Saba Alizadeh - Temple of Hope (2025)

Saba Alizadeh creates music that is politically-involved and commenting on social matters. And as he is from Iran, you know that it is not going to be an easy-listening album. On his third album, Temple of Hope, the experimental musician talks about the issues in an extremely interesting and poignant way, even if he doesn't use many words.

"How can a sense of beauty be found amidst fear and cruelty", asks his Bandcamp account and I have to say, his post0industrial electronic soundscapes are far from the self-reflecting ambient pieces I usually listen to. Instead, they are filled with nerve-wrecking, thrilling sounds that come and go. There is the sense of danger and darkness as he "transforms the events during the >>Woman Life Freedom<< movement, as well as the struggles of the population in previous years, into poignant electro-acoustic music".

I said that he uses a few words and it's true: Alizadeh himself uses Kamancheh, a traditional, string instrument the sound of which is heavily transformed into the noisy, industrial output used to create the soundscapes. On some of the tracks, there are vocals though. They are provided by guest artists from Iran (Iran-born Sanam Maroufkhani) and from the Western World (Austrian Andreas Spechtl) and I have to say, the charm and beauty mentioned before can be found mostly in those places. The temples of hope.

Temple of Hope costs 8 EUR.

Check: Plain of the Free

Country: Iran

Genre: experimental post-industrial

Label: 30M Records

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Decline of the I - Wilhelm (2025)

I had post-metal debutants this week, now it's the time for the genre's old timers. However, we won't go far from the existential themes exploration in heavy, yet spiritual music. The French Decline of the I released their fifth album and did it with a (surprisingly experimental) bang.

Released by the Polish label Agonia Records, the album marries very traditional metal elements with airy and spiritual ones while still creating a coherent whole. The gregorians-like chanting is kept in check by angry vocals so that nothing here takes control over the music and the balance is in place. The same goes with samples, spoken word parts, tear-jerking violins in backgrounds. This black metal is filled with eclectic ornaments that make the album stand out.

The album is the second part of the trilogy devoted to Søren Kierkegaard and his existentialist philosophy, one that could only be illustrated so well by the sound of black metal. As the band's leader, AK, admits, the album constitutes "a constrained dive into the angst of ethics", or, as I would call it, an exciting, yet depressing and overwhelming at times, lesson on existentialism.

Band picture by William Lacalmontie. Wilhelm costs 11 USD.

Check: Éros N

Country: France

Genre: eclectic black metal

Label: Agonia Records

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Void of Hope - Proof of Existence (2025)

The best post-metal album with blackgaze inclinations released in the first quarter of 2025? I'll take the Finnish debutants (under this moniker, not in general)'s Proof of Existance over Deafheaven's Lonely People With Power every time. Not only because I think the American powerhouse's one is mid at best, Void of Hope genuinely created something breathtakingly beautiful.

Released by the Italian label Avantgarde Music, the album was created from scratch in five days "in the studio with -30°, -35° outside and in complete darkness for most of the day". Can you imagine something more Finnish? But the most important thing is that the music that came out of this session is extremely hot. Energetic. Euphoric. The best words to describe a good blackgaze album although I'm not 100% sure the band aimed for this (the genre tags on Bandcamp don't enourage this opinion). Nevertheless, for a blackgaze fanboy like myself, a great blackgaze release, even an accidental one is nothing to sniff at.

Just listen to Gift of Life or the monumental The Hollow Hymn. The atmosphere here is so dense, I could swear I felt like in a sauna when listening to it. This is the way the artists talk about "a journey through mental health and depression" that are a common thing for anyone who experienced existing. I feel better already after listening to Proof of Existence.

Proof of Existence costs 6 EUR.

Check: Gift of Life

Country: Finland

Genre: blackgazey post-metal

Label: Avantgarde Music

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Kestrels - Better Wonder (2025)

Coming from Nova Scotia, Canada, Kestrels is a love child of one Chad Peck. For some reason, I've never heard of the band although they play my kind of music and they do it for well over a decade now. Better Wonder is their fifth album so far and its catchy melodies and non-overwhelming noise-filled arrangements caught my attention with a fuzzy grip.

The release is filled with songs that are so memorable perhaps because they had been brewing for years. As the band mentions, the good amount of them comes from Peck's never released solo album. This time around, time helped the material grow to shine with this shoegazey/noise rocky shine that involves a soothing vocal, hearty lyrics and comforting fuzz in the backgrounds. It does feel a bit as if it was a solo album, making me appreciate the small scale beauty of the songs. It's fun, it's sunny, it's easily approachable. It's surf rock if it was possible to surf in Nova Scotia (which, I had to google, is in fact possible. But probably a bit cold).

The only thing I don't like on the album are those accentuated rock-like solo riffs taking the lead from time to time. But it's just a personal preference. What I like is certainly Dream of You in Black, as it is described, "a synthed-out Robert Smith-style love song to a fictional goth girl". I'm not an expert on The Cure, but I can hear that.

Better Wonder costs 10 USD.

