ClemencyReferences2 B Real
References, the debut full EP from Manchester-based producer Clemency, delights in its simplicity. Opener ‘Testimony’ is a lithe 85 BPM stepper, primed for a DJ’s warm-up set, while ‘Biblical Names’ centres around a warped hand drum loop and the kind of square wave basslines that long to be played on a crushing sound system.
Ambrose Akinmusireon the tender spot of every calloused momentBlue Note
On his fifth album, trumpeter Ambrose Akinmusire has never sounded more self-possessed. Supported by his long-term working quartet—pianist Sam Harris, bassist Harish Raghavan, and drummer Justin Brown, he implants expressions of rage, sorrow, and hope within pieces that maintain composure even when the band pushes hard against his compositional frameworks.
Cold MeatHot And FlusteredStatic Shock
Australian feminist shitkicker punx Cold Meat do their clangingly tuneful thing in LP form after a flurry of EPs. The result is like those releases, i.e. great, but even better. Lyrical topics include a championing of Devo over ZZ Top, though you don’t have to agree to enjoy.
Nape NeckNape NeckSelf-Released
The eight songs on this release find guitarist Bobby Glew throttling his instrument in gleefully grating ceremonial sword-sharpener fashion, hacking into the seam of the groove or setting off micro-eruptions of metallic slide guitar. While sounding less like his other project Guttersnipe than the two ex-Beards in Nape Neck sound like Beards, I’m tempted to suggest he brings the American skronk/US Maple/Chinese Stars element to Nape Neck; Claire Adams and Kathy Grey the Gang Of Four/Delta 5/Leeds post-punk canon – but I doubt things are that linear, even if I’ve correctly identified their ingredients.
Six Organs Of AdmittanceCompanion RisesDrag City
All the looping and processing on Companion Rises gives it hallmarks of glitchy IDM such as the raw metallic percussion textures similar to those on Autechre’s Chiastic Slide. Each instrument seems to be produced in one of two styles: it’s either mired in sonic detritus like heavy processing and digital degradation; or presented coldly and clinically without embellishment or varnish like the bright acoustic guitar on ‘Two Forms Moving’ and ‘Haunted And Known’. The effect of this binary is songs that feel layered and granulated; they buckle and bulge while still marching onwards.
Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs PigsVisceralsRocket Recordings
For opener ‘Reducer’ the spotlight is on the cosmic lead guitar licks. ‘New Body’ grinds along antisocially like Swans or perhaps some kind of half-speed Jesus Lizard number. There’s a weird almost dubsteppy intermission with some spoken-word vocals involving an extended gastronomic metaphor. There’s maybe a thrash influence rearing its head elsewhere and some accessible growl-along choruses here and there. The crucial thing, however, is that the riffs are still heavier than Ray Winstone after a slap-up black pudding breakfast.
CassowaryCassowaryDaddy Kool
Like Roy Ayers’ Stoned Soul Picnic, this is the sort of record that just feels extraordinarily pleasant to be around, making the room it’s played in feel more comfy and the weather outside look sunnier. Which is not to say there’s anything ‘easy listening’ about the album, it’s full of off-kilter jolts and strange sonic disjecta, noises that sound like they don’t quite want to be there and silences that seem to be waiting to be filled in. But then that’s part of what makes this record so welcoming – it invites you in and has you doing little odd jobs around the place.
The HomesickThe Big ExerciseSub Pop
It’s difficult to know where to start with The Big Exercise, such is its effervescence. One can simply revel in seemingly microscopic sleights of hand that imbue the record with a sum greater than its parts. There are gorgeous chord changes, such as on ‘Pawing’, where the bass hops along, lifting the achingly beautiful plucked guitar part in the bridge. Last December’s single, ‘I Celebrate My Fantasy’, has enough clever twists to fill a whole record.
Aksak MaboulFiguresCrammed Discs
Totally pop, yet psychedelic enough to make one reconsider the ingestion of psychedelic drugs just to hear it in in such a state, replete with wonderful touches (such as elements of the systems music of Steve Reich or Philip Glass), Figures manages to contain elements from every phase of the band, whilst still having a contemporary edge. As in the very best attempts to merge disparate elements, the pop and avant elements perfectly compliment one another.
Delphine DoraL’Inattingiblethree:four
Those familiar with Delphine Dora’s work will know about the melodically and emotionally indeterminate spaces she inhabits but there’s plenty that is new here: she sings entirely in French for the first time, and the process of crafting (writing and editing) the 21 pieces has been more involved than the spontaneous approach she has previously favoured. Without becoming overburdened, Dora’s voice and piano are richly embellished.
YlangylangInterplayCrash Symbols
YlangYlang’s been swimming around between various electronic vibes over her many releases to date, breaching the surface of the ambient and abstract, or composing more rigid tracks of bedroom pop – the entire process often united by a distinct style of singspeak. Interplay however, feels like a huge step forward. Here, Debard ropes in a host of guest instrumentalists to flesh out her various DIY beats, synthy pads and melodic licks, adding in saxophone, strings, santur, flutes, double bass, and rich brass.
Aoife Nessa FrancesLand Of No JunctionBa Da Bing
“My old life was hard to shake,” begins Aoife Nessa Frances on ‘Blow Up’, one of the first songs she wrote for her spellbinding debut album. The track, with its psychedelic protest-folk pace, goes on to confront the Dublin songwriter’s frustration with the treatment of women in Ireland, particularly prior to the legalisation of abortion in 2018. “Tired of being human,” she sings. “Lesser than man.” A sense of personal and political disillusionment crops up again and again on Land Of No Junction – a feeling of always having one foot stuck in the past, of being on the cusp of something just out of reach.
