by Dan Goldin (@post_trash_)

Welcome to FUZZY MEADOWS, our weekly recap of this week's new music. We're sharing our favorite releases of the week in the form of albums, singles, and music videos along with the "Further Listening" section of new and notable releases from around the web. It's generally written in the early hours of the morning and semi-unedited... but full of love and heart. The list is in alphabetical order and we sincerely recommend checking out all the music we've included. There's a lot of great new music being released. Support the bands you love. Spread the word and buy some new music.

*Disclaimer: We are making a conscious effort not to include any artist in our countdown on back-to-back weeks in order to diversify the feature, so be sure to check the "Further Listening" as well because it's often of top-notch quality too.

BAKED | “Walkin’ Into”

After five long years with little activity, New York’s Baked have returned, set to release a new split EP together with Pittsburgh’s The Zells. Pairing the laid back fuzz and blistering twang of Baked with The Zells’ garage tinged slacker pop, it’s a split feels rooted in mutual admiration. Due out November 2nd via Crafted Sounds (A Country Western, Gaadge, Silver Car Crash), each band released their first singles, The Zells’ “Electric Upside” and Baked’s “Walkin’ Into,” the latter crackling with slow burning walls of guitar. The track is held up by a glorious rhythm that seems to ride deep in the pocket, as Baked are once again joined by original drummer Yoni David. There’s a guest vocal appearance from Bueno’s Luke Chiaruttini and the band are joined by Adam Reich, making this one a family affair, capturing Baked in their full glory. With a sludgy riff, R.J. Gordon’s laconic vocals, and Isabella Ronayne’s vibrant synths, the band slink and groove, stumble and soar, and remind us the power of their laidback bliss.

BEIGE PALACE | “Distant Fizz”

Leeds’ Beige Palace have truly mastered a special and singular kind of gnawing intensity, their minimalist punk is utterly abrasive but incredibly captivating. Their sound scrapes and peels with broken syllables, a detached sense of melody, and dread that forms in tense open spaces. The construction of the band’s interwoven brand of post-hardcore is brilliant throughout their second album, Making Sounds For Andy, due out November 17th via Human Worth. “Distant Fizz” is built on a staccato riff and what we’ll call howling drones, the song stretched and pulled with little to distract you from the incessant repetition. There’s a quality to it that feels like watching the pieces come together, falling in their place, shimmering with a sort of deranged brilliance. There’s a sense that each instrument is sort of playing against each other, the groove snaking with an atonal clamor. While some band’s like to sweeten the pot with a soft vocal melody, Kelly Bishop’s commanding and drawn out vocals as well as the mumbled shouts of Freddy Vinehill-Cliffe only add to the carnage. Modern post-hardcore minimalism at it’s finest.

CEL RAY “Piss Park”

Chicago’s Cel Ray already released one of our absolute favorite EPs of the year back in February, and as the well deserved hype around the band continues to grow, they’re getting ready to release another one. The quartet play bugged out post-punk full of animated character with boisterous hooks, tightly wound riffs, and razor sharp rhythms that feel brilliantly jagged. They rattle with a sense of melodic familiarity, their sound equal parts frazzled and catchy. Cel Ray return with Piss Park, a new EP due out November 17th via Six Tonnes De Chair Records. The title track picks up where Cellular Raymond left off, darting around with unexpected jitters. The guitars do plenty of poking and prodding, detached from the rubbery bass groove and the blistering fills of the drums. The highlight though is the bent melodies of Maddie Daviss’ vocals, as she laments attempting to find a place to pee at the park. The song is fun and punchy, tight yet elastic (just listen to bassist Kevin Goggin run all over this one), the band flexing their charm.

CHECKPOINT | “Drift” LP

Melbourne/Naarm’s Checkpoint began as the solo project of Erik Scerba (Hobsons Bay Coast Guard), who recorded, mixed, and mastered the band’s debut album, Drift, at home prior to expanding the line-up. With the expansion, which found Scerba joined by Jordan Oakley (Pinch Points), Miranda Holt (Dr Sure's Unusual Practice), Tom Woodruff (Gonzo, Dragnet), Amada Monteiro (Carpet Burn, Gutter Girls) and Chris Loftis (HBCG), a band of incredibly tight musicians was formed to play incredibly loose punk music. Drift, out via Erste Theke Tontraeger, is a pure distillation of “egg punk” abandon, built on jittery tempos, soaring synths, punchy garage punk riffs, and a generally whacked out kind of charm. The songs race from lo-fi joy-soaked beat down punk to a kind of B-52s art pop shimmer in the blink of an eye, with distortion and crackling fuzz going hand-in-hand with the riotous energy. It’s a freaky affair of non-stop fun, and just when you think you have the general scope of the record pegged, Scerba keeps the audience guessing, prone to switch between primal repetition and avant-garde prog when the mood strikes.

FAITH HEALER | “The Hand That Fits The Glove” LP

The sound of Faith Healer’s music is smooth as eggs. The duo of Edmonton’s Jessica Jalbert and Rene Wilson make AM gold with a pop splendor, their sound more complex that it would seem but the result is gorgeous and easy listening. The deeper you dig, the more rewarding it is, but The Hand That Fits The Glove works both on immediate levels and repeat listens, mixing synthetic boogie and haunting folk that ultimately sounds like a constant comfort. While some songs have an insistent shuffle and hypnotic grip (“I’m A Dog”), others are content to drift in the dreamy haze with a Laurel Canyon grace (“Green Velvet”), but no matter the mood, Jalbert’s voice is the brilliant focus. Her words fall with such a delicate warmth that even as sings of regret and heartbreak, there’s a warmth, the surreal feeling that things might turn out okay. Vocal melodies, hushed but glistening in their own dreary enchantment, glue together the framework of jazzy folk (“The Hand That Fits The Glove”) and fuzzy psych (“Stranger”).

