Pop & Rock Vinyl New Releases - News

“Everything has to be said.” This is the conviction guiding Indigo De Souza’s sophomore album, Any Shape You Take. This dynamic record successfully creates a container for the full spectrum—pushing through and against every emotion: “I wanted this album to give a feeling of shifting with and embracing change. These songs came from a turbulent time when I was coming to self-love through many existential crises and shifts in perspective.”

Faithful to its name, Any Shape You Take changes form to match the tenor of each story it tells. “The album titles a nod to the many shapes I take musically. I don’t feel that I fully embody any particular genre—all of themusic just comes from the universe that is my ever-shifting brain/heart/world,” says Indigo. This sonic range isunified by Indigo’s strikingly confessional and effortless approach to songwriting, a signature first introduced inher debut, self-released LP, I Love My Mom. Written in quick succession, Indigo sees these two records ascompanion pieces, both distinct but in communion with each other: “Many of the songs on these two recordscame from the same season in my life and a certain version of myself which I feel much further from now.”

Throughout Any Shape You Take, Indigo reflects on her relationships as she reckons with a deeper need toredefine how to fully inhabit spaces of love and connection.“It feels so important for me to see people throughchange. To accept people for the many shapes they take, whether those shapes fit into your life or not. Thisalbum is a reflection of that. I have undergone so much change in my life and I am so deeply grateful to thepeople who have seen me through it without judgment and without attachment to skins I’m shifting out of.”

Growing up in a conservative small town in the mountains of North Carolina, Indigo started playing guitarwhen she was nine years old. “Music was a natural occurrence in my life. My dad is a bossa nova guitarist andsinger from Brazil and so I think I just had it in my blood from birth.” It wasn’t until moving to Asheville, NC thatIndigo began to move into her current sound, developing a writing practice that feeds from the currents thatsurround her: “Sometimes it feels like I am soaking up the energies of people around me and making art from aspace that is more a collective body than just my own.”

Featuring Squirrel Flower and Liam O’Neill (SUUNS). Recommended If You Like: Mount Eerie, Low, Richard Swift, the Weather Station, Lomelda, Fleet Foxes, Squirrel Flower, L’Rain. Cedric Noel is a songwriter, bassist, collaborator and producer currently based in Montréal, Québec. The newest longplayer from Tio'tiá:ke/Montreal staple Cedric Noel lands with a stunning sense of surety and self. Hang Time stands as a high water mark for a songwriter who's spent the past decade quietly expanding the borders of his music. Longtime fans will recognize the fluid elements of the album’s open-ended rock formations: reflective strumming, soaring choruses, searing guitar lines, subtle bass grooves; all occasionally dissolving into pools of pure ambience. New listeners will find surprises throughout: threads of folk pop, ambient and sound collage fasten the foundations of this expressive whole. However, what’s most striking on Hang Time is Noel’s newfound sense of voice, both literal and metaphorical. Written primarily in 2017-18 during an intense period of self-reflection, this collection of songs finds Noel wrestling profoundly with his sense of identity, self and place. The album’s material was captured faithfully at The Pines, a beloved downtown Montreal studio whose doors shuttered shortly after amidst the strain of the pandemic. Noel worked closely and patiently with friend and engineer Steve Newton, ensuring the songs had the time and space needed to come fully to fruition. Hang Time features subtle rhythm work from drummer Liam O’Neill (SUUNS) and guest spots from Brigitte Naggar (Common Holly) and Tim Crabtree (Paper Beat Scissors) among others. The album opens in mid-air with ‘Comuu’, a song that implores a becoming-more while hovering triumphantly. Then follows a suite of songs (‘Headspace’, ‘Keep’, ‘Stilling’) that recall the heart-rending power of y2k-era Low, albeit with a more vigorous beat. On ‘Bass Song’, an intimate duet with musician Ella Williams (Squirrel Flower) that explores the depths of interpersonal constriction. At the crux of the album sits ‘Born’, a deceptively pleasant-sounding song that explores the confounding emotionality of adoption before fading into a distended soundfield. Throughout the back half of the album, Noel double’s down on this commitment to his genuine, proud, Black self. The most confrontational track, ‘Allies’ finds him refraining “Are you on my side?” as a trailing guitar solo interweaves a Malcolm X soundbite, eventually engulfing the composition. Glorious lead single ‘Nighttime (Skin)’ traces the artist’s sense of ancestral dissociation through to a triumphant moment of pride in self-acceptance. Throughout Hang Time, Noel finds a way to ask hard questions (both of the listener and himself) in ways that are compassionate, open and honest. The ebb and flow of tension and tenderness that moves within these tracks helps to grow the heart and redefine what Black music can be in 2021.

After Ramkot's single 'Red' from their first EP earned them the De Nieuwe Lichting 2021 award from Studio Brussel, the trio from Ghent is ready for a new smash. Ramkot's new EP 'What Exactly Are You Looking For' drops on November 5!

The band, made up of brothers Tim and Tom Leyman along with Hannes Cuyvers, proved over the last year that they were ready for bigger and better things. With 2021 appearances at Crammerock, Lokerse Feesten, Rock Ternat and many other shows in Belgium and the Netherlands, Ramkot firmly established their "ramrock" reputation in live settings.

On the already released singles 'Am I Alright Now' and 'Fever' the band sounds stronger and more danceable than ever, luring essential airplay for them on Studio Brussel, Willy, NPO 3FM and KINK.

'What Exactly Are You Looking For' reminds you of a mixture of stale beer, cigarettes and sweat (really, a lot of sweat), with nods to Millionaire, Soulwax, STAKE and De Staat, who sound just like the name implies. In the run-up to the release shows on December 1 and 2 at Vooruit (in Ghent) the band will be eagerly touring throughout the Netherlands and Belgium.

Ramrock, courtesy of Ramkot. It isn't any harder than that!

Somewhere Between: Mutant Pop, Electronic Minimalism & Shadow Sounds of Japan 1980–1988 hovers vibe–wise between two distinct poles within Light In The Attic’s acclaimed Japan Archival Series—Kankyō Ongaku: Japanese Ambient, Environmental & New Age Music 1980–1990 and Pacific Breeze: Japanese City Pop, AOR & Boogie 1976–1986. All three albums showcase recordings produced during Japan’s soaring bubble economy of the 1980s, an era in which aesthetic visions and consumerism merged. Music echoed the nation’s prosperity and with financial abundance came the luxury to dream.

