Miss Dinky - Melodìas Venenosas (2001)

Woozy, ambient synth abstractions from Chilean-born, NYC-residing producer Alejandra Iglesias, aka Dinky/Miss Dinky. Melodìas Venenosas is her first album, and it's a definite outlier in her discography, as from here she went in a generally more danceable/techno direction, which I admittedly haven’t really explored, as I just keep coming back to this record.

Track listing:

1. Spring Rolls

2. Perpetuidad

3. Cilantro

4. Sapos

5. Broken Dream

6. Bahia Azul

7. Chili Drama

8. Chinatown Rape

9. Nora

10. Clare de Sangre

11. Sto Domingo Dub

12. Neruda

13. Agualuz

14. Capoeira

Milk

Similar listening:

Hex - Digital Love (1993)

Locust - Weathered Well (1994)

Morgion - Cloaked by Ages, Crowned in Earth (2004)

At the beginning of the pandemic, I set aside maybe 300 records to sell, figuring it'd be a soothing house project that could end up netting me a few thousand dollars. They've been sitting in my office for almost two years now, and tomorrow I'm finally gonna take a crate down to the ol' punk/metal record store and see what's what. So I've been sorting out some of the more desirable but not particularly valuable ones -- those I'll probably sell on Discogs -- and came across this LP.

Now, I hadn't listened to this album on any format for maybe a decade, and that alone was why it got set aside, but something compelled me to give it one last spin while I folded some laundry, and fuck that, this one stays. Epic, melodic death/doom with a slightly crusty, earthy feel, a spacious, clean-guitar-heavy atmosphere, and beautiful, meditative vocals, all put together as one continuous piece. Goddamn, what other phenomenal LPs am I about to sell?

Track listing:

1. Cloaked by Ages

2. A Slow Succumbing

3. Ebb Tide

4. Trillium Rune

5. The Mourner's Oak

6. Cairn

7. She the Master Covets

8. Crowned in Earth

They are the sentient circle

The meeting point to the end

If you like this, try:

Abandon - The Dead End (2009)

Akelei - De Zwaarte van het Doorstane (2010)

Bardspec - Hydrogen (2017)

Related:

Today Is the Day - Willpower (1994)

Today Is the Day - Today Is the Day (1996)

Today Is the Day - Sadness Will Prevail (2002)

Trinacria - Travel Now Journey Infinitely (2008)

Abstract, ambient psych from this project of the great Ivar Bjørnson of Enslaved, featuring Steve Austin of Today Is the Day. Churning oceans of crystalline guitars, synth, and trance-inducing percussion for temporary removal from whatever hell you're being dragged through currently.

Track listing:

1. Deposition

2. Bone

3. Fire Tongue

4. Gamma

If you came upon a door

If you came to push it open

Also listen to:

Karl Sanders - Saurian Meditation (2004)

Sink - Ark of Contempt and Anger (2016)

Festung - Der Turm (2022)

2022 is still young, but it's already seen the release of a nice grip of great black metal records, and Der Turm is one of my favorites of that crop. Following an excellent demo, it's the first album from this German trio, and it's a near-perfect piece of epic atmospheric black metal, somewhere in the same windswept, blast-heavy vein as Paysage d'Hiver, complete with excursions into the desolate lands of dungeon synth and neofolk.

Free/name your price via bandcamp.

Track listing:

1. Mauer

2. Jericho

3. Fallt!

4. Trümmer

5. Lanze

6. Ewig

7. Wahrheit

8. Wehe uns

To forget death

You should also hear:

Svart - Våran tid är förbi (2009)

Dissonant Winds - Forestrial Transcendence (2017)

Rob Essers - Raincolors (1994)

Related:

Ron Boots, Eric van der Heijden & Friends - By Popular Demand (1993)

Synth time! Rob Essers is from Holland, and in the 90s, he had a big ol' pile of synths, and he used them to make a pair of nerdy-ass Berlin-school records, then he spontaneously combusted, I think.

Track listing:

1. The Ability to Dream

2. A Walk Through...

3. Truceless

4. Sparkles

5. Square One

6. Luscious Feelings

7. Monochromatic

8. Colors of Rain

9. Loosing Chains

10. Electrons

11. The Trivial Round of Life

Some velcro and an order of fries

More like this:

Mario Schönwälder - The Eye of the Chameleon (1989)

Redshift - Down Time (1999)

Jerry Butler - The Spice of Life (1972)

Soul singer/Impressions founder Jerry Butler's unsung magnum opus. A double album of big-hearted symphonic soul that somehow has yet to be reissued or offered on streaming services. There's no big, overarching theme at work here -- obviously, love comes up a lot, but that's pretty much par for the course for a soul record -- it's just a collection of great songs that wouldn't fit on one LP.

