Teenage Filmstars - Star (1992)

Severely under-appreciated UK shoegaze. For reasons that escape me, everyone -- critics and fans alike, including the dude who first played them for me -- is intent on calling Teenage Filmstars "psych rock" or "space rock" or something like that, despite the fact that Star, their first album, is as shoegaze-y as they come. It's probably one of the all-time great shoegaze records, in fact.

I don't know what you call a band defined by lush, distorted walls of guitar and far-away, angelic, reverb-saturated vocals, all in service of gorgeous sensory overload and (possibly opium-enhanced) euphoria, but I call it motherfucking shoegaze. If I were to curate a series of compilations titled Now That's What I Call Shoegaze, I'd put Teenage Filmstars on the first goddamn volume. Nary a shoe escapes Teenage Film Stars' gaze.

SHOE. GAZE.

Track listing:
1. Kiss Me
2. Loving
3. Inner Space
4. Apple
5. Flashes
6. Kaelidoscope
7. Vibrations
8. Soulful
9. Hallucinations
10. Moon

What's it going to be then, eh?

If you like this shoegaze record, you'll probably like these other shoegaze records:

Majesty Crush -
Love 15 (1993)

Astrobrite -
Pinkshinyultrablast (2005)

Saatkrähe - Of Ravens and Graves... (2009)

Lo-fi French atmospheric black metal. Mesmerizing in its cryptic, esoteric pursuit of black metal purity, Saatkrähe is one of my absolute favorite projects of its kind.

Track listing:
1. Antichristian Tenebra
2. Ravens Cacophonia
3. The Graveyard Song
4. The Black Plague
5. Ravens Euphoria

Sleeping with ravens in a shroud at the heart of the forest

You should also hear:

Nordlicht -
Nebelmeer (2002)

Cripta Oculta -
Sangue do Novo Amanhecer (2009)

Piquet - The Faulty Caress (1996)

Abstract, glitchy, electronic sounds from UK producer Paul Kendall. Largely sparse and ambient-ish, but steel yourself for extended sections of sheer, harsh aural terror.

Track listing:
1. Feed #1
2. Caress
3. Feed #2
4. Alone in Stone
5. Paraph
6. Pre-Remains
7. Remain

Glass eye

You'll probably also enjoy:

Mirror -
I Paint for the Love of Color (2001)

Alog -
Miniatures (2006)

Total Genocide - Worship Humanicide (2006)

Filth-ridden French raw black metal. Disgusting and lo-fi. If you're concerned about potential sketchiness: I'm pretty sure that Total Genocide want to kill everyone, regardless of race or religious affiliation.

Track listing:
1. Vomit Human Life
2. Alienation
3. Cold Life
4. Worship Humanide
5. Under an Eternally Lugubrious Sky
6. Terror
7. For Your Morbid Greatness

Satan noise vomit chaos

If you like this, try:

Black Howling - Forgotten Land,
Throne and Crown +
Flagellation Reigns Eternity (2003)

Crucifixion Wounds -
Bastard Son of God(2009)

Haxen - Black Fire Suicide (2006)

Raw US black metal. The perfect mix of mysterious occult feels and straight-up ass-kicking. Haxen's first proper LP came out a few months back, and it's one of my favorite albums of the year so far. So to whet your appetite, here's their excellent second demo, Black Fire Suicide, two songs from which were rerecorded for said album.

Note: that's not the album cover, it's their logo. As far as the internet is concerned, there was no album cover.

Track listing:
1. Introduction
2. Black Fire Suicide
3. Dig Me No Grave
4. Sleepwalking Through Forests of Thorns
5. Smite My Enemies
6. Oscillating Goathead (Outro)

Cold life

You'll also like:

Evilfeast -
Thy Abhorrent Emerging (2002)

Mastery - Barbaric Usurpation of the
Hypereonic Black Metal Throne (2011)

Frostwinter - The Hour of Decline (2010)

German martial industrial. Cavernous, clanging percussion, thick sheets of rumbling noise, and fatalistic dialogue samples. Devoid of all traces of light or warmth.

Track listing:
1. Geistloser Wille
2. Il N'y A Aucun Progres
3. Revolution Ist Krankheitskraft
4. Vivisection Chamber
5. Something About Amorality
6. Ressentiment
7. Praying for Extinction
8. Jene Anthropofugale Notwendigkeit
9. One Day Without Existence
10. Wound of Dasein
11. Pour L'éternité
12. Wolves Among the Ruins
13. Epilogue (From Beyond)

If there is no struggle, there is no progress.

You might also like:

Brighter Death Now -
The Slaughterhouse (1993)

Deutsch Nepal -
Only Silence Among the Filthy (1994)

Hadez - Aquelarre (1993)

Phenomenal Peruvian black/death. Dark, doom-tinged ritual dissonance and chaotic blasting/tremolo picking, with a bestial choir of growls and shrieks, and extended passages of cavernous dark ambient. Aquelarre is a lost classic of unhinged, Satanic misanthropy, and you will be an eviler and grosser person for having listened to it -- which, obviously, is what we all want. Essential.

Track listing:
1. Intro / Human Extinction
2. A Cult to the Everlasting Badness
3. Intro / Form Designed to Be Evil
4. Little Known Abomination
5. A Sect at the End of the Abyss
6. Intro / Dark Language of a Supreme God
7. Drunk with the Saint's Blood
8. The Oracle of the Bleeding Head
9. Aquelarre
10. The End

Against the fucking saints
He is authority now

You might also like:

Thou Shalt Suffer -
Into the Woods of Belial (1991)

Dimentianon -
Seven Suicides (2003)

Flowers - Icehouse (1980)

Australian new wave. Icehouse is pretty much perfect. There's some goth-y brooding, some punk-tinged anthems, some angular post-punk guitar work, some synth-y nods to Low-era Bowie, and all with a cohesive overarching vision. Following this album, Flowers changed their name to Icehouse.

