Leech - Sapperlot (2024)

It's only February and it's the second post-rock album from Switzerland I'm posting here. I know, they're both from last year, but it doesn't matter. What matters is that it says a lot about the condition of the genre in the Alps and I can't stop saying that Switzerland is now chocolate, banks and great instrumental guitar music.

I have to admit that the album bought me with first notes. Literally, the first notes of Knock Knock feel so good, I can't explain it. Even if these slightly unnerving sounds don't represent the vibes of the whole album, they what drew me to the release so much. I'm saying that it's not a good representation because the album is... nice. The sound is very approachable, with extremely good flow and melodies fueled by synthy keys that are the background of every composition. It's not loud, it's not unnerving at all, it's like this perfect boy you'd want your daughter to mary. Even if you don't have a daughter at all.

And I can see how some may feel like it's not that good. But I can assure you, it is: the time goes so fast with the band's music. I find the synths always pretty transcendental, their vibes make it easier for me to flow in the sound without thinking about my physical self. And as the guitar side of Leech's music doesn't overwhelms the delicate synths, it's very easy to do just that with Sapperlot.

Sapperlot costs 20 CHF (22 EUR).

Check: Knock Knock

Country: Switzerland

Genre: synthy post-rock

Label: Instarmental Records

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Elita - Dysania (2023)

Elita is a project led by Emma Harvey (also known as Elita Harkov) that combines modern, attractive electronica with heavy dream pop influences. The first album under this moniker, Dysania, was released back in March via Opposition.

The album is called after a condition that is defined as "a state of finding it hard to get out of bed in the morning" but unlike people who deal with it, the music here is fairly energetic. Elita joins the club of cute and creepy young artists who are painfully honest in what they do and who create music that is as atmospheric as it is catchy. But while some of them are all about glitchy experiments (like Yeule), here the music is pretty traditional: it's all about catchy melodies with synthy backgrounds and occasional sample that makes it even tastier. The level of catchiness in Elita's compositions is truly remarkable. Even ballads (like Summer Song) stay in your hand for a long time. Oh, right, and it's exceptionally steamy, from the beginning to the end.

Dysania costs 7 USD.

Check: Mentally Not Here

Country: Canada

Genre: dreamy electronic pop

Label: Opposition

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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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Julia Sabra and Fadi Tabbal - Snakeskin (2022)

This blog knows Julia Sabra as the vocalist of the Lebanese dream pop outfit Postcards. But she makes music under her own name too. Recently she joined forces with her compatriot, electronic/ambient music creator, Fadi Tabbal, in order to create a unique record called Snakeskin.

In their music, the artists combine Sabra's ultimately dreamy vocals and Tabbal's experimental electronica into non-obvious compositions. Already the first song here, Still Life, surprises the audience with crunchy samples that are everything but soothing to ears but yet, sounding very well together with Sabra's angelic voice. Later, the compositions get much more flow with the industrial flavours planted all around them. But really, this album is very difficult to attempt any kind of labeling with neoclassical ambient pieces like Past Tense, the unnervingly dark In Our Garden or the hazy dream of One by One. Practically speaking, each song is a different story with different vibes and emotions. And everything makes one whole glued together by the vocals and the melancholic aftertaste.

Snakeskin costs 8 USD.

Postcards - After the Fire, Before the End (2021)

Postcards - The Good Soldier (2020)

Check: One by One

Country: Lebanon

Genre: dreamy experimental pop

Label: Ruptured Records/Beacon Sound

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Future Conditional - Isotech (2022)

It was such a sad moment when the acclaimed ghost rockers of Piano Magic said their final good byes in a classy way by releasing their last album Closure in 2017. But luckily, the Glen Johnson and Cédric Pin duo makes for a real continuation of the band's legacy and they proved it again after 2018's dark The Burning Skull album.

The project is called Future Conditional, the album is called Isotech and it's clearly very different but also very familiar to any fan of the British band. While the music is definitely shifted towards minimalist electronica/synth kind of vibe, the vocals and, most importantly, the lyrics feel very ghost rock-like. The elephant in the room is most certainly Demolitions, the track that is filled with Piano Magic's urban-oriented melancholia and which, very literally, refers to The Last Engineer from PM's masterpiece Part Monster. I appreciate the musicians' urge to self-development and experimenting and as such, the album can be seen as a continuation of Piano Magic's discography with a sudden shift in style.

