Hope Drone - Husk (2021)

The Australian band Hope Drone works as a collective for some time now (10 years!), but recently they found they needed some change in their sound and this change (make their music and their name more fitting together) is something that turned me back to them with their new album Husk being a really solid take on offstream metal.

As far as I remember, the band's previous releases didn't quite strike a chord with me "Strange times call for new perspectives and the chaos of the last few years has given rise to our new release where we set out to experiment" - this change of sound involves putting more focus on bass and drums at the expense of guitars and vocals that got transferred more into the backgrounds. This made their music more ambient/drone metal with its hazy atmosphere and soundscape-like values. And even that the pace of drums is usually very much black metal, the general impression left by their music is the massiveness and weight. The album consists of four tracks only, but they are long enough and written in such a way to slowly develop and impress the audience with heavy and satisfying finishes (so well-done in Existere) and leave it wanting even more.

Husk costs whatever you want to pay.

Check: Existere

Country: Australia

Genre: drone metal

Label: Moment of Collapse Records

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Christina Giannone - Glazed Vision (2021)

The New York City's Christina Giannone was introduced to the Past Inside the Present label back in 2019 but only now her first LP for them is released. I mean was in the last October when Glazed Vision was released with its drone soundscapes that accumulate like grey clouds over your head.

The whole album is absolutely filled with drone soundscape. The sounds twirl and create layers becoming considerably heavy and thick. But this is a peaceful music, very much leaning towards relaxation and self-reflection. Nocturnal music but without the element of danger and uncertainty. I feel like everything is fine and there's little to worry about when the short (for an ambient album) release is revealing its contents. And it is finished with a remix by worriedaboutsatan, which is a big deal on its own. 

Glazed Vision costs 6 USD.

Check: Divinity

Country: New York, US

Genre: dark drone

Label: Past Inside the Present

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Blush - Blush (2021)

It's incredible how many shoegaze/dreamy bands are called Blush (or similar like Blushing or Blush Response) now.  This time it's a debuting band from Singapore whose sophomore EP called, you guessed it, Blush, presents some adorable and catchy noise pop.

The band may be new but the artists were involved in quite a big number of Singapore-based projects, most notably including Sobs. You can hear that they know what they do - the guitars produce a good-quality noise and bring exciting melodies while Soffi Peters' vocals are dreamy and airy, just as they should be. The EP is very short and includes the previous single track Best Friend and two quality noise pop tracks. And just as it is advertised (that "ubiquitous to Blush’s sonics are a crescendo fuzz that’s thick as syrup, and as cathartic as it is cacophonic"), they are very noisy and loud and this loudness transforms into an ethereal bliss in the listeners' minds (especially in the more slowcore-like, album-finishing Suck).

Blush costs 2 EUR (3 SGD).

Check: Suck

Country: Singapore

Genre: noise pop

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Carmen Sea - HISS (2021)

Carmen Sea are from Paris and last autumn debuted with an album called HISS. Their rapid and surprising post-rock is bound to impress many fans of the genre, yours truly included. 

The EP begins with a chaotic and extremely energetic sounds of Frames that suggest a lot of mathrock influences. However, what clearly is the first thing one notices, is the involvement of violin sounds - not ones that are supposed to generate mystical or depressive atmosphere but ones that are pure energy and fun, folk-style. And when they lead the heavy guitars in experimental compositions, it's beyond impressive. Especially that there's also a good quantity of electronic effects involved (almost dub step-like in some places) - the chaos that's generated this way brings energy and strength to dance and/or destroy things around. It's even more surprising when in the album's finishing track, the long Glow in Space, the violin gets suddenly very artsy, almost as if taken from The Irrepressibles' works, only to get back to the band's signature madness after a while. I love it.

HISS costs 7 EUR.

Check: Frames 

Country: France

Genre: violin-led mathrock

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Mariuk - Blue Days (2021)

Mariuca García-Lomas is best known as the vocalist in Northwest, the London-based experimental and artsy project I posted about almost three years ago. At the end of the last year, the Spanish artist released her solo album Blue Days and it's a real dose of ambient pop magic.

The story of this album is very inspiring. Back in 2020, García-Lomas made a public declaration to learn how to play guitar and prove it by releasing a single every month. This album consists of 12 tracks so the artist proved to be successful in her challenge. And although the songs are not recorded in brilliant quality, they create unique, very intimate atmosphere; nothing brings an artist to their audience so much as small mistakes and imperfections that have to be battled with. This resulted in an ambient pop and quite noisy album that makes me think of Grouper or Midwife but with some of Northwest's very artistic vibes.

When describing the process of creating this album, García-Lomas mentions how difficult 2020 was and how she faced existential crises and it's well visible on the release. It's no coincidence that the first song's title is literally Sad and the artist doesn't shy away from singing about the most traumatizing things ("How could you not feel sad?/I'm afraid of dying all the time" or the one of being Almost 30 (that's depressing, I'm already past that)). But this sadness gradually gives place to very much more hopeful tones with The World Is Yours as their pinnacle. It just shows that the album portrays more than just one evolution of the artist.

Blue Days costs 3 EUR.

Northwest - II (2019)

Check: Hunger

Country: Spain/UK

Genre: noisy ambient pop

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Plaisir - Foam (2021)

So the Italian-Swedish-French trio from Berlin came back last year to gift us their longest album up to date. I already posted about the dreamy but also erotica-soaked band when they had only a short single two years ago so Foam is something I really had to go back to.

First of all, what the hell? The first track's title is in Polish and translates to "salty butter/butter with salt" and the only thing my brain makes connection to is a taste of crisps. In reality it's meant ot be a "hopeful song about agony" and warns us to be "far away from butter and salt" - is it because the crisps are unhealthy? Probably not. But the certain thing is that this track shows what I like about the band the most - the way all of the musicians sing (sometimes in their own languages, sometimes as spoken word) and how it creates a chaotic but very engaging atmosphere all over the album. 

But there's more to their music. It is built on very prominent bass lines with the psychedelic hazy sounds playing less important roles than it's traditionally in dream pop. So although there's tons of oneiric atmosphere here, especially in the way the vocals cooperate, the music has a very noticeable post-punk vibe. And, what's at least as important as the atmosphere, the artists can create so catchy melodies! Cold the Paraoh or Hunting Season are best example with their tunes following me since I first heard them.

Foam costs 7 EUR.

Plaisir - Sap (2020)

Check: Masło z solą

Country: Germany, Italy, France, Sweden

Genre: ethereal wave

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36 & Duenn - Distance as Power (2021)

Dennis Huddleston, the ambient artist from UK, has such a long discography that it can barely be believed. Only this year he created 4 albums (featuring a collaboration with Awakened Souls). The last one, Distance as Power, is created together with Duenn, a Japanese vocalist, and present a very airy take on drony soundscapes.

The Japanese artist (who frequently works together with Merzbow for instance) provides the ethereal part of the project with the dispersed vocals creating soundscapes on their own. Foggy and mysterious ones. But the further into the album, the more important the role of the dark electronic drones. It's this kind of slow, contemplation-fueling music that is perfect for the long winter nights, especially in the finishing parts of the album when the layers of sound are heavy and leave little space for focusing on anything else than the music itself.

Distance as Power costs 6 USD.

Check: Distance as Power

Country: UK

Genre: ethereal soundscape

Label: Past Inside the Present

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