Track listing:

-Disc One-

1. What's So Good About It (You're My Baby)

2. If I Could Remember (Not Ever Having You)

3. I Only Have Eyes for You

4. That's the Way It Is (That's the Way It Was)

5. One Night Affair

6. A Prayer

7. Get on the Case

8. So Far Away

-Disc Two-

1. I Need You

2. You Can't Always Tell

3. Stop Steppin' on My Dreams

4. Baby I'ma Want You

5. (They Long to Be) Close to You

6. Don't Rip Me Off

7. The Masquerade Is Over / Since I Fell for You

8. All Kinds of People

You know, most folks are scared of dying

So the fear brings it near

And I see them buying books to get heaven

But they fight real hard to stay right here

You should also hear:

Jerry Peters - Blueprint for Discovery (1972)

Angelo Bond - Bondage (1975)

Dragobrath - Fra Myrer Taake (2010)

Related:

Kroda - Fimbulvinter (2007)

Coping with my weltschmerz by listening to Ukrainian black metal, including this slice of excellence from a solo project of Yulian Mytsyk, better known as a principle founding member of Kroda. Like so much great Ukrainian black metal, Fra Myrer Taake simultaneously embodies both the majestic beauty and the icy brutality of nature, never letting the listener get too comfortable with either one.

Track listing:

1. Intro

2. Inhaling the Distant Open Far...

3. Nightwings

4. Fra Myrer Taake...

5. Blazes of Starlit Firmament

6. Crimson Leaves Dance

7. Ravenclouds

8. Walk the Path of Sorrow [Satyricon cover]

By pack, they soared into night and away

More from the Ukraine:

Astrofaes - Those Whose Past Is Immortal (2006)

Ulvegr - Arctogaia (2012)

ilkae - Pistachio Island (2001)

Chilled-out sounds released by the great Merck, a Florida-based label that put out tons of great shit over a relatively short run.  Pistachio Island = 45 vignettes of ambient, beat-driven IDM, along with the artist's encouragement to play it on shuffle. This conceptually playful approach feels like a relic of a bygone era of electronic music, but sonically, the record feels like an antecedent to the whole "chill lo-fi beats" thing, only in ADHD form.

I'm not typing all that out; find the track listing here.

Warm filaments

If you like this, listen to:

Gimmik - ?!Load-Error E.P. (1997)

Opiate - While You Were Sleeping (2002)

All Sides - Dedalus (2007)

First album by All Sides, a moniker of German artist Nina Kernicke which she has since changed to Allseits. Dedalus evokes vast, dark spaces with minimal bass-lines, throbbing rhythms, and amorphous guitars.

Track listing:

1. The Idea

2. They Come by Night

3. Luv

4. Dedalus

5. The Unfinished End of H.W.

6. Mistake

7. Against the Sun

8. Runaway

9. Icarus

10. Into the Sea

11. Stay

Life is an optical illusion

If you like this, try:

The Third Eye Foundation - Semtex (1996)

Cyclobe - Luminous Darkness (1999)

Escarnium - Interitus (2016)

Dark, punishing Brazilian death metal. I kinda wrote Interitus off at first -- there was so much OSDM-worship coming out at the time, I think I was just burnt-out -- but upon revisiting, it kicks ass. Refreshingly, Escarnium weren't just aping Incantation. In fact, they're not really aping anyone in particular, although they are somewhere in the razor-sharp, subtly cerebral realm of Immolation.

Track listing:

1. The Horror

2. While the Furnace Burns

3. Starvation Death Process

4. Radioactive Doom

5. Omnis Mortuus Est - Inheritus

6. Macabre Rites

7. Genocide Ritual

8. The Gray Kingdon

9. 100 Days of Bloodbath

10. Human Waste

Piled up, entangled

In putrid human flesh

You'd probably also like:

Trauma - Imperfect Like a God (2003)

Inverted - The Age of Harvest (2015)

Mother Tongue - Open in Obscurity (1988)

A one-off collaboration between Andrew McKenzie (The Hafler Trio), influential experimental/industrial musician Z'EV, and poet/writer Dorothea Franck. Side A is an 18-minute mass of droning, textural musique concrète; Side B incorporates percussion and Franck's voice into the mix. 

