Artificial Go Hopscotch Fever 12″ (Feel It)
There’s no shortage of stripped-down DIY post-punk bands to choose from, old and/or new, but the ones that exude a natural, self-assured cool as if they were the only band in the universe? Those are harder to find. Nice job to Feel It then for sharing Artificial Go with us, a home-grown Cincinnati trio who make minimalist, dance-y post-punk seem like the coolest thing in the world all over again. Their music has that sort of early Au Pairs, garage-y Gang Of Four style: no reverb, no effects and the bone-driest of drums, but it’s the vocals of Angie Willcutt that push Hopscotch Fever into a must-hear affair. Willcutt’s voice bounces from sleepy to distracted to over-it to electrified, depending on the track and the mood that strikes her, and it’s a constantly compelling element. Her vocals call to mind “Guys Are Not Proud” by Anemic Boyfriends, the purr of Girl Ray and the scratch of Vivienne Styg, and on the album-opening single, “Pay Phone”, I’m getting visions of a youthful Chan Marshall fronting a garage-punk band. You either have this vocal charisma or you don’t – we can all tell when you don’t – and Willcutt immediately pulls you in for the ride, even if you tried to come up with a good excuse. Sure, post-punk as a genre is solidified and scripted at this point, and I’d imagine Artificial Go understand which influences to crib from and which to avoid, but I love this sound when it comes together perfectly, as is the case with Hopscotch Fever, one of the finest Feel It debuts in a while.
Black & White Cat Black & White Cake Black & White Cat Black & White Cake LP (Swimming Faith)
When it comes to long black-cat-centric band names that are exasperating to say out loud, it’s hard to top Kiss The Anus Of A Black Cat, but the newest project from the tirelessly-prolific John Toohill comes valiantly close. While clearly willing to play or program all the instruments himself if the idea strikes, Toohill is relegated to guitar in this human-drummer-deficient quintet, what could easily be classified as his “goth band” among garage-punk, surf, post-punk and proggy post-hardcore projects. If you’re onto your sixth band in as many years, and one of them isn’t goth, what are you even waiting for? True to the Swimming Faith style, this group’s self-titled full-length debut is self-recorded and sounds like it, as if the band is pumping away inside of a large cardboard box with thick towels draped on top. That’s not a disqualifying trait for underground music though, and it leads B&WCB&WC into the thorny territory of Blank Dogs, were they playing Echo & The Bunnymen songs with an aggressive, hardcore-informed stance. It’s tricky for any given song to stand out in this gloomy din, but the atmosphere is firmly established, a rainy night at a haunted hotel on a hill where all the staff stare at you motionless in their black band t-shirts. They’ve reserved you the “Unknown Pleasures” suite in the attic… good luck surviving the night!
The Brides Suburban Vermin LP (HoZac)
It’s starting to feel a little uncomfortable that eras of underground music I personally experienced first-hand are reissue fodder, if mostly because twenty years ago doesn’t feel like twenty years ago at all. What a thrilling epiphany that I am surely the first person to have! HoZac has done pretty well with their ongoing archival / reissue campaign, and this collection from Chicago’s The Brides fits the bill: raucous, youthful garage-punk that simply don’t care if you like ’em (or at least really want to make you believe they don’t care). They did a couple Rip Off Records singles in the ’90s – about as close to a hallmark of quality as you can get within the confines of Mordam distribution back then – and while nothing on Suburban Vermin sounds particularly remarkable or thrilling to my ears, it’s a satisfying trip back to the confused and anxious ’90s garage-punk underground. It’s raw, but clearly not indebted to chasing Killed By Death dreams, so much as maybe opening shows for Boris The Sprinkler and Gas Huffer and drinking all their free beer before getting chased out of the green room. Timeless and rude teenage antics, the stuff that feels like a revolution in the moment but is merely one of the countless iterations of brash and offensive white-boys causing trouble simply because they can. If you’re immune to the charms that come with it, you’re a better person than I.
Bumbo’s Tinto Brass Band V2 7″ (Bumbo)
Much like Ruth’s Chris Steak House, Bumbo’s Tinto Brass Band has an awkwardly possessive name, but I’m here for zonked-out Detroit art-punk, not overpriced tenderloin! This is their second self-released seven-inch – the two EPs comprise their entire discography thus far – and bearing six brief tracks, it’s my favorite of the two. I didn’t hear it the first time around, but there seems to be an accidental Minutemen thing happening here: post-punk-funky bass-lines (played by Bumbo himself) off of which the drums react, with jazzy little melodic guitar phrases and a confident, center-of-attention spoken-word vocal delivery. The uninhibited, party-ready vibes reflect Bumbo’s Tinto Brass Band’s Detroit home, but the music feels like the missing row of seats in a Meat Puppets / Saccharine Trust tour van circa 1985, everyone filing up their notebooks with spur-of-the-moment poetry and tie-dying the stains out of their shirts. And look, there’s Joe Carducci and Byron Coley locked arms in some sort of hoedown dance as the strange final track, “Honey Don’t”, unspools itself with guest mutterings by Asha Vida! It’s the sorta thing that Third Man Records is surely aware of but probably a little too nervous to get involved with, what with the true outsider style and lack of social-media savvy. Hopefully that last comment provides the nudge you needed to check it out for yourself.
