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After more than a decade of music-making, Durand Jones & The Indications have blossomed as a unit and are basking in their successes. On their aptly titled new album, Flowers, The Indications unfurl their true colors _ embracing all their roots and influences, maturation and confidence, and share them with the world. Since forming in 2012, the road has taken The Indications from those origins at Indiana University, Bloomington to the global stage, selling out shows across Europe, Japan, Australia, and New Zealand to the West Coast_ where DJI has a strong following among the lowrider and vintage soul enthusiasts. For as far as Durand Jones & The Indications have come, Flowers grew from the desire to return to their roots in a Bloomington basement, a space where they first found camaraderie in gritty funk and Southern soul that would inspire their self-titled debut. Pulling sonically and spiritually from each of the group's previous releases and solo work, Flowers is the next stage of DJI's inspired soulful discography. DJI are not only accepting their flowers, but indulging in their sweet and sexy fragrance.

Claremont 56 founder Paul ‘Mudd’ Murphy has been in a rich vein of creative form of late. Having released his first solo album in 18 years in 2024, the effervescent and picture-perfect 'In The Garden of Mindfulness', Murphy is well on his way to finishing solo LP number three – a set you’ll be able to hear in full later in 2025. To get us in the mood, he’s offering up a two-track taster featuring instrumental takes on cuts that will appear as full-vocal songs on the final album. Both were written with, and feature instrumentation by, regular collaborator Michele Chiavarini, an Italian musician, producer, composer, and arranger who has long been part of the Claremont 56 family.

Up first is ‘Mahalo (12" Instrumental Mix)’, a languid and emotion-rich groover built around a smooth, mid-tempo jazz-funk-goes-disco groove – think crispy drums, delay-laden hand percussion and rubbery bass guitar – and all manner of ear-catching musical details. As the track unfolds, you can expect to hear lilting strings, warming electric piano chords, mazy synth solos, heady horn-style blasts and glistening, eyes-closed guitar licks. It’s a genuinely superb slab of musically rich dancefloor warmth. The track that follows, ‘Mata Ne’, is an altogether dreamier and more dub-influenced affair. Featuring some sublime piano playing from Chiavarini, it sees Murphy layer simmering strings, cascading guitar licks, spacey synths and blissed-out melodic motifs atop the kind of chunky, dubby groove that has long been one of his aural trademarks. Offering positivity and melancholia in equal measure, ‘Mata Ne’ is Mudd at his most musically majestic. His forthcoming album will be worth waiting for.

Lela Amparo's debut album for Past Inside The Present is a smooth fusion of ambient guitar, IDM, trip-hop rhythms, orchestral arrangements and poetic vocals that draw from her American Southwest roots, international travels, and life in Gothenburg, Sweden. Amparo crafts a raw, worldly sound from these inspirations and mixes cinematic grandeur with tender grace, gorgeous melodies and head-nodding drum programming. Highlights include 'Space Us Out' with its emotional beat and piano loop, and 'You Say You Love' which combines harp and choral voices. 'Rose & Honey' reflects on isolation in Tokyo, while 'Wrong Thing' offers a Burial-style rhythm. Keep Your Soul Young is all about finding home within yourself.

20/20 Vision marks its 30th anniversary with another great release here in the form of some remixes of Crazy P's iconic single 'Stop Space Return'. The late Danielle Moore's unmistakable vocals shine across two stellar reworks from Colleen 'Cosmo' Murphy who infuses her cosmic, acid-laced disco energy into the track. Her Cosmodelica Remix and Dub version blend trippy 303s, cowbells and deep grooves into something suitably fresh. Also included are two classic Unabombers mixes from 2009, and they offer raw house heat and dubbed-out psychedelia that serves as a fine floor-focused reinterpretation of a beloved anthem.