Track listing:

1. Geelgalayah

2. Who

3. Wind Carved My Face

4. Lying in the Desert

5. The Humble Man

6. Heart

This is not enough

You should also hear:

Ron Geesin - Right Through (1977)

Zero Kama - The Secret Eye of L.A.Y.L.A.H. (1984)

Soultek - Dreaming Under a Starlit Sky (2009)

Related:

Intrusion - The Seduction of Silence (2009)

More immersive dub techno from another one of Chicago producer Steven Hitchell's many aliases. A hypnotic trip through a nocturnal world of echoing, soft-focus synths and pulsing, punchy beats. Once in a while, a harsher element might attempt to break through, but it quickly disperses like rain on a window.

Track listing:

1. Dreaming Under a Starlit Sky

2. Forever Feeling

3. Elektricity

4. Lighter Path

5. Clouds Overhead

6. Lost in Love

7. World of Dreams

8. Glacial Blue

Soul twist

Also listen to:

Ro70 - Ro70 (1995)

Onur Özer ‎- Kaşmir (2007)

The Lover Speaks - The Lover Speaks (1986)

Excellent, sophisticated pop rock/new wave from this short-lived English duo. The Lover Speaks were clearly aiming for the fences with their self-titled debut, and artistically, their efforts paid off -- it's what I want Spandau Ballet to be -- but the album's commercial impact was pretty much nil, and the band broke up while recording their second album. Given that they received their first industry boost by Dave Stewart of Eurythmics, it tracks that The Lover Speaks are best remembered for Annie Lennox's cover of their single, "No More 'I Love You's", which I'm pretty sure most people (in America, anyway) don't realize is a cover.

It's worth noting that, while The Lover Speaks had only two official members -- vocalist David Freeman and everything-else-ist Joseph Hughes -- The Lover Speaks was undeniably a group effort. Most significantly, there's vocalist June Miles-Kingston, whose ethereal, Elizabeth Fraser-esque singing is so prominently featured in every song that it's truly awkward that she wasn't billed as an official member.

Track listing:

1. Every Lover's Sign

2. No More "I Love You's"

3. Never to Forget You

4. Face Me and Smile

5. Absent One

6. Love Is: "I Gave You Everything"

7. "This Can't Go On"

8. Still Faking This Art of Love

9. Tremble Dancing

10. Of Tears

The language is leaving me

You'd also like:

Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark - The Pacific Age (1986)

The Dolphin Brothers - Catch the Fall (1987)

Hauschka - Substantial (2004)

First album by Hauschka, a pseudonym of German pianist/composer Volker Bertelmann. Breathtaking, minimal piano pieces with the lightest touches of layering -- a field recording here, an electronic texture here, a synth here, a second piano there. Substantial really taps into a deeply melancholic place in my psyche. Like, as far as my conscious brain is concerned, I'm good, but as soon as this record starts playing, I'm contemplating all the different paths my life could have taken, missing friends from high school who I haven't thought of in years, and mulling over all the sweet things that I should say to my loved ones but just can't ever seem to. Not sure that this is coming off like a ringing endorsement of this record, but it's supposed to be.

Track listing:

1. Orange I

2. Vielleicht

3. Golden

4. Dark I

5. Sequence I

6. Fragile

7. Wait

8. Sequence II

9. Cardiff

10. Dark II

11. Orange II

Left with a trace of all that was

You should also hear:

Bing and Ruth - Bing and Ruth (2006)

Clogs - Lantern (2006)

Strangelove - Love and Other Demons (1996)

A relatively unsung gem from the Britpop era. Love and Other Demons kicks off with the gnarled, discordant guitar squall of "Living with the Human Machines", before settling on a noire, string-laden sound to accompany the album's themes of addiction and alienation. If that description reminds you of Suede, it should: Strangelove opened for Suede on their Dog Man Star tour, and Brett Anderson sings backing vocals on a couple of tracks here. They also opened for Manic Street Preachers just before Richey Edwards' disappearance, and for Radiohead on one of their first major tours. So clearly, they were in rarified Britrock company, and they had the tunes to back up the hype, but vocalist Patrick Duff chose wellness over rock stardom -- he'd been struggling with serious addiction and mental health issues -- and ended the band shortly after their next album came out.

Track listing:

1. Living with the Human Machines

2. Beautiful Alone

3. Sway

4. 20th Century Cold

5. She's Everywhere

6. #1432

7. Casualties

8. Spiders and Flies

9. Elin's Photograph

10. The Sea of Black

A futureless peep show

You should also hear:

The Auteurs - Now I'm a Cowboy (1994)

The Tears - Here Come the Tears (2005)