Chat Pile Cool World LP (The Flenser)
Noise-rockers du jour Chat Pile follow their (unexpectedly) well-received debut with Cool World, delivering more gnarly Midwestern chug with confidence and panache. I wasn’t totally sold on the first one – too much second-hand embarrassment in that “Why” song, and not in a fun way – but as a fan of heavy, lumbering grooves and gluey layers of distortion, Cool World is a big greasy bowlful of the stuff. On paper, their riffs are probably as schematic as that of Metz and Idles, but the way in which they play them – either in the unwieldy, stumbling manner of Korn, the seasick swing of Lubricated Goat’s “In The Raw” or the Sabbathian groove-rock pacing of Rage Against The Machine – is immediately recognizable as Chat Pile, only a few years in. They really nail the production too, outlandishly heavy and punchy (does anyone have a Jeep with subs in the trunk that I can listen to Cool World in?), but not overly polished – the grimy residue on the guitars is rendered in high-def, far more disgusting to witness than if presented in a lo-fi blur. Vocalist Raygun Busch has the chance to make it or break it, and he does a fantastic job of giving the songs what they need, be it a full-throated holler, frothy-mouthed screaming or the quiet mutterings of a madman in his cabin, surrounded by the Feds who don’t yet realize the whole place is rigged with explosives. The songs themselves are varied in demeanor and aggression as well, sequencing slower, more melodic sections between lightless dirges and stompy nu-metal ready to warm up a metal-fest crowd for System Of A Down (see if your head ain’t banging to “Funny Man”). They should bring some of those rigged explosives to the Liquid Death-sponsored OzzFest redux they’ll inevitably be invited to play and really show those fools how it’s done!
Cicada Wicked Dream 7″ (Unlawful Assembly)
There’s a certain strain of modern hardcore that does it like this: a pogo drum beat with heavy reliance on the floor-toms opens alongside a Bone Awl-derived down-picked riff, and it skips a beat, at which point the singer appears with an anguished aough. There’s a lot of this stuff going on, and while Richmond’s Cicada open their Wicked Dream EP in precisely this manner, they strike me as more interesting, or at least more impactful, than many of their like-minded peers. I think it’s because, while much of their foundational riffage is in league with Gel and Gag, Cicada are coming from the spiky punk side of the equation, focusing on speed and sudden shifts rather than pit-worthy breakdowns. They’re playing on the same team as Electric Chair and Invertebrates, not Sunami and Scowl. And rather than do the usual overly-effected vocal thing, where a single shout echoes through waves of distortion, the vocalist performs a faithful remake of Sakevi’s Detestation style, an evil guttural growl that works well over this spastic hardcore punk. (The EP ends with the band clapping and cheering, which would’ve been the perfect time for him to mimic Sakevi’s “bye bye!” at the end of “Endless Blockades”. Maybe next time!) I’d say this sort of ugly, Japanese-inspired hardcore belongs on a one-sided flexi, but it turns out they beat me to it – Cicada’s three-song demo was reissued earlier this year in flexi form on Total Peace. Real punks know what to do!
Citric Dummies Trapped In A Parking Garage 7″ (Feel It)
You can’t leave these Citric Dummies alone for five seconds without them getting into trouble! This time we find our heroes unable to escape a parking garage mere moments after stuffing themselves on Arby’s, the basis of the two a-side tracks on this new seven-inch for Feel It. This is the silly side of real-people punk, reflecting the same mundane crap whose motions we all find ourselves unconsciously going through here in the US of A, giving us a moment to laugh at ourselves in order to cover up the tears that should be flowing instead. I really enjoyed their last LP, Zen And The Arcade Of Beating Your Ass, which crammed Misfits-y hooks into twice-the-speed songs, but this new four-song ripper is “whoa-oh” free, too agitated to do anything but shout their common complaints over fast-paced garage-punk blasts. These tunes take a similar updated-Ramones riff mentality as Dark Thoughts and rip the muffler off, Dwarves-style, for frantic yet poppy punk that would whip even the boredest crowd into a frenzy. It’s a Dwarves you can feel good about, though – songs like “Driving A Piece of Shit” and “Sit At Home And Die” aren’t geared to show you how woke they are, thank goodness, but rather express these sincere slices of life with relatability and an appealing sense of humor, calling out the nonsense everyone else seems resigned to ignore. Even in this time of unimaginable tumult and horror, Citric Dummies need to speak their truth on “Sit At Home And Die”, and speak it they shall: other bands suck!
CS + Kreme The Butterfly Drinks The Tears Of The Tortoise LP (The Trilogy Tapes)
Even including the good stuff, it often can feel like we’ve heard it all before, so I always relish a new CS + Kreme release, confident that at the very least it will be something I certainly haven’t heard before. The Aussie post-experimental duo never repeat themselves, but a line can be traced through all their records, if not an entirely straight one. The Butterfly Drinks The Tears Of The Tortoise is their third full-length, and will probably end up being referred to as their “guitar record”, unless of course they bring in Scott Ian for their next one and blow this out of the water. Acoustic guitars are prominent throughout, often laid exquisitely bare but never untouched – part of the CS + Kreme process seems to be wiping down every last sound with something unexpected or otherworldly. While the guitar is a prominent figure, there’s still plenty left-of-left-field sound-design happening, be it the metallic tinkle of a ratchet, chopped-up auto-tune vocals, Graham Lambkin-esque frequencies or mind-tricking effects. The music of CS + Kreme calls to mind the secret sonic pulses mushrooms send back and forth to each other, dog whistles, whale song… sounds that elude the typical human umwelt yet vibrate all around us. This is what they’d sound like if played by humans on the instruments available to humans. “Fly Care” is precisely what I’m talking about: slippery melodic drones and sputtering pulsations coincide with an unintuitive melodic solo of unknown digital origin, the mating call of whatever avian-cyborg species replaces homo sapiens a thousand years from now.
