The soundtrack of the harvest month, is as rich as a recently reaped crop. It includes all-time familiar names as well as new ones who offered us memorable releases. We will start by praising two of the debut album releases of this month for the richness of their sound and their conceptual originality. They are the albums ‘At The Sound Of The Heart‘ by Whispering Void and ‘Sober Maal’ by De Mannen Broeders. Whispering Void, bring together WARDRUNA’s ceremonial vocals (i.e. Lindy-Fay Hella(current) and Kristian “Gaahl” Espedal (ex-member)), ENSLAVED and TRELLDOM’s prog and black metal hues. The result is truly enchanting.
De Mannen Broeders is a project that had to be created as the personal stories of AMENRA’s frontman Colin van Eeckhout and Tonnie ‘broeder’ Dieleman, a Flemish folk icon, had so many common elements, that they had to be channeled through a common outlet. The debut album is entitled ‘SOBER MAAL‘ which refers to the process of eating a simple meal to express gratitude.
During this month, we welcomed the return of A Place To Bury Strangers with yet another powerfully addictive psych rock album entitled ‘SYNTHESIZER‘. The punk side of this monthly soundtrack, represented by MESTRE and M I C H A E L, combined heavy psych elements as well as bone-cracking social realism, making the albums ‘All of you are so far‘ and ‘Nite Salad‘ and , two of the best of the year.
Finally, Godspeed You!Black Emperor resurfaced with yet a new album with a title that acknowledges the incredible loss of life in Gaza and Lebanon. The album contains six tracks that build up the energy and anticipation through carefully crafted drone/ambient compositions.
We hope you enjoy this playlist as much as we did while creating it!
Perhaps we can admit at this point that this is the best month of the year in terms of its music output and the best playlist of the year in terms of the variety of styles and energies that our favourite releases represent.
The debut albums of this month, from Virgin Vampires and Dreamless Veil, have maintained our interest in great gothic rock and extreme metal music. The former has songs infused with macabre theatricality, and the latter has bone-cracking/grief-infused vocals followed by frantic guitar solos that make us wonder how it might feel to disappear fully.
The new offering by ABU NEIN, coming from a place of profound sadness as the band has admitted, continues to haunt us with melodies that touch some very well-hidden dark chords in our psyche. The punk section of the month’s soundtrack was powerful and socially perceptive as it should be with a new single by SPRINTS, and a new album by Golpe sending rare political resistance vibes to the world from Italy.
Perhaps the most powerful noise/industrial release of the year, is the new album by Dame Area which manages to bring back the (now) rare qualities of dynamin non-hypnotic, non-repetitive industrial music. Alongside it we can enjoy the new album by Phobos Reactor, taking inspiration from powerful old-school industrial rhythms and aesthetics.
This month’s post-punk section includes powerful entries by CROWS, kontrolle and Chain Cult who stress the melodic, the vindictive and the noisy aspects of post-punk.
We believe that the darkest sonic colours were used by the releases of Diablation , Tribes of Medusa and A Swarm of The Sun this month. We believe that only a lived experience can give to people the wisdom of the layers and textures of sadness and darkness and these two albums explore all of them!
Finally, a special mention is necessary for the new albums of The Beauty of Gemina and Tindersticks. The return of Tindersticks revealed a preference for soul-infused songs and an exploration of animation and humour in their video clips.
The new album by The Beauty of Gemina, sounds very personal as if coming from a place of sadness. We have welcomed the return of the melancholic post-punk melodies in the band’s songs also evident in their visuals.
We hope that you enjoy listening to this playlist as much as we did while preparing it.
July might have been much quieter than usual, but it was not a dull month in any way. The soundtrack of the month included the release of a very promising debut single by Virgin Vampires who are warming us up for their first album that sounds as if it will be following a darkwave path. The new offering by Peace De Resistance was refreshing with its combination of socially perceptive lyrics and a glam rock attitude. The new album by The March Violets is a classic gothic rock album that should be heard on the dancefloor of any dark alternative club.