This style is seen as a futuristic (I'd say retro futuristic even) idea presented by Johnosn himsself when he said: “I had this idea….well, more of a hope, that, in the future, there might be clubs where androids go to dance and humans are banned". This coldwave-like take on club electronica surely can buy me too. Apart from the familiar faces, there's also a couple of guests on the album with Amanda Butterworth aka Mücha and Trembling Blue Stars' Bobby Wratten and Beth Arzy as the most prominent ones. And their melancholic vocals  match the tone of the album perfectly.

Isotech costs 9.5 EUR (7.99 GBP).

Check: Demolitions

Country: UK

Genre: ghost synthpop

Label: Second Language Music

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Lights A.M. - Clouds (2022)

Erlend Eilertsen comes from Norway and it's something that certainly is well audible on his solo album Clouds. The member of a synthpop outift Essence of Mind, brings a lot of synths to create an airy and out-of-this-world soundscape neatly packed under the Lights A.M. moniker.

From the very beginning, his music strikes with the ability to create dense and thick synth atmosphere that seems to be very close to ambient soundscapes of the highest oneiric quality. But this time, they are used as backgrounds for slow and moody compositions based on Eilersten emotional vocals. Together, this combination brings one of the most ethereal experience of the year, that also involves tons of emotions. There's a lot of dream pop's atmosphere here obviously, but the tunes are livelier. It's something from Ruby Haunt, something from Fireflies, sometimes heavier, sometimes lighter. It is how bright nights of Scandinavia probably feel like.

Especially that the artist can easily ditch the vocals and still create something utterly touching, as it is with The Last Dance: its long finish is truly mesmerizing. Not to mention What I Am Feeling and Inscecure's utterly melancholic synthy vibes. And yes, I feel like the feeling of this autumn-like, subtle but omnipresent melancholia is what dominates this beautiful album.

Clouds costs 9 EUR.

Check: Inscecure

Country: Norway

Genre: synth-heavy dream pop

Label: Alfa Matrix

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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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Mooring - Blue Dream (2022)

Mooring is a Guadalajara-based noise pop outfit that have recently released their debut album called Blue Dream. The Mexicans are really into the airy atmosphere and sweet melodies of dream pop and I appreciate it a lot in their music.

On their debut, the four-piece band is quick to evoke many interesting inspirations with The Pains of Being Pure at Heart and Letting Up Despite Great Faults as perfect examples here. Their music is an exciting blend of melody-heavy dream pop with harsher guitars and noise-filled backgrounds. The soft and dreamy vocals by Nathalia Romo and Carlos Kardusen correspond with the synth tunes and are balanced by heavier guitars that appear from time to time to lively up the dreamy compositions. Mooring's song are very good at leading a listener into a psychedelic trance, especially that their lyrics are in good part based on short and repetitive phrases written with a heavy dose of poetic mysteriousness. 

Blue Dream costs 8.5 EUR (175 MXN)

Check: Blue Dream

Country: Mexico

Genre: noise pop

Label: LATIGO

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Bad Light District - Brak Oczekiwań (2022)

The Kraków's band Bad Light District function on the Polish scene for years now, although I discovered them through their fourth album Lucky Blood Moon. Three years later, the band continues their unique music path with a short release called Brak oczekiwań ("No expectations").

Their music can't really be called post-punk with its complex and artsy compositions. But there is one thing that certainly comes from post-punk (and punk)'s legacy: the anti-establishment and social critique-heavy lyrics. I love the band's creative approach to language: the lyrics in all of their tracks are filled with clever play on words that is not only decorative but also designed to convey messages that are important to understand the whole thing: the most striking being "podstęp cywilizacyjny" in one of the tracks title being a play on the phrase "civilization progress" and "deception". So its chorus that goes "It all looks perfect/ from a distance" makes a fine and unsurprising comment on the world we know around us.