Check: Dream of You in Black

Country: Nova Scotia, Canada

Genre: noise (surf-)rock

Label: Darla Records

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Masma Dream World - PLEASE COME TO ME (2025)

Unsettling but spiritual, dark but filled with emotions, her live gigs are titled ceremonies. The Gabon-born and New York-based Devi Mambouka, known as Masma Dream World, opens up fantastic spaces to your personal use on her new album and it is recommended to follow her.

Her music involves "invokes, magic, and healing as a form of worship to the universal Dark Mother", making it clear that the experimental industrial dark ambient's biggest trait is its spiritual character audible in the forms of chants and backing vocals that are the leading force of the new album. But there is more, so much more. Even the pace changes as Seeking Your Protection offers a unique, industrial tribal vibes. Not every face of the artist on this album is what I like, but I appreciate the fact that the rather diverse album still feels like a coherent mass of sound.

I'm happy that I will be able to partake in one of her ceremonies during this year's dunk!festival in Ghent. I'm looking forward to this and getting ready my spiritual self. 

PLEASE COME TO ME costs 10 USD.

Check: O, Dark Mother

Country: New York, US

Genre: spiritual dark ambient

Label: Valley of Search

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Niechęć - Reckless Things (2025)

I am a person who famously dislike jazz. Sorry. But when I like an album that is very jazzy, if not jazz full stop, it's a clear indication that the album is really good. It's not Ciśnienie whose post-rock noise is structured like jazz, it's jazz music that feels like post-rock and it's enough for me to get really intrigued by the Polish band's fourth ever album.

The band admit their love for improvisation (is there any jazz outfit who don't like it?) but that their sound changes constantly and "balances between fury and melancholy, recently leaning towards trance rhythms and synths". After the first two tracks I was already sold: Nowe płuca (translating to "New Lungs") present a perfect riff (but played on a trumpet, I think) that makes the track an instant hit while Bezdech ("Apnea")'s finish is... just pure post-rock. Sorry to keep coming back to the comparison with the guitar-based genre, but this is where I feel comfortable in. I'm not trying to offend anyone.

Although it is not a norm for me, I prefer the livelier, more energetic fragments of the album. The more self-reflecting parts played with a saxophone (I think) are definitely not my cup of tea. Still though, I am excited by this album more than I could have guessed.

Reckless Things costs 7 EUR (29 PLN). 

Check: Nowe płuca

Country: Poland

Genre: post-rocky jazz

Label: Audio Cave

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Postcards - Ripe (2025)

Ah, yes, after last week's Cats of Transnistria, there comes another common guest of this blog. I follow the Lebanese Postcards' career since their 2020's sophomore album and I'm never disappointed with what they cook in their artistic, lyrical minds. Last month they released their 5th album with the title suggesting that it is their final artistic form.

So what is this ripe fruit of their work? It is a melancholic and moody as ever, but I feel like the band shifted slightly their sound towards chamber rock (pop/singer-songwriter vocals and compositions accompanied by rock-like yet very moody guitars (Poison!) ) at the expense of the dreamy tones. Slight shift, there's still tons of the oneiric parts (like the beautiful ending of Wasteland Rose), but generally makes me think of how Lucy Kruger plays after Medicine Boy got disbanded. Nevertheless, the music is addressed to the sensitive audience just like it's been up to this point.

This thought is acknowledged by the band itself as the description of the album includes phrases like "[the band] transmute their rage into something transcendental" and "[the album] is as much a departure as it is a natural evolution for the band: rawer, darker, but with the same unflinching resolve". One has to also remember about the wherabouts of the artist's music: coming from Lebanon, it revolves around many hardships their land faces, which is reflected in the titles like Wasteland Rose, Ruins or Construction Site, in many places drawing comparison between the world in shambles and the reality of one's love life.

Ripe costs 10 USD.

Check: Wasteland Rose

Country: Lebanon

Genre: lyrical art rock

Label: Ruptured

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

Postcards - The Good Soldier (2020)

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Radar Men From the Moon x Twin Sister - Mirrors for Discharge (2025)

Radar Men From the Moon have already around 10 releases, but none of them was very much to my taste. It's different with the live album and one can say it's VERY different as I rarely appreciate live albums at all. And this one, recording of their live set together with Twin Sister made in 2/3 of Dead Neanderthals, I find definitely appreciating worthy. 

The album was recorded during the gig at 2022's Roadburn Festival and, what's important here, the compositions had been all written for this specific set. Both formations are known for their heavy, psychedelic space rock and this is what dominates in the speakers when listening to the album. Heavy, psychedelic space rock squared. The slow, but poignant composition venture towards the noisy and sonically overwhelming realms thanks to a real army of guitars.

But the heaviness is not the only thing. Somewhere in the compositions, hidden between the mesmerizing repetitiveness and meaty riffs and desperate, touching vocals, I hear the dreamy escape offered to the audience. Perhaps it's the space element of their music that invites me so insistingly to the experience. Or maybe it's Twin Sister as it is only their second album ever (under this moniker of course) and they are 2/2 present on this blog.