Sonically, Somewhere Between mines the midpoint between Kankyō Ongaku’s sparkling atmospherics and Pacific Breeze’s metropolitan boogie. The compilation encompasses ambient pop, underground electronics, liminal minimalism and shadow sounds—all descriptors emphasizing the hazy nature of the nebula. Out–of–focus rhythms wear ethereal accoutrements, ballads are shrouded in static, and angular drums snake skyward on transcendent tones. From the Avant–minimalism of Mkwaju Ensemble and Yoshio Ojima, to the leftfield techno-pop of Mishio Ogawa and Noriko Miyamoto (featuring members of YMO), and highlights from the groundbreaking Osaka underground label Vanity Records, these are blurry constellations defying collective categorization.

These tracks also exist in a space of transition when the major label grip on the Japanese recording market began to give way to the escalation of independents. Thanks to the idyllic economic climate and innovations in domestically–manufactured music gear, creators on the edges were empowered to focus on satisfying their artistic visions in the open headspace of home studios. While labels like Warner Music and Nippon Columbia explored new sounds through traditional channels, it was possible for Vanity, Balcony and other indie labels, not to mention self–released artists like Ojima and Naoki Asai, to publish their work via affordable media such as cassettes, 7" vinyl, and flexi–discs.

Expertly curated by Yosuke Kitazawa and Mark “Frosty” McNeill (dublab), Somewhere Between is a collection of music, much of it released for the first time outside Japan, that is bound more by energetic vibration than shared history, genre or scene. They are the sounds of transition and searching—a celebration of the freedom found in floating.

Note: The track “Days Man” by Yoshio Ojima is only available on the LP and Cassette versions.

Ferocious Dog have been putting lockdown to good use by writing and recording their fifth studio album 'The Hope'. Instantly recognisable as a fusion of folk, punk and ska - but with newer members Ryan and Johnny really putting their stamp on evolving their sound further - the former adding much more bite to the electric guitar, with the latter juxtaposing this aggression with softer folky sounds.

The ever-present traditional cover is here, right on-trend with a sea shanty vibe, the rest of the album flows irresistibly through tales of historical observations to biting commentary on the plights facing the world today. The songs follow a rollercoaster of pace and sentiment which will have you wanting to mosh one moment before having a moment to contemplate, coupled with a surprise collaboration and an overdue catch-up with how Mairi is getting on.

A great follow-up to Fake News and Propaganda - Ferocious Dog seem to have the knack of evolving their sound enough to pique your interest, without losing any of the sound or attitude that made you fall in love with them in the first place. Once they’re allowed out to play again they’ve given themselves a real headache in trying to pick a set list from their now burgeoning back catalogue.

SPICE singer Ross Farrar speaks of the band’s ambition to forge a sort of aesthetic patois: a mode of expression as strikingly regional as it is recognizable. Last year’s self-titled debut, released in the depths of the pandemic, fully achieved this goal, distilling decades of North Bay punk and post-hardcore into an urgent, artful set of emotive unrest. Their latest single, A Better Treatment b/w Everyone Gets In, further refines the group’s singular mix of weathered melody and abrasive poetics, equal parts bracing, bruised, and cryptic.

“A Better Treatment” began as a song about a friend who died but through the turmoil of collaboration transformed into something more macroscopic and opaque, blurring the boundary between hopeful and defeated (“I thought loving someone would cure my self-hatred”). Bass and drums build against walls of guitar while the violin threads its own melancholy within the noise; Farrar is blunt about the intention: “The violin is an instrument of death you know.”



“Everyone Gets In” is both poppier and more pained, an anthem for angst aging into the reverie of regret: “We lose our strength / along the way / we lose each other / the funeral sways.” The tempo sways too, gradually slowing to an anxious crawl before finally revving back into a storm of shimmering guitar and splashing drums, fighting against the dying of the light. It’s music of raw truths and
rejected pedestals, storied but unswerving, a revolt against the great regress: “and my / my time is spent / adoring seasons / that I / I never should’ve.”

"Yūtai-ridatsu ±", an album from Osaka-based electronic music producer Futoshi Moriyama. Initially released in 2015 as a cassette on the Birdfriend label run by Koshiro Hino (aka YPY), augmented by four unreleased/new tracks which replace other tracks. Beautifully weird home-recorded orchestral music!

RCA Records - the 16 track album is the audio accompaniment to her recent documentary 'All I Know So Far', released on Amazon Prime. The movie is directed by 'The Greatest Showman's' Michael Gracey and follows P!nk on her 2019 Beautiful Trauma Tour, culminating in her Wembley Stadium shows. "All I Know So Far: Setlist" was released 21st May on CD. The album features live renditions of her classic hits such as So What, What About Us and Who Knew, plus live covers from the tour of Queen, No Doubt, Cyndi Lauper and Bishop Briggs. 'All I Know So Far: Setlist' is the first live album from P!nk to get a global release, and only the second of her career following 2009 Australian only release Funhouse Tour: Live in Australia. Two studio tracks will also feature on the record, recent single Cover Me In Sunshine with her daughter Willow Sage Hart, and All I Know So Far. This is the standard black vinyl 2LP format. Marketing activity across all media outlets.

Italian crew Unknown Collective come correct on this latest Purism joint as they drop some seriously bumping deep house heat to get bodies popping with approval. "Nodi" is the consummate A side jam, all exuberant energy and rock solid functionality, just like a DJs best friend should be. "Virgo" is, on the surface, a slinkier affair, but don't be fooled as there's some serious weight in that bassline which will absolutely rock on a proper soundsystem. "Arya" is the dreamier cut on the record - the groove is still solid, but there's a dreamy tone to the pad hovering in the background and the track is sprinkled with all kinds of extra sonic delights to toy with your mind at the hazy end of the dance.

Jame’s Newton’s 1977 self-released solo-debut, ‘Flute Music’ is an unheralded gem of the 70’s jazz underground. An album that showcases a diverse range of styles and fervent cross-pollination, while retaining a clear sense of direction and cohesion. An artist funnelling their wild expression into multiple facets of “The New Music”, crafting an auspicious and artistic debut. Newton would later go on to record with revered jazz labels like India Navigation and ECM, and collaborate with fellow creative luminaries like Sam Rivers, Anthony Davis, Andrew Cyrille, David Murray, and John Carter. But ‘Flute Music’ captures Newton’s fiery creativity and experimental nature in its earliest blossom.

The album’s opener, Arkansas Suite, finds Newton’s flute unaccompanied, but densely layered. Folding and cascading upon itself, he creates a ricocheting web of dense woodwind harmonics. The effect is deeply immersive and meditative. From first blush, it seems this could be an album of blissful new age. But after this track, Newton’s influences explode outwards. On the same LP side, Darlene’s Bossa welcomes a full band into the fold. The track expounds upon a latin-jazz groove as if the group were seasoned experts of the form. The next track once again finds Newton’s flute on its own as he upends Duke Ellington’s jazz standard, Sophisticated Lady. And finally, on the sidelong b-side track, Poor Theron, the band is suffused with free-jazz electricity - quietly roiling in the midst of musique concrete clatter, and exploding into a din of spiritual fervor. Flute Music pushes in many directions at once, and yet it revolves firmly around a singular smoldering core. That core is Newton’s unmistakable talent and musicianship. His flute anchors the whole affair, whether it’s in cascading sheets of unaccompanied wind, or flitting between the breathmarks of his backing band.

