Albums Quarterly #15

Since the last AQ, the world has changed. The Tories were thrown on the scrapheap. Donald Trump was just about thrown on there, while Joe Biden submitted to it.

Has it actually changed? Other than the shuffling around of world leaders, let’s be honest… it really hasn’t and most certainly won’t for the foreseeable future.

Here in the U.K., whether you think Keir Starmer is the white knight marauding down the hill to save the country is neither here nor there. It’s far too early in Labour’s reign to make to make any sweeping statements, but optimistically, while the bar may be low, anything is better than the Tory hellscape that has heaped misery on the country over the past two decades. We live in hope, I guess, but such as the mess that Labour has inherited, a quick fix this ain’t, my friends…

Back to travelling through the seam of optimism, however, and let’s talk music. As always, this time of year on the new release hamster wheel is changing gears; just this week has seen some really strong releases, which you can read all about if you care to ferret around.

While most are lamenting their summer (as dull as it has been despite being uplifted by the purity of sport that is the Olympics), the final months of the year are sure to be packed with more new music goodness. Backtracking for releases over the past couple of months, it wasn’t until handpicking the albums for this latest Quarterly that I realised just how good it has been. In fact, this may just be my favourite so far.

So on that note, there’s not much left to bore you with. Be well, and stay tuned for some exciting features coming your way in the coming weeks and months ahead….

Pete Simonelli Interview: “There’s always a sentience to a place and time”

Mat Ball: Amplified Guitar 2
The Garrote

While his band BIG|BRAVE have gained the deserve plaudits over the past several years, Mat Ball’s solo endeavours have gone under the radar. His debut album, Amplified Guitar, was music that spoke to you, and the next chapter is every bit as good.

Amplified Guitar 2 consists of six knotty compositions that explore the origins of folk the same way BIG|BRAVE has done recently. Sonically, it does cross pollinate with A Chaos of Flowers, but Ball goes slightly further afield here, combining hypnotic heaviness with the kind of wandering gravitas that packs a mighty punch.

Also a part of the new collaboration featuring Efrim Manuel Menuck, WE ARE WINTER’S BLUES AND RADIANT CHILDREN, it’s been some year for Ball, and despite perhaps not gaining the attention it deserves, Amplified Guitar 2 feels like a vital conduit which leads to everything else he’s produced so far.

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Beings: There is a Garden
No Quarter Records

As if Jim White hasn’t been busy enough this year, what with his debut solo album All Hits: Memories, the new collaboration album alongside Marisa Anderson, and the small matter of the Dirty Three’s long-awaited return.

Yes, there’s no rest for the wicked, and this time alongside guitarist maestro Steve Gunn and New York lifers, Zoh Amba and Shahza Ismaily, the supergroup billed as Beings deliver their debut, There is a Garden.

While There is a Garden takes a bit to sink into the bones, do stick with it, because this collaboration lives up to what it suggests on paper. With jazz freak-outs, Amba’s warm melodies and Gunn’s swirling guitars, this is the kind of album from the kind of band that should be taking up a month-long residency at Café Oto.

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Black (W)hole: Kaleidoscopic Rhapsody
Self-released

Austrian experimentalist, Black (W)hole, makes the kind of music inspired by the psychedelic horrors one would find deep within the bowels of the void.

Following their 2020 release, Fuzzology, Kaleidoscopic Rhapsody sees Black (W)hole moving between burgeoning acoustic composition and dead-eyed krautrock that smokes out dreams.

Kaleidoscopic Rhapsody almost feels like a lost compilation of Boris’ shape-shifting and genre-bending escapades. It’s all here, and with an added layer of darkness, Black (W)hole has conjured up something that is oddly compelling and off-kilter in equal measure.

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Melt-Banana: 3+5

Cassini: The Cassini Promise
Echodelick Records

Minneapolis’ Cassini are like the vita thread that stiches together the technicoloured patchwork.

On their debut LP, The Cassini Promise, Cassini act as the agent that guides music from era-to-era. There’s plenty of worship not limited to Can, Neu! and, most recently, Prison. It’s one of those records where you don the headphones and be taken to a place that showers you in colours. The images and reflections overriding the sound.