Feeling Figures Everything Around You LP (K / Perennial)
Montreal’s Feeling Figures continue to explore any and all facets of underground guitar-band music on their second full-length, Everything Around You. It feels like they’d be a group Kurt Cobain would’ve repped on a t-shirt in 1989: aggressive but not masculine, defiant yet melodic, a band that is clearly not beholden to commercialism but might surprise you with a pop nugget that should excite the faceless masses were they sharp enough to receive it. Maybe it’s because that Love Child reissue is still kicking around my turntable, but I can imagine a kinship with Love Child and how they did it, covering all sorts of styles within the gravitational pull of classic indie-rock (even nearly hardcore-punk?) with as many band members singing as they want… they’ll throw a weird little proggy moment in that has me thinking of Home Blitz or even Henry Cow just as soon as they’ll plod out a Velvets-y choogle that requires less than ten fingers per band member to pull off. Violent Change are as similarly scatterbrained when it comes to songwriting, but Feeling Figures opt for a more traditional sonic route, easy-listening for anyone who likes their easy-listening a little scuffed up. At only four members, Feeling Figures are downright minimalist by Canadian indie metrics, but who knows, maybe they’ll get a tambourinist and an auxiliary synth player soon enough? Could we handle such an endless combination of possible Feeling Figures songs?
Gyeongsu & June All To None 12″ (Deardogs)
Stir up those autumnal feelings with some lazy-hazy ’90s-inspired alt-rock-lite from France. Gyeongsu & June remind me of a time when coffee shops had big disgusting brown couches and a pegboard with local flyers, not antsy Doordash deliverers hogging the bathroom key, so if you want to slide back into those semi-fabricated memories, “Scarlet”, the first cut off this twelve-inch EP, is a great place to start. It’s like if Dolores O’Riordan of The Cranberries wrote the theme for a sitcom based on Amélie. “Faces” chills even harder, a couple of 4AD-soaked guitars wandering a lonesome path that has me imagining Carla dal Forno materializing in the vocal booth right as Oasis laid down “Cast No Shadow”. The vibe continues on the title track with cool European guitar-work and vocals that pull you in close, still feeling like a Cranberries high on early Modern English and scampering through cobblestone streets after dark. Closing track “Lead To Curse” opens with a few minutes of a pleasantly fuzzy pulse, like shoegaze with only gaze, no shoes, but it eventually configures itself into its final form, slow-core trip-hop that will have the kids making TikToks at a previously unheard-of caliber. The throwback signifiers are clear, but the final concoction is fresh and almost unbearably hip. Go on, play it for your friends and pretend you heard it in some after-hours lounge in the fifth arrondissement, not on some old man’s web blog.
Некројаготки Вештице 12″ (Опачина)
Turn off your brain, you won’t need it where we’re headed! Outsider Macedonian label Опачина continues to share its crude and noisy visions with the rest of the world care of its most perplexing release yet, a one-sided twelve-inch vinyl reissue of a 1992 cassette release from Macedonia’s Некројаготки (which translates to “Necrostrawberries”, I’m told). Somehow, the gleefully unlistenable vibes brought about by Meat Shits, A.C., Napalm Death, Testicle Bomb and Final Exit in the early ’90s found likeminded souls in Macedonia, the Necrostrawberries themselves. Rather than full-on gore-grind noise-core blasts, Некројаготки play around with form and style, often mocking other forms of music (funk and glam metal, for instance) by playing their own sloppy, terrible versions of it, sampling long stretches of cartoons direct from the TV, or doling out some charmingly rudimentary crusty d-beat hardcore. It’s a perfectly understandable reaction to a self-serious, pro-‘tude underground from a land mostly ignored by the rest of the world, but the part that I struggle to grasp is why Опачина decided this needed to be resurrected from its decades-old cassette grave and pressed on vinyl here and now. I’d say the audience is limited, but that feels like an understatement – there might actually be a negative number of people out there who want to buy this record, sit down and listen to it. It simply does not get more anti-commercial than this particular venture right here, so by that criteria alone, two thumbs up for Опачина.
Jabu A Soft And Gatherable Star LP (Do You Have Peace?)