“I cross the void beyond the mind. The empty space that circles time... Eternal wisdom is my guide. I am the Doctor!” Demon Records celebrates Jon Pertwee’s flamboyant portrayal of the famous Time Lord, 55 years after he made his screen debut on 3 January 1970. Available on Blue and 4 x Blue and Green Vinyl, with a beautifully illustrated cover, this set presents Jon Pertwee narrating two classic Doctor Who Target Books, an array of bonus Jon Pertwee audio appearances, and his own 1972 pop single, Who Is The Doctor? Doctor Who and the Curse of Peladon is Brian Hayles’ abridged TV novelisation set on a medieval-style world, and Doctor Who and the Planet of the Daleks is Terrance Dicks’s abridged adaptation of the Terry Nation adventure set on the jungle-like Spiridon. Bonus features are also included on each disc spanning the 1970s to the 1990s, including BBC radio interviews, a Goodwood Races sketch with Elisabeth Sladen, comedy featuring Mel Giedroyc, and tributes paid by family members and Doctor Who producers. This also includes a frameable photographic print of the Third Doctor. Accompanied by the BBC Radiophonic Workshop’s familiar Doctor Who theme, the Jon Pertwee Collection celebrates one of the most stylish, iconic and beloved Doctors of all

At this point the vast swathes of unreleased Muslimgauze material Bryn Jones left behind when he passed away over 25 years ago is as legendary as any of his work. And sure enough, there's still some being unearthed today. The new »Single #One« is the first in a series of four (three 7"s and one 12") taken from one of Jones' customary completely unlabelled DATs he sent to labels seemingly as fast as he finished them. Both sides here indicate that, even on what might have been throwaway efforts for other artists, Jones was constantly chasing his muse around new corners.

Side A begins with the kind of tough percussion loop often found on Muslimgauze releases, but even as foreboding synths start to swell in the background, Jones introduces a rhythmic, peppy little keyboard riff far jauntier than most things he created. Side B, meanwhile, takes Jones' looped hand percussion in a dubbier direction, but unlike other times he explored that space there are some elements (phased zaps, a slightly skanking rhythm) that, while not reggae exactly, makes this feel more like a traditional dub than Jones tended to make. Both sides stand in testament to a creator who never stayed in one place for very long.

One of Romania’s most important composers in the last half-century, Octavian Nemescu (1940-2020) is among the few that were not “part of the system”, managing to survive and compose in a world that felt more and more “empty”, fragile, confused and scarce in prophecies. The mystical approach to his art defines Octavian Nemescu as an essentialist who believed in the power of archetypes in which he found inspiration. His pieces always start from an idea that has spiritual, cosmogonic implications and often involves synthesizers, sounds from nature (buzz of bees) and the “ison” (drone). When defining “meta music” or “imaginary music”, Nemescu was an advocate of looking from above, from the top of the mountain. Silence is very important in his work in order to keep the sound flowing and to reflect on the sound from before, as a space, as a pause for thinking. Nemescu put forward another kind of music: a song that has not yet surfaced through human voice, any musical instrument, orchestra or other electro-acoustic means: an intimate, interior, introverted inner sound that focuses on the individual and the imagination. Imaginary music is a reaction, it comes in contrast to the spectacular, it is anti-show. For him, music had a ritualistic function, it served no cultural purpose.

This 3LP set collects eight pieces for variable ensemble, tape and electronics, composed between 1968 and 2015, selected together with Erica Nemescu, who also mastered the tracks. Most tracks have been previously released on different CD’s but never before on vinyl.

2025 Repress

Forest Drive West returns to Livity Sound with the 'Dualism' EP, a tour de force of stripped dub aesthetics and swirling psychedelic rhythms.

One of the finest breakthrough UK producers of recent years, in a short space of time Forest Drive West has created an enviable catalogue across labels such as Livity Sound, Rupture, Echocord, Whities and Mantis. This new EP marks some of his best work to date.

The final track on the EP, 'Scorpion', features Melbourne based percussionist Lucky Pereira whose frenetic but tightly locked drums add a fizzing energy to Forest Drive West's deep atmospheric rhythm track.

Livity Sound is a label set up by Peverelist in 2011 as a vehicle for a raw and exploratory strain of UK techno, rooted in the heritage of UK dance music and sound system culture. It has since become one of the UK's foremost protagonists for cutting edge underground electronic music.

Emotional Rescue completes the series of non-defined reissues where the label licenses an all-time favourite, remasters and then reappraised with new interpretations by contemporary producers for today’s collectors.