Mirrors for Discharge costs 7 EUR.

Check: Drowning in Self-Image

Country: The Netherlands

Genre: heavy psychedelic rock

Label: God Unknown Records

Twin Sister - Twin Sister (2020)

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Amulets - Not Around but Through (2025)

This is not ambient electronica for easily startled people. The Oregon soundscapes icon brought the next album in his discography this year and filled it with an ambitious take on ambient music: it can be overwhelming, it can feel heavy, but it is always as beautiful and emotionally marked as possible.

The album explores the "process of acceptance and the tumultuous journey of looking within" with mesmerizing soundscapes that may sound nice and kind at the start, but soon enough evolve into a slow-motion avalanche of organ-like noise. A beautiful one too. And this is a common pattern on the album. The music here is a curious kaleidoscope of genres including drones and post-rock and almost anything you can imagine.

And ambient pop. And when Midwife borrows some of her fuzzy magic to an album, you know it has to be good.

Not Around but Through costs 10 USD.

Check: Myriads

Country: Oregon, US

Genre: heavy soundscape

Label: Beacon Sound

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Cats of Transnistria - IV (2025)

POV: A band checks all your personal boxes to catch your interest. Having a great, unusual name; being from a beautiful and unusual place; and most importantly, creating magical music. No wonder that the Helsinki-based Cats of Transnistria have appeared on this blog many times already and it is safe to say that with every new album they will be featured here too. 

Because the band's dream pop is how this should be done. And since it's been already 6 (!) years since their previous (and my favourite!) album, I had to post about IV. Henna Emilia Hietamäki and Tuomas Alatalo have a great ability of creating moody, intimate dreamy tracks that do not shy away from using lightly louder guitars as it is the case in very old-school rock like parts of Thunder as an Arrow (no wonder that the video to this track looks like taken from the 90s.). I appreciate that, but still my favourites are the songs that mesmerize with repetitive structure and airy atmosphere. Like Horrors, a beautiful little nightmare.

And so the dream finally comes to an end with the extremely airy Ceiling of Stars and one can only want to go back. The cosy, very artistic and drawing from other genres dream pop from Finland is quite addictive.

IV costs 7 EUR.

Check: Horrors

Country: Finland

Genre: art dream pop

Label: Soliti

Cats of Transnistria - Aligning (2019)

Cats of Transnistria - Opium (2018)

Cats of Transnistria - Divine (2016)

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Sterile Cuckoo - Until All the Flocks Are Gathered (2025)

Dream pop that feels both intimate, melancholic and filled with life and emotions? Lively ambient meeting sadcore vocals? This is how Sterile Cuckoo's third album feels and I gotta say, there is little that could be done to grab my emotions more.

The name of the project is taken from a novel by John Nichols that was adapted to the screen by Alan Pakula so you know it's bound to be about interhuman emotions and the music proves is so well. The lo-fi atmosphere certainly help as well as the artist feels so close to the audience that you can almost hear his breathing (this closeness reminds me of what Raised by Swans does so well). But you can't say it's a monotonous singer/songwriter type of lo-fi project. 

Sterile Cuckoo creates compositions in which "haunting synths weave a tapestry of ethereal textures, interspersed with cascading guitar lines that radiate like distant starbursts", making soundscapes that are bursting with life while still feeling slow and contemplative. I love the addition of strings in Spring and Loss that is not too invasive but fits right in. Similarly the glitchy effects in Grave Memories and many more. Elements that enrich the compositions, without overtaking them and overshadowing the clue. And yes, the artis admits what we know already, the music is designed as a tool for meditation, for taking a while to reflect on your lives, on your emotions. And it works, maybe even too much.

Until All the Flocks Are Gathered costs 1 EUR.

Check: Spring and Loss

Genre: vibrant slowcore

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ANIMADORA - Sobre lo visible (2025)

If anyone craves some dreamy vibes but with strong sense of rock-like energy, very emotional vocals and heavy guitars, the second EP from the Spanish ANIMADORA is something to try. Sobre lo visible may be short, but there is some fantastic vibes included.

ANIMADORA seems to be a solo project by Andrea Podadera that evolved into a 5-pieces band (at least that's what RYM suggests). And this wide line-up is certainly audible: the compositions are multi-layered, with a big focus put on creating the shoegaze atmosphere but still maintaining the rock/grunge-like energy. The tracks are usually vibrant and fast, they make me think on the band's compatriots (at least formally!) from Arima, so I know that I won't stop listening to the alum anytime soon.

The EP talks a lot about relationships (that didn't go that well) in an emotional but also extremely poetic way. It is in Spanish, which I appreciate, so I have to rely mostly on a translator, but, yeah, those kinds of words are very universal. It is so well visible in the opening track that talks about the Devil the protagonist falls in love with and in El Carro:inóvil, certainly the most emotional piece here. 

Sobre lo visible costs 5 EUR.

Check: El Carro:inóvil 

Country: Spain

Genre: grungy shoegaze

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