rescuing musical virtue in distress.
I shouldn't be surprised that a music maker based in Jakarta seems to channel about half of the bands I was watching and listening to as far back as the '80s. The world is a small place. A connected place. A place where influences and ideas ebb and flow across both time and geography. It's... Continue Reading →
On paper at least, the ideas and influences which go into FLDPLN's sound shouldn't work. A return to the saxophone as the driving instrument, the nostalgic whiff of classic 80's pop music (as experienced through the ears of a young music fan via a late-night Walkman), electronic soundscaping and plenty of it. But in the... Continue Reading →
Some artists tell stories via a song. Others create longer narratives via, for want of a better word, concept albums...or at least albums of concepts. Keeley, via the band of the same name, has an even more focused and singular approach to story-telling. Five years ago she read about German tourist Inga Maria Hauser, whose... Continue Reading →
We have had lots of music born of the lockdown experience over the last year. Naturally. But now, as the rough shape of what the new normal might look like is beginning to make itself known, our thoughts, also, quite naturally, turn to how we might transition from the isolation of the last year and... Continue Reading →
We know that all the best things come in small packages and ahead of a two-track release, which in the past would have gone by the ungainly name of a double A-side single, LA-based multi-instrumentalist, AMMO, releases just one of those tracks to light the way. And light the way it does, shimmering and shining... Continue Reading →
After charming us for just over a minute with a delicate wash of shimmering, ambient indie vibes, Neon then pulls the rug away from the listener's expectations and turns into an upbeat and texturally rich, pop song. And no matter at which end of the song's sonic journey you find yourself, you are cocooned in... Continue Reading →
It's been a while since I had a Screens 4 Eyes track waft my way, but as always it has been well worth the wait. And waft is the perfect word to use as their music seems to drift through the listener's consciousness, floats around you and fogs the senses and get absorbed by osmosis... Continue Reading →
Although happy to admit references to '80s and '90's dream-pop sounds and electronic scenes, Something Stranger is nothing if not music for the here and now. It is easy to find past sounds threaded through the music, a sort of gentle motorik hypnotism powers much of the music and, songs such as The Storm could... Continue Reading →
Sitting in the lush sonic space between the ethereality of dream pop and the more intense sonic swathes of psychedelia, Seasurfer makes a sound that walks a fine line between space and intensity, light and claustrophobia. They also dance between the musical world's of post-punk past and dark electronic futurism, dream-state vocals and solid beat... Continue Reading →
If Kiera Lyons music has taught us anything it is that it is possible to make pop music which is musically elegant, sonically eloquent and a big step above the usual chart fodder we see vying for the pop-dollar. Aflame was the perfect demonstration of exactly that and Hurry Back just seems to underline the... Continue Reading →
If someone was going to write music that would chime perfectly with my current tastes, then it wouldn’t sound radically different to the beautiful and beguiling sounds that Norrisette conjures up. If at all. Back in the heady days of post-punk when synths were new and samples were just about imaginable on the technological horizon,... Continue Reading →
If you were to consider music in terms of writing, as perhaps sonic pen strokes on a musical page, then Norrisette’s 2020 is the equivalent of stunning calligraphy but also written in a somewhat off-beat and otherworldly hand. Some people just make music to merely communicate or lift spirits, Norrisette seems more concerned with enthralling... Continue Reading →
Blending beat with beauty, Magic Wands manage to make music which is driven by a tightly-wound, energetic engine room yet simultaneously the stuff of blissed out, sonic dreamscaping, and that is a hard thing to pull off. But pull it off they do and Blue Cherry is all the proof that you need. Dream dance... Continue Reading →
It’s safe to say that Stay Lunar have found their groove, and it is a good groove. Make that a great groove. Whilst so many of their peers are looking back to that much maligned decade…the 80’s…and finding inspiration in the twee-indie and synth-driven landfill pop which seems only to define it in hindsight or... Continue Reading →
Imagine if Ennio Morricone had taken a different approach to Leone’s iconic Spaghetti Western soundtracks and decided to invent dream-pop whilst scoring them. You can’t imagine such a scenario? Well, give The Roogs debut album a spin and you’ll get some idea what that might have sounded like. Courtney Davies and Steve Gerdes are perhaps better... Continue Reading →