After the series started back in 2019 with Hawkwind’s sprawling psychedelic electronics, featuring deep drone mixes by the esteemed digger Cherrystones (ERC074), the bouncing cosmic-Balearics of Thomas Leer with wonderful reworkings by friend and producer Bullion (ERC075) and then the post punk dubs of The Embrace and Timothy J Faiplay’s brooding italo-dub excursions (ERC076), there was always one artist and producer left out. Finally, then the percussive excursion of the early 80s band The Impossible Dreamers and their cult B side jam, Spin, coming with 9 minutes percussion-dub extravaganza of an extended reversion, plus a dub heavy reprise, by label go-to Dan Tyler (Idjut Boys /Noid), under his NAD moniker.

Started by a group of friends while at Exeter University that centered around Caroline Radcliffe, James Hood, Justin Adams and Nick Waterhouse, their debut 12” record is one of just three on the 100 Things To Do label. The other two releases have already been covered with the Hamburger All Stars ‘Swinging London’ 12” (ERC114) of 2022.

Recorded before the move to West London, ‘Life On Earth’ was a raw post punk vocal pop cut, with influences of dub, funk, hip-hop and African music shining through, there were in their own words, “young music fans starting out, with no agenda”.

However, it was on the B side that things got interesting. Enamored by the growing trend of extended 12” singles, they decided, with the A side wrapped up, to have some studio experimentation by recording a drumming jam, with all the members playing percussion, followed by some overdubbing. Memories are hazy, but at the time the band was an 8-piece, so the results a chaotic explosion, capturing the essence of that time. Featuring Nick and James on 4 hand piano, plus Caroline on Oboe, with some additional hollering and wooping vocals, Spin was a 5-minute burst of energy.

In effect, self-released in 1982, the band didn’t expect much to come of it, but the 12” acted as a calling card leading them to London and later signing for RCA. At the same time, Spin was being discovered in the early eighties alternative club world. On a trip to New York, the track was heard being played Downtown, and on enquiring it was discovered the DJ was playing a 7” that was never an official release but cut in the US solely for the club DJs there.

Its resonance extended further, to Italy and the Cosmic club of the resident, an ever-searching Danielle Baldelli, before being picked up a few years later by a young Andrew Weatherall during his pursuit of an alternative “Balearic” beat during the late eighties Summers of Love and has even recently received the Joe Clausell edit treatment back again in NYC.

For the remake to fit the label series, it was only right to ask label friend Dan Tyler to do what he does so well, putting the original through his array of dub machines and pedals, extending and cutting with aplomb to create an incendiary ‘Reversion’ that will send dancefloors literally in a spin. Teasing the percussion incandescent, looping and teasing, the piano held back before finally releasing in a haze of dub effects.

This is followed by the ‘Riddim Reprise’. Working with London based drummer Matt Bruce (Claptrap), this is the perfect DJ tool, taking the original idea of the band, to just jam see what happens, twisting it full of space echo and reverb, to offer a perfect 12” Extended Mix.

*People Like Us, the project of artist Vicki Bennet returns to Discrepant with a special vinyl release of "COPIA". This album marks the first new musical material since "The Mirror" in 2018, delving into the profound realms of existential collage and sampling, celebrating these forms as expressions of timeless connectivity.
* The title "COPIA," meaning 'abundance' and 'copy,' reflects the essence of collage and sampling - art created not in isolation, but as a connective thread through time and space, linking ideas across generations in a seamless tapestry.
* By reconfiguring preexisting sounds and images, Bennet highlights the non-dual nature of creation — where distinctions between past, present, and future possibilities blur, revealing a shared foundation beneath. The album marks a return to not just solo works but collaborations with notable artists.
* Drawing from the new People Like Us live AV performance, "The Library of Babel," sampling and edited sound collage, electronic music, combined with Ergo Phizmiz's lyrics and melodies, "COPIA" weaves and recombines a timeless blend of diverse elements that transcends traditional musical boundaries. This creative process unfolded through the exchange of multitracks across both water and ether. Collaborating with the voices, instruments and editing timelines of Matmos, Hearty White, Gwilly Edmondez, Lotte Bowater, Buttress O’Kneel, Douglas Benford, Irene Moon, Jon Leidecker, and Matt Warwick, the work evolved exquisite corpse-style.