With ‘Flute Music’, James Newton casts himself as a potent force on the creative-jazz scene, and the rest of his career has certainly given credence to that promise.Reissued for the first time since its scarce private-press issue in 1977, Morning Trip are exceedingly proud to present the debut solo work by a renowned and prestigious jazz luminary.

The punchy sound, courageous lyrics and their anarchist attitude was a bit too much for the mainstream music industry. Still the underground rock scene of Turkey in the 2000s was broad and generous enough to welcome the discrete.

Zardanadam hit hard with their DIY practices. Besides being the pioneers of copyleft digitals, they self-produce and distribute almost 100 000 CDs at concerts and via airmail for free.

Here is a selection of their greatest hits from the six-album discography compiled for the first time on vinyl for the 20th anniversary of the band.

Die weltbekannte Band aus Island ist mit ihrem elften Studioalbum, dem hoch emotionalen "Mobile Home", zurückgekehrt und veröffentlicht damit ihr erstes Album seit 2018. Das Kollektiv beweist einmal mehr die Meisterhaftigkeit, seine künstlerischen Grenzen zu erweitern, indem sie eines ihrer ambitioniertesten und kraftvollsten Alben seit Jahrzehnten veröffentlichen. Für ihr neuestes Album holten sich GusGus die VÖK-Sängerin Margrét Rán zur Hilfe, um ihren Stil zu erweitern und den Sound des Kollektivs so frisch wie immer zu halten. Das 9-Track-Album bietet eine Mischung aus elektronischem Rock, Ambient, Darkwave, Downtempo und Synthpop. GusGus besser denn je!

World-renowned group GusGus have returned with their 11th studio album, the highly emotive Mobile Home, marking their first album release since 2018. The collective once again prove their commitment to pushing their artistic boundaries as they release one of their most ambitious and powerful albums in decades. For their latest record, GusGus call on VÖK’s lead singer Margrét Rán to help expand their style, keeping the collective’s sound as fresh as ever. The 9-track album features a concoction of electronic rock, ambient, darkwave, downtempo, and synthpop.

After announcing a new album in October 2020, GusGus wowed fans with their first single “Higher,” offering a first taste of how VÖK’s impactful vocals mesh seamlessly with GusGus’ intelligent and powerful electronic production. “Higher” was soon followed up with the darker, downtempo “Stay The Ride” and the bright and energetic synth work on “Our World.” The three captivating singles each received equally remarkable music videos courtesy of founding members Arni & Kinski, the directing team known for working with the likes of Sigur Rós, Kiasmos, Ólafur Arnalds, Of Monsters and Men, and more.

Every track on Mobile Home doubles as a window into a futuristic dystopian world that has been overtaken by machines. A nod to the rise of technology and ever-growing uncertainty surrounding automation, the album explores themes of solitude, rebellion, science fiction, hedonism, pleasure, and anger. Swirling within this world is a disconnected, aching soul who is on the verge of slipping into complete dementia. Forgotten purpose and goals but continues to be driven by the hedonistic default program of material consciousness; sensually self-indulgent and engaged in the pursuit of pleasure alone. In Mobile Home, GusGus challenge themselves like never before, resulting in a wonderfully chaotic reflection of the ongoing war between soul and machine.

With Mobile Home, GusGus show the quality and sonic diversity of the singles pervades throughout the full LP, while preserving the melodramatic themes that tie its 9 tracks together. “Simple Tuesday” showcases the group’s aptitude for blending contemporary electronic production with pop sensibilities while keeping an optimistic tonality at the forefront. Meanwhile, “Love Is Alone” and “Original Heartbreak” offer a slower, more pensive take on synthpop, and evoke feelings of solitude and deep melancholia. “Silence” and “The Rink” boast some of GusGus’s more experimental production, each alternating between radio-ready vocal verses with inventive and exciting synth elements. GusGus closes Mobile Home with “Flush,” an instrumental score that leaves the listener riding high as they finish the LP.

THE PALE FOUNTAINS - LONGSHOT FOR YOUR LOVE (Marina Records) New enhanced, remastered vinyl edition of the long-deleted, much sought-after Pale Fountains compilation "Longshot For Your Love" - originally released in 1998 - covering the band's early years from 1982 to 1984. "Longshot For Your Love" is a collection of rarities, radio sessions and previously unreleased tracks by Liverpool's second best band ever - fronted by Michael Head ("Our greatest living songwriter" - NME). Seven cuts are released here for the first time ever - incl. the superb John Peel and Old Grey Whistle Test BBC Sessions ('82/'83). The album comes with enhanced artwork - in a beautiful gatefold cover plus inner sleeve feat. lots of unseen band photos and extensive linernotes by former Pale Fountains manager Patrick Moore. On Marina Records.

"Much like their contemporaries and collaborators NSRD, the music of 19 gadi pirms sākuma captures frustration with their own reality, and a playful drive to make up a new one." Latvia, late 80's

Over 10 years in the making, Audika records offers us 'another archival release that peels back another layer of Arthur Russell's idiosyncratic sense of sound' - mostly all tracks yet unheard, including music once recorded as demo for major labels, as well as several recently discovered folk songs he wrote during his time in Northern California in the early 1970s

Over the past decade, the visionary musician Arthur Russell has entered something close to the mainstream.

Sampled and referenced by contemporary musicians, his papers now open to visitors at the Performing Arts Library at Lincoln Center in New York, and his name synonymous with a certain strain of tenderness, Russell is as widely known as he’s ever been. Thanks to Russell’s partner Tom Lee and to Steve Knutson of Audika Records, who have forged several records from Russell’s vast archive of unfinished and unreleased work, the world now hears many versions of Arthur Russell. There’s the Iowa boy, the disco mystic, the singer-songwriter and composer, and the fierce perfectionist deep in a world of echo. While all of these elements of Russell are individually true, none alone define him.

