N & ninemiles - 44​.​04 (2020)

Two German artists, Hellmut Neidhardt (N) and Thomas Kempka (ninemiles) (the latter known as a member of [BOLT]) have cooperated and toured together for some time now but it's only now they released their own material via dunk!records. And by "now" I mean the end of the last year, but 44.04 is too good to skip it in favour of newer albums.

The soundscapes of the first track on this album are of the more lively type. There's a lot going on, but, at the same time, their sound is homogenous and well thought-through; there's no chaos in this music but there's a lot of mood. The darker, rougher noise usually finds its place in the backgrounds while organ-like synths and other effects occupy the first rows of the compositions. Of course, this is the thing that mostly catches attention here, those simple but also in a weird way complex compositions have some particularly mesmerizing features, swallowing the audience whole. The second track is more about noisy drones that can easily lull you to sleep.

44​.​04 costs 7 EUR.

Check: II

Country: Germany

Genre: synth-rich soundscape

Label: dunk!records

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Blue Minute - Live or Hope (2020)

Blue Minute is an artist with very specific interests: "Tapes. Vinyl. Found Sound. Samples. Synths. Guitars. Drums. Bass. Thrift. Theft. Beaches. Clipd Beaks Gang". But he doesn't make hip-hop music as one could guess, quite far from it actually. His new EP is filled with very dreamy but also very electronic music.

It is opened with Live or Hope  which is a perfect example of slowcore ambient pop the dreamy atmosphere of which takes a lot from dark, foggy landscapes at dawn. Exceptionally moody track. And then, the album changes: now it's slowcore ambient pop as seen from the sunny, Californian perspective with No More Years built upon clear and invasive electronic backgrounds that eventually transform into some guitar noise too. It's not a slow slowcore, but the atmosphere is similar thanks to the extremely subtle vocals sounding as if heard from very far away. The industrial soundscapes that finish the album fit both of the worlds perfectly, even if there's as much of nervousness as there's peace in this music, especially in my favourite track here, To the Sky.

Also, I love the cover arts Blue Minute adds to his music and this EP is no exception here.

Live or Hope costs whatever you want to pay.

Check: To the Sky

Country: California, US

Genre: electronic slowcore

Label: Blue Industry

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Valotihkuu & Dynastor - Midnight Fairytales (2020)

This is a throwback to the end of the last year when DRONARIVM released this beautiful album that's the result of collaboration between the Russian artist Denis Davydov a.k.a. Valotihkuu and the Dutchman Maurits Nieuwenhuis, better known as Dynastor. Midnight Fairytales are exactly what the title suggests.

It is also a reference to Valotihkuu's previous album, Winter Lullabies. Still, it means that what we find on the album is both a bit dark and very much dreamy. The synthy textured backgrounds are so dense that they create a heavy layer upon which some beautiful sparks of keys and electronics thrive which is so beautifully done in Creature Comforts but also spilling forward to all of the tracks. This really feels like a fairy tale, the darkness of which is only comfortable and the message comforting. And, what's most important, the world of which is beautiful like the music here.

Also, the Bandcamp's description of the album really deserves a whole paragraph all for itself, it's such a perfect summary of what we hear: "Warm, flickering candle light illuminates grandfather's face as he opens the book. Outside insects lullaby the deep dark sky, reflected in the water, a slight rustling through the leaves. You wrap yourself in your bedsheets, waiting for grandfather to start reading, you are ready to go on a journey. He winds up the music box, looks at you with a warm smile and starts reading".

Midnight Fairytales costs 6 EUR.

Check: Creature Comforts

Country: Russia/The Netherlands

Genre: dreamy soundscape

Label: DRONARIVM

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Grande Loge - Mantras (2020)

Hailing from France, Grande Loge is a collective made of former members of the metal bands Malepeste and Tower of Silence, who turned towards highly spiritual and dark ambient music. Back in Decemeber they released one, long mesmerizing trip in the form of the album called Mantras.

Their music consists of folk-inspired chanting, dark airy ambient and mesmerizing tribal parts. This thick and extremely attractive atmosphere is also the result of the use of more or less exotic instruments like buzuki, nafar, shaman drums and tanpura, as well as mantras and a very unorthodox languages, namely Ancient Greek in Hekaten. When you listen to this album, there's always something that makes you say "no way they can get more mysterious" and then it does. The atmosphere also reaches further than just the music and strongly influences their appearance which means that their live gigs must be absolute madness. In a dark and spiritual way of course.