There is nothing like kicking off an album with some beguiling and engaging sounds, the sort of musical exoticism which grabs the listener right from the first languorous and luxurious vocal, the first skittering and skewed beat. That’s how you get peoples attention and Bakhchalarda does just that and does it perfectly. A blend of... Continue Reading →
If ever there was a piece of music which deserves to be prominently placed in the next Sci-Fi blockbuster movie, then this is it. With it’s obvious Vangelisian, Blade Runner-esque fluidity and a video which revels in mystery, beauty and science fact, this short dream state slice of ambient cinematics goes beyond just being about... Continue Reading →
Given that the last time I had Daniel Angelus under my pen it was to write about an album called Act I, it wasn’t entirely unexpected that I should now find myself with a new album titled Act II in front of me. What wasn’t expected was how much he had moved things on since... Continue Reading →
If you are going to choose to cover a song, especially one by a band known for having such a signature sound, you really need to be bringing something interesting to project. Otherwise what is the point? The Pull of Autumn really understands this and this cover of The Bee Gees' Holiday has so many unique... Continue Reading →
Maybe it’s some sort of self-fulfilling prophecy. A band who, consciously or otherwise , find themselves going down a certain creative route eventually find themselves working with someone who was, in part at least, one of the architects of just such a sound in the first place. Perhaps it is just co-incidence. Perhaps million to... Continue Reading →
As tough as break-ups are, as lost and untethered as they make us feel, as emotionally confusing as they might be, even in such turmoil you can find the positive. And if you are as smart as Ámaris Wen then you can turn that positivity into an album of songs. Without getting too preachy or offering... Continue Reading →
Sometimes, songs tell their story through the medium of lyrical communication, laying out the narrative in no uncertain terms. Other times they tell their tales in less tangible ways, through emotion and feeling, or perhaps just a general vibe. The Warped Glimmer seems to do both but it is to the latter approach that it... Continue Reading →
I’ve been sat here listening to this debut album from Tiny Fighter trying to work out just why it is so great. Obviously it is full of deft and clever songwriting, it goes without saying that any album deserving such a label has that, but there is something in the delivery of these songs that... Continue Reading →
I guess the art of making music which falls into the loose and broad realms of dream-pop is getting the balance between blissful transience and an engaging structure just right. Wander too far one way and you are into formless ambience, head towards the other extreme and you end up making washy dance music. It’s... Continue Reading →
Four tracks in, as far as I’m concerned anyway, and I’m really falling for Phantom Phunk. I don’t understand what they are up to, how they blend their musical strands together, I just know that the world, and not just the music world, is a better place for them being in it. You have to... Continue Reading →
In an ideal world, the release of a new Fassine album would be something which brings the whole country together, like a new series of Love Island or the hunt of a serial killer. And to be fair, given their increasing popularity with each release, they will probably get there. But for now they are... Continue Reading →
It is interesting that speaking of this song, taken from the forth-coming album Forge, vocalist Sarah Palmer described it as being, “About a Magpie-type lover and all that comes with it, luring us into the hope of a beautiful relationship. It’s as close as we could get to writing a pop song on this album!” Interesting... Continue Reading →
If 4AD were launched today as a dance label, this would be their signature release. It’s a simple as that. Ballad of JC Quinn runs along on pulsing dance grooves, the sort of thing that Bristol’s underground scene revelled in during the 90’s, but then swathes itself in layers of shimmering sonics. The background beats... Continue Reading →
When I look outside my window I see a world built of angles and sharp edges, littered with colour schemes that are either brash or drab, skies half hidden by man made structures and people who seem to be dutifully going about their business and finding little joy in it. That’s why I listen to... Continue Reading →
I did it again! I took one look at the band name, the artwork, the track's title and jumped to conclusions. Everything suggested that what lay beyond would be some sort of strange electro music, digital dalliances made up of synth textures and angular, programmed off-beats. Well, you know what they say about judging books... Continue Reading →