Track listing:
1. Icehouse
2. We Can Get Together
3. Fatman
4. Sister
5. Walls
6. Can't Help Myself
7. Skin
8. Sons
9. Boulevard
10. Nothing to Do
11. Not My Kind
12. Send Somebody

Gimme the gun

You should also listen to:

Magazine -
Secondhand Daylight (1979)

John Foxx -
Metamatic (1980)

Funeral Ghoul - Ancient Darkness (2015)

Disjointed, dissonant Hungarian black metal and synth-based dark ambient. Ancient Darkness is the first of 13 album-length demos that Funeral Ghoul, a solo project headed by a dude who calls himself Lord Aäkenrez, has released since 2015 -- all of which are available for free/pay as you will download on his bandcamp.

Track listing:
1. Ancient Darkness
2. Stench of Ruminant Dead
3. Spell from the Unknown
4. The Old Devil's Throne
5. This Thing Has Lost in Shadows
6. Call of Master
7. Night in Secret Precambrium World
8. A Melancholic Dawn
9. Satan
10. Fullmoon's Shine in a Corpse's Face

Destroy my body for eternity

You might also wanna hear:

Borgne -
III (2007)

Bestia Arcana -To Anabainon
Ek Tes Abyssu (2011)

Pelt - Ayahuasca (2001)

Raga-inspired psychedelic drone performed on a pleasingly broad palette of instruments. I've never taken ayahuasca, but I once knew someone who believed in its supposed healing powers, started taking it regularly, formed an ayahuasca-themed band, and ended up living a fully ayahuasca-centric lifestyle in the jungles of Peru. Last I heard she was training to be a shaman. So, if her experience is any indicator, it's pretty fuckin' sweet.

Track listing:
-Disc One-
1. True Vine
2. Deer Head Apparition
3. The Cuckoo
4. Deep Sunny South
5. Raga Called John, Pt. I
-Disc Two-
1. The Dream of Leaping Sharks
2. Bear Head Apparition
3. Will You Pray for Me?
4. Raga Called John, Pt. II
5. Raga Called John, Pt. III

Hippy war machine

You'll also enjoy:

Burning Star Core -
A Brighter Summer Day
(2002)

Badgerlore - Of Things Too Sorrowful
to Be Reminded of, and Things Too
Beautiful to Possess (2003)

Graven - Of Misanthropic Spirit (2000)

German black metal. Not groundbreaking in the least, but it's still a great album. Or, it's a demo, I guess. For those who like their black metal extra black metal-y.

Track listing:
1. The Ruins of My Lost Kingdom
2. Horde of the Darkened Forest
3. Nightwinds Lead My Sword
4. Forestgrave
5. Fullmoon Rites
6. Land of Thousand Sins
7. Of Misanthropic Spirit

The presence of death

More like this:

Grond -
Winterkrieger (2000)

Amnion -
Cryptic Wanderings (2008)

Les Rallizes Denudes - Heavier Than a Death in the Family (2002)

Noise-fucked Japanese psych rock. Screeching, feedback-laced guitars and super-cool, delay-heavy vocals over a patient, mantra-like rhythm section. Factor in harsh, blown-out production that's fit for a Forbidden Citadel of Spirits record, and we're looking at some ill shit.

Track listing:
1. Strong Out Deeper Than the Night
2. The Night Collectors
3. Night of the Assassins
4. Enter the Mirror
5. People Can Choose
6. Ice Fire

Night tripper

You'll also like:

Pärson Sound -
Pärson Sound (2001)

Birchville Cat Motel -
Our Love Will Destroy the World (2006)

Körgull the Exterminator - Dogs of War (2009)

Related:
Of Darkness - Death (2004)

Sloppy, poorly recorded and mixed, generic, utterly kickass Spanish blackened thrash. If you want a professional-sounding recording, maybe the new Red Hot Chili Peppers would be more up your alley -- the production's AMAZING.

Track listing:
1. Howls of War
2. The Death Squads March upon the Extermination Fields
3. Revenge of the Dead
4. Berserkers
5. Dogs of War
6. For the Glory of Tyr
7. From Hell
8. Varg the Mighty
9. Kindome of Darkness
10. Satan Bless You [Sabbat cover]

Blood must be spilled

Give these a spin, too:

Sabbat -
The Dwelling (1996)

Nocturnal -
Arrival of the Carnivore (2004)

RAH Band - Going Up (1983)

Airy, funky synthpop/disco from English producer/project mastermind Richard Anthony Hewson. They're all winners, but the super-smooth "Perfumed Garden (With Scented Strings)" is particularly mixtape-worthy -- goddamn I love that song. Makes me wanna get some neon tights and a perm, than do a bunch of cocaine.

Track listing:
1. Messages from the Stars
2. Roll Me Down to Rio
3. Perfumed Garden (With Scented Strings)
4. Hunger for Your Jungle Love '83
5. Same the Samba Man
6. Winter Love
7. Tears and Rain
8. Two Bodies
9. Party Games
10. Riding on a Fantasy

You must be from another galaxy

You'll also wanna hear:

Kimiko Kasai -
Butterfly (1979)

Teena Marie -
Starchild (1984)

Darkness Enshrouded the Mist - Forbidden Vocations (2010)

It's 4 AM, I've been high for almost six hours... you know what that means. It's time for some dark ambient, beeeach. Of the blackened, cavernous, utterly unmusical Dutch variety. (Not to be confused with Darkness Enshroud.)

Six tracks, titled "I" through "VI."

Realm of rats and pestilence

More scary sounds to play in the dark:

Mons Veneris -
Inferno (2005)

Akhlys -
Supplication (2005)