Warning! Mind this hilarious note from their FB: "We are a group of artists, not fucking freemasons!". And remember that!

Mantras costs 7 EUR.

Check: Hekaten

Country: France

Genre: tribal dark ambient

Label: Cyclic Law

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Montana Wildhack - Summer (2020)

Montana Wildhack is a lovely band of artists from... virtually as far from Montana as you can be, from Australia's west coast and the city of Freemantle. I follow their dreamy music for a while now, they also appeared on the blog two years ago with an EP called Soak, now they are back with their newest EP Summer that works like a shot of ethereal vibes.

It also makes a nostalgia trip for those who live on the Northern hemisphere and miss summer (very fitting in the snowy Europe like now). Those hazy sounds are like reflections of the sun filling your eyes when walking in the trees. The music is set in a slow pace with heavily dreamy guitars and very dream pop-accurate vocals (both male and female) with this feeling of being garage-made or recorded live that makes it more exciting and intimate at the same time. Even when the album gets more indie rock-guitar-based and subtly noisy in Fast Country, the overwhelming feeling of the hazy trip is what defines it. Also, huge props for the spoken word ballad You Are Here ending the album, I love it.

Summer costs 7 AUD.

Montana Wildhack - Soak (2019) EN

Check: You Are Here

Country: Australia

Genre: dream pop/rock

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Windermere - Unspoken / Unheard (2020)

The Danish Windermere haven't released any new album sine 2006 but somehow recently they are able to entertain us with their music again. After the live recording earlier last year, they released an unused material from after No One Winds, their last studio album. And Unspoken / Unheard makes a sad experience, showing how much hood music have we lost due to the band's inactivity.

Although they are more likely to be called a dream pop band, the new album is purely instrumental and filled with an exciting blend that could be easily called "dreamy post-rock". It is told to be "a bit rough around the edges", but, honestly, I have little idea what they are talking about. Instead, they are a great example of how well the dream pop's ethereal atmosphere can work with instrumental-only post-rock sounds. I bet there would have been lyrics and vocals put on top if it had been to be fully developed, but it really works like it is now.

Actually, it works exceptionally well in Untitled 2, in which the drone-like passages are given so much dream pop fantasy but at the same time preserve their mysterious atmosphere until they transform to a full-time post-rock composition. And when the whole thing dies slowly in the very much instrumental ambient of the fourth track, you can ask yourself a question, "how good their third album could be?".

Unspoken / Unheard costs whatever you want to pay.

Check: Untitled 2

Country: Denmark

Genre: dreamy post-rock

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Jocelyn Packard - Nothing Is Solid (2020)

With the name taken from David Lynch's mythos, the Polish Jocelyn Packard have a little choice but to create mysterious and dark music. The duo's second album is called Nothing Is Solid and contains an interesting blend of ambient and post-rock vibes. This release is already three months old but is so intriguing I can't go past it without posting something on my blog.

The album is said to be a musical type of a diary with the music corresponding to the artist's life experience and gradually "growing out of them". It is expressed with lazy noise poring over form the speakers for long minutes. This guitar ambient with traces of very slow, very climactic post-rock would perfectly fit Twin Peak's darker scenes of its unnerving mystery (Kate Song (Jet Fuel Perfume)!). BUT as it seems, the artists are not very fond of Twin Peaks-oriented similes when describing their music so perhaps let's stop here. Although the noisy psychedelia that in visual form defines Lynch's works, truly lives here in its audio persona. And, of course, there are references to other Lynch-like weird pieces of culture like James Joyce's infamous Finnegans Wake. 

Nothing Is Solid costs 2.5 EUR (10 PLN).

Check: Kate Song (Jet Fuel Perfume)

Country: Poland

Genre: noisy ambient

Label: Opus Elefantum

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Zetra - The Wanderer (2020)

Zatra is a post-punk/gazy duo from London who lately released some intriguing stuff. I liked their EP from 2020 but what really caught my attention was... an EP from 2020. Towards the end of the year, they released a themed EP called The Wanderer.

This album was, naturally, written in isolation during the lockdowns, however, its focus is not on this experience but on something quite different: the nature of Christian holidays and their beginnings "when native European gods and traditions were assimilated and appropriated into a festival now celebrated across the world". So we have something about Odin, something about Sol Invictus here and all this sort of jazz. Quite special for this kind of music (sounds like a metal theme to me) - a blend of delicate, pop-like melodic and dreamy at the same time vocals with shoegazy coldwave and noise rock in the backgrounds.

