Sadie Dupuis and her crew are BIG on sonics; they played about fifty different guitars, through over a hundred effects pedals and thirty amps at Rancho de la Luna and Sonic Ranch for Rabbit Rabbit. The band has always had a guitar focus, and the riffs have continuously been hot, but engineer Sarah Tudzin, brought added heat.
The recent self-titled album by Atlanta band Vangas is a punishing and relentless record. From the first moments of “Chromatic Ascending” to the closing “The Handstand (Pt. 2),” there’s little room to breathe as the band tunnels through a hole of noise for 35 minutes, dragging you along amid some of the year’s most exciting noise rock.
We can’t overstate the importance of Helvetia, a constant favorite for well over a decade. The impact of its sound and style, the structure, finesse (as well as lack of finesse), has left a profound impression on what this era’s psychedelic music can be. The Beach At The Edge Of The World is a prime example of Helvetia at its absolute best.
Some bands just sound like they are up for a good time. Florry are one of those bands. Led by frontperson Francie Medosch, Florry continue to let loose with a rootsy folk/country blend and some truly incisive and often times devastating lyricism on the Philadelphia based band's second full length, The Holey Bible.
The sense of freedom that reigns supreme on Vol. II is immediately apparent. It’s that exploration (along with Ian Teeple’s songwriting) that make up the heart of the record. He’s content to choogle along in a warped and weird world of progressive bedroom pop, distorted post-punk, glam-tinged power-pop, alien dream-pop, and lo-fi psych.
Super Snōōper toughens up the band’s sound. The recording lends depth and metallic sharpness for maximum wallop; Blair Tramel’s voice is brought more to the front of the mix, and gains range and power. With this more straightforward sonic palette, an array of Snōōper’s best material holds up: taut, funny, and ribboned.
Set in the woods of Harvey’s hometown of Dorset, I Inside The Old Year Dying constructs a folk-horror universe with the assistance of longtime collaborators, Flood and John Parish. Old Dorset dialect, musique concrète, field recordings, audio libraries, and standard instruments reshaped create surreal sounds that transport listeners.
Without giving consideration to the future or lack-there-of, it’s safe to say that Squitch have made their best record to date with Tumbledown Mountain, a collection of songs both personal and inherently complex. It’s an album that deals with the finality of things but as the band know, “it’s not the end.”
Ain’t shit pretty about Currency // Castration and that’s the beauty of it. The band’s third album is ensnared in filth and dissonance, at home amid the depravity, for better or worse, this is where we’re at and Geld aren’t delusional. Rather than collapse under the weight of it all, they chose to decimate, creating something that feels relevant and timeless.
The world of Squid Ink Sky lives in the moon’s glow, it fills the space at the end of the day reserved for late night sentiment. It’s the feeling of being alone with your thoughts, watching as your mind wanders from what could be to what is, and how it could have gone a million different ways between. It’s also astonishingly beautiful.
The band’s sixth full length album is drawn from life’s very real low points, both personal and general, namely the death of Joe Casey’s mother and the worldwide misfortune of the pandemic. In what could have been a collection of songs buried in doom and gloom, Protomartyr return with a new resolve.
Stuck’s expertise lies in making deeply entertaining post-punk and art rock by means of leading the listener into unknown and unpredictable directions. Each song metaphorically tears into the listener with the canines and incisors and slowly but surely moves them into the morals in the back of the mouth, ruminating on its themes.
Gracie Jackson’s journeyed voice reflects the years of entropy and moil but spins that into songs of self-determination, confidence, and humor. Whether eating fried chicken in a hazmat suit, breaking up fights, or dancing with a stranger in a white stetson, her narrative lyrics are almost cinematic in their oddly specific detail.
BRICK HEAD is the Melbourne based solo project of Sarah Hardiman, a prolific guitarist/vocalist best known for Deaf Wish, Nightclub, Moon Rituals, and LOU. The production credits, and brief ones at that, are about all we know about Bricks For Brains, that… and the fact that we can’t stop listening to it, which is really all you need to know.
It seems hard to believe woods had time to reflect upon his life on the road, but it’s clearly been on his mind, as visions of “home” fade and he’s left sleepless on planes, in hotels, and at soundchecks. The grind of it all brought him back to Kenny Segal, the pair resuming their chemistry for Maps, yet another record that feels destined for hip-hop infamy.
Are things that we’ve decided to give importance to actually important? For some of us, it’s best not to think about, but it’s an exploration that Washer takes on headfirst with their third album, Improved Means To Deteriorated Ends, a record that matches thoughts of decomposition with a slow burning rage-infused drive.
Coast 2 Coast, the band’s fourth album and first for Stones Throw, documents the band’s journey from their former home in Florida to their current in LA, building a surrealistic odyssey of video games, ocean front beaches, and fantastical bliss. Pearl & The Oysters use their daydream psych to bring a sense of the majestic to the mundane.