“Bennett has proven herself an alchemist of popular music, able to push her source material into fresh and engaging places. Where some artists hack existing instruments and technologies to create their new sounds, Bennet has circuit-bent the songs themselves.” - Spenser Tomson, The Wire Magazine

In celebration of its 10th anniversary, Aesthetical Records is honoured to reissue Peau Froide, Léger Soleil, the groundbreaking collaboration between Finnish electronic music luminary Mika Vainio and French experimental music pioneer Franck Vigroux. Originally released in 2015, this new edition revives a work of unparalleled sonic intensity and textural exploration. The album is set to release on double vinyl and CD on May 24, 2025.

This iconic album is the result of a three year recording process that began after Vainio and Vigroux’s first live performance in Paris in 2012. Their collaboration serves as an intricate balance of minimalist meditations and maximalist energy, pushing electronic music into radical new directions. Peau Froide, Léger Soleil is a journey through psychic resonance and spatial abstraction, constructed through Vainio’s intense, brutalist grooves and Vigroux’s explorations in tonal extremities. Spanning a total of nine tracks, the album unfolds like an odyssey, densely layered yet free from structural limitations, traversing vast emotional landscapes where each sound feels at once intimate and tectonic.

Beginning with the ominous, bass-heavy textures of “Deux,” Vainio and Vigroux establish a dynamic atmosphere, setting the stage for the intense soundscapes to follow. “Mémoire” introduces ghostly voices that weave through thick waves of sub-bass and distorted noise, while “Souffles” explores uncharted sonic territories with its microtonal landscapes and spectral ambiance. Vigroux’s mastery over spatial abstraction comes to life in “Le Souterrain,” adding an atmospheric weight reminiscent of Ennio Morricone’s stark loneliness or Neil Young’s Dead Man soundtrack. In contrast, tracks like “Parabole” and “Le crâne tambour” unleash fierce, maximalist grooves, making them some of the most aggressive and memorable moments in Vainio’s discography.

Peau Froide, Léger Soleil represents a landmark in its sonic identity, embodying a vision of uncompromising, avant-garde sound design. This anniversary reissue on Aesthetical honours that legacy while inviting new listeners into Vainio & Vigroux’s collaborative universe—a space where electronic music becomes both weapon and sanctuary.

The 10th-anniversary edition promises a fresh listening experience, preserving the legacy of two artists who have redefined the boundaries of sound.

In a flurry of angular beats and space age synth licks, Livity Sound welcomes Willis Anne to the fold under the guise of a new alias, FOREIGNER. Operating within the thriving scene around his current base Naarm, Anne brings a live, jammed-out focus to machine-rooted electronic performance that translates into his productions. All four tracks on this new EP crackle with improvised energy, whether it manifests in the dramatic synth shapes on 'Last Peoples' or tangled up in the beat exploration on 'Visible'. At its core, the EP makes its mark thanks to the clarity of Anne's ideas as he swerves the temptation to over-work the sound, ringing true with the immediate, spacious approach of Livity Sound's many-sided catalogue.

Livity Sound is a label set up by Peverelist in 2011 as a vehicle for a raw and exploratory strain of UK techno, rooted in the heritage of UK dance music and sound system culture. It has since become one of the UK's foremost protagonists for cutting edge underground electronic music.

Fronted by brothers Peter O'Doherty and Reg Mombassa , Dog Trumpet have been playing, writing and recording their music since the early 90s. Reg and Pete were founding members of iconic Australian band Mental As Anything, who hit the charts around the world with “Live It Up”. The band made a mark with their left field mix of music, art, video and humour and leading eventually to ARIA awards and induction into the Hall of Fame in 2009.

Dog Trumpet’s new album Live Forever is the result of 2 years in the studio.

For this, their ninth album , the song writing brothers Peter and Reg have brought Peter’s multi instrumentalist son Declan in on drums, production and mixing duties, enhancing and expanding their sonic palette.

At times psychedelic and ethereal, the album weaves together Dog Trumpet’s signature acoustic and electric guitar and bass driven sound with melodic drums, synthesisers, mandolin, saxophone and added backing vocals by their touring bass player Bernie Hayes.