In Hanged God, we can hear fitting long and desolated passages of guitar sounds as well as wavy electronic devices and it's blends into the cold noise rock of the rest of the album. The balance in the form of the angelic vocals (especially in the ballad-like Before I Dissolve) is like light to the music's shadow and fits perfectly the visual side of the project.

The Wanderer costs 2 GBP.

Check: Hanged God

Country: UK

Genre: dreamy noise rock

Label: Death Waltz Recording Company

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Tapes and Topographies - Inoculations (2020)

I almost missed this, but Tapes and Topographies is a moniker of Todd Gautreau a.k.a. Sonogram who for me is better known as the leader of Crushed Stars, a duo responsible for the brilliant album Go Dark, Canaveral from two years ago. Here, within his solo project, he's busy with casting spells with ambient music and he does it very regularly as Inoculations is already his second album in 2020.

It's unbelievable how beautiful Gautreau's music is. The way the subtle, extremely delicate noise goes together with the elements of neoclassicism and soundscape'y vibes is something one can hardly find anywhere but also longs for all the time. It's very, very sad but also quite constant in this sadness as if it was morning about something that happened a long time ago. No bursts of depression but long, peaceful melancholia. I absolutely love it.

Inoculations costs 7 EUR.

Check: The Leaving Feels the Same

Country: Texas, US

Genre: melancholic ambient

Label: DRONARIVM

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Seasurfer - Zombies (2020)

Seasurfer are a German duo made of Dirk Knight responsible for the music and Apolonia, the lyricist and vocalist. Together they create their own take at the ethereal and synthy dream pop music that makes the filling of their new album Zombies.

As the project's name suggests, their music is very wavy. The coldwave and post-punk influences here cannot be denied with the dreamy and the cold cooperating (or fighting each other) in every second of the release. No wonder they call it "dream punk". Actually, the dreaminess of their sound is solely the result of the extremely dispersed and very densely projected vocals that create a real sea of ethereality. And even in faster songs, as in Tears & Happiness, there's no doubt it's still dream-oriented. Even in the very much darkwave compositions like Drifting.

If for someone it's not enough of the band's music, the album actually contains a bonus EP or an appendix if you will, a mini album called The Dreampop Days with songs created in cooperation with Elena Alice Fossi, an Italian vocalist. Together, Zombies stands for almost 2 hours of cold and dreamy feast.

Zombies costs 13 EUR.

Check: Zombies 

Country: Germany

Genre: dream punk

Label: Reptile Music

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Magic Wands - Illuminate (2020)

The Californian Magic Wands released their debut album almost a decade ago, now it's time for a new release with Illuminate's catchy, dreamy and somewhat cold tunes showed to the world at the end of the last year.

Their blend of the indie pop's liveliness, the post-punk's vibes in the backgrounds and the dreampopish atmosphere appeared already on my blog three years ago with their third album Abrakadabra. With the new album, the artists keep digging into the very catchy and ethereal way of creating music, basing them on synth-minimal and coldwave-like flat backgrounds. It makes it sooo easy to be attracted towards this atmosphere of the futuristically magical dance trances from the 80's (hey, no wonder they wear those space-like glasses). 

Some of the songs here stay with the listener longer, I'm mostly thinking about Honeymoon and my favourite Queen of the Gypsies with its heavy ethereal mood combined with the magical, or perhaps even mythological, theme of the Roma people. Illuminate makes a light and catchy work for sad people who want to dance.

Illuminate costs 11.11 USD.

Magic Wands - Abrakadabra (2018)

Check: Queen of the Gypsies

Country: California, US

Genre: dreamy synthpop

Label: Majestic 7

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SPOOL - cyan / amber (2020)

I've always been reluctant to say there's something like Japanese dream pop/shoegaze subgenre, but in fact, the bands playing ethereal pop from Japan and the Orient tend to have their unique sound. The Japanese SPOOL are great example here and as the all-female band released their second album called cyan / amber, I am more and more convinced.