This also means that the almost-spoken word vocals really sound like poetry, especially that the synth-heavy music around it rarely is particularly invasive. There's some of the guitar noise and dark electronica there, but the most important thing for music here is to make the lyrics even more eery and ominous. And it works like a charm. Perhaps only the last track here, Błąd maszyny ("Machine's error"), is more into the instrumental part, sounding like a dark (and eery and ominous) post-rock gem with vocals in ornamental role.

Brak Oczekiwań costs 3.5 EUR (15 PLN).

Bad Light District - Lucky Blood Moon (2019)

Check: Podstęp cywilizacyjny

Country: Poland

Genre: darkwave synthpop

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Ai fen - Daily Grief (2022)

Ai fen, also known as Ewelina Chiu, is a Polish-Chinese artist who is already quite recognizable here. She recently released her second album and while I used to associate her with modern experimental pop music, Daily Grief shows more of her airy and ethereal side.

While in general Ai fen is still all about the new, avant-garde approach to pop music, the pop that is everything but simple and boring, I find some elements from dream pop music particularly touching here. It's mostly about the artist's vocals, very often dispersed and whisper-like, contrasted with minimal bass lines, deconstructed club elements and extremely subtle electronica. In other places, they remind me of the glitch princess Yeule herself or the ambient pop dark eminency Nicole Dollanganger (like in The Muse) with their hinted emotional layers. While the nature of the vocals changes from track to track, the experimenting and fresh electronic music stays at the same, intriguing level.

The album was written under the influence of the pandemics and its regular negative impact on people's life, and is meant to cope with "grief beyond the general understanding as a reaction to a life shattering event", something we all have to deal with in those uncertain times. It comes as no surprise then, that the pinnacle of the album comes in COVID Techno, the only track here dominated by the dark disco vibes.

Daily Grief costs 6.5 EUR (150 CZK).

Check: Can You Believe?

Country: Poland/China/Czech Republic

Genre: dreamy avant-pop

Label: Tender Matter

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Local Blood - Dystopian Disco (2022)

The Lithuanian Local Blood debuted (also on this blog) with their EP called A Lure of Sights with the brilliant Total Guidance as the final track. But it was already over 5 (!) years ago. Finally this year, the post-punk scholars showed their proper debut album and Dystopian Disco is everything you may have wanted it to be.

I can sense so much influences here: there's something from Modest Mouse and IDLES in the vocals, tons of post-punk references from across the genre's scene and also something from the electronic compatriots from Solo Ansamblis in the way the compositions flow. As the post-punk canons state, the lyrics touch all the important stuff from the social point of view from the religious deceitfulness in My Blood to the state of being controlled (in, well, Control) and modern politics (Crawling Borders 2). But all this is made very approachable (which is important in those dark times now) with the melodic and catchy tunes and the way the band emits pure energy towards the audience. Especially when it's strengthen by the synthesizer madness like it is the case in Pressure. This modern and attractive approach to post-punk that hides the gloomy messages in the energetic blast makes the Lithuanians an important debut and a must-see for concert goers.

 

Dystopian Disco costs 9 EUR.

Local Blood - A Lure of Sights (2016)

Check: My Blood

Country: Lithuania

Genre: energetic post-punk

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Zetra - From Without (2022)

Zetra, the metal-stylized dream pop project from London is back. In fact, they release new EPs quite regularly and after I posted about The Wanderer two years ago, they managed to release two EPs: From Within and From Without. And the latter is so good that I couldn't miss it.

Although the image of the band is clearly black metal-inspired (with the logo, the cover arts, the IG pictures all about the dark culture of metal music), their music is located on the more ethereal part of the music spectrum. The dispersed and very airy vocals are balanced with tangible, coarse rock/metal guitars and the results are brilliant. Especially in my favourite song on this short album, Call of the Void with its catchy (and extremely unnerving and gloomy) chorus. Those dream pop vibes are packed in a synth-soaked package that ties the project also to more post-punk scene, but, in reality, the project really draws the best from very different genres and this is what I like about it the most.

From Without costs 6 EUR (4.99 GBP).

