Päfgens - Westend (2026)

The Slovakian couple who has been releasing their music for some time now as Päfgens already appeared on this blog with two albums. But I couldn't ignore the 6th one in their discography either: a beautiful but also utterly melancholic, hopeful but dark like an autumn day ambient pop for emotional people.

As the artists say, this album was born "when we bought a drum machine with the intention of making pop songs", which can hardly be further from what eventually happen. The slow ambient pop ballads made with acoustic guitar, whispering voice and various field recordings, fill out the air with never-hurried atmosphere of wistfulness. And when I wrote that the album was "born", it's not a coincidence as it is dedicated to the couple's baby, as they summarize it: it "is a memory of those who are no longer with us, but also a celebration of new life".

And you can hear it both in the lo-fi, fuzzy sound that makes the songs so much more intimate, as well as in the lyrics with the poignant "everyone you know will leave" sentiment repeated endlessly in Poprad that for me became the focal point of the whole album already at its beginning.

Westend costs 7 EUR.

Check: Poprad

Country: Slovakia

Genre: lo-fi ambient pop

Päfgens - Der Regen (2022)

Päfgens - Der Sturm (2019)

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Yndling - Time Time Time (I'm in the Palm of Your Hand) (2025)

A few months after this year's EP, Silje Espevik known as Yndling, released her sophomore album filled with the signature cute and dreamy pop music. She used the songs we already know and love and built an LP around them, making it one of the best dream pop albums of the second half of the year.

You can't help but smile when you hear Espevik's voice sounding like the summer evening sun touching your skin feels like. A bit dreamy, very melodic and soft. You don't need much more, it's enough to have hazy indie pop sounds around it and a perfect dream/indie pop music is being born. Especially that songs like Even if it's a Lie (I Don't Mind) and (especially!) As Fast As I Can are already imprinted onto my music mind since the June EP.

I like how the light and swift songs can, when it's necessary, be weighed down with some sweet guitar noise in the background, adding to the atmosphere and balancing the twee/tropical fragments (like in the trip-hop-esque title song) so well. The album is finished with two strong candidates for the best track at the album: the extremely catchy Falling Behind and the most artsy Some Things You Don't Get. There is a lot to choose from on this release, that's for sure.

Time Time Time (I'm in the Palm of Your Hand) costs 10 USD.

Check: As Fast As I Can

Country: Norway

Genre: soft dream pop

Label: Spirit Goth Records

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Feral Atom - Przestrzenie (2025)

Finally the time has come. After a series of great singles, a brilliant EP and a series of collaborations, Ola Beręsewicz aka Feral Atom, one of the most talented dreamy artists of the new generation in Poland, released her debut album. The artist continues her style of creating soft songs, hazy atmosphere and catchy melodies, all in one.

Coming from one of the wildest and most desolated regions of the country, Beręsewicz managed to catch attention of the dreamy music lovers with her almost perfect EP I Dream in Blue, performed at festivals all around the country and secured two extremely interesting collaborations with Tomasz Mreńca and with Kryowake. Especially the former is of interest to me as I value Mreńca's music sensitivity and because he joins Feral Atom at the debut album on my favourite track Visions. This song stand out at the album with its louder, almost shoegazey vibes.

Otherwise, songs are written in more minimalist style, based mostly on Beręsewicz airy vocals and solitary guitar riffs. The structure is completed with electronic beats taken from more mainstream indie music but maintaining the dreamy, unhurried atmosphere (so well done in Cold as Ice). This hazy, spacious atmosphere is so important that the artist entitled the whole album "spaces" with three interludes directly referencing the notion. Interestingly, on the album, we have songs both in English and in Polish and somehow, this doesn't happen very often, I prefer the artist's lyrics in the foreign language. Nevertheless, a really well-done and well-rounded debut.

Przestrzenie costs 7 EUR (30 PLN).

Check: Visions

Country: Poland

Genre: hazy dream pop

Label: Seszele Records

Feral Atom - I Dream in Blue (2021)

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Mumrunner - Yearning Heart (2025)

I can hardly wrap my head around it, but it's already almost a decade since I discovered my favourite Finnish shoegazey-dream popey band through their brilliant Gentle Slopes EP. Time flies when you're not looking... Luckily the Tampere-based group still does their signature light but moody, melodic but airy take on the haziest of music genres.

I like how carefree and soft the music sounds. There's certainly some element of twee and lo-fi music in here, although probably in the spirit, not necessarily in the form because the album sounds well-developed and -made. Most of the time it's the melodies and the easy-listening vibes that matter, making the whole thing sounding like a younger sister of Pia Fraus. It's definitely not about the noisy element. But it doesn't mean that there are no disruptions. There are and they always catch attention, like the change of the tone in Violet or the sudden stop of Hawkeye.