GUIDED BY VOICES | “For The Home”

How much more can really be said about Guided By Voices that hasn’t been said a million times over? You know what you’re getting into with a new GBV release, especially when it comes as their third this year, but then again “For The Home” would prove that you don’t always know what good ol’ Robert Pollard and co. are up to. We’ve said it with each successive release for the past couple years (which is more releases than you might think) but the Dayton legends are on a hot streak, a fact that really is astonishing forty years into their career. With Nowhere To Go But Up due out on November 24th, the record’s first single hints that they’re not resting on their laurels. There’s a smokey mountain kind of front porch aesthetic to the song’s resonating intro and while it eventually fades into more of a traditional GBV power-pop stomp, that sense of twang creeps just beneath it all, warbling in the background whenever the overdrive dips low enough to hear it. We’re excited to hear the album, which really says a lot at record number thirty nine.

LOWER PLENTY | “No Poets” LP

Lower Plenty holds a special place in our heart. While the band’s members are best known for their contributions to Terry, Sleeper & Snake, Total Control, UV Race, Deaf Wish, and Hot Tubs Time Machine, there’s a spiritual beauty to their work in Lower Plenty, a place where folk and avant-garde meet with relative simplicity. The acoustic nature of the project and poetic lyrics creates a gentle invitation to all, but the multi-headed songwriting approach wields a great touch of dynamics. Al Montfort, Daniel Twomey, Jensen Tjhung, and Sarah Heyward work in a haunting unison and stark contrast, bringing each others songs to life with bare bones harmonies, delicate rhythms, and minimalist guitars. Every moment counts, each chord, every trilling croon, every moment of open space strikes with maximum impact. The intent is felt miles away even as perspective shifts between songs. It’s a wondrous new record, creeping and creaking with supreme beauty and rattling atmosphere.

MISTER GOBLIN | “Kentucky Kingdom”

We’ve come to depend on the steady of new music from Mister Goblin over the past five years, with a new release each year to remind us that Sam Goblin remains a national treasure. While his songs often take a “funny” approach on the outside, there’s often a deeper sense at the core, but then again sometimes he’s just writing your favorite (or least favorite) b-list horror movies. It’s in the piecing together of Goblin’s lyrics, the pouring over his words where the profundity is most often felt. “Kentucky Kingdom,” his first single since last year’s great Bunny LP, is like a masterclass in Mister Goblin writing. It’s a song about another Midwest amusement park, but then again it’s not so much about that at all. Over soft acoustics, pedal steel, massively syrupy hooks, and subtle programmed percussion, Goblin (joined by Andy Krull and Spring Silver’s K Nkanza) laments a life without hardship and affliction, personified by an unjust day at the amusement park.

MOPE CITY | “Population: 4” LP

Sydney’s Mope City have hit their stride with their latest album, adapting their slacker punk formula with a new feeling of dense brutality. Population: 4, released via Tenth Court (Wireheads, Ostraaly, Dippers), is still slow and full of sinewy harmonies, but they’ve upped the sense of dread, they’re gentle voices are paired with sludge that swarms in unexpected ways. Refining the “doomgaze” and “sludge pop” sounds, Mope City songs rarely head where you think they will, there’s a jarring sense of something in the way, and it’s part of what makes this record so special. They’re going at it the hard way, burrowing deep and blasting sweetened melodies out from the dirt. With everything pulsating in slow motion, the song’s feel raw and unfused, nothing sparks, nothing shimmers, it’s the last gasp of caterwauling alternative rock at its most claustrophobic, and it’s all the more beautiful for it. Discordance wrestles with melody to create songs that feel intentionally off balance, the band often allowing the noise to take control. True Widow and Sweet Williams fans, take note.

NNAMDÏ | “You Can’t Tell Me Shit” (feat. Big Baby Scumbag)

NNAMDÏ’s wide ranging talent and musical freedom is a large part of what defines him as a once in a generation artist, he can seemingly do anything, and he’s proven it time and time again. That being said, hot damn, there’s nothing like his bugged out rap songs. Since the days of Bootie Noir and “Campbell’s Soup” he’s shown to be an unmatched MC, his palette and delivery shapeshifting in real time in a way that feels truly unique but also draws comparisons to some of the all time greats. Following the deluxe expansion of Please Have A Seat earlier this year, NNAMDÏ comes back in triumphant hip-hop mode on the self-explanatory “You Can’t Tel Me Shit”. Together with a booming verse from Florida’s Big Baby Scumbag, the pair lace the warped and psychedelic beat (produced by NNAMDÏ) with rhymes that prove them to be on their own path, one that winds through shifts in tone and cadence, wrapping itself in wonderful circles. It’s brash in the best of ways, a vivid rap tune without limits.

Further Listening:

OCTOBER 02 - OCTOBER 08:

OCTOBER 09 - OCTOBER 15:

Fuzzy Meadows: The Week's Best New Music (October 2nd - October 15th)