Granted, there’s plenty of average psychedelia out there, but it’s albums like Cassini’s The Cassini Promise that keep the standards up to where they need to be. Yup, this is a hot one that demands your time.

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Doris: Four Trees
Kitty Records

There’s a vibrant post-hardcore scene evolving throughout Australia, and Sydney’s Doris are one of current players in it.

Following the likes of fellow antipodeans Twine and Freight, the Sydney collective’s latest release, Four Trees, is a raw, blistering homage to the likes of Cap N Jazz and early Unwound. There’s a purity to these recordings which explodes with DIY spirit. It feels like that’s needed now more than ever.

Four Trees ticks a lot of boxes but, most of all, there’s a young, vibrant energy from a band unafraid to explore the dark corners and keep the flag flying for a new generation. Very solid stuff indeed.

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The Drin: Elude the Torch
Feel It Records

The Drin is yet another group from one of America’s most vibrant underground scenes in Cincinnati, Ohio. Having already birthed the likes of Crime of Passing and The Serfs, The Drin (who also feature members from both of those bands) are another delight from the Midwest.

Following their breakthrough 2023 record, Today My Friend You Drink the Venom, the band make a quick return with Elude the Torch. Taking lo-fi and a twisted darkwave horror blues, The Drin mash it together into something you could have seen The Rolling Stones producing as a companion piece to Exile on Main Street.

Yup, there’s plenty of tin can clatter here, and while Elude the Torch hasn’t gained the same plaudits of its predecessor, to these ears it’s the better-rounded album and yet another fine document to spool from the rust belt.

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Duster: In Dreams

Elkhorn: The Red Valley
VHF Records

Elkhorn are the majestic New York guitar duo of Jesse Sheppard and Drew Gardner. The pair have been prolific in their interplay between electric and 12 string guitar. Their latest album, The Red Valley, underlines their beautiful virtuosity.

In all its wandering majesty, there’s so much at play throughout these six compositions. The echoes of Richard Thompson which Grails went onto master with their first two LPs. The dark psychedelia of Sun City Girls to the cosmic marooning of, say, droneroom. It’s all here.

With The Red Valley, Elkhorn open the mind to new possibilities. Where it leads to is anyone’s guess, but one thing is for certain: this is a journey one must take. 

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Gerycz / Powers / Rolin: Activator
12XU

Jen Powers and Mat Rolin aren’t strangers around these parts, however their latest collaboration alongside Jayson Gerycz had evaded the ears for well over six months.

Released in January via 12XU (also home to Rolin’s other endeavour, the mighty Winged Wheel), he and Powers team up for their latest release with the percussionist extraordinaire in Gerycz for Activator. Six tracks at over 43 minutes of improv’ freakouts that weave in and out of everything from Neil Young to the early assaults of Grails.

There’s a bit of sunroof sway too (Stasis), confirming that Powers and Rolin can move through the gears with whomever their collaborator may be. And in the case of Activator, it’s one of the best they’ve done yet.

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Ghost Dubs: Damaged
Pressure

Ghost Dubs is the alias of Michael Fiedler (also known to many as Jah Schulz), and with his debut LP under Kevin Richard Martin’s Pressure label, the producer takes us on a voyage to escapism.

Damaged is dub for completely going to far out places, namely the Turkish hash den. While a homage to dub and dancehall, Fiedler also goes beyond that. Think of what Bark Psychosis did in deconstructing rock music, and apply those rule here!

Damaged covers big ground. It’s almost like Keith Hudson at half-speed or, hell, even The Bug himself! Press play, sink into the couch and let Ghost Dubs take care of the rest, because take care of it he does.

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Danny Paul Grody Duo: Arc of Night

Gloios: Natureza Errada
Self-released

No matter how inaccurate you think algorithms are, deep in the bowls of streaming land, there’s always something that catches a spark, and the latest is all the way from São Paulo, Brazil: the one-man army known as Gloios, who releases his debut LP, Natureza Errada.