It is sung in Japanese and maybe it's part of the unique vibes, together with the rather high-pitched, Anime-like (sorry for narrow cultural perspective) vocals provided by Ayumi Kobayashi, that, at the beginning at least, are more lively and carefree than moody and atmospheric. But that's not a problem with the tweepop, lo-fi dream pop guitar arrangements that, together with the omnipresent ethereal backing vocals, take care of the dreamy part of the project. When also vocals get to this level of ethereality, as in Suicide Girl or in my favourite ghost, the dream pop-ish ecstatic state is way closer and it feels so great. 

ghost is actually special as, being the longest one, shows how well the musicians handle the mesmerizing, psychedelic passages if they give themselves a bit more time and space in a track. The whole album makes an almost-40-minutes-long dreamy trip lead by the beautiful and chic vocals, cute and catchy.

cyan / amber costs ¥2,100 (17 EUR).

Check: ghost

Country: Japan

Genre: Asian dream pop

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Beckahesten - Vattenhålens dräpare (2020)

Beckahesten, Swedish ambient trio is the latest addition to Cyclic Law impressive portfolio of ubelievable artists. Their debut album is called Vattenhålens dräpare and mixes most of the most atmospheric genres into one, mesmerizing work.

One of the most striking features of the Swedish project is the way Viktoria Rolandsdotter's vocals are incorporated into the industrial/horror ambient adding mysterious, ethereal but also as much as frightening vibes to the project. Especially when, in the second part of the album, she's all in for folk chants. But there's so much more too. The folk influences as well as some dark ambient layers of heavy, overwhelming sounds make the project's music catch the audience with no intention of letting them go.

Vattenhålens dräpare costs 7 EUR.

Check: Dödsfålen

Country: Sweden

Genre: ethereal dark ambient

Label: Cyclic Law

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Harkane - Fallen King Simulacrum (2020)

I'm a sucker for atmospheric post-metal, sometimes it means I listen to cringy and kitschy stuff but not this time. Harkane are Italian black metal band whose monumental music is not only dark and heavy but also extremely touching, just like their new material from Fallen King Simulacrum.

Dusktone, probably my favourite metal label, describes their music as "multifaceted barrage of coalescing poignant and orchestral parts, exploding in a unique, yet tremendous atmosphere". On one hand the vocals are very traditionally scream-oriented and rough, always making my throat hurt only from listening. On the other, the vital choir/orchestral parts add up to the massive atmosphere with no trace of kitschy falseness. Yes, it is monumental and absolutely breathtaking but it's only in good way. The themes the band draws inspiration from include the past of the Apennine Peninsula with ancient Rome appearing all over the place, being especially intriguing in Caligula with the opera-like "Ave Ceasar" as a chorus. Equally interesting a track is Hidden Amongst the Ruins of Ur as well as the single one, already appearing on the blog before, Fallen King Simulacrum. 

Fallen King Simulacrum costs 4.90 EUR.

Check: Caligula 

Country: Italy

Genre: atmospheric black metal

Label: Dusktone

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Michael Denny & Simon Sylvester - Imaginary Mountains (2020)

Michael Denny is a composer, Simon Sylvester is a writer, both are related to the land of Cumbria, and together they created an album with music stretching from ambient soundscapes to mild post-rock ornamented with poems read by Hilary Pezet. This is Imaginary Mountains.

The album makes a "soundtrack to a walk in the wilds of another Cumbria" that was created for Aerial Festival, a festival of sounds and words in the Lake District. Very folk culture vibes here. And so the presence of the land and its people with their folklore and history is extremely audible throughout the work. This is, first of all, due to the lyrics/poems with the themes of last year's tough experiences of pandemics and lockdowns situated in the first rows but also considering a lot of other burning matters. 

But there are also samples of nature sounds and people's lives incorporated into the music and being its vital parts. Some pieces are extremely touching, most notably Fools We Are with its existential theme and very post-rock-like composition and ecologically engaged Ever Smaller Circle. There's a lot of  difficult topics here but aren't they all parts of our life now? 

Imaginary Mountains costs 6 GBP.

Check: Fools We Are 

Country: UK

Genre: spoken word post-rock

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Plaisir - Sap (2020)

A new trio consisting of a French, an Italian and a Swede, and hailing from, surprise, surprise, Berlin, the most multicultural city I can imagine, released their first material in the form of an EP called Sap. A very short one, like the title itself, but impressing enough to catch my attention.

The suggestive (though in fact innocent) cover art hides some dream pop with a warm, intimate atmosphere (perhaps also because of French language they start in). The dreaminess of their music is only strengthen by the mesmerizing guitar backgrounds and some occasional bell-like sounds. This doesn't mean they don't do catchy music, with the best examples in Bread for the Dead and, primarily, Poste Francaise (with the best use of spoken word ever and also directing the whole album towards more coldwave-like areas). The EP is very short but also so genre-rich I am extremely curious what they come out with next time. Lovely album.