There’s an unmistakably British form of weary, grey-skied anomie that hits so well when it comes to depressive dream-pop that I don’t know why groups from other nations even try. You simply can’t match the low-level misery that’s baked deep into the crust of the best classic United Kingdom 4AD groups, and Bristol’s Jabu are the newest example of how artistically rich this dour form of underground music can be. Opener “Oceanside Spider House” is almost over-the-top in its Cocteau Twins similarities, the crystalline vocals of Jasmine Butt (huhuh) cascading over drums programmed at the slowest possible speed and chorus/flange guitar the colors of an oil spill. The rest of the record isn’t quite as directly referential, as the song-form drifts into hazier, drearier territory, rain-dappled loops taking precedence over verses and choruses in a way that is distinctly Bristolian. (I can’t help but think of the sprawlingly creative Young Echo crew and their various ventures like O$VMV$M, of whom Jabu’s Amos Childs is, get this, also a member. It’s all making sense now!) “Sea Mills” is a standout, as it blends the experimental approach you’d find on a Blackest Ever Black or Stroom release with late ’80s goth-pop, like Anna Domino putting her phone on silent and listening to the first couple Black Tape For A Blue Girl albums on repeat. Yet even so, A Soft And Gatherable Star doesn’t sound like a cross-breeding of influences so much as a strange new goth music that our times demand; somber, elusive, smart and sensual.
Jay Glass Dubs Resurgence LP (Sundial)
Been a minute since I sat down with a new Jay Glass Dubs record – the Greek producer’s exquisitely danked-out records were a mainstay of my immediately-pre-pandemic listening regimen – and boy am I glad I did! Seems he stepped back from the flurry of activity he was kicking up in the late ’10s, but maybe he was just saving all the best stuff for Resurgence, an absolute stunner of mystical narcoleptronics. The moods he conjures are mysterious, heavy-lidded and serene, soothing isolation-tank vibes if the tank was floating through the dwindling hours of either a goth club night or a dub soundclash depending on the particular record. It’s probably not the trickiest sound to conjure up, but I swear to you, Jay Glass Dubs operates on the highest level, finding the perfect balance of reverberated rhythms, haunting ambient flutter and unconventional percussive elements. “Arbitrary” sounds like you’re deep into a trance listening to Gas’s Königsforst when Valentina Magaletti steps out of the shadows and lays into some trippy percussive phrasing. That comparison should be enough to sell you on Resurgence (or at least have you pull it up for free on Spotify like some sort of gauche freeloader), but the whole album is this satisfying. “Don Lenti” and “Laguna” are the closest thing to the Rhythm & Sound school of dub here (check those time-elapse horns on “Laguna”, mmmm), only shredded and stretched like a cosmic mozzarella stick. “Swint” comes last and might actually be my favorite cut of the bunch – if you managed to make it through the rest of the album upright, a fully horizontal position becomes unavoidable from the closing minutes of this calming dub smear.
Junior Loves Redriff / Piper 32 12″ (5 Gate Temple)
I will always check out something new on John T. Gast’s fascinating 5 Gate Temple label, unless it’s like, a USB keychain release or deleted dubplate or something impossible like that (though honestly, if you have any 5 Gate Temple deleted dubplates, let’s work out a trade). Junior Loves is a perfect artist for the label, in that his identity is only ever partially revealed – in this case, the artist’s Instagram features more pictures of hand-built cabinetry and shelving than club selfies or promotional flyers. I’ll have to locate some of his earlier records (which, based on the impenetrable nature of this scene, are selling for either £2 or £200), as these three tracks of aggressively digital dub have me pulling my thickest hoodie up over my head. “Redriff” is an ice-cold stepper that calls to mind the fiercer side of Y2K-era IDM, not drill n’ bass but punctuated with a similar aggression. “Piper 32” you can slink into, dystopian digi-dub with a persistent low-end and Final Fantasy synth leads, but “End Cut” might be my favorite of the bunch, quite similar to “Piper 32” in mood and presentation but with wilder percussion and a cryptic Jahtari sound, tailored for the puzzle room of any pyramid crypt. One person shouldn’t be this talented at crafting both bespoke hardwood joinery and underground digi-tech steppers, yet Junior Loves walks among us.
Mexican Coke Mexican Coke 12″ (Convulse)
One-upmanship has always played a role in hardcore, with earlier generations focusing on sonic extremes: shorter, faster, louder, scarier, realer or heavier, just for starters. Nowadays, it seems that the focus has shifted from song to vibe, a circumstance that this twelve-inch EP from Houston’s Mexican Coke perfectly exemplifies. From fan-shot Instagram clips to formal music videos with some sort of production budget, Mexican Coke made their name on live visuals, seeing as they arrive at any scene with black ski-masks and authentic intimidation in the form of brazen firearm flashing, on stage and off. Maybe it’s a Texas tradition (Gibby Haynes firing shotgun blanks into the Lollapalooza crowd is a YouTube must-watch), but Mexican Coke take things further than the large number of hardcore bands who make fearsome menace an integral part of their aesthetic. The music seems to enhance the vibe rather than command it: besides the intro and outro, these songs are kind of interchangeable Gag/Bib/Hoax-core, burly down-picked stomps that offer little variation from each other, with vocals slathered in death-metal effects to the point of obliteration. Sonically, it’s a whole lot like fellow Houston unit Sexpill, though Sexpill’s sound is weirder, heavier and more uniquely memorable. Mexican Coke seem a lot more likely to blast me in half with a sawed-off shotgun, though, so if the quality of “which band would literally end my life” is a determining factor, get your last will and testament notarized and then head over to the Mexican Coke show.