Finally the new psych-rock release by Black Market Karma is inspired by the characteristics of analogue recording equipment with the aim of making the album “…feel like a collection of discarded and worse for wear instruments came to life, refurbished themselves and started to play. The sound is an attempt to give form to the often formless feeling that is nostalgia. With songs attempting to crystallise a feeling known as ‘fernweh’. A kind of longing for a place and time you’ve never experienced, be it in this world or another.” as Stanley Belton explained.
We think that this short and sweet playlist will be a great accompaniment to a very warm evening during the hours of the sunset and we hope that you enjoy it as much as we did while preparing it!
Here we are at the end of the Spring that never came with a monthly soundtrack that probably has the most debut album entries for a long time. There are two entries that need a special mention and they are the new releases by Chameleons and Barry Adamson. Both have been keeping us wondering about a next release and here they are. Chameleons with the EP ‘Where Are You?’ -teaser of an upcoming full-length album and Barry Adamson, faithful to his soul/rock existential blues offered us ‘CUT TO BLACK’ an album that fits very well within the rest of his discography.
Another special mention is due to one of our all-time favourite bands from Italy, no other than Ataraxia who kept us very good company with a nature-inspired, ceremonial, ethereal album entitle ‘Centaurea’. We particularly liked the psych rock releases of this month, both the new single by Julie’s Haircut and the new album by The Janitors which, at times, is reminiscent of the hazy and grunge atmosphere of the music of The Stooges.
As always, we were delighted to listen to the new album by PIG, as his addictive sensual take on industrial music is always managing to make us realise that we really don’t have enough of this type of rejuvenating energy. Six years after ‘The Heretics’ Rotting Christ have come back with ‘PRO XRISTOU’, another album with big sound and big ideas, faithful to the band’s black metal character and favourite themes.
The debut albums of this month’s soundtrack prove that we are now living at a time when the quality of releases that come to us from new bands, is incredibly high. ‘YOBS’ by YOBS, ‘L’Enfant Terrible’ by L’Enfant Terrible, ‘Weaponize Tomorrow’ by MISSILES, ‘Discerning Spirits’ by A Sinister Light, all add a powerful note and reveal a fresh take on punk, coldwave and post-punk respectively.
We would like to end with a mention of the album ‘Heksescapes’ by Edward Ka Spel, an all-time favourite musician whose sonic spells accompany us like a protective spirit and the release of LEDFOOT, that hits our rock note and made us put ‘Thunder And Rain’ on our portable device so that we could listen to it on repeat.
Until next month, we hope you enjoy this as much as we did while preparing it.
A month whose soundtrack includes new albums by and also the trees, PET NEEDS and Whispering Sons is not one to pass by!
We might have had terrible cold, dark days here in London last month but great music kept us good company. With a few exceptions, most releases in February, explored existential themes as highlighted through their lyrics.
PET NEEDS have come back with yet another powerful, socially perceptive punk album that encompasses within its lyrics, everyday life scenes and thoughts of a reality consumed by existential fear. A similar path is followed by the lyrics of Whispering Sons, albeit one that has a stronger theatrical element. During February, we were delighted to listen to the debut post-punk/darkwave album by TORCH, a new band from Aarhus. and also the trees, offered us yet another beautiful album, an elegy to known and unknown sides of a city. Finally, a special mention is due, to Vera Sola , whose dark folk album ‘Peacemaker’ draws inspiration from her personal experiences and presents them using poetic, melancholic vignettes.
The psychedelic side of this month’s soundtrack is represented by the incredibly powerful album by Thee Alcoholics, whose cover is evidently inspired by pop art and some of its guitar riffs bring to mind those of Black Sabbath.
We hope you like this playlist as much as we enjoyed making it!
Unlike others, we love winter and its darkness, and we look forward to the releases of the season. The soundtrack of the first long month of the year had everything from post-folk, to metal and heavy psych. We enjoyed impressive debut releases and promising self-released music and once again we were amazed by the paths that sonic experimentation is able to open in our consciousness.
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