Yearning Heart costs 9 EUR.

Check: Violet 

Country: Finland

Genre: melodic dream pop

Mumrunner - Valeriana (2020)

Mumrunner - Gentle Slopes EP (2016)

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Cloakroom - Last Leg of the Human Table (2025)

Smooth vocals meeting harsh, grunge-like guitars, this is Cloakroom, a band "hailing from the harsh realms of Northwest Indiana" to show us their new, fourth in general, album called Last Leg of the Human Table. 

This is the kind of music that if it wasn't for the airy vocals, would certainly be classified in another genre than I do it. And I think of it as dream pop that went mad and started a noisy brawl in a guitar shop. The guitars sounds in various combinations: sometimes more melodic, sometimes more nerve-wrecking, are the main line of attack on the audience's ears. This lasts until the band suddenly steps on the brakes and delivers a rather soothing ballad or a indie pop singer/songwriter piece. Who knows what the next track will bring? I think it's rather a plus of the release, even if the band sounds best when the brake pedal is never touched.

Last Leg of the Human Table costs 9.99 USD.

Check: Clover Looper

Country: Indiana, US

Genre: (various kinds of) dreamy

Label: Closed Casket Activities

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Glazyhaze - Just Fade Away (2023)

Irene Moretuzzo and Lorenzo Dall’Armellina and two artists who together formed Glazyhaze, a debuting band with a taste for dreamy and ethereal pop rock music. Their first album is called Just Fade Away and is definitely something a fan of dream pop music should check out.

This is the core of good dream pop music: swift melodies, airy backing vocals and slightly noisy guitars in the backgrounds. This all, together with the fresh but also distracted vocals by Moretuzzo, are what make Glazyhaze's debut sound as if they've played for a long time. While the melodies can be often lively and designed to make the audience dance, there are parts where the music gets slower and moodier. And usually, it's something in between: an indie pop with heavy melancholic vibes and pretty hazy atmosphere. Certainly a good debut for the dreamy outfit.

Just Fade Away costs 7 EUR.

Check: The Shadow of Your Smile

Country: Italy 

Genre: melodic dream pop

Label: Slimer Records

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Ilajan - Villes de Papier (2023)

Ilajan is a debuting singer-songwriter who keeps her music in a very dreamy atmosphere. This is the first EP ever in her discography and Villes de Papier promises a lot for future.

Released by Hummus Records, album is made by Ilajan and her sister, Indiana, who "shape their own delicately oneiric atmospheres, mixing guitars, voices and electronic experimentations". Their compositions are as dreamy as they can be with slow and cozy music drowning the audience with its beauty and calming abilities. The singer/songwriter component is very strongly present here with the artist's soft vocals as well as emotional and particularly poetic lyrics being the focal point of each song (especially mysteriously appealing when sang in French!). I'm reluctant in making comparisons here as I'm not an expert in these genres, but if I was to make a guess, I'd say it's what Tori Amos would sound like if she decided to venture to the dream pop music territories. 

Villes de Papier costs whatever you want to pay.

Check: Mad

Country: Switzerland

Genre: dreamy singer/songwriter

Label: Hummus Records

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Full Moon Little House - Funeral (2023)

Kévin Navizet comes from Bretagne and leads the Full moon Little House band. The Frenchmen make an interesting, calm and dreamy take on indie music and it's definitely worth trying. Their debut LP called Funeral was released in March.

It's all about the subtle and oneiric (but not too subtle and oneiric) vocals and catchy (but not too catchy) melodies that makes this music so captivating. The music is also rich with psychedelic elements, but, as everything here, it's not overwhelming, but rather approachable. It's also fun to find out what kind of  artists the band are inspired by. My favourite is probably Suuns, as Eyes sounds like it could be taken from Suuns' Zeroes QC, one of my most favourite albums ever (also, June totally sounds like Radiohead towards the finish). The atmosphere here is a bit all over the place (there are elements of electronica, post-rock and other genres), but the unassuming vibes and great way of engaging the audience are what drives me to this album.

Funeral costs 8 EUR.

Check: Eyes 

Country: France

Genre: dreamy indie rock

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Uniforms - Trance (2023)

Three years after their last album called Fantasía moral, the Spanish noise pop outfit Uniforms are back with their third ever LP. And Trance really induces this kind of melodic and noisy, but also a bit post-punk in some aspects, entertaining trance.