Sun ArawRock SutraDrag City
I think Rock Sutra sounds something like an 8-bit version of the soundtrack to Steely Dan’s Making Of Aja documentary. I don’t think that’s a wholly accurate way to describe this live-to-MIDI album, particularly not technically, but it’s the best I can do with something that sounds like nothing else.
Torbjorn ZetterbergAre You Happy?Moserobie
Sweden’s Torbjörn Zetterberg has been a commanding bassist and bandleader since emerging 15 years ago, conveying the muscular ebullience and contrapuntal fervour of Charles Mingus without imitating his sound. He’s led several projects over the years, but none transmits the same vitality and soul like his sextet Den Stora Frågan (The Great Question). Unlike so many jazz records, these improvisations seem to be cut from the same cloth as the driving arrangements, and Zetterberg eschews trite head-solo-solo-head structures in his tart, multipartite writing. On the steamrolling opener ‘Meningen Med Vad’, drummer Lars Skoglund brings extra heft and propulsion to the masterfully buoyant drummer of Jon Fält, while Alexander Zethson stokes the fire with fat Hammond organ jabs, but they’re also present on the spacey ballad, “Påminnelser För Den Kortsinnade, with Zethson on chill Fender Rhodes.
Quelle ChrisInnocent Country 2Mello Music
Innocent Country 2 is an antidote. An hour and four minutes of necessary healing. Where Innocent Country‘s (2015) tones were pessimistic and internal, its sequel is joyfully defiant. Instead of swearing fealty to the inevitability of an apathetic existence in the American project, here Quelle Chris grabs hold of the crumbling architecture of a nation split with itself and plays with it, hopscotching in and out of its moral caverns and contradictions.
Black CurseEndless WoundSepulchral Voice
Endless Wound insanely hostile opener ‘Charnel Rift’ or the skull-scrapingly abrasive ‘Seared Eyes’ are terrifyingly efficient. The title track, meanwhile, is absolutely lethal, delivering both ridiculously fast, precision blastbeats with dive-bomb leads that sound like a horse being torn in half and some of the album’s most desolate, sparse riffery in its midsection. The band seem to know exactly when to shift gears for maximum impact, whilst maintaining a palpably evil atmosphere and engagingly nasty riffing throughout. There’s not a dull moment on it, or even a moment that dips below “supremely fucking intense.”
Blind EyeBlind EyeViral Age
Blind Eye vocalist Annie Spaziano has no past bands I’m aware of but runs an eponymous mini-chain of burger joints, which is obviously a smarter idea than trying to make your mark on the world through discredited artform ‘music’. She has a ripper set of pipes, too, variously apoplectic and snarky and with a trashy drama to her tone that could fit an ’80s speed metal band. Her musicians flit between full-tilt 80s USHC and spots of wailing, smoggy psych, guitarist Andrew Morgan’s serpent-squirm solo excursions being the bridge between these modes. And in case you thought Blind Eye were half-assing their trippy side, closing number ‘End’ lasts nine minutes and hammersmashes all my Geld/Destruction Unit/Butthole Surfers (who I’m guessing inspired their name) brain-bite buttons.
Minor ScienceSecond LanguageAD93
Angus Finlayson’s productions as Minor Science have a remarkably distinctive quality, even as, as he does on debut album Second Language the tempo darts from the frenzied live drum-aided jungle of ‘Balconies’ to the mostly beatless, warped basslines of ‘Polyglottal’, the kind of track that always seems like it’s on the cusp of bursting into a more predictable 4/4 kick but brilliantly never does. Finlayson’s is a sound rooted firmly in the club, but with enough left turns, fake-outs and the kind of sound design chops that make it one of the year so far’s best electronic music albums.
Sarah DavachiGathersBoomkat Editions
The three tracks on the A-side of Gathers see Sarah Davachi work with harpsichord, harmonium and piano. Opener ‘Gathers I’ strikes a faintly medieval tone, while ‘Gathers II’ settles into more hypnotic deep listening territory, its soothing drones letting in the faintest hint of melancholy. On the B-side, Davachi turns her attention to her Mellotron, electric organ and EMS Synthi AKS. ‘Gathers IV’ is a gorgeous meditative piece that you could get lost in for hours, where closer ‘Gathers VI’, with its distant wailing synth tones, has a more piercing quality. Gathers, though, has provided a perfect, much-needed soundtrack for relaxation amid the COVID-19 lockdown, offering a sonic balm to press pause on everything around me while I let my thoughts wander.
Jason CrumerJason CrumerBreathing Problem
Jason Crumer approximates the nebulous nature of dreams. The first track, ‘Vent’, opens with discomposing drones slowly that rumble away; it’s like waiting for test results from an oncologist. At about the four-minute marker, an onslaught of sickly noise reminiscent of Atrax Morgue ushers in the holy terrors to come. Several song titles personify the most vulnerable of emotional states. ‘King Depression’, for example, uses a high pitched drone with interjections of pyretic noise, illustrating melancholia as a dreadful banality. Few noise artists make sounds so rife with narrative implications as conceptually realised as Jason Crumer.