Pablo’s Eye The Light Was Sharp, Our Eyes Were Open LP (Stroom)
Stroom introduced me to Brussels-based collective Pablo’s Eye with Spring Break, a collection of their ’90s material released in 2018. I found myself throwing on this subdued, left-field sort of trip-hop / spoken-word / downtempo-electronics assemblage all the time, so the discovery that they’re somehow still a fully-operational contemporary act tickled me like bros at the gym when DraftKings sends them a bonus twenty-dollar parlay for the weekend. The Light Was Sharp, Our Eyes Were Open is similar in mood yet different in execution to Spring Break: across fourteen fairly short tracks (shorter than your average Fugazi track, let’s say), synths hum and warble as Marie Mandi reads the poetry of bandmate Richard Skinner in a direct deadpan, as if she’s either hypnotizing you or herself. The ninth track, “The Deep Dark Days Of September”, is the first time we settle into any form of the rhythmic, late-nite Balearic sexual healing I heard on Spring Break – think The Beloved’s “The Sun Rising” without the pop fragrance – as most tracks tend to hover in low-light, more cinematic than danceable. It really works for current-day Pablo’s Eye, and while I hate to call anything “Lynchian” if I don’t really mean it, this music seems to focus on whatever is happening off-screen rather than on, though in Pablo’s Eye’s case, it’s a horny skin-flick on HBO circa 1996 turned Icelandic cerebral thriller, not Twin Peaks. Whatever it is, you won’t hear anything else like it, which is more or less the seal of authenticity you can expect from Stroom.
Pearson Sound Which Way Is Up 12″ (Hessle Audio)
Hessle Audio’s post-dubstep king returns to the label he co-founded, maintaining his extremely reasonable “once every two years” approach to EPs. Works for me! Leave the mediocre stuff on the cutting room floor and drop a fresh, high-quality twelve-inch every even-numbered year since 2018 and I’ll be here for you. Which Way Is Up flexes Pearson Sound’s rhythmic muscle – one of his finest qualities, I’d say – but this time around, there’s more playfulness to the proceedings than I’d have come to expect. Maybe he’s been palling around with Joe? “Hornet” probably gets its title from the ever present stereo-panned whine, more Charlotte Hornets mascot than invasive killer, bumping up against b-boy effects and clean-eating beats. “Twister” goes harder and faster, with a tense snare pattern, gluey bass and high-pitched percussive samples to soundtrack any getaway chase. “Slingshot” is all silky bass and a reclined rhythm – the soundtrack for counting your stacks following the proceeding getaway chase – whereas the title track initially recedes from Pearson Sound’s imposing percussive storms, a moment of clarity before the deepest bass wobble of the EP stumbles into a cab. Don’t take me home yet, what other clubs are still open?
Pharmakon Maggot Mass LP (Sacred Bones)
On her fifth Sacred Bones full-length, New York’s Pharmakon continues to writhe in the organic muck like a child in a ball-pit. There’s a formality to Pharmakon albums that I find very appealing – rather than release every other rehearsal on a limited tape, Pharmakon albums are comparatively infrequent and feel more like an “event” than more new crap on a merch table. Each album offers its own unique thesis, expertly crafted to bludgeon and frighten, always enhanced by starkly personal visuals and concepts to accompany the industrial noise. Maggot Mass is a harrowing and intense admonition of humanity’s failure, and I can’t say she’s wrong! Of course, a theme falls limp if the music is mediocre, but Maggot Mass might be my favorite Pharmakon material yet. The album is anchored around these massive, disgusting bass riffs, either on bass-guitar or synth, heavier and meaner than even the ugliest doom-metal bands. Pharmakon even kinda “sings” on some of these tracks, her vocals never more present and grueling than here, and the harsh metal-on-metal scrape is pungent and punishing. I’m reminded of Wolf Eyes circa Dead Hills and Chicago’s HOGG, though neither ever got this heavy – Pharmakon is only ever competing with herself, really. “Oiled Animals” is the closest I’ve heard anyone get to Swans circa Filth as far as desolate, gut-punching industrial rock is concerned, and “Splendid Isolation” sounds like Emptyset kicking the crap out of Throbbing Gristle’s “Hamburger Lady”. Humans are a terrible species, it’s true, but I’d love to see an iguana or an otter make a noise record this good!
Raynerfromfinance An Intro To Truffle101 12″ (Truffle101)
Truffle101 is a new label coming from Berlin run by DJ posse LazySusan (aka 2StepBec, Zeus and their British chum Oliver.r), though the amusing moniker of “Raynerfromfinance” is Oliver.r’s doing. When crews run thick like this, though, I wouldn’t be surprised if they all got to throw in their two cents (pence?) each, particularly as An Intro To Truffle101 is a smorgasbord of cheeky Balearic fun, sensuous elevator muzak, spa-resort dub and new-age jazz. It seems like lots of cratedigging vinyl nuts have run out of obscure private-press dazzlers to unearth, so they’ve taken to crafting the music of their dreams themselves – this might be how we ended up with “Dystopian Mr. Miles”, which melds Mille Plateaux-style IDM-ambient with “Careless Whisper”-informed sax. “Crazy” is like an AliExpress form of instrumental Sade; “Imaginova” goes fuzzy bossa-nova for a couple of Gen X lovebirds from a Hal Hartley movie, whereas “Tokyo Dreaming” slips those characters under the covers for the first time. The vibes are palpable and exquisitely tailored, Raynerfromfinance having clearly crafted a record that he would’ve lost his mind over had he found it in a musty cardboard box under the priced used records in some sleepy record shop. Truffle101 is doing a decent job of keeping the tracks offline, so that you too might stumble upon its pleasures in its physical form too. How excited can you get discovering an MP3?