From the depths of personal reckoning to the forefront of the UK"s alternative scene, SPLIT CHAIN have spent the past two years transmuting raw emotion into sound. Their debut album, motionblur, out soon on Epitaph Records, is a thunderous statement of intent-an electrifying fusion of shoegaze, grunge, and nu-metal that surges with both nostalgia and forward momentum. Sonically, motionblur captures a distinctive aesthetic, steeped in the melancholic haze of early 2000s alt-rock yet sharpened by the intensity of modern hardcore. Guitars drenched in chorus and distortion crash into ethereal, hook-laden vocals, forging a sound that"s at once crushingly heavy and deeply immersive. Following a string of self-released singles that organically amassed millions of streams, SPLIT CHAIN"s signing with Epitaph catapulted them further into the spotlight. Their first label-backed single pushed their streaming numbers past the 15-million mark, earning them accolades as AltPress" Breakout Artist of the Month and Revolver"s "Badass Rising Band to Know." With nods from Stereogum, The Needle Drop, BrooklynVegan, and Metal Injection, the buzz around Split Chain is undeniable. With motionblur, SPLIT CHAIN aren"t just making an album-they"re making a moment. And if their trajectory so far is any indication, this is only the beginning.

From the depths of personal reckoning to the forefront of the UK"s alternative scene, SPLIT CHAIN have spent the past two years transmuting raw emotion into sound. Their debut album, motionblur, out soon on Epitaph Records, is a thunderous statement of intent-an electrifying fusion of shoegaze, grunge, and nu-metal that surges with both nostalgia and forward momentum. Sonically, motionblur captures a distinctive aesthetic, steeped in the melancholic haze of early 2000s alt-rock yet sharpened by the intensity of modern hardcore. Guitars drenched in chorus and distortion crash into ethereal, hook-laden vocals, forging a sound that"s at once crushingly heavy and deeply immersive. Following a string of self-released singles that organically amassed millions of streams, SPLIT CHAIN"s signing with Epitaph catapulted them further into the spotlight. Their first label-backed single pushed their streaming numbers past the 15-million mark, earning them accolades as AltPress" Breakout Artist of the Month and Revolver"s "Badass Rising Band to Know." With nods from Stereogum, The Needle Drop, BrooklynVegan, and Metal Injection, the buzz around Split Chain is undeniable. With motionblur, SPLIT CHAIN aren"t just making an album-they"re making a moment. And if their trajectory so far is any indication, this is only the beginning.

Gelateria Fisotti (a real gelato spot located in Otranto, Apulia) chose to give life to the "Gelato Italiano" project in 2023, with the idea of creating a soundtrack that would be able to enter the Gelateria spaces as a protagonist. A compilation that presents the contributions of different artists, moving between disco, house, broken-beat, with different nuances within it, almost like the various flavors of an ice cream and which this year reaches its 3rd volume. The sound is unfailingly summery, in balance between "body" and "sweetness"

The debut album from Addy Weitzman, ‘Light Months Will Fly Over Us’ explores new-wave, romantic pop and art rock with elegance and ambition, drawing from Weitzman’s scattered network of collaborators, as well as a “frighteningly vast” personal archive of compositions. Sequenced by Seth Troxler and released on his Slacker 85 label, it represents a pivot in musical direction for the imprint, and a showcase for the songwriting craft Weitzman honed as a member of cult electro duo Footprintz, and Montreal synth-pop projects The Beat Escape and Dawn to Dawn.

The title Light Months Will Fly Over Us is derived from a line in a poem by the Russian writer Anna Ahkmatova. Weitzman was immediately struck by its “hopefulness, its mystery… it gives the feeling of being suspended, hanging in a dream-like state”. This interpretation has been translated to the album, rich in memorable songwriting that nonetheless invites the listener to lean in further. Delicately mixed by engineer Pierre Guerineau, known for his work alongside Marie Davidson, each of the eight tracks gently interrogates life’s greater mysteries; fear, love and salvation, each defining and revealing the human soul.

Opener ‘End of The Line’ invites us into an immediately lush space of lounge lizard existentialism, soft brass and piano helping Weitzman introduce “where the journey begins and the fantasy dies”. Across orchestral arrangements arranged by Adam Wilcox, whose sensitive, ambitious compositions are weaved throughout the album, ‘Beyond The Speed of Life’ brings to mind the laments of Scott Walker. Navigating vulnerability via grandeur, Weitzman’s earnest vocals flourish in wide-eyed call-and-response with the object of a transcendent love affair.