Zetra - The Wanderer (2020)

Check: Call of the Void

Country: UK

Genre: darkwave dream pop

Label: Children of the Vortex

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The KVB - Unity (2021)

Their first album was released over a decade ago, since then, the British duo The KVB released several works that shaped the world of electronic airy music with Always Then and 2018's Only Now Forever as perfect examples. This year, Nicholas Wood managed to release his solo album under the moniker Saccades and now, the band is back on it again with the new album called Unity.

The KVB's main characteristic is that they create very airy music without much of the guitar sounds. But unlike, say, SPC ECO, they don't go towards moody trip-hop but more into synthwave with post-punk's vibes. But you probably know about it already, it's no surprise to anyone interested in nugaze-like music. The quality of their music rarely disappoints and the new album, again, is a special thing on this year's timeline. The synthesized sounds and beats create engaging compositions enriched with guitar sounds (but they sit in the backgrounds, rarely driving the whole music structures) and with the airy backing vocals. Kat Day's vocals have this deep, post-punk hue, even though they are always properly dispersed and airy. 

But probably the most important thing is how well the band can adapt the synthwave's catchiness. Literally every song on the album has a memorable melody and constitutes a potential hit. In this sea of catchiness, I was particularly impressed by World on Fire with its minimalist but highly contagious chorus with a little unsettling lyrics.

Unity costs 7.99 GBP.

Saccades - Flowing Fades (2021)

Check: World on Fire

Country: UK

Genre: dreamy synthwave

Label: Invada Records

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Suuns - The Witness (2021)

Back in 2010, the Canadian outfit released one of my favourite albums ever, their debut Zeroes QC. I got a glimpse of it when I was late to their gig at OFF Festival in Katowice. But what I heard convinced me to fall in love with the album. And while they have never come close to this perfect level, they maintain their independent, unique style which they recently included on the new release called The Witness.

Everything in their music sounds like nothing else. It's true for the bass-based tunes with synth noisy deconstructed avant-garde music around, it's true for Ben Shemie's neurotic, subtle way of singing/speaking as well. I love how it works together and how, while being very much experimental, they are able to make their music appealing and enjoyable. As in the single tracks Witness Protection and C-Thru, the melodies are subtle and demand the listener's full attention, but it only makes them more satisfying and emphasizing the weird but accordingly ambitious lyrics. I love how some tracks feel almost ridiculously minimalist with the vocals, very subtle beats and not much more (like Clarity) but they make captivating ballads anyway while other ones are based on the mesmerizing electronica/guitars combo that feels close to Zeroes QC (as the great The Fix). I respect that the band have their own unique style and that they are not afraid to use it; it makes their music so easily recognizable and, honestly, pure, experimental fun.

The Witness costs 8 USD.

Ben Shemie - A Single Point of Light (2020)

Check: Witness Protection

Country: Canada

Genre: experimental synthpop

Label: Joyful Noise Recordings

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Kælan Mikla - Undir köldum norðurljósum (2021)

I remember getting to know Kælan Mikla when they came to Poland to support King Dude three years ago. Since then, they managed to release an almost perfect album Nótt eftir nótt, threw more exciting live gigs, create solo albums and now, they're back with a new album, Undir köldum norðurljósum, that is easily as good as the last one.

There's a lot of those darkwave's dark discotheque vibes all over the release (just have a go at Ósýnileg!): the synth backgrounds burst with lively sounds while still generating the gloomy and mesmerizing atmosphere. This is only empowered by the whispering vocals singing in Icelandic, the mystic and mysterious readings quickly get out of the scale. Especially in my favourite Sólstöður with its witch-like tribal screamings adding to the exciting horror vibes (it comes with absolutely zero surprise that the track's title translates to "Solstice"). The album's title, on the other hand, means "Under the Cold Northern Lights" but, truth be told, it doesn't feel that cold; maybe there's a hint that it is freezing outside, but here, in the vicinity of hot, dancing bodies and in the warm darkness they bring, it is hot and steamy.