Now, after ten years of work inside the Russell library, Lee and Knutson bring us Iowa Dream, yet another bright star in Russell’s dazzling constellation. Blazing with trademark feeling, these nineteen songs are a staggering collection of Russell’s utterly distinct songwriting. And although Russell could be inscrutably single-minded, he was never totally solitary. Collaborating here is a stacked roster of downtown New York musicians, including Ernie Brooks, Rhys Chatham, Henry Flynt, Jon Gibson, Peter Gordon, Steven Hall, Jackson Mac Low, Larry Saltzman, and David Van Tieghem. Musician Peter Broderick makes a contemporary addition to this list: more than forty years after Russell recorded several nearly finished songs, Broderick worked diligently with Audika to complete them, and performed audio restoration and additional mixing.

Several tracks on Iowa Dream Russell originally recorded as demos, in two early examples of his repeated brushes with potential popular success—first in 1974, with Paul Nelson of Mercury Records, and then in 1975, with the legendary John Hammond of Columbia Records. For different reasons, neither session amounted to a record deal. Russell kept working nearly up until his death in 1992 from complications of HIV-AIDS.

At once kaleidoscopic and intimate, Iowa Dream bears some of Russell’s most personal work, including several recently discovered folk songs he wrote during his time in Northern California in the early 1970s. For Russell, Iowa was never very far away. “I see, I see it all,” sings Russell on the title track: red houses, fields, the town mayor (his father) streaming by as he dream-bicycles through his hometown. Russell’s childhood home and family echo, too, through “Just Regular People,” “I Wish I Had a Brother,” “Wonder Boy,” “The Dogs Outside are Barking,” “Sharper Eyes,” and “I Felt.” Meanwhile, songs like “I Kissed the Girl From Outer Space,” “I Still Love You,” “List of Boys,” and “Barefoot in New York” fizz with pop and dance grooves, gesturing at Russell’s devotion to New York’s avant-garde and disco scenes. Finally, the long-awaited “You Did it Yourself,” until now heard only in a brief heart-stopping black-and-white clip in Matt Wolf’s documentary Wild Combination, awards us a new take with a driving funk rhythm and Russell’s extraordinary voice soaring at the height of its powers. On Iowa Dream, you can hear a country kid meeting the rest of the world—and with this record, the world continues to meet a totally singular artist.

If M.A BEAT! was a place, it would be the Liquidrom in Berlin. This sauna where the youth swim to the rhythm of comforting electronica. Their music is often oneiric composed of ethereal details with surrealist samples.

After 'Drowning For Love' album and a few EPs, M.A BEAT! 's second album 'Sans Soleil' will be released 29 September via BMM records and its first single Nosferato on September 8 with a clip by the gif artist Sarah Zucker.

Ambient music legend, Brian Eno-collaborator, Laraaji is featured on the album and give birth to a cross collaboration with the band : M.A BEAT! will release a remix for Laraaji's new album.

In the lineage of avant-garde electronic music, the band's last effort appears to be experimental, adventurous and radically different from their previous ones. Using less sample collages and improving composition techniques, the trio seems to travel in time with ambient landscapes and obscure pop songs.

In the early 1970s, Mariangela Celeste signed to a major label at 13, she would go on to record her self-titled album with rising European superstar Vangelis. Though tragically overlooked upon its release, Mariangela is a gem of early electronic pop with sparkling synths, drums machines, and lush arrangements propelling the songs of an unapologetically strong-willed adolescent.

In the early 1970s, Mariangela Celeste signed to a major label at 13, she would go on to record her self-titled album with rising European superstar Vangelis. Though tragically overlooked upon its release, Mariangela is a gem of early electronic pop with sparkling synths, drums machines, and lush arrangements propelling the songs of an unapologetically strong-willed Adolescent.

By 1972, Vangelis’ group Aphrodite’s Child had earned widespread acclaim for their lavish psych-prog masterpiece, 666. Though still years away from the Chariots of Fire and Blade Runner soundtracks that would make him a household name in North America, Vangelis had released three solo albums and was well on his way to becoming an international luminary. Polygram hired him as a producer to work with up and coming artists on their roster, and he handpicked the teenaged Mariangela. Mariangela’s most successful songs are the ones she wrote herself, coupled with Vangelis’ forward-thinking production. The heart-pumping disco of “You Are The One” sounds like a teenage impression of ABBA or sonic pre-cursor to The Carpenters’ “Calling Occupants of Interplanetary Craft.” Floating head and shoulders above all else is Mariangela’s minimal wave ballad “My Dear Life”, fusing the spellbinding vocals of Wendy and Bonnie’s Genesis with the dazzling futurism of Roberto Cacciapaglia’s Ann Steel Album. Its sound is years ahead of its time, with Vangelis’ decisions to drape the song’s dreamy melody in sun-dazed synths, popping drum machines, and cavernous guitar effects confounding even its creator. When the album hit the shelves in 1975, its release was confusingly limited to Greece, Canada, South Africa, and Holland. Why Polygram would choose to make it nearly impossible to find in Western Europe or England where Vangelis’ star was rising remains a mystery to this day.

Part 3 of the Melody As Truth Studio vinyl documents

Hierzulande dürfte das Quartett Sun Seeker wohl nur Personen bekannt sein, die sich unlängst im
Nachtleben von Nashville herumgetrieben haben. Denn dort haben sich die seit gemeinsamen High-SchoolZeiten befreundeten Alex Benick, Austin Edwards, Asher Horton und Ben Parks in den letzten Jahren
nachhaltige musikalische Meriten erspielt. So war es nur eine Frage der Zeit, bis Third Man auf die Jungs
aufmerksam werden und Sun Seeker zu einer Studiosession einladen würde. Unter der Ägide von
Produktionsass Buddy Hughen (Tristen) spielte die Band bei einer solchen Session die beiden Songs
"Georgia Dust" und "No One Knows" ein. Das Mastering übernahm John Baldwin, der Mann mit den
verlässlichsten Ohren Nashvilles. Und fertig war die Debüt-Single.

Picture Disc. Say No More

Dieses Jahr kommt die 25-jährige Jubiläumsausgabe des zehnten Studioalbums von R.E.M., New Adventures in Hi-Fi. Das 1996 erschienene Album war die letzte Studioaufnahme von R.E.M. mit Gründungsmitglied Bill Berry, der die Band im folgenden Jahr einvernehmlich verließ. Als fünfte Zusammenarbeit der
Band mit dem langjährigen Produzenten Scott Litt (Green, Out of Time, Automatic for the People und
Monster) experimentiert das Album mit neuen Klangtexturen, die von filmischen Bildern, dissonanten
Noten und eindringlichen Effekten geprägt sind. Der Platin-Seller enthält die Singles ”Electrolite”, ”E-Bow
the Letter” (mit Patti Smith) und ”Bittersweet Me” und ist mit einer Gesamtlaufzeit von 65 Minuten die
längste Studioveröffentlichung von R.E.M.. New Adventures in Hi-Fi erlangte Jahre nach seiner Veröffentlichung Kultstatus und wurde in mehreren Presserückblicken - und von den Bandmitgliedern selbst -
als eines der besten Alben im R.E.M.-Katalog eingestuft.