Those post-punk influences are mostly audible in the distinct bass lines and vocals that, form time to time, sound like taken from some female-led punk band - there's no screaming but some of the almost spoken word vocals certainly feel like it. However, this all is swamped with noisy guitars and dense, but energetic and melodic, music. That said, the Spanish can as easily go into different direction with indie pop ballads like Dusky, where the main focus is put on the vocals themselves. But the guitar compositions are definitely more numerous here. I appreciate how the band can create melodic songs but still accent the might of the guitar-fueled noise. Or transform their style into an adrenaline-filled run with a perfect flow in I Quit. 

Trance costs 7 EUR.

Uniforms - Fantasía moral (2020)

UNIFORMS - EQUALS (2018)

Check: I Quit

Country: Spain

Genre: post-punkish noise pop

Label: Oso Polita

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Lowly - Keep Up the Good Work (2023)

In 2019 they shook my musical world withe their near-perfect album Hifalutin. This winter, the Danish band of Lowly finally released their next, third one already, album called Keep Up the Good Work. And they did exactly what they mentioned in the title.

They call themselves "restlessly inventive, exquisitely melodic, and defying easy categorisation" and there's no exaggeration in those words. They create indie pop that borders with everything possible. There's a lot of ambitious electronica and synthpop here, that's for sure. There's some dreampop and noise pop elements (although I feel like less than before, instead, there's more tropical, twee vibes). There's a very broad approach to vocals as they very often function as background sounds for the whole compositions. But the main thing is how easily the Danish create absolute bangers that are catchy and melodic to the extreme. On the last album, it was Children and In the Hearts, now it's Seasons and Keep Up the Good Work.

This kind of experimental in nature but also extremely catchy music with positive vibes makes me think of their latest work as a calmer, more artsy version of what Plastic Mermaids delivered us last year. Both albums being something very special.

Keep Up the Good Work costs 8 EUR (7 GBP).

Lowly - Hifalutin (2019)

Check: Seasons

Country: Denmark

Genre: experimental synthpop

Label: Bella Union

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Seyda Neen - Nocą (2022)

Seyda Neen are a really underrated duo from Bydgoszcz, Poland. Their music combines the catchiness of pop music with moodiness of various alternative genres and five years after their debut release Odwilż ("A Thaw"), they prove it with the sophomore album called Nocą ("By Night").

The band, or an orchestra of electronic delicacies ("orkiestra elektronicznych frykasów"), as the artists call themselves, creates a curious blend of simple but very catchy melodies and synthy, dance-inducing music with dreamy vocals and gloomy themes. As in my favourite among the album palylist, Słońce ("The Sun") that makes a summer hit-like composition with lyrics about depression ("The Sun shine/ the Sun gives joy/ the Sun gives warmth/ to everyone but me"). The pace is not the highest and even when it speeds up, the overall lo-fi vibes make the songs feel chilled and cozy, it's like your local indie pop/rock band put through some highly effective oneiric and slightly dark filters.

Nocą costs 4.5 EUR (20 PLN).

Seyda Neen - Odwilż (2017)

Check: Słońce

Country: Poland

Genre: dreamy indie pop

Label: Prądy

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The Haunted Youth - Dawn of the Freak (2022)

Led by Joachim Liebens, the Belgian outfit The Haunted Youth delivers fun and airy indie pop rock that checks all the marks for catchy and easy-to-fell-in-love-with music. Dawn of the Freak is their debut and it feels very fresh and exciting.

The band is already well recognized with both MNE and KXP praising their music. No wonder, the melodies here are mesmerizing, the carefree guitars extremely soothing and the airy vocals very moody. But if this is not enough, the omnipresent synths transform the dreamy music into danceable, psychedelic disco that can be enjoyed by everybody. This is all combined with gloomy, melancholic (and emo) lyrics which makes the whole thing both enjoyable and touching. This all culminates in my favourite track here: Coming Home that is both painfully real and filled with the heaviest melancholia, as well as ridiculously catchy and ready to be hummed from the first listening session.

Dawn of the Freak costs 8 EUR.

Check: Coming Home

Country: Belgium

Genre: psychedelic dream pop

Label: Mayway Records

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Lucid Express - Floret (2022)

From the far away land of Hong Kong, "young dreamers creating a stunningly airy blend of shoegaze and indie pop", known as Lucid Express, hail. They have recently released their second album, following the really good debuting self-titled one, and called it Floret.

