Tags: music and stuff
Boreal Massif - We All Have An Impact
Strong AOTY candidate. Deep, bottom end heavy instrumental hip hop / ambient. Kinda reminds me of Endtroducing, but without the flashy drum patterns and sounding more refined / focused. The entire album has an almost lo-fi dub texture to it, all the crackles and prominent time-based effects are all over the album.
Release date: 2019-10-11
[9.1/10]
Rakta - Faina Comum
Dark, visceral post-punk. My only complaint to this album is its short runtime.
Release date:
[8.8/10]
Jansport J, Haz Solo - Solo Sport
If you dig Eric Lau or J Dilla then this is the stuff. Although none of the songs reaches two minute mark the songs never feel rushed or unfinished.
Release date:
[8.6/10]
Jefre Cantu-Ledesma - Tracing Back The Radiance
Totally missed this one… awesome ambient release by one of the genre’s finest. This is the exactly how an ambient musical project should be done…
Release date:
[8.6/10]
非 / 密閉空間 - Flow, Gesture, And Spaces
Dissonant, chopped up glitch / IDM / jazztronica. 好後悔沒去看發片然後跑去看了陽光普照…
Release date: 2019-11-06
[8.5/10]
Takafumi Matsubara - Strange, Beautiful And Fast
So the mastermind behind Gridlink has recovered from his hand injury… and now he still shreds. This one got more grooves and melodies than Gridlink albums IMO. Super dope.
Release date: 2019-09-20
[8.5/10]
Lanark Artefax - Corra Linn
Very awesome IDM / jungle. Don’t miss out!
Release date: 2019-10-24
[8.5/10]
Dysrhythmia - Terminal Threshold
Shredding like it’s gonna melt your face off.
Release date: 2019-10-04
[8.4/10]
Seefeel - Peel Session
Dub / minimal electrionica / ambient. Those who dig Jan Jelinek and Pole will definitely love this one.
Release date: 2019-11-15
[8.3/10]
Lee Gamble - Exhaust
So what exactly is “conceptronica”… Dope bass / techno release. I really like the soung Tyre and Envenom, but other songs are pretty tight too. RIYL bass heavy, groovy club techno music. Also if you don’t know who Mark Fisher was then you definitely should.
Release date: 2015-07-24
[8.3/10]
Abyssal - A Beacon In The Husk
Crushing death metal. If Blood Incantation is your jam… this one probably isn’t. This is more like a catchier Portal. Their debut LP is more chaotic and gnarlier than this one IMO, so do make sure to check that one out.
Release date: 2019-06-21
[8.3/10]
Ana Frango Elétrico - Little Electric Chicken Heart
Latin jazzy indie rock / pop. Vibrant and a lot of fun!
Release date: 2019-09-12
[8.3/10]
AGF - Commissioned Work
Experimental ambient / field recording music. The dissonant songs are very engaging, keeping the listener on the edge of their seat, while the softer ambient songs are haunting and right up my alley. I really like how AGF meshes synth sounds into eerie field recording music. Pretty dope.
Release date: 2019-09-28
[8.3/10]
Drowse - Light Mirror
Brooding, dark post-punk / shoegaze / ambient. Think what you imagined the new HANL release would be before it was really out.
Release date: 2019-06-07
[8.2/10]
Seba Kaapstad - Thina
Pretty dope chilled out jazz hop. The opening track is really good… overall has a Nujabes vibe to it. I suppose this is exactly the sound Taiwanese rappers are trying (and failed) to achieve.
Release date: 2018-12-21
[8.2/10]
Madteo - Dropped Out Sunshine
House + hip hop + ambient.
Release date: 2019-11-15
[8.2/10]
Carla Dal Forno - Look Up Sharp
New age inspired post-punk / indie pop. The instrumentation is pretty sparse in this release, which I dig. If there ever is a cafe that plays this… everyone should go there to do stuff.
Release date: 2019-10-04
[8.1/10]
Black To Comm - Before After
Dissonant, bleak modern composition / drone / ambient. I enjoy this quite a bit.
Release date: 2021-04-16
[8.1/10]
Ziúr - ATØ
Pretty dope techno. Overall this album sounds vibrant and is a lot of fun to listen to. Kind of feel like an instrumental Sophie album, with that animate yet mechanized texture to it. Cool stuff.
Release date: 2019-08-16
[8.0/10]
Fabulous Diamonds - Plain Songs
To be honest I still prefer Commercial Music to this one. This album still carries that eerie vibe but not as haunting as their previous one. Nevertheless it is still quite enjoyable and definitely recommended for those who dig dark, bleak, almost ceremonial music.