On the back of two EPs over the past 18 months, Natureza Errada is something that stretches the ligaments of post-rock. On a foundation of drones and local-inspired percussion, these five compositions pulse with a friction between sound worlds.

There’s Godspeed reverence here but only slightly. These compositions are more inward, feeling closer to the home of the artist responsible for them. Natureza Errada is ceremonial and abstract, drawing from the vestiges of post-rock, drone and psychedelia. Fans of all those things will also be fans of this.

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Goat Girl: Below the Waste
Rough Trade Records

So many bands from London fail to mirror the quality their hype suggests: thankfully, Goat Girl aren’t one of them.

On their third album, Below the Waste, once again the three-piece move the boundaries in an oddly hypnotic affair that clocks in just under 50 minutes. With soothing melodies and riffs that sit somewhere between psychedelia and slacker, the concoction Goat Girl serve up is one far removed from their contemporaries.

With three albums that move in their own mysterious ways, Goat Girl are a band that exist not only to explore, but also to never make the same record twice. Below the Waste comes on strong in what is the band’s greatest leap so far.

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Havestman: Triptych: Part Two
Neurot Recordings

The second of three Triptych releases to celebrate the solstice, Steve Von Till’s latest moves through more knotty terrains than its predecessor.

While Part One undertook more of a woodsy vibe reminiscent of a warped version of Richard Thompson, Part Two sees Von Till leaning into the gooey-psychedelic hybrid that has been the foundation of much of the Harvestman recordings.

Once again accompanied by Om’s Al Cisneros on bass, Triptych: Part Two has all your left-of-centre, droning psychedelic needs under one roof. It’s Von Till taking the idea of punk to new places, and Part Three, set for release next month, shouldn’t be any different.

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Metaphysical Transitions: In Conversation with Lilacs & Champagne’s Emil Amos & Alex Hall

Ivan the Tolerable: Water Music
Riot Season

It’s been another hectic year for Oli Heffernan’s Ivan the Tolerable odyssey. Are we surprised? Not really, this chap treats his studio like his first home, not second and, well… you put the work in, you reap the rewards.

Which is what his latest release, Water Music, is. The companion piece to Vertigo, here Heffernan hasn’t sounded so minimal, and through field recordings and the vestiges of improv’ jazz, he manages to find a new place within his sonic enclave.  

Heffernan has always had an uncanny knack of cleansing space. Blurring the lines between so many facets of life. With sonics that are soothing, whether you’re a music fan or not, Water Music is like the coalition of sound, and not many within the underground experimental scene can boast this.

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KMRU: Natur
Touch

Having released the excellent collaboration alongside The Bug’s Kevin Richard Martin, Disconnect, Joseph Kamaru continues the ceaseless march with his latest solo LP, Natur.

The Nairobi-born, Berlin-based producer weaves bourgeoning drones into the minimalist patchwork that sounds like a force field that protects the outer world. There’s an expansiveness to this but it’s done in very subtle ways that almost feels hypnotic.

Those who were enamoured with Edition 1, the collaboration between King Midas Sound and Fennesz, will find something in Natur that explores similar paths, exposing certain parts of the soul. KRMU is a student of the game, and Natur is the latest example of this.

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Mono: Oath
Temporary Residence

Following the release of their career-defining 2006 LP, You Are There, it’s like Mono have been treading water since. It’s hasn’t been for the lack of trying, of course; there’s been additional instrumentation that has taken the band to new corners, but ones that others had already occupied across the post-rock landscape.

Still, they’ve muddled through, and it’s a good thing they have, as Oath is one of their finest moments captured on tape. This release sees the Japanese collective capture the magic of their past, but also finding new emotional force in the present.

Recorded by the late Steve Albini, who was always a champion of the band, it’s fitting that this was one of the final records he worked on. In their own way, Mono pay beautiful tribute to him with Oath. 

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Weirdo Rippers #14

Martha Skye Murphy: Um
AD 93

While the term ‘atmospheric pop’ exists, most artists described as such don’t hit the mark. However, the idea of it seems pretty much in line with what Martha Skye Murphy has produced on the excellent Um.

