current single ‘When She Turns’ is out now, with ‘In A Maze’ to follow on 4 April.
To mark the release, we asked the band to share the psychedelic tracks that mean the most to them. Mellotrons feature heavily.
The Beatles – Strawberry Fields Forever
Joe: It’s an obvious one but it is probably my favourite track of all time. It’s not like I listen to it all the time nowadays, but when I do it always has an impact. Nobody needs this track breaking down for them of course, but I love its mystery, how it starts out soft and mellow, and ends heavy with a crazy mellotron jam at the end. The whole production, how they spliced together 2 takes in slightly different keys, and actually went with it. The most ambitious single yet, by the biggest band in the world, and they released a mash up of 2 different takes that were in different keys and tempos to one another. But it works and actually makes the track sound weirder and more ethereal, like it wasn’t made by humans. And apparently it still wasn’t to Lennon’s liking because it wasn’t heavy enough. I’d love to hear the version he had in his mind. I’m also a sucker for anything from the 60s and 70s with a mellotron and this song is the reason.
Joe: I remember the first time I heard this was at one of the Mousetrap nights in London in like 2001 or something. I didn’t know the track, but it was in my head for months afterwards, until me or Pete managed to track it down. To hear a track like this for the first time at full blast in a basement is the perfect introduction. At that time I didn’t know what I was listening to! I knew it would be from 1968 or 69 but it was just so far out, I couldn’t absorb it or work out how this sound had been made. I remember I ordered the CD of the album and it came through the post on a Saturday morning. No one home , and I was blaring this track out on the kitchen CD player, my Dad came home and was just going “what is this?? Far out man!!” all sarcastic. We actually got to support Tom Newman and July in about 2016 which was nice.
We play our first gig in 10 years on Friday 1st May 2026. It will be as part of the psych event Freakout, held at The Night Owl in Birmingham. Our new album is out the week before an we will be playing new songs with some of the old ones. It should be a good night with support from psychedelic covers band The Mystery People and psychedelic DJ's.
Tickets available HERE
We're happy to announce that we have a new album to be released April 24th 2026. The Solid and the Hollow is available for pre order from our Bandcamp page now.
Available on vinyl, CD and digital.
We started this project heading in a slightly different direction to where we ended up. As it progressed it became a kind of nostalgia trip — imagining how we would have approached music as teenagers, when so much of the 60s and indie music we now know and love was brand new to us. It made the whole process feel fresh and exciting to make.
We've actually included a song written in our teens called She Makes the Sun Shine — albeit updated and slightly different from the original — and it gave us a good springboard for the vibe we were on.
We were listening to a lot of 60s garage, 80s neo-psychedelia and early 90s shoegaze during its production, which pushed us toward a more guitar-led sound than our previous two albums. We felt we hadn't made a proper guitar album since Paint the Ground and decided it was time to get the amps out again.
We will be playing our first live gig in 10 years to support the release on 1st May in Birmingham. Tickets available HERE.
Pre-Order available now: The Solid and the Hollow | The Junipers
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