The five artists are devoted to creating soft and dreamy pop music that strikes with their slow pace and moody atmosphere. There's a decent amount of noise accompanying the guitar, not overwhelming, melodies and the withdrawn, very much dispersed female vocals. So everything we love in dream pop music. The album is actually a four-tracks-long EP but it is enriched with another five remixes and, I must say, it does feel like one whole album. Perhaps it's because the listener does not focus on separate songs that much as the whole album offers a blissful, dreamy experience. It's very well audible in Venture, where the music and the vocals reach this psychedelic, dreamy state of trance-like sound that last up to the end of the "EP" part of the album.

Floret costs 6.99 USD.

Check: Venture

Country: Hong Kong

Genre: dream pop

Label: Kanine Records

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Pencey Sloe - Neglect (2022)

Pencey Sloe are based in Paris and they create particularly moody dream pop/rock music. Their second album is called Neglect and was released last summer; right in time to provide us with some of the oneiric tunes for this autumn.

The music here is right on the "path of cinematic soundscapes and beautiful psychedelic colours" as it's stated on the band's Bandcamp page. The focus is certainly put on creating the engaging and thick atmosphere of melancholy and mystery, and it's only the artists' skill that makes it possible to balance it with Diane Pellotieri's beautifully dreamy vocals. Especially tricky since she, as the song-writer, deals here with a heavy theme of self-consciousness and the most existential question of "who am I?" - not so easy to wear it with catchy melodies. There's also more nuance to the album than simply tagging it as dream pop as there are parts that are simply pieces of atmospheric post-rock/instrumental ambient (beautiful Sigh).

Probably the most surprising thing about this album, though, are the guest musicians from the highest world level of... metal music. That's right, two parts of The Run feature Alcest's Neige and Jesu's Justin Broadrick, but I must say that they don't add much to the album. I feel like Pelloteri's vocals and the band's heavier dream pop tunes are right where they should be on their own.

Neglect costs 6.99 USD.

Check: Inner

Country: France

Genre: atmospheric dream pop

Label: Prophecy Productions

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Pale Blue Eyes - Souvenirs (2022)

It's been a year and a half since I posted here about Pale Blue Eyes' single Motionless/Chelsea and it's finally the time when the Totnes-based trio showed their debut LP. The album called Souvenirs is filled with energetic and carefree dreamy indie pop.

"The richest Devon cream-pop" is what they themselves call their own music and it really makes sense. The dreamy indie pop the trio creates has an incredible flow and catchy melodies so it is both smooth and full of flavour. The single tracks like TV Flickers and Chelsea are something you can easily loop on your playlist without getting bored. The lightness of their music is a result of the oneiric but also lively vocals and the synth-rich backgrounds. This is the kind of music that makes you dance and forget about your life even if only for a minute, but still, the kind we all need from time to time.

And the band's music is already appreciated since they have been playing together with bands such as Public Service Broadcasting and Swim Deep and it makes me happy. Artists who can so easily create catchy melodies and enchant them into the easy-listening music deserve that.

Souvenirs costs 9.5 EUR (7.99 GBP).

Check: Chelsea

Country: UK

Genre: lively dream pop

Label: Full Time Hobby

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Grazer - Melancholics Anonymous (2022)

Two years ago, Matt and Mollie, two artists from Australia, showed their first EP to the world and so debuted also on this blog. This summer, they released their first long play and it's as much sunny fun as ever, although the album is actually titled Melancholics Anonymous.

Grazer is a perfect choice for anyone who is interested in unassuming melodies, minimal arrangements and warm and beautiful vocals. It's this kind of indie pop that is delivered through the dreamy and very subtly noisy filters; it feels very authentic and intimate, also thanks to the bedroom pop-like approach: it's simple and engaging. Besides the lazily uplifting music, the duo turns into more melancholic way in the lyrics: there's a lot of loneliness and existential fears, doubts and absurdity of life, everything so universal and relatable for all of us. This melancholical-indie pop balance goes on for the whole album, except for I Want Control where, with the change of the vocals, it suddenly gets more indie rock-like guitar-oriented and catchy - but really, it's just a wink to the audience, everything gets back to Grazer's normal very soon.

Melancholics Anonymous costs 9 USD.

Grazer - Grazer (2020)

Check: These Days (Pass Me By)

Country: Australia

Genre: dreamy indie pop

Label: Cascine

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Melting Palms - Noise Between the Shades (2022)

Melting Palms debuted two years ago with Abyss, but they hadn't caught my attention until this year's second release ever, Noise Between the Shades. And as the title of the album suggests, it is filled with many shades of pop music that are glued together by the noisy elements.