Release date: 2021-05-20
[8.0/10]
Lafidki, Ayankoko, Pisitakun - Dângrêk Mountains
Definitely keep an eye on Chinabot… this techno / jungle compilation features three artists from the three countries bordering the namesake mountain. This release kind of coincides with what I’m reading right now, about how borders and limits are created, and how can we conceptualize strategies to transcend / overcome them. I guess one could probably call this an attempt at the realization of a BwO music? Probably…
Release date:
[8.0/10]
Giant Swan - Giant Swan
Gritty industrial techno. Starts off really strong.
Release date: 2019-11-08
[7.9/10]
Johanna Knutsson, Karen Gwyer - Oscillate Tracks 003
I always thought Karen Gwyer is more like Felicia Atkinson than Laurel Halo, boy was I wrong… pretty intense techno EP. My only complaint is the super short run time. If the sound textures and moods on this EP were to be extended and developed more I’d say it’s a solid 8.0+.
Release date: 2019-08-09
[7.9/10]
Arp Frique, Americo Brito - Radio Verde
Vintage funk & pop compilation from Cape Verde. Some songs sound somewhat similar to Japanese city pop music from the 80’s, but much funkier, with more world music references (there are obvious samba influences), and adventurous.
Release date: 2019-10-07
[7.9/10]
The Body - Remixed
I think The Body’s own proper releases are not as good as the remix / collabs…
Release date: 2013-01-01
[7.8/10]
Masahiro Sugaya - Horizon, Volume 1
Minimalistic Japanese new age music. Has a jazzy feel and a playful mood throughout the album.
Release date: 2019-10-11
[7.8/10]
Steven Warwick - MOI
Upbeat UK club techno / synth heavy avant-pop. Pretty good. I like how his voice is very low and reminds me of some post-punk vocalists.
Release date: 2021-03-31
[7.8/10]
Various Artists - Earthen: A Cold Spring Sampler
Two hours of morbid music. Honestly it’s a bit too long to my liking… but some tracks on this compilation album definitely worth checking out. Music spans from noise (Merzbow) to noise punk (Zeni Geva) to ambient (Coil) to black metal (Jotunspor). The Coil tracks in this album are pretty dope.
Release date:
[7.7/10]
Al-Doe, Spanish Ran - Doña Blanca
Super compact east coast rap EP. Who’s Spanish Ran and how come he can come up with these sick AF beats… The lyrics aren’t really that good but the delivery is gritty and on point.
Release date:
[7.7/10]
Scorn - Cafe Mor
Newest release from a dub techno veteran. Grinding.
Release date: 2018-09-01
[7.7/10]
Konradsen - Saints And Sebastian Stories
Delicate indie pop. Overall this album has a sound very likely to be found in several Taiwanese artists’ releases, the kind of music where soothing chill hop meets indie pop /rock, but this one has much more consistency. Or think a softer, less memorable version of Shura’s new album…
Release date: 2019-10-25
[7.6/10]
Duckwrth - The Falling Man
Alright hip hop album. Flow-wise there are plenty of moments that remind me of how Denzel Curry does it. The features on this EP are overshadowed by Duckwrth’s own performance though.
Release date: 2019-05-17
[7.5/10]
Chikano, Granddad Woolly - KanoDadda: Exprmnt VII
A straightforward hip hop album. The beats and the flows sound pretty oldschool, I guess for an album that focuses on vintage sci-fi themes that’s reasonable… Still a decent hip hop album, just that I’m no longer that huge on this kind of stuff.
Release date:
[7.4/10]
Bersarin Quartett - Methoden Und Maschinen
While I’m a huge fan of their self-titled LP released back in 2010, I totally missed out on their second and third releases and am totally ignorant on how their sound evolved. To me this new album feel more like a tamed version of Ben Frost’s stuff. Overall I still prefer the said self-titled to this release.
Release date: 2019-11-28
[7.4/10]
Alessandro Cortini - Volume Massimo
Poignant synth-based electronica. I really like the first song but not so much the others - not really digging all these major chords and faux-brooding post-rock cliches.
Release date: 2019-09-27
[7.3/10]
Aphex Twin - Peel Session 2
Eh.
Release date: 2019-11-15
[7.2/10]
Shanti Celeste - Tangerine
Uplifting house music. Pretty funky.
Release date: 2020-04-24
[7.2/10]
Doon Kanda - Labyrinth
I think the chord progressions are pretty predictable on this LP, and the classical influenced textures / instrumentations, while quite intriguing on the first couple of songs soon become repetitive. I do agree this album has a overall darker, haunting yet playful mood to it, and is indeed a pretty memorable album. Despite the opinions I have about this album I’ll definitely be looking forward to Kanda’s future releases.