RKDIA are releasing their debut album: ‘Into RKDIA’. The album was written in Zanzibar, where the duo escaped the Nordic winter for some warm inspiration.

The duo consisting of Danish Morten Schantz (synth + vocals) and Swedish-Norwegian Anton Eger (drums) are well-known names on the jazz and fusion scenes of Europe. For a while now, both have been pushing the envelope, applying jazz logic in all sorts of unconventional shapes and places, seeking out the new and unheard.

LP in printed innersleeve. SUWI is an instrumental trio emerging from the creative scene of Ghent (Belgium).Music for lovers of instrumental soul and artists such as Tommy Guerrero, Khruangbin, Menahan Street Band, ...

After two archival releases, Raakvlak appears in the frontline of contemporary sonics, and it is the French collective Organizatsiya that gets the label’s feet wet.

Vlug, Dutch for rapid, is a work marked by a sense of being in transit. Bent under lockdown circumstances and corresponding feelings, all tracks were created in a car (!) and on the road throughout various places in Europe. Haunted by good old escapism, yet already too remote from anything to really drive away from. This translates to a dreamlike album that provokes the past and the present by taking elements of both, and stirring it up until something in-between comes out. The organic and the digital blend effortlessly, as acoustic guitar and bass sit next to intelligent electronix and similar FX. Sometimes this takes centre stage, while at others it forms a natural canvas for spoken words.

On Akzident and Een Lied Voor Jou these words are provided by that other lyrical maverick, Rik van Boeckel, whose archives had been subject of Raakvlak’s second release Deze Hoofden Praten. Here too, old and new blend, into an in-betweenness that forms an entity of its own.

*limited edition cassete**
Printed see through plastic inner cover inside an orange fluorescent case, with folded paper insert. 20 track compilation.

Inspired by Clarissa Pinkola Estés canonical text, Women Who Run with the Wolves (1992), the eponymously titled Donne che corrono coi lupi is a dedication to feral feminine energy, connection and sisterhood. In the book, Estés – a psychoanalyst, poet and cantadora, or “keeper of old stories” – draws on Jungian theory to weave an alternative mythology of The Wild Woman archetype. She conjures images of the underworld, rivulets of menstrual blood; a lumpen mass of placenta splattering onto a cave floor. In a mirrored gesture, for Donne che corrono coi lupi, more than twenty artists and producers have come together, giving rise to a primal, mystical compilation destined to entrance and ensnare.

An eerie lullaby, Cucina Povera’s ‘Liikaa liimaa’ recants her trek through Glasgow’s Victorian Necropolis, a gigantic cemetery comprised of elaborate tombs and monuments. Searching for some healing growth during the bleak Scottish winter, she wandered among the graves, coming face to face with an elusive herd of deer. Translating this encounter into sound, Povera’s ethereal vocals glide and glissade, taking on the malleability of melting ice. Another eulogy to animals in the landscape, Kakubo’s ‘Aboyá’ derives from the Brazilian Portuguese word “Aboiar” – a chant utilised by farmers to herd cattle. The sloping beat is interlaid with synthetic horns and Brazilian folk songs, traditional compositions made by marginalised rural communities.

Camille Mandoki and Lucrecia Dalt’s contribution is named after the ancient Greek goddess – Baubo is a fearsome, headless torso, who appears with nipples for eyes and a vulva for a mouth. In Estés’ envisioning, Baubo is a gloriously obscene character who shakes her breasts and tells hilarious dirty jokes. Her nipples are described as “psychic organs,” with the vulva becoming an endless portal to women’s stories and secrets. On the track, developed during a virtual artist residency at the Goethe Institut, Mandoki and Dalt experiment with timbre, creating the uncanny, spectral presence of a third singer. Voices are an essential component throughout Donne che corrono coi lupi, harmonising and unifying, refusing to be silenced. Eva Geist, in her native Italian tongue processed through a multitude of fx pedals, casts spells – incantations to honour the power of female friendship. While label boss Elena Colombi, utilising Ece Özel’s hypnotic reading of the parable of The Red Shoes and Pirinç by Turkish poet Lale Müldür, summons dissociative glossolalia.

In defiance of the punitive rationality that structures the domesticated world, Estés instead holds reverence for intuition – wild impulses generated from one’s body and soul. Bergsonist – whose alias references Bergsonism, a school of philosophical thought which rejects static values in favour of motion and change – records almost all her music live. ‘Speculation’ is an improvised piece, instinctively composed in the heat of the moment.

"Dare, dare, dare ... She/her gets caught staring at the wall, bashing table with brushes, shouting at the clouds filling the red-loud sky. What is left? Just … sound, sound, sound." Percussionist Valentina Magaletti’s ‘Bubble Pain’ seethes like a boiling cauldron, her rapid, heart-fluttering rhythms inflected with bat screeches and canine yelps.

Borusiade – a stalwart figure in Romania’s queer dance community – unleashes ‘Our Hustle,’ the title referring to the urgency of gaining “an equal status in society.” A powerful industrial affair, the track sways with mechanic momentum. Also tuning into cyborg fantasies, Isabella, alone in the midst of the pandemic, conducts a ​​seance with her Elektron Octatrack – ’Cherry Sky’ blends mechanical synth with sticky-sweet lyrics. Formerly known as Inga Copeland, Lolina takes a bath with a drum machine, its waterlogged utterances meandering over her disquieting refrain: “Let me drown in sound.”

Closing off the B-side, ‘Dali's Elephant Caravan Melting Desert’ is a recording of a performance held in a former brothel – perhaps the oldest – in Hudson, New York. Emulating the motion of a train thundering past the building, Deradoorian encapsulates the dynamism of the city, its ghosts and obscured history of labouring sex workers. Reaching climax, the record concludes with Fetter’s ‘Karma’ – a cacophony of raucous punk-noise, exploding into incandescent fragments as sharp as broken glass.

You’ll Never Get To Heaven (Alice Hansen and Chuck Blazevic aka Slow Attack Ensemble) returns with their fourth release Wave Your Moonlight Hat for the Snowfall Train, a collection of ethereal songs that move through the mercurial weather patterns of minimalism and dream pop.

The duo named this album after the closing track on Phil Yost’s 1967 release Bent City, inspired by its prescient use of delay processing in elevating spare beatless arrangements into haunting arrays of sonic afterimages — an approach Hansen and Blazevic explore on this outing in their own way, with a few favoured instruments and a Chorus Echo and Revox in hand. The result is a collection of sparse, lightly dub-infused songs and instrumentals, equally icy and wistful, characterized by melodic fretless basslines, spaced-out harmonics, watery piano and marimba, hushed vocals, and tape echo treatments.