Alongside collaborator, Richard Lamb, the next chapter of the LP plunges into contrasting machine-driven moods; the wry, bubbling ‘Entertainment Is All I Wanted (And I Found It)’ is imbued with the playfulness and experimentation of 80s electronic pioneers such as Fad Gadget, while the tougher, icier ‘Stranger To Your Kind’ shifts in a more instrumental direction, recalling Weitzman’s dancefloor experience, as well as contemporaries such as Matthew Dear.

Album centerpiece and striking first single ‘Running & Returning’ is the first of a suite of three tracks in collaboration with Weitzman’s The Beat Escape and Dawn to Dawn bandmate, Patrick Boivin. Blending lush saxophones and angular guitars with a wistful melodic touch and lyrics, its irresistible art-rock rhythm provides the foundation for one of Weitzman’s most involving vocal performances.

It’s followed by an anthem for existential absurdity: ‘Ice Cream Candle’ provides a driving acceptance that “the more and more you learn, the less you understand”; Weitzman submits to this uncertainty with equal grace on ‘No Man’s Land’, as baroque invocations of “words swept through the fields” and meeting “where the water lilies grow” give way to a blistering guitar solo, humbly riding hypnotic percussion.

For the compassionate finale of Light Months Will Fly Over Us, Weitzman narrates the experience of ‘Gabrielle’, a woman slipping between rooms between shuttered blinds in the towering city, “where cigarettes and roses fill the air.”

As lyrically delicate as it is musically ambitious, Light Months Will Fly Over Us is a sublime debut album, enriched with care, love and much-needed enchantment.

A1 - Symbiotic Link
Kicking off another stellar, varied EP, ASC opens Symbiotic Link with an eerie introduction telling of a tense interaction between orcas in open waters before a thunderous break with immensely sharp venom-fueled snares often used by the likes of Photek back in the day aggressively seizes the attention, jolting and stabbing as the juddering bassline rumbles below - as synthy melodies provide respite in the mix.

A2 - A Single Emotion
Serving up another raucous, nostalgia-driven treat for any breakbeat fan, ASC channels his old-school mastery with a thoroughly absorbing journey through a variety of breaks, edited, chopped and filtered to perfection with dense, earthy basslines lying beneath. Lifted by a soundscape filled with light horn melodies, echoing vocal hits and washes of pads, you'll experience more than a single emotion here.

AA1 - Whirl
Time for a Hot Pants break serenade through swathes of atmospheric synths as Whirl expands ASC's diverse repertoire further still - an earworm melody at the forefront is provided by the bassline on this occasion - simple yet immensely effective. The bass intertwines with the breaks effortlessly while sci-fi effects and samples whoosh and fall with several tonal changes keeping things fresh till the curtains close.

AA2 - Frontier
A rousing cymbal kicks off a curious, deep introduction punctuated by melodic keys and a simmering undertone of suspense. Chunky old school breaks suddenly enter the mix with a continuous, enveloping bassline as the atmosphere builds steadily via micro melodies, noir vocal samples and delicate bells, as ASC closes another Spatial EP in his inimitable, unpredictable engaging style.

Words by Chris Hayes (Spatial / Red Mist)

The album opens with "Hypnagogia," an ode to the space between sleep and wakefulness where we are open to other realms of consciousness. The song slowly builds along a steady pulse provided by bassist Pickle (Nicole Smith) and drummer Rikki Styxx. Tripped out saxophone bleats from guest player Gabe Flores swirl on top of the organ drones laid out by guest keyboardist Gregg Foreman. The band's choral objectives for Under the Spell of Joy are established right off the bat, with Bonnie Bloomgarden's melodic invocations bolstered by a choir, giving the album a rich and vibrant wall-of-sound aesthetic. The song ominously builds on its hypnotic foundation until it opens up into a raucous revelry at the four-minute mark. The portentous simmer of the opening track yields to the ecstatic rocker "Hold My Hand," where verses reminiscent of Velvet Underground's "I'm Waiting For The Man" explode into big triumphant choruses. From there the band launches into the title track, which marries the griminess of The Stooges with an innocence provided by a children's choir chanting the album's primary mantra "under the spell of joy / under the spell of love." Death Valley Girls have always vacillated between lightness and darkness, and on "Bliss Out" they demonstrate their current exuberant focus with a patina-hued pop song driven by an irrepressibly buoyant organ line laid down by keyboardist The Kid (Laura Kelsey). A similar cosmic euphoria is obtained on "The Universe," where alternating chords on the organ help elevate soaring saxophone and keyboard lines out beyond the stratosphere. If you're looking for transcendental rock music, look no further.

