The New Citizen Kane – Causing A Commotion Review: Glitter, Funk, and Unapologetic Mischief

If only your Spotify playlist would burst into sequins and party under a disco ball until dawn, The New Citizen Kane's new EP, Causing A Commotion, is essentially that dream come true. The band has never been a complacent experimenter, from the galactic soundscapes of The Tales of Morpheus to the raunchy neon playground of TEMPLE. BEACH. DISCO, DADDY. With every release, he appears intent on gliding between genres like a magician yanking scarves from thin air. This time? He's pillaging the glitter box, turnin' up the BPM, and reminding us that music don't always gotta brood, sometimes it just has to boogie.

Kicking Off With a Pulse

Opening song "Sunconscious (Primordial Radio Mix)" forgoes foreplay altogether. It attacks with a driving 4/4 beat that makes you think someone opened the doors to the club, gave you a glow stick, and pushed you directly into the centre of the dance floor. It's disco, it's pop, it's electronic glitter, and, yes, it all but glows. Don't resist; just submit.

Then there's "Bubble Gum Hot." Even the title is a sugar high, but the song goes all in with sizzling horns that sound like confetti shooters. Funk edges peek in and out, the groove gets playful, and before you know it, you're smiling like you just stumbled on a free pizza buffet at a party. The horns are the MVP hero here, brassy little troublemakers that give the entire song lift.

When the Lights Dim (Just a Little)

But it's not all unrelenting light. "San Diego (Synthphonica Radio Mix)" creeps up with rich synths that are the sonic equivalent of golden-hour light. It's melancholy, hazy, warm, a great mix of sadness and euphoria. The vocals drift with just enough pain to remind you that even clubbers have hearts. This one lingers beautifully, like the afterglow of an evening you can't help but rewind.

Meanwhile, “Meet Me On Street Corners (Synthphonica Radio Mix)” leans fully into 2025 pop polish, shiny, sleek, engineered to stick in your head until you’re humming it while brushing your teeth. It’s pure radio candy but done with flair.

Funk, Fragments, and Full-On Commotion

"Hearts Aren't Made Of Wood (Rework '25)" swaggered in with gritty, bass-laden swagger, and a vocal performance that's essentially taunting you not to budge. And there's "Subconscious," a strange 25-second a cappella fragment that I found myself wondering: "Was this a song? A joke from another planet? A palate cleanser?" Either one, it's a weird lung-clearing.

The title track “Causing A Commotion” wears its Daft Punk influence on its shiny, filtered sleeve. Funk riffs twist and turn, the groove is tight, and the whole thing feels like a love letter to the French house giants. By the time “Ratbag Joy (Alternative Radio Mix)” closes the EP, you’re fully convinced The New Citizen Kane has bottled the reckless optimism of endless summer nights and slipped it into your headphones.

Final Spin

To listen to Causing A Commotion is to travel back in time to the nights when the air was electric with possibility, the drinks were always flowing, and the only rule was: never stop dancing. It's youthful without innocence, nostalgic without being quaint, and fun without apology.

So go ahead, hit play. Let your inner disco kid out. And if anyone asks why you’re suddenly dancing in your kitchen at 2 a.m., just blame The New Citizen Kane. After all, he warned us: he came here to cause a commotion.

LITM Singer-songwriter brings you tunes featuring Hand Gestures, Danny Vuckovic and Saline Eyes!

LITM Singer-songwriter brings you some really great tunes brought to you by Hand Gestures, Danny Vuckovic and Saline Eyes!

1. Hand Gestures – Label the Labelmaker

Even the most unlikely of ideas sometimes have the most profound outcomes. For Brooklyn singer-songwriter Brian Russ, the notion was naming a label-maker, something he remembered clearly from his school days that germinated into "Label the Labelmaker," the first single for his new band, Hand Gestures.

The song is a gentle, country-folk reflection on how humans tend to hold on to labelling and compartmentalising their world—only to find that life doesn't always fit. It's fun, certainly, but also sensitive, bearing wisdom for Russ's toddler daughter and anyone clunking through the quest for meaning. Townes Van Zandt fans will recognise the vibe here: earthy, languid, and aglow with sincerity.

The lyric video enhances this beauty. Directed by Russ over Badlands, Yellowstone, and Acadia National Park, the sweeping shots reflect the music's feeling of openness and awe. It's a soul road trip, where you can be asked to slow down and take a breath. With a debut album being released October 31 through Campers' Rule Records, Hand Gestures doesn't feel like a new band, but rather a new chapter in American songwriting.

2. Danny Vuckovic – If I Get to Heaven

There is honesty, and then there is the sort of raw honesty that Danny Vuckovic presents in "If I Get to Heaven." Composed, sung, and recorded by the Gillingham-born artist alone, this track is more of an introspective confessional than a highly produced studio track. It is intimate, raw, and human.

The song grapples with dirty truths: toxic relationships, the desire to break free from poisonous cycles, and the glow of hope that there's something better on the other side of the wreckage. Vuckovic's vocals pendulums between vulnerability and toughness, and every note is laced with hard-won experience. When he belts into higher registers, the vulnerability is palpable—not made-up, not smoothed over, just authentic.

Production-wise, the flaws are the goal. Recorded at home using a DAW, the acoustic guitar was tracked in one take, no drop-ins, no sheen, providing the song with a heartbeat that's human and vulnerable. It's music that refuses to be perfect because life isn't perfect.

"If I Get to Heaven" would be something you'd find stumbling about at midnight, only to discover fragments of yourself amidst its battered lyrics. It's exorcistic. It's devotional. And it shows that sometimes, truth rings louder than grooming.

3. Saline Eyes – Alone

Saline Eyes, the audio vision of James Hackett, come back into view with "Alone," a guitar-breeze single that glides into a finer territory than his past indie-rock adventures. Whereas earlier songs like "No You and I" glimmered with edgy brightness, this one chooses subtlety: rich guitar timbres, soft voice, and just sufficient instrumentation to provide the song with its ghostly weight.

But don't confuse simplicity with predictability. "Alone" constructs a rich tapestry of textures, drums that throb like faraway thunder, strings that quiver under the melody, piano flashes glinting like sunlight through blinds. There's even a calculated messiness here, a collision of sound that feels nearly accidental, echoing the lyrical subject of broken connections and emotional disarray.

Hackett's capacity for blurring beauty and anarchy is what makes this single so interesting. It's a song about solitude, yes, but not the quiet type. This is the sound of a head attempting to sift through the residue of a person who has passed. Melancholy but also hypnotic, "Alone" reaffirms why Saline Eyes still gets industry attention.

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