Stylistically, it’s almost as if the duo was imagining what an early This Mortal Coil demo might have sounded like had Ivo enlisted in lieu of the usual cast, with a pared back L’Empire Des Sons as the session band, and June Hardin or a young Julee Cruise on lead vocals. The album evokes an overcast autumnal evening of cloud-watching, an inner journey witness to an expansive spectrum of moods, from nimbus clouds to shimmering sun showers. RIYL: Broadcast, Weekend’s ‘81 Demos, Chantal Weber, Orquesta de las Nubes, Hydroplane, The Moon and the Melodies, Eberhard Weber

Reunited after some fourteen years, following the historic success of their first collaboration Raising Sand (2007), which reached #2 on the UK album chart, generated multi-platinum sales, and earned six Grammy Awards including Album and Record of the Year.
Like its predecessor, Raise The Roof was produced by T Bone Burnett, who worked with Plant and Krauss to expand their collaboration in thrilling new directions, accompanied by drummer Jay Bellerose, guitarists Marc Ribot, David Hidalgo, Bill Frisell, and Buddy Miller, bassists Dennis Crouch and Viktor Krauss, along with pedal steel guitarist Russ Pahl among others.
The album features twelve new recordings of songs by legends and unsung heroes including Merle Haggard, Allen Toussaint, The Everly Brothers, Anne Briggs, Geeshie Wiley, Bert Jansch and more. Other highlights include a Plant-Burnett original, “High and Lonesome,” and the Lucinda Williams classic “Can’t Let Go,”.

Once again melding relatable words of life, love and late nights to the hip-shaking grooves that have ignited numerous festival stages, irrepressible indie-soul-funk six-piece Red Rum Club return with their head-bopping new single, Nightcalling. Their first new material of 2021, the pin-sharp, three-minutes of pure cocktail-swilling, dancefloor-carving magic heralds the release of their third album, How To Steal The World, announced for a Fri 12 November 2021 release via Modern Sky.

Unaccustomed to the new ‘wait and see’ conditions of modern living, Red Rum Club bottled their impatience, wrapped up their worries and gathered their thoughts together in cathartic writing and recording sessions for album number three. Reacting with force


to dark winter lockdowns and the extended live break, Nightcalling is a story of new love set to the beat of a smooth soundtrack that’s as close to the sound of red-hot Miami as it is the band’s wind-blown, native Mersey.

When we think of the phrase Bonded By Blood, we think of two things: a brotherhood that is meant to outlast the trials of war, pain, and time... and the almighty EXODUS. With a bond forged in youth and decades-old friendship, the undisputed masters of thrash metal return with their eleventh studio album: PERSONA NON GRATA. Literally translating to “an unwelcome” or “unacceptable” person, PERSONA NON GRATA touches on themes of modern societal disgust and degradation. “The people that disgust you - cut ‘em out like cancer,” explains guitarist Gary Holt. “Who is that person? It could be anybody. That’s up to the listener. Who is ‘Persona Non Grata’ to them?”

For decades, EXODUS has impressed us with the ability to attract opposing factions to their music because of its intensity and versatility. A track like “The Beatings Will Continue Until Morale Improves” was inspired by the riots both in theme, and sound. “Without seeming insensitive to the riots, the song is tongue in cheek about what the people beating on the rioters were expecting to happen. Did you think you would beat a smile onto their face? At 3 minutes in length, it’s probably the shortest EXODUS song we’ve ever done. It gets in, gets out, and is just crushing,” describes Holt. While most of the songs do run on the shorter side, this album also comes equipped with crushing, epic tracks.

Whether it’s the music industry gossip sites, or the big players like CNN and FOX, we’re all aware of how news outlets love to set little rat traps; “Clickbait” discusses their methods of picking things out of context to grab your attention, add to their page views, and increase their revenue all while riling up your emotions. “It’s all journalistic dishonesty,” explains Holt, “it’s a modern-day version of Al Capone’s vault, everyone tunes in, and then there’s NOTHING.“ Evenly balanced with extraordinary speed and tremendous, catchy choruses, “Clickbait” is a song that explodes with vigorous energy. “As heavy as this album is, and it’s heavy as fuck, if times were different and there was still metal radio, this song, and probably over half the album, has single capabilities.”

Sitting as the second to last song on the album, “The Fires of Division” keeps PERSONA NON GRATA strong all the way through. “This album doesn’t operate on the normal parameters,” describes Holt, “we didn’t frontload this one, it’s strong right through to the end. It’s supposed to be a musical journey as the songs segway together.”

For the third time in the band’s history, EXODUS returned to Swedish artist Par Olofsson to create the album artwork PERSONA NON GRATA. “After this album, I feel like we probably won’t work with anyone else again, Par just gets it,” states Holt. A three-faced, winged creature sits atop a bloody pile of diseased and rotting humans as they scream in pain and reach their hands up desperately towards the beast. Undead riot cops beat mercilessly, and senselessly upon this pile of the dying and the world is red with fresh, sopping blood. “Is it an angel, a demon? Is the world being created or destroyed,” asks Holt, “you don’t really know.”

EXODUS don’t fall into the usual recording slump that most bands get stuck in. Gathering at Tom Hunting’s house up in the mountains, they avoided the need to book studio time or adhere to a certain schedule. “At first it was just Tom, myself, a half stack, and a drum kit; we call it jam camp. We lived there. We built the studio, we immersed ourselves in it. Number one, because we still enjoy each other’s company enough to do it. When we’re not actively rehearsing or recording, we’re still sitting there talking about the songs, working on them, plucking on acoustics until things really work,” explains Holt, “we’re not settling.” Working from three home-built studios, the band recorded PERSONA NON GRATA themselves with the help of Andy Sneap on mixing and mastering and with Steve Lagudi at the helm of engineering.

“As a band, I’m super grateful. I’ve seen a lot of things around the world and we’re still a band that loves each other, have each other’s back, and we genuinely like to hang out with each other,” explains Holt. “Take it how you will, but I’m this band’s biggest fan. We write songs that are designed to make us feel fired up - that’s why it’s still heavy.”

Following on from the successful ‘An Idiot Prayer’ live album and livestream event released this year, Nick Cave Productions & BMG announce B-SIDES & RARITIES PART I & II to be released internationally on 22nd October 2021.

B-SIDES & RARITIES PART II was compiled by Nick Cave & Warren Ellis and features 27 tracks from “Dig, Lazarus, Dig!!!” in 2006 to 2019s “Ghosteen”. Also features 19 rare and unreleased tracks including first recordings of ‘Skeleton Tree’, ‘Girl in Amber’, ‘Bright Horses’ and ‘Waiting for You’.