Pelican has always been a band that's not just from Chicago, but distinctly of Chicago. Formed in 2000 by guitarists Trevor Shelley de Brauw and Laurent Schroeder-Lebec alongside brothers Bryan and Larry Herweg on bass and drums respectively, Pelican's foundation was built upon the rule-free, genre-agnostic scene synonymous with the Fireside Bowl. "The `90s in Chicago was a free-for-all. Everyone was just coming from a place of pure creativity," says Shelley de Brauw. With Schroeder-Lebec returning to the band following Dallas Thomas' departure in 2022, this reunified version of Pelican allowed the band to tap back into the spirit of their formative era and build something distinctly new with Flickering Resonance. While longtime Pelican fans will recognize the album as an update to the band's ethos_one that's been constantly evolving since their very first EP_their new partnership with Run For Cover Records emphasizes something that's always been implicit to the Pelican formula. These songs take as much inspiration from titanic `90s post-hardcore, space-rock, and emo as they do traditional metal, showing that though Godflesh and Goatsnake records occupied the shelves of Pelican's songwriters, so too did Quicksand, Christie Front Drive, and Hum. "A lot of people didn't hear it at first," says Schroeder-Lebec. "I was like, well, I guess the metal world is where we fit. But now, we're more willing to acknowledge all the suits we're wearing."On Flickering Resonance, Pelican doesn't attempt to reinvent itself as much as emphasize the elements that were so often overlooked. Though Pelican's thick sonic backbone remains intact, the songs on Flickering Resonance show a more humanistic side of the band. Tracks like "Evergreen" and "Indelible" tease Pelican's doom-metal roots, but these songs feel equally, ebullient and truthful, playing like Texas Is The Reason songs transmuted into a post-rock landscape. Recorded with longtime musical compatriot Sanford Parker, who recorded their first EP, Pelican begins this new chapter of their career with an album that's neither full reinvention nor back-to-roots revivalism. After so much time apart, and with so much life having been lived between the original Pelican lineup's last recording sessions together, the band approached it with renewed vigor and a more communal spirit."There was more room for openness and critique with the understanding that we're all trying to craft the best song possible and that every suggestion is valid until it's proven invalid," says Shelley de Brauw. That process allowed everyone to embrace the material with a shared vision. "We didn't move forward unless we all wanted to move forward, and that felt like real community building," says Schroeder-Lebec of this unified approach. "I went from seeing it as my art and my craft to our craft that we were shaping together."In doing so, Pelican allowed themselves to look at their music less as a means of hard-earned catharsis and more as an appreciation for the glimmers of joy that occur even in the bleakest landscapes. Songs like "Cascading Crescent" and "Indelible" don't languish in what's been lost, these tracks see the band embracing what remains in their hands instead of lamenting what's slipped through their fingers. It's a concept that's mirrored in the artwork of Christian Degn that graces the cover of Flickering Resonance. It's a piece built off the concept of flame meditation, and how the smallest flames can often bring about the biggest transformations. A song like "Flickering Stillness" exemplifies this feeling through its sonic expanse, putting the band's sonic density and hyper-focused clarity on display, but with an emphasis on the profound human connections that have kept Pelican going all these years. "When Laurent left and we were able to carry it through, there became a real sense of gratitude for the fact we still have this artistic outlet and a community of people who want to be a part of it" That feeling of deep, grounded appreciation isn't just one that's within the band members, it's expressed in every track on Flickering Resonance. Because at the very core of Pelican, are four individuals who have grown both separately and together, and always will.Like a distant light faintly glowing in the darkest night, Flickering Resonance is a reminder of all that has passed us by, but also all that is still to come.