Sordid Dreams - Still Waiting EP (2011)

Bandcamp

9.3

/Psychedelia, Weird pop, Avant-pop, Crossover, Electronic, Avant-garde, Freeformfreakout/

Comment: Warped psychedelia meets heavily stomping beats, airy piano strums, noir-esque spasms, odd electronic-based developments, and dense metal roaring variegated with autotuned aspects (as just a stylistic element concluded for). Indeed, it sounds mostly as instrumental music. This Philly-based collective is already compared to Black Moth Super Rainbow - and they are actually right.

Stephan Leonard - Crown Heights (2007)

Luv Sound
Bandcamp

9.2

/Musique concrète, Microtonal, Microsound, Organic electronica, Sound-art, Experimentalism, Avant-garde/

Comment: The Berliner Stephan Leonard has released his music on tapes, Mp3s and CDr-s since the first half of 00s, and got involved in such collectives as JuliJuni, Leo Mars, and Plastic Doll. However, this one-track issue recorded in his Brooklyn apartment represents an experimental approach where burning microtonal progressions and skrees are accomplished with the organic minutiae of musique concrète, bare glitches and noisy blow-ups. Very interesting.

Sandro Marinoni - Borderline (2009)

Clinical Archives

9.0

/Bebop, Modal jazz, Free jazz, Live session, Hard bop, Improvised music, Cool jazz/

Comment: Borderline is Marinoni`s follow-up to Ten Little Songs under Clinical Archives (his is also known as part of Flames). His tenor saxophone play is clearly dominating - introducing soothing themes and conjuring up suggestive solos, which at times is intervened with bubbling and whistling, twirlingly running electronics by Stefano Roncarolo). These 9 songs represented here veer from bepop and hard bop to free improvisation/free jazz and cool jazz. By any means, these 41 minutes are really worth to give it a try.

Bed. - ame_to_wonder.ep (2011)

Totokoko

9.7

/Folktronica, Ambient, Organic electronica, Avant-folk, Dream folk, Post-pop, Experimental folk, Toytronica/

Comment: Having no distinct preference of this 11-pieced whole`s general impression, however, should it be categorized either "electronica" or "(indie) pop"/"folk music"? This can be dissected as similar as whenever you were lost in thought regarding the sound by the Icelandic elfin combo mùm. Lots of feyness is played up here via naive glockenspiel/clockwork toy-relied snippets, slow melodica-based shifts and excellent chiming guitar approach as well. Moreover, such kind of sound is the brand one for Totokoko label, a Japan-based records. All is very fine on it, from the very start to the closure point, though, my special tracks are fourth (heartbreaking harmonies!) and tenth (otherworldly soothing minimal ambientas if coming from a remote, aluminium-coated wasteland) in the song list, respectively. Thank you, Daisuke.

Romantic States - The Fourth

Pollux - Crucial (2011)

Sirona-Records

8.8

/Drum and bass, Illbient, Conceptual, Dystopbient, Avant-industrial, Big beat, Remixes, Avant-garde/

Comment: This 4-pieced remix album comes from France. Here are remixed Godspeed You! Black Emperor`s The Dead Flag Blues - showcasing it as an instance to be adrift on a vista of industrial-filled dystopic ambient/illbient. Moonengineer`s All In Your Hands starts out with slightly diffusive big beat pounding and solemn church organs running this way off into the next one. Indeed, Boards Of Canada`s Corsair gets a drum and bass (actually dream and bass)-dominated coat wrapped in a little more amplified solemnity. µ-ziq`s Fall Of Antioch continues principially in similar vein, yet getting designed through more tense, rumbling rhythmic sequences.

Aux.Out - Read Quickly (2011)

Bandcamp
Lastfm

9.3

/Slowcore, Post-rock, Experimental rock, Shoegaze, DIY, Dreamgaze, Indie rock, Experimental indie, Lo-fi, Singer-songwriter/

Comment: There is possibility to consider the music history as an array of imaginable connections made up of contributions from young, talented musicians. Garrett Mombourquette is a 17-years-old sound maker from Dartmouth, Nova Scotia, Canada who has recorded a handful of albums during a pair of last years. However, his sound can be considered shoegaze/slowcore/experimental rock-influenced singer-songwriter-ism. Here are 8 tracks which are finely accented through slowly ascending orchestrated ambiences, merely buried vocal lines, strongly emphasized guitar fingerpicks and coiling wondrous harmonic loopholes. In any cases, you can find out a wide spectre of sounds besides (marching rhythms, progressions on noise and electronics). A superb result indeed.