Nachdem die Songs ”Matter of Time” und ”Say Hi” bereits im Rahmen eines Charity Events digital veröffentlicht wurden, folgt nun der physische Release als 7inch Vinyl Single.

Beide Songs von Eddie Vedder sind inspiriert von Familien, die mit der genetisch bedingten Hautkrankheit Epidermolysis Bullosa kämpfen und wurden in Zusammenhang mit einem virtuellen Charity-Event veröffentlicht. Für das Finden einer Heilung setzt sich Eddie Vedder mit seiner Frau Jill seit Jahren ein und gründete die gemeinnützige Organisation „EB Research Partnership“ mit. Eddie Vedder erreichte mit Pearl Jam stets Top 10-Positionen der weltweiten Charts.

“Matter of Time/Say Hi” erscheint als Vinyl Single und digital.

Storage units hold possessions on pause from the outside world, objects capable of reconnecting us to a time or place. Hana Vu (born in 2000s California) grew up with her family making regular use of public storage spaces in Los Angeles, moving every few years, leaving a mix of the sacred and the mundane to sit inside concrete and steel. The 20-year-old musician sees the art of making and releasing songs in a similar sense: “these public expressions of thoughts, feelings, baggage, experiences that accumulate every year and fill little units such as ‘albums.’” She lived next to one of these buildings when she started writing her full-length Ghostly International debut, Public Storage, and its towering presence lends a metaphor to a record that sounds far bigger than the bedroom it came from.

Vu’s relationship with music began when she picked up a guitar her dad had lying around and taught herself to play. She’d wake up every day and listen to LA’s ALT 98.7, home to ‘90s and ‘00s alternative rock; later in high school, she found the local DIY scene. She remembers, “A lot of my peer musicians were surf rock/punk type bands and so I tried to fit into that when I was gigging around. But what I was listening to at that time St. Vincent, Sufjan Stevens was very different from what I performed.” Ultimately she’d do her own thing, keeping a journal of bedroom pop ex-periments on Bandcamp, including a low-key Willow Smith collaboration and covers of The Cure and Phil Collins. She caught the ear of Gorilla vs. Bear, who released Vu’s self-produced debut EP in 2018 on their Luminelle Recordings imprint, followed by a double EP the next year.

Public Storage builds on the sound of Vu’s early work underscoring her strengths as a songwriter with a deeper sense of luster, sophistication, and urgency. She calls it “very invasive and intense sounding music,” refreshingly out of step with contemporary trends; this is music to engage with rather than lean back to. For the first time, she welcomes a co-producer, Jackson Phillips (Day Wave), who helps Vu create a vast, grainy, multifaceted world to stretch into vocally, her distinct contralto drifting freely between evocative low-lit ruminations and soulful, skyward bursts.

Storage units hold possessions on pause from the outside world, objects capable of reconnecting us to a time or place. Hana Vu (born in 2000s California) grew up with her family making regular use of public storage spaces in Los Angeles, moving every few years, leaving a mix of the sacred and the mundane to sit inside concrete and steel. The 20-year-old musician sees the art of making and releasing songs in a similar sense: “these public expressions of thoughts, feelings, baggage, experiences that accumulate every year and fill little units such as ‘albums.’” She lived next to one of these buildings when she started writing her full-length Ghostly International debut, Public Storage, and its towering presence lends a metaphor to a record that sounds far bigger than the bedroom it came from.

Vu’s relationship with music began when she picked up a guitar her dad had lying around and taught herself to play. She’d wake up every day and listen to LA’s ALT 98.7, home to ‘90s and ‘00s alternative rock; later in high school, she found the local DIY scene. She remembers, “A lot of my peer musicians were surf rock/punk type bands and so I tried to fit into that when I was gigging around. But what I was listening to at that time St. Vincent, Sufjan Stevens was very different from what I performed.” Ultimately she’d do her own thing, keeping a journal of bedroom pop ex-periments on Bandcamp, including a low-key Willow Smith collaboration and covers of The Cure and Phil Collins. She caught the ear of Gorilla vs. Bear, who released Vu’s self-produced debut EP in 2018 on their Luminelle Recordings imprint, followed by a double EP the next year.

Public Storage builds on the sound of Vu’s early work underscoring her strengths as a songwriter with a deeper sense of luster, sophistication, and urgency. She calls it “very invasive and intense sounding music,” refreshingly out of step with contemporary trends; this is music to engage with rather than lean back to. For the first time, she welcomes a co-producer, Jackson Phillips (Day Wave), who helps Vu create a vast, grainy, multifaceted world to stretch into vocally, her distinct contralto drifting freely between evocative low-lit ruminations and soulful, skyward bursts.

Written, programmed, recorded and produced throughout 2019/20 by Ed Wynne in ‘Blue Bubble Studios’ by the sea, this exploratory and diverse musical adventure comprises seven new tracks spanning 45 minutes.

Inspired by the Scottish hills, valleys and beaches surrounding his studio, Wynne feels that lockdown in a strange kind of way has provided ‘Space For The Earth’ to breathe for a while and for people to rediscover its resonant healing frequency. ‘This is space music for people from the Earth to enjoy’.

Ozrics’ synth player Silas Neptune and drummer Bal zs Szende join forces again with Wynne on the album which also features special guest appearances from former members synth player Joie Hinton, drummer Nick Van Gelder, flautist Champignon and percussionist Paul Hankin. Psychedelic voyager Gracerooms also contributes additional synth layers.

The album ebbs and flows through blissed-out soundscapes featuring incendiary guitar solos, space grooves and ambient atmospheres. Wynne plays his recently revived Ibanez Jem, a new 8-string guitar, all kinds of synths and bass. Van Gelder uses the original snare he played on the first six cassette albums and early live Ozric performances. One tune features Champignon playing kaval, a traditional wooden Balkan flute.

The album artwork was inspired directly by these seven tracks and realised by arboreal artist Kitty (Twisty-Trees) with help from Ed and cosmic artist Ivy.

One of the most influential bands to emerge from the UK’s festival scene, Ozric Tentacles formed during the solstice at Stonehenge Free Festival 1983 going on to become psychedelic staples at Glastonbury and other festivals. The creative vision of multi-instrumentalist Ed Wynne, the Ozrics’ uniquely trippy soundscapes connect fans of progressive rock, psychedelia and dance music culture.
‘Space For The Earth’ represents the next harmonic step in the unfolding Ozric
journey.

Tout Bleu's second record, Otium, recalls a route where the electronic crosses paths with the acoustic.

