As some of you surely know, I don't post download links to brand new albums, with the obvious exception of albums that the artists themselves have made available for free download. As none of you know -- unless you've been spying on me, you weird pervert -- practically all I've been listening to is new stuff. And
Steve Tibbetts while I do school work. So instead of yet another Steve Tibbetts record, these are 5
more recent favorites, and if you like one of them, please consider buckling down and actually buying it.
Scowl - Psychic Dance Routine
The first track on
Psychic Dance Routine is a flaming, head-on collision of 'traditional,' circle-pitting hardcore and hooky pop-grunge
à la Veruca Salt. The rest of the EP fleshes out that dichotomy in spectacular form. It's a blatant swing towards accessibility and a wider reach, but it's also easily my favorite thing this band has done.
Nicole Dollanganger - Married in Mount Airy
Vignettes of doomed romance, addiction, abuse, suicide, and murder via dark, surreal, undeniably Lynch-ian Americana. Dollanganger's dreamy, almost child-like voice and guitar are at the core of every song, but they're encased in layered, pitch-shifted sonics that have an unsettling, almost alien-sounding sheen. Fans of Ethel Cain should find a lot to love here.
Tujiko Noriko - Crépuscule I & II
Tujiko Noriko has been making excellent IDM/experimental pop/other electronic sounds since the turn of the millennium, and it's truly criminal that I have never posted about her on here. Her latest, Crépuscule I & II is an expansive double album of immersive, cavernous ambience: drifting, reverb-drenched synths, the odd scattered, slo-mo rhythm, and Noriko's whispery intonations.
Derhead - The Grey Zone Phobia
Dense, eerie black metal with a massive, all-consuming sound that suggests both the yawning cosmos and the crushing cacophony of urban sprawl -- quite appropriate for an album that purportedly encourages the listener to "contemplate the contrast between reality and the inner self." Labyrinthine but not overwrought, frightening singular but not self-consciously so. Undoubtedly some of the best black metal in recent memory.
Baaba Maal - Being
A seamless fusion of Senegalese desert rock and half-time electro-pop groove. Maal's vocals would be mesmerizing in virtually any context, but over distorted rhythms and subwoofer-knocking bass-lines, there are moments of true transcendence. Practically impossible to listen to at anything less than max volume.