Reymour NoLand LP (Knekelhuis)
Belgian-Swiss duo Reymour stick with the great Knekelhuis label for their third twelve-inch record, clearly a case of cool recognizing cool. Reymour are all icy-hot dub-disco post-punk, big oval sunglasses and leopard-print fur coat two sizes too big. They prefer space-aged synth squiggles to guitars, coat their deliberately-sparse drum machines in wet reverb, and work with bass-lines that are certain to enhance any dance-floor with their mysterious intrigue. NoLand confirms their shared sensibilities with Anika and Antena, and probably Young Marble Giants to some degree as well, though Reymour’s penchant for sensual chanson places them in the curved leather booth in the back of a late-night café rather than the wooden desk and chair of a public library. This sort of sound is inherently appealing to my ears, but also prone to exhaustion if done the exact same certain way that most people do it, which is why I appreciate the variety of songwriting and instrumentation that Reymour throw into it. “Documentary” still sounds like them, for example, but if you told me it was a Happy Mondays cover, I wouldn’t doubt you for a second. And they follow that up with the mischievous waltz of “Sans Éveil”, a totally different vibe… NoLand benefits from its sequencing and playful contrasts. At fourteen tracks, it’s a hefty chunk of music, but this is a rare case of excellent value, not gratuitous overkill.
Shackleton & Six Organs Of Admittance Jinxed By Being 2xLP (Drag City)
I feel like that Vince McMahon meme with each successive Shackleton collaboration as of late. Holy Tongue? Six Organs Of Admittance?? What’s next: Bad Brains? Benny Benassi, Stevie Nicks??? That Holy Tongue collab / reworking is a tough Shackleton release to beat in 2024, though his pairing with cryptozoological guitar-conjurer Ben Chasny doesn’t compete with anything besides the secrets deep within its own metaphysical navel. When Chasny’s vocals are in the mix, it’s particularly creepy – this must be what Comus dreamt of at night, some sort of Babadook peeking out of inter-dimensional portals, ready to nibble upon your soul. They balance those moments of Sun City Girls-esque supernatural horror with dreamy passages of languid guitars and soft-ambient synths, tranquil sand dunes separating beast-filled waters. “Stages Of Capitulation”, for example, has me considering that Dylan Carlson and Richie Hawtin might actually share more similar artistic viewpoints than not, so righteously does it meld solemn guitar and soothing electronic production. The back to back fright of “The Sign Of The Dove” and “Electric Storm” has me checking under my bed before I turn off the lights though, not wanting to end up the victim of some arcane fairytale too morbid for Grimm to write. Shackleton and Six Organs Of Admittance need to release the magical antidote to Jinxed By Being before it’s too late!
Shirese Hardly Cricket LP (C/Site Recordings / Grapefruit)
Much like Feeling Figures, Connecticut’s Shirese are a versatile rock ensemble, unbounded by stuffy genre guidelines or prevailing trends. They’ve got nearly a million tapes and records out now, the personnel shifting and loosely assembled around vocalist and band-leader Matt Paolilo, and while I’ve only heard a handful of their vinyl full-lengths thus far, they don’t show any signs of songwriter fatigue or quantity for quantity’s sake. Hardly Cricket is their newest, and leans on the classic-rock dial, guitars finding time to bear resemblance to Loaded-era VU, the dual firecracking of Thin Lizzy and the adorable stumble of Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain, all on the same record (though usually not on the same song). I get that Pavement and The Velvet Underground are two giant tentpoles of underground rock, so towering as to practically be rendered meaningless as signifiers, but I sweat that Shirese doesn’t just follow the motions, they seem to possess that same inherent spark of magic that transcends simple jangly melodies from regular old songs like the aforementioned legends. It’s all over the place as usual, and not all of it hits for me – the ’50s sock-hop vibes of “Red Cent” is my least favorite Shirese moment to date – but opener “New Music” thrills with wildly unselfconscious Jonathan Richman joy, “Sacred Heart” makes you think you’re living in the same sweet reality as The Adventures Of Pete & Pete, and “Arguing” is intrepid garage in the manner of The Original Sins. An abundance of rock value well worth the price of admission.