This new milestone in Genevan multi-instrumentalist Simone Aubert's (Massicot, Hyperculte) musical field represents a kind of fruitful deceleration. Initially conceived as a solo project in 2018, the act is now an exploration ground for the musicians gathered on Otium : Naomi Mabanda on the cello (Orchestre Tout Puissant Marcel Duchamp, Chien Mon Ami) and Luciano Turella on the alto (Irtum Branda) encounter the sampling machines of POL, that could already be found on the first eponymous album Tout Bleu. In Tout Bleu's music, the part-melodic, part-abrasive riffs reminiscent of Massicot are present, and so are the socially engaged, energetic singing of Hyperculte. However, the band, by using acoustic instruments, vocals and electric guitar in an unconventional way, draws an orchestral landscape that sometimes flirts with pop, and where strings merge in polyrythm on low tempo beats.

Empty surrounds all of me. It’s a poignant line from the third album by Blackwater Holylight that encapsulates the search for self when suddenly everything has changed. There’s a theme of processing vast personal trauma throughout Silence/Motion that eloquently — both lyrically and musically — and simultaneously embodies the crushing emptiness, sorrow, strength and rebuilding of recovering from personal devastation.

“There was so much grief both in the world and interpersonally during the process of creating Silence/Motion,” says vocalist/bassist Allison “Sunny” Faris. “The four of us gave one another more space to be ourselves, to experiment with each other’s ideas and to be gentle with one another more than we ever have before. So, we knew this tenderness would manifest in extremely honest arrangements, and I think that you can hear that throughout the record.”

Curiously, considering the dark times in which it was created, this is the band’s most melodic and catchy music so far. Blackwater Holylight, as the name suggests, is all about contrasts: It’s a fluid convergence of sound that’s heavy, psychedelic, melodic, terrifying and beautiful all at once. And, Silence/Motion finds the band honing those contrasts, letting ideas and moods fully develop from song to song, rather than filling every song with a full range of their capabilities. It allows the band to go fully prog-rock here, and simply stay hushed and intimate there. There’s a new confidence to the band in how seamlessly they wield their stylistic amalgam.

“Writing this album was extraordinarily difficult emotionally, however it did come to fruition fairly quickly,” Faris says. “In the past, the theme of vulnerability has always been a big player and it definitely showed up full force while writing this album.”

Blackwater Holylight recorded the album as a four piece: Faris on vocals and guitar (on “Silence/Motion”, “MDIII”, “Around You” and “Every Corner”) and bass for the remainder, Sarah McKenna on synths, Mikayla Mayhew on guitar (and bass when Faris plays guitar) and drummer Eliese Dorsay. New second guitarist Erika Osterhout will perform the songs with them live. For Silence/Motion the band chose to work with a producer for the first time, bringing in A.L.N. (of Mizmor, Hell) to produce, along with recording engineer Dylan White — who also helmed their previous album Veils of Winter (2019) — at Odessa Recording Studio in Portland, OR. Guest vocals on album opener “Delusional” are by Bryan Funck (Thou.) Mike Paparo (Inter Arma) and A.LN. (Mizmor, Hell) lend guest vocals to album closer “Every Corner.”

Silence/Motion opens softly with interwoven folky single note guitars over an ominous sounding drone for the first minute, akin to moments from Pink Floyd’s Echoes. Suddenly an irresistibly head-nodding, groovy droptuned riff kicks in with the drums and it’s a full on blackened rocker with soaring synths and Funck’s witchy whispers over the top. “Who The Hell,” the track quoted above, takes proceedings into a Krautrock direction, centered around McKenna’s arpeggiated synth loop and Dorsay’s tom-tom triplets, while 16-note guitar strums add tension as Faris wearily sings, “So tell me who the hell would want to live this way — so afraid/ To feel this void, to dwell in it… I can’t describe this pain I wear/ It suffocates and you left it here.” It’s an incredibly powerful 6 minutes. The title track delivers the 1-2-3 punch of the album’s brilliant opening trilogy. It starts with lightly plucked acoustic guitar, plaintive piano chords and Faris’ voice gliding so softly it sounds more like a Mellotron. The song builds slowly toward crescendo, led by a swinging tom pattern, that abruptly switches back to a heavier version of the opening melody.“Silence/Motion” is about digesting and healing from sexual assault. As Faris explains, “It is an ode to the juxtaposition of feeling paralyzingly blank and and like your entire life is moving through you simultaneously.” Elsewhere, Black Metal guitars collide with dreamlike melodies. “Around You” brandishes a hopeful, hummable synth melody and shimmering shoegaze guitars like throwing down a gauntlet. In the end, it becomes undeniably clear just how completely into their own Blackwater Holylight has come.

“The analogy is that with our first record (Blackwater Holylight, 2018) we were getting into to the car and buckling up,” Faris says. “The second (Veils of Winter, 2019) we were turning the car on, and with this third we have kicked into drive toward our destination. Our destination is a bit mysterious and has the ability to change from day to day, but we’re on our way.”

“I want total freedom, total possibility, total acceptance. I want to fall in love with the rock.” That’s how Lillie West describes the theme of “DIVER,” the song she calls the thesis of Lala Lala’s third record, I Want The Door To Open. The rock in question is a reference to Sisyphus, the mythical figure doomed by the gods to forever push a boulder up from the depths of hell. To West, it is the perfect metaphor for, in her words, “the labor of living, of figuring out who you are, what's wrong with you, what's right with you.”

Coming off of 2018’s acclaimed The Lamb, an introspective indie rock album recorded live with a three-piece band, West knew she was ready to make something sonically bigger and thematically more outward-looking than anything she’d done before; a record that would be less a straightforward documentation of her own personal struggles and more like a poem or a puzzle box, with sonic and lyrical clues that would allow the listener to, as the title says, open the door to the greater meaning of those struggles.

The result is I Want The Door To Open, a bold exploration of persona and presence from an artist questioning how to be herself fully in a world where the self is in constant negotiation. From the moment West declares “I want to look right into the camera” over a cascade of dreamy vocal loops on opening track “Lava,” I Want The Door To Open distinguishes itself from anything she’s done before in scope and intensity. The ultra-magnified iteration of Lala Lala is fully encapsulated in the monumental “DIVER.” Inspired by a character from a Jennifer Egan novel, it’s a pop song of Kate Bush-esque proportions replete with layered synths and booming, wide open drumming by fellow Chicago musician Nnamdi Ogbonnaya, and West pushing her vocals to the ragged edge. I Want The Door To Open is a musical quest undertaken with the knowledge that the titular door may never open; but it is through falling in love with the quest itself that one may find the closest thing to total freedom, total possibility, and total acceptance available to us on this plane of existence.