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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