Nala Sinephro Endlessness LP & 12″ (Warp)
Every year, there’s one popular experimental album where the vinyl sells out before you find out about it – it seems like Nala Sinephro’s debut Space 1.8 held that title in 2021. The Caribbean-Belgian composer’s follow-up was due to have lots of eyes on it, and I can’t imagine any pre-existing fans have been disappointed by Endlessness. In fact, it almost feels like it was grown in a lab to satisfy each and every Pitchfork-jazz type, so perfect is its on-trend synthesis of long-form string composition, spiritual jazz and space-aged electronics. The hipsters are screen-printing a million different Alice Coltrane shirts right now for a reason, and the music of Nala Sinephro has quickly found a similar spot in the bins of dabblers, dilettantes and poseurs across the globe. If this feels like a diss (and I guess it kind of is), please be assured that you can count me in those ranks as well, as if there’s any sonic or aesthetic fault within Endlessness, I haven’t been able to find it. Sinephro is exquisite in the way she’ll pull a soothing drone out like saltwater taffy, dub-techno pads slowly rising and receding, giving way to heavenly brass and keys as percussion locks into form ala Natural Information Society or explodes outward like Irreversible Entanglements. If anything, I would savor the chance to hear Nala Sinephro do something less blatantly crowd-pleasing – after all, the original spiritual/free/experimental jazz masters weren’t following blueprints so much as carving uncharted sonic paths with no guarantee of financial support or even critical acclaim, and there’s no denying Sinephro’s abundant talent to pull off whatever she wants. But for now, there’s Endlessness, sophisticated, delectable, and almost eerily algorithm-pleasing.
Alan Sparhawk White Roses, My God LP (Sub Pop)
Having lost his wife and decades-long musical partner Mimi Parker in 2022, fans, friends and onlookers of beloved slow-core pioneers Low expressed their overwhelming sympathy towards Alan Sparhawk, and understandably so. It’s a loss that can only be grasped if it’s happened to you as well, and as one of the few shining beacons of underground integrity, both logistically and creatively, it feels like the whole world is on Low and Sparhawk’s side. It’s with that framing that I’d imagine most people have greeted White Roses, My God, an extreme electronic outlier in Sparhawk’s catalog, and presumably a one-off dalliance rather than the establishing of some intentional new direction. Low’s final album Hey What pushed in bold new maximalist directions for guitar production, but White Roses was created and performed entirely on Sparhawk’s son’s (and son’s friends’) synths and drum machines, and it certainly bears the hallmarks of that younger generation. The beats are the familiar form of trap-lite one might associate with Playboi Carti and Future, the synths a simplified take on PC Music’s squeaky-glossy sound, and perhaps most jarringly, Sparhawk’s vocals are pitch-shifted to vocoder-chipmunk form, a style 100 Gecs brought to prominence (or at least stubborn popular acceptance). The grief roiling within Sparhawk is undeniable, so the disconnect between the fully synthesized sounds and his emotional state is jarring and unexpected: on “Project 4 Ever” you can feel his heart leaping out of his chest, even if it’s transmitting through the thick glowing Gorilla Glass of an iPad.
Split System Vol. 1 LP (Goner)
Melbourne’s Split System are already up to Vol. 2, and probably working on Vol. 3, but Goner recognizes a garage-punk sensation when they see it, so why not press it up for American audiences hungry for the stuff? Take me, for example: Split System weren’t previously on my radar and I often feel like I’m drowning in a sea of modern Aussie punk. They have a very particular set of skills – namely, merging Eddy Current-indebted guitar riffs with Hank Wood’s vocal delivery – and it’s pretty darn stellar! While I cannot speak to the creative circumstances that led them to this particular sonic combination, I’m willing to give them the benefit of the doubt that they didn’t directly set out to rip off two of the 21st century’s garage-punk greats, but came across these catchy, easygoing riffs and the choppy vocal dispatch on their own, as snug together as a domestic beer in a Goner koozie. They do a great job of sounding more like a squad or a gang than a band, locked in and operating hand-in-hand with each other, knowing full well they’ve cooked up a great batch of songs and enjoying the earned cockiness that comes along with it. Can’t help but be reminded of OBN III’s as well, as they’re both that rare form of band who generally sounds like the rest of the bill they’re on, yet even though they’re playing second out of five, they’re the one the crowd remembers best the next morning. My favorite Goner release in a minute!
Tabor Mountain Twilight Apologies LP (Related)
Isn’t it kind of strange how so many awkward outsider weirdos got into playing soft-rock in the last decade or so? I wonder what that’s about… perhaps it’s, in our social-media drenched mindset, everyone knows they can’t really shock anyone anymore – what’s the point in jumping off the roof into a dumpster when some other guy is jumping off a higher roof into a filthier dumpster five minutes later? Those thrills aren’t thrilling anymore, but there’s definitely a comfort in retreating to the harmless soft-rock new-wave pop we remembered hearing as children, if even indirectly, and after all, any music can be fun to play if it’s good. Patrick Tabor has been operating as Tabor Mountain for a while – he’s one of the folks I’m talking about – and you can put me in his corner. Twilight Apologies is feel-good pop with a strange aftertaste, like an unopened bag of Runts from the ’90s consumed today. I’m reminded of Ariel Pink, had he set his sights on Survivor, Journey and REO Speedwagon and pretended his bedroom was the finest digital studio you could buy in 1984. We know who those three groups are because they wrote some absolutely gargantuan hooks, and while Tabor Mountain hasn’t necessarily delivered its own chunk of twenty-four karat AM gold, Twilight Apologies is a strong and entertaining effort, the kind of album that sounds good on first go-around and only gets better from there. Not sure if any of my readers like to wear spandex unitards and denim vests while doing bicep curls as they scheme to seek revenge against the local bullies / two-timing ex / greedy factory owner / corrupt police chief in their lives, but if so, boy have I got a record for you.