The London artist produces vague, warped vignettes that, at times, feels like an out-of-body experience. A whisper through the miasma, like trying to handle a dream, but, indeed, failing miserably.

There’s a dark, vulnerability that runs through the songs that comprise of Um. Like that dream, something that is always eluding the listener. Songs that have more questions than answers, and it’s essentially this reason as to why you keep going back.

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Oneida: Expensive Air
Joyful Noise

New York noise veterans, Oneida, continue to lament on the state of what it is to be an artist (and perhaps, indeed, a human!) in 2024, with Expensive Air.

Following their excellent 2022 dispatch Success, Expensive Air follows a similar vein in both theme and sound. Opening gambit, Reason to Hide gallops and swerves with the kind of vigour that sees the band at the top of their game.

And the rest of Expensive Air follows suite in what is a seamless continuity from Success – both albums sounding glorious when listening to them back-to-back. The year always feels a little bit better with a new Oneida record it in, and with the shitshow that is 2024, that’s some doing. Thank you, Oneida!

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Quivers: Oyster Cuts
Merge Records

Merge Records have finally sourced the same good oil fellow indie label, Trouble In Mind, have been dispensing over the last couple of years.

Another fine import from Melbourne which has already boasted the likes of Snowy Band, Partner Look and a slew of others, Quivers are Sam Nicholson (vocals/guitars), Bella Quinlan (vocals/bass), Michael Panton (guitars) and Holly Thomas (drums). With their debut album Oyster Cuts, the band take that sleepy-eyed garage rock hybrid mixing it with Pretenders-worship, and it goes down a treat.

The results are very easy on the ear indeed, with a set of songs that are assured, and tailor-made Sunday afternoons and beer gardens. Or indeed, the open road. Whichever setting you find yourself in, press play and turn it up loud.

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The Floating World Interview: “There’s something about places that I find very haunting”

The Soundcarriers: Through Other Reflections
Phosphonic

Following their 2022 album, Wilds, the Nottingham four-piece return even bigger with Through Other Reflections.

If you were ever looking for the embodiment of something sounding British, then you’d be hard-pressed go past The Soundcarriers. The quartet, architects of the kind of library music-inspired psychedelia that radiates with warmth and charm. It’s wonderful songwriting, pulling bits of a past and making them oddly pertinent in the present.

You always know what you’re going to get with The Soundcarriers, and with Through Other Reflections, once again, they’ve produced something supremely confident. It’s a lovely record that enhances record collections and turns drab days into bright ones.

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Sumac: The Healer
Thrill Jockey

Any creative endeavour involving Aaron Turner never relives past glories, and in the case of Sumac, that’s no different.

On the band’s latest, The Healer, the experimentalists stretch the Sumac sound world out to more extreme places, this time with four long-form compositions that are equal parts hypnotic and hard-nosed in what is simply one of the avant-garde metal releases of the year. 

It’s always a case of expecting the unexpected with Sumac, and the day that changes, the day that they will seize to exist. The Healer is another blueprint in the world of experimental metal where Sumac continue to be the spearhead of it.

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Webb Chapel: World Cup
Strange Mono

The only world cup this year belongs to Philadelphian shape-shifters, Webb Chapel, who return with their second record of the year.

The concept of the ‘community musician’ really rings truly when listening to World Cup. Webb Chapel pass of the vibe as the people’s band. Steeped in DIY and community spirit, there’s everything here from breezy glam rock and woodsy campfire echoes to straight up scuzz-a rolla.

As far as guitar records from the underground are concerned, Web Chappel have all the bases covered. The quintessential band’s band who are in it for all the right reasons. You can feel it just by hearing the music they make, and World Cup is the latest document.

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Previous AQs:

AQ #14
AQ #13
AQ #12
AQ #11
AQ #10
AQ #9
AQ #8
AQ #7
AQ #6
AQ #5
AQ #4
AQ #3
AQ #2
AQ #1