It is further confirmed by the band themselves, who say that "what unites us all is reverb". Baptized as "loudest group in Hamburg", they embrace the noise pop genre, and everything it includes, with fantastic enthusiasm. The lively and energetic melodies are what drives the album together with the very catchy guitar work. The two vocals go together with these vibes but there is some of the dreamy nostalgia in them as well. And everything is drown in subtle but omnipresent noisy atmosphere that makes it so attractive to the fans. But it doesn't mean that everything here is fast and pop-ish: in tracks like Ark, the artists give themselves some time to play around instrumental, appealing and extremely moody music (those violins here!).

The lyrics about "hope and misfortune, about melancholy and promise" bring the so appreciated contrast against the upbeat (most of the time) music with examples like the gloomy Crimson Eye: "Stuffed my chest/ with harsh regret/ Clouds drop rain upon the bed/ My mouth runs dry, all has been said". Sad and beautiful, like the whole album.

Noise Between the Shades costs 12 EUR.

Check: Ark

Country: Germany

Genre: noise pop

Label: La Pochette Surprise Records

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Crystal Eyes - The Sweetness Restored (2022)

Five years after their debuting album The Female Imagination, the Canadian Crystal Eyes are back with another super catchy and dreamy release. The Sweetness Restored makes me think of Pia Fraus and other bands that marry the oneiric with the fun.

The band says it's a "feel-good self-help record for the age of existential dread" and that fits nicely with the twee pop kind of indie music that fills the release. The music is certainly not overwhelming, the guitars are subtle and give the way to the bass lines and its melodies. I love that the compositions here blend in various super weird instruments, including "the Hammond C3 with Leslie speakers, a string quartet, a choir, an out-of-tune piano, analogue synthesizers" and more. This adds some of the psychedelic chaos to the tracks (as in I Still Believe in Love for example). But in the end, it is mostly the background for the beautiful, dispersed vocals that are both melancholic and filled with sunshine.

The Sweetness Restored costs 8 EUR (10 CAD).

Check: I Still Believe in Love

Country: Canada

Genre: psychedelic indie pop

Label: Bobo Integral Records

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Watchcamp Best Singles of May-June'22 with atmos bloom, Midpoint Union, Onira, The Palace of Tears, Redloz

atmos bloom - daisy

The first single from the incoming album that will follow the band's 2020 debut EP; the Curtis Paterson and Tilda Gratton duo from Manchester present a super airy indie pop that is so very, very catchy. The song costs 1 USD.

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Midpoint Union - Beyond Days

Pedro R. is from Portugal and his music combines synth-based, lively and melodic backgrounds with vocals that in turn combine dream pop's subtle sound with post-punk's vibes all over them. Two songs stay in your head from the very first time you hear them. They cost whatever you want to pay.

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Onira - What's to Fear?

Carefree and tune-rich indie pop with a lo-fi-kind-of noise all over it - this is the Californian band who have recently released their debut single/short EP. Three brief songs cost whatever you want to pay.

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The Palace of Tears - Tears of the Moon v​.​2

The Erick r. Scheid and L.V. Darkling duo from New Orleans create a super interesting take on darkwave music: minimal and atmospheric backgrounds and vocals that range from suggestive whispers to opera-like beautiful singing. Two years after their debut, they are releasing a short but very meaningful EP. Two tracks cost whatever you want to pay.

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Redloz - Ungatz

The Dutch artist Bart de Groot, together with Jonny Parlett who provided vocals, created this airy and melodic piece of dream pop. Two versions of the song cost 2 EUR.

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Youth Novels - Blue (2022)

It's been already fiver years since the Poznań-based duo released their last EP. While Chaos I Create successfully married catchy synthpop with moody dream pop, their new album shows their melancholic and super atmospheric face. Hence the name: Blue

The Ania Babrakowska and Emil Nowak duo has a fantastic ability to effortlessly engage the audience into their dreamy and nostalgic world. The title track that opens the short EP has its catchy tune and fairly energetic pace but it is, most certainly, a beautiful and tear-jerking ballad. And as such, it sets the tone for the whole album with four perfectly moody compositions. No wonder that they describe their music as meandering between "quasi-acoustic compositions, ambient soundscapes [and] widely understood alternative music". There is a healthy dose of discreet and attractive electronica that builds the backgrounds with tons of ethereal, dreamy af backing vocals all over the place.

The album is closed by The Moon, a track that features Iwona Skwarek's vocals, the artist known from Rebeka and Shyness!, very popular projects on the Polish offstream music scene. This song shows the most the artists' love for the acoustic sound. I really hope we won't have to wait for more of this magical music so long as before. 

Blue costs 5 EUR (20 PLN).

Youth Novels - Chaos I Create EP (2017)

Check: Blue

Country: Poland

Genre: synth dream pop

Label: Golba Music

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