Sap costs 5 EUR.

Check: Poste Francaise

Country: France/Italy/Sweden/Germany

Genre: dream pop-wave

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Sun Sleeps - Care Less (2020)

Sun Sleeps or Heft or Zwel Mun Wint, ambient artist, producer and the head of the Urban Gut label. Simply saying, a Renaissance man of ambient music from Myanmar.

Under this moniker, the artist focuses on "piano improvisation on atmospheric layers and psychedelic loops" - the impro part is important here as the artist wanted his music to reflect life that's inherently filled with smaller or bigger errors. Still, the effect is very much soothing with the ethereal soundscapes  ornamented with extremely subtle neoclassical elements dripping out of the speakers like pudding, after all it's been created "to lean back and take some self-care when the time comes to take away what you have in your life with no warning".

Care Less costs whatever you want to pay.

Check: Fatal Petal

Country: Myanmar

Genre: soothing ambient

Label: Urban Gut

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MANTIS - Glint (2020)

MANTIS, the Belgian one, is a band that has been on the border of post-rock mainstream for some time now. I remember them from their debut LP called Magnolia but there was also a number of EPs. At the end of the last year, they came back with another LP called Glint, released by dunk!records, and proved they have everything to be more recognized in the world.

Complex but not hasty compositions on heavy, almost post-metal-like guitars with occasional violins and vocals (by Jacques Nomdefamille in quite ethereal Altamont with those shoegaze'y vibes) - this is their music. Big role of the bass line makes it very melodic in a darker way, something like math-rock meeting post-metal, the chaotic energy and heavy atmosphere together make their music roll. This feels best when the musicians give themselves more room to fully develop the compositions like it is in the longest tracks on the album. Especially in the already mentioned Altamont in which they reach some tribal-trance-pure energy levels or, though a shorter one, Hessian, flowing with loud and crunchy guitars and lively pace. It makes me wonder how awesome their live gigs, can't wait to see them somewhere in Europe.

Glint costs 7 EUR.

Check: Altamont 

Country: Belgium

Genre: heavy math-rock

Label: dunk!records

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Monochrome - Monochrome (2020)

This is some story. Once upon a time, there was a shoegaze band called Monochrome who managed to perform only ones at the The Spiral rock club for around 20 people. Then they split up but we can now witness what we lost because of that as the live gig's recording has been found and released as this short EP.

And quite frankly, it's a sad story too. Monochrome's music seems to have been a top quality shoegaze music that could stand out even in its time - it was the early 90s, the peak of the first wave of shoegaze, now legendary, bands. Its slow waves generate such an intensive, nostalgic and immersive atmosphere that it makes me jealous of those 20 people who could experience it live. Not to mention that it is first of all thanks to the violins adding up to the overwhelming feeling of nostalgia. Especially that the vocals here sound like the male version of Slowdive's Rachel Goswell, helped from time to time by female backing vocals (that eventually take the lead) and it's such a good combo. The one track that really stands out is definitely Never Ending Eyes, one I'm going go back to often.

Monochrome costs whatever you want to pay.

Check: Never Ending Eyes

Country: New York, US

Genre: original shoegaze

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Escuelas Pías - Plantas de exterior (2020)

Another dream pop duo this week. This time it's Sevilla-based band consisting of Cristian Bohórquez and Davis Rodríguez with their short but juicy ethereal material on the EP called Plantas de exterior.

As said, the EP is only 4-track-long but still catches the ear of the listener. It is, however, meant to be a preview of four EPs planned to release the following months that will eventually make up an LP. Sounds complicated but the point is that Plantas... works as an album too. It is built on a significant amount of synth keys and electronic sounds. With some industrial flavours in the background while the foreground is dominated by catchy indie pop with very dreamy atmosphere. The vocals change at point as the band invited Erica Pender, the vocalist of Terry vs Tori to join them in La gran revelación but in general the band traverse between denser, more atmospheric parts and light, melodic indie pop (as in the closing Mutismo). Now we have to wait for the EPs.

Plantas de exterior costs 3.5 EUR.

Check: Regeneración

Country: Spain

Genre: synth dream pop

Label: El Genio Equivocado

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