Toribio Bring Dat Jazz 12″ (BDA)
Trying to make it a thing where every time I’m in Detroit, I swing by People’s Records and pick up some new dance single off the new-arrivals wall. I decided to go with this one when I was in town last month, based on the song title “Jazz Misconduct”, the James Vinciguerra-esque lettering and the fact that Sam Wilkes is featured on a track, and People’s did not lead me astray. Cesár Toribio is actually from Brooklyn, but Bring Dat Jazz is bursting with the soulful and passionate house sound I associate with Moodymann. “Bumples” is full of Detroit flavor led by wild, proggy horns, with tight live-band arrangements repurposed for parking-lot sound-systems. “My Humps” is as lush as Theo Parrish taking the brunch shift, jazzy house that would be ripe for some g-funk rapping if the beat ever furrowed its brow. And that’s the b-side! Opener “Jazz Misconduct” snaps and clicks with elegantly funky bass runs, more of that dizzying horn-play and an off-kilter strut that Kyle Hall would appreciate. “Mr. T (Toribio Edit)” is the track featuring bassist Sam Wilkes and it’s the least jazzy of the bunch, colorful 8-bit sounding synths popping off in the direction of vapor-wave. It’s cool, and part of the reason I picked up Bring Dat Jazz in the first place, but my soul is so fully nourished by the other three cuts that I’m almost too content and peaceful, if only for a moment.
Wake In Fright Around Every Corner EP 7″ (Police)
“Wake In Fright” has to be the name of a horror movie – it’s a Uniform album title, of that I’m certain – but I’m not into scaring myself on purpose, so I’m refusing to investigate further. I was prepared to find something grisly and harrowing on this record, but the band Wake In Fright is a stately indie-punk trio out of Portland, ME, far more suited to the role of heroes than monsters. The tight, snappy rock they’re ripping through here exudes the same underdog chutzpah of Ted Leo and Chisel at their finest, taking starting cues from Elvis Costello and The Jam and giving it that American DIY kick in the pants. Vocalist/guitarist Micah Blue Smaldone was in Boston hardcore stalwarts Out Cold back in the day, before cutting out on his own in the American-primitive acoustic scene, and Wake In Fright feels like another successful back-to-basics reset, a classic guitar/bass/drums trio that can fit all their crap in a station wagon and conquer the continental forty-eight one corner-bar venue at a time. On this EP, you get four solid, buttoned-up and buoyant rockers. There’s never a bad time for a new anti-cop song, and “Good Cop Bad Cop” is going to have the blue-lives morons slinking off to the bathroom in defeat. If it doesn’t have you spilling your pint glass in righteous agreement, what are you even doing at a Wake In Fright show in the first place?
Way Dynamic Duck LP (Spoilsport)
There’s a subset of the Australian indie underground that’s full of rainbows, stuffed animals and picnics, one that seems remarkably, almost suspiciously happy in 2024. I’d file Melbourne’s Way Dynamic accordingly (and on some bright piece of primary-colored construction paper), so pleasantly unworried are the songs of Duck. The album title and cover drawing could’ve been rendered by children, which is a fitting setting for these songs, ripe for broadcast on a left-of-center children’s TV show. That’s certainly the vibe, and while I suppose there are probably some kids out there perfectly content with the simplicity of Raffi, Way Dynamic’s tunes are quite sophisticated, full of varied instrumentation and cool little tricks: a ridiculous bass-line here, lush keys there, Lehmann Smith guesting on clarinet and bass-clarinet as needed. Think Brian Wilson’s lust for pop perfection brought back to earth by Randy Newman’s silliness and Christopher Cross’s knack for an original melody that already feels familiar. The attention to detail is undeniable, each song given plenty of space (and a wide range of instrumentation) to bring every darkened corner into full technicolor sunshine. Your enjoyment may hinge on exactly how uncynical and cheerful you’re feeling; give me Duck on a bad day and I’m throwing it out the window, but the next time I get a less-than-cost-of-living salary increase or clean colonoscopy report, remind me to pull out Duck to help celebrate.
Milan W. Leave Another Day LP (Stroom)
Milan Warmoeskerken is a favored name around these pages, having released a couple of fantastic low-key IDM / inner-searching ambient records, ones that seemed too restless to abide by clean aesthetic boundaries. You can’t go wrong with Stroom on their worst day, so I was eager to peep Milan W.’s newest, Leave Another Day. Much to my sincere surprise, it sounds almost exactly like Kurt Vile circa his first couple Matador albums! Leave Another Day is dragged cosmic cowboy blues, the same sort of hound-dog-in-outer-space vibe you get from Kurt Vile all by his lonesome. Check “All The Way” and “Face To Face” and tell me you don’t immediately hear it, from the lilting, gauzy vocal to the string arrangement and drearily spacious atmosphere. Now, I’m not saying Milan W. is ripping off Mr. Vile – in fact, I’d guess it’s more likely that neither artist is aware of the other – and that’s part of what makes this album so fun, the unintended coincidence of it all, which often happens when these techno/electronic-centric producer folks venture out into the world of rock music (or, occasionally, vice versa). Milan W. does a fine job with it, regardless of Vile’s existence, his songs densely-layered but never overstuffed, inflected with shimmering stardust or goth-ish pomp as needed. If this takes us one step closer to Kurt Vile’s IDM record, I’m gonna order a second copy.