Although their sounds differ much, Kælan Mikla seem to be close with the French icons of Alcest: they toured together and now they collaborated in the studio as well with Hvítir Sandar being more guitar-oriented and Alcest-like atmospheric. The three witches from Iceland will be back on tour when the day get longer again, and, fortunately, are coming to Kraków once again, this time as the main course - can't wait!

Undir köldum norðurljósum costs 10 USD.

Sólveig Matthildur - Constantly in Love (2019)

Kælan Mikla - Nótt eftir nótt (2018) EN

Check: Ósýnileg

Country: Iceland

Genre: synthpop darkwave

Label: Artoffact Records

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Praises - EP4 (2021)

I remember the third EP by the Canadian artist Jesse Crowe's project Praises as one of my favourite albums of the last year. Not surprisingly, this year's EP4 is almost as good and absolutely worth-mentioning on the blog.

Crowe's music balances somewhere between ethereal ambient pop and industrial-flavoured electronica. However, it also shows a lot of catchy melodies and compositions that make some of her songs my instant classics - like it is with the EP's closure in A World on Fire. But before that, there's three more songs: the opening ballad Apples for My Love, the more post-punk-esquely aggressive and cold We Let Go and Soil - a song that brings some of artsy chaos to the picture: Crowe's vocals become here theatrical and more into pop's melodiousness while the music is very much unpredictable. And finally, A World on Fire adds a madly catchy chorus on top of the unnerving, anxious theme. My favourite kind of combination.

EP4 costs 4 CAD.

Check: A World on Fire

Country: Canada

Genre: industrial synthpop

Label: Hand Drawn Dracula

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Ambulance on Fire - Ambulance on Fire (2021)

Ambulance on Fire is a Lithuanian duo consisting of Jūra Elena Šedytė and Mėta Gabrielė Pelegrimaitė, musicians of jazzy and theatrical music backgrounds. They combine these artsy worlds with modern electronic music and it sounds extremely interesting on their debut EP simply called Ambulance on Fire.

The title of the first track says a lot about their work. The traditional music (represented here by a very folk-sounding flute) meets the modern music and world. The artists draw inspiration from a various music genres from IDM to synthpop and 90's electronica and those come to the stage with the heavy-bass-reach I Will Never in which the, again very much folk-inspired, vocals go together with coarse synths and soul-filling basses. This, often improvised and lyrics-lightweight, music talks about "anxiety, anger, or fear that can be felt even deeper in a specific musical atmosphere" and I would add the social aspects of those, perhaps it's because of the very vivid name of the project.

As well as the last track entitled in the same way. One that is filled with uncomfortable electronica, ethereal synths in the backgrounds and those unique, repetitive and mesmerizing chanting that closes the very promising debut.

Ambulance on Fire costs 4 EUR.

Check: Ambulance on Fire

Country: Lithuania

Genre: art synthpop

Label: Future Sound Scientists

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MØAA - Euphoric Recall (2021)

Jancy Rae Buffington is MØAA, an artist who creates a very dreamy and moody music, which is kind of strange when you know that the moniker came from the name of a MAO-A gene, one that is connected to aggressive behaviour. She just released her debut album called Euphorics Recall on We Were Never Boring Collective label.

The music here is no punk, that's for sure. And although Rae created her music persona to write about frustrations and her "troubled past", she chose to do that in the form of very dark but also melodic, synth-rich dream pop. What's more, the album was created both in the rainy Washington state and the sunny Italy where the American met Andrea Volpato who is the second part of the project, the one responsible for co-writing the music as well as producing and mastering. This geographical factors may have influenced the way the music here combines the gloomy atmosphere with lively melodies that can be hummed from the very first listening (with the fantastic X Marks as the best example).

O2, on the other hand, combines the very ethereal ambiance and backing vocals with quite noisy form while Lam shows the more post-punk face of the project's synthpop with quite ominous vibes. And the further into the album, the more guitar-based and wavey the songs get, not losing anything from the atmosphere of the dark and moody, trip-hopish beginning.

Euphoric Recall costs 8 EUR.

Check: X Marks

Country: Washington, US; Italy

Genre: ethereal synthpop

Label: We Were Never Being Boring Collective

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