Release date: 1986-01-01
[7.0/10]
Chai - PUNK
J-pop with punk influences (duh). To me it’s too overtly sweet but I do think the songs are very nicely written. Definitely worthy of the praise they’ve been getting lately, just that this type of music isn’t really my jam.
Release date: 2020-07-01
[7.0/10]
Coucou Chloe - Naughty Dog
Experimental trap-influenced club music.
Release date: 2019-05-31
[6.9/10]
Olga Wojciechowska - Infinite Distances
Graceful piano modern classical music. While the music is soothing it lacks memorability and captivity.
Release date: 2019-11-04
[6.9/10]
Boris - Love & Evol
There are moments that are crushing and unrelenting, and then there are its post-rock-ish Bugs of Phonon parts, but overall Boris is just replicating their old stuff on this record.
Release date: 2019-10-04
[6.8/10]
An Isolated Mind - I’m Losing Myself
Post-metal / black metal / folk metal. One of those metal albums that tries to blend various musical influences into an album but doesn’t really accomplish too much apart from the presence of multiple different guitar tones. The start of this album is pretty heavy but the ending two songs are just placeholder ambient songs with no discernible meaning.
Release date: 2019-03-23
[6.7/10]
Have A Nice Life - Sea Of Worry
Is it awful? Don’t really think so. Is it a disappointment? Definitely. Gothic post-punk with dripping reverb layered on top. The vocals feel rather out of place and doesn’t really fit with the other instruments.
Release date: 2019-11-08
[6.7/10]
Kevin Abstract - Arizona Baby
Pretty tame pop rap. Can’t stand the falsettos…
Release date: 2019-04-25
[6.5/10]
clipping. - There Existed An Addiction To Blood
I enjoy Midcity and their self-titled album much more than this one. I like Ed Balloon’s feature here, but the other songs feel like pretty bland trap / horrorcore to me.
Release date: 2019-10-18
[6.0/10]
Departure Chandelier - Antichrist Rise To Power
Raw black metal. I don’t think there’s a bassist in the band, and sometimes the timing is way off to go unnoticed. The guitar sounds… really bad :/
Release date: 2019-04-26
[6.0/10]
Ameer Vann - Emmanuel
At first I thought he’s a newcomer in the underground hardcore hip hop scene… but then after skimming through news about him it appears this album is more like a non-apology of a sex offender. I actually like the instrumentals on the first three songs quite a bit, but this kind of buck passing is just beyond tolerance IMO. 田昀凡饒舌樂
Release date: 2020-05-29
[5.0/10]
魏如萱 - 藏著並不等於遺忘
This is an incoherent album. There are brooding, drawn out mellow songs, shallow electro pop songs with beat drops, frivolous folk songs that are there just for the sake of it, and then there are soft rock songs. There’s even a bossa nova song… I mean trying out new styles of music is definitely commendable, but this feels less like an attempt to incorporate different styles into a musical project than a lack of song selection. I will say that the musicians did a great job, especially the drummer - lots of chops has been added and they do shine through the rather blandly written songs. As for the lyrics… 「在你設定的世界 規矩就是斑馬線 很多人站在那邊 卻很難走到對面」 Some Kanye level stuff.
Release date: 2019-11-20
Overall this album feels pretty superficial and doesn’t even try. My biggest complaint is that the songwriting just feels… lazy, to the point where it’s like the songwriter just decided which song should fit in what genre, then put the most typical instruments and chords into that song.
[3.3/10]
持修 - 房間裡的大象
insufferable
Release date: 2019-11-20
[0.3/10]
Chris Orrick - Portraits
Dope jazz hop album. Dig the self-deprecating lyrics.
Release date: 2020-11-05
[8.5/10]
Lye By Mistake - Fea Jur
Menacing progressive metal / jazz fusion. Imagine Allan Holdsworth on speed. After I checked out on Dysrhythmia’s new stuff I recalled that I dig this band like 8 years ago. Turns out I’m still diggin’ it.
Release date: 2021-06-01
[8.5/10]
Regis - Necklace Of Bites
The quintessential techno album. FFO JK Flesh.
Release date: 2019-11-01
[8.3/10]
Roy Montgomery - Scenes From The South Island
FFO Suishou No Fune. Honestly it sounds much more like a stripped down guitar centric psych rock record than an ambient one. Still pretty good though.
Release date: 2019-11-29
[7.4/10]
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