'Double Exposure' isn’t a departure, necessarily, but this new album contains some of the rawest and most deconstructed sounds that James Hoare – of Veronica Falls, Ultimate Painting and Proper Ornaments – has recorded to date. Principally, and for the first time, the guitars take a back seat. It’s not a ‘no guitar’ concept album by any means; it’s mostly just the way it came together. It would also be inaccurate to suggest the guitars have been banished altogether, especially after the dual six-string solo that rips through the speakers on the mighty album opener Regrets. It’s not ‘Skynyrd’ necessarily, but it’s a hairs-on-end experience for sure.

Following 2024’s gorgeous 'Backwater Collage' debut LP under the Penny Arcade nom de plume, this is a hallucinogenic experience, and the backbone of 'Double Exposure' is the drum machine that informed the songs. It’s also an album of sweet duality. For all the darkness of early highlight 'Worst Trip' – a haunting stagger through “the worst trip I ever had” – the following 'You’ve Got the Key' is a gorgeously knotty workout, so rich in a distinctly English take on psychedelia that it’s hard not to believe it was recorded to tape fifty years ago. The mood then swaps sunny psychedelics for a slice of blue-eyed soul on 'Everything’s Easy', the soundtrack to melancholic, sunshine-stained car journeys. The album features flashes of guest appearances, but for the vast majority it is an album of solo experimentalism, with gestations that bubble to life across the stereo before fading back out again. Nothing is overthought; this is an album of ideas.

The drum machines take centre stage on 'Rear View Mirror', playing out like In Rainbows-era Radiohead channelled through Silver Apples, a trip in three minutes that you can play on an infinite loop. Like so much of the album, it was recorded almost instantaneously, with a simplicity and rawness that heavy overdubs and meticulous arrangements could never achieve. It is an album high on vibe. James explains: “I was preparing to move to the south of France when half of the album was recorded. This fed into the lo-fi feel of the record; it had to be recorded quickly and that does give some of the tracks a demo-like quality.” When one of the album’s many highlights is a hazy two-minute cut called 'Instrumental No. 1', you know this is about rolling the tape and capturing the vibe.

Clicking drum machines and oozing organs interplay with different hues of guitar work, from the ragas of the George Harrison-esque 'Early Morning' to the tripped-out, smoke-drenched 'We Used to Be Good Friends'. 'Double Exposure' is an unfussy collection of songs. Closing track 'Riverside Drive' – like so many of the album’s sublimely melancholic highs – appears, fully forms, then dissolves, never outstaying its welcome and softly ringing in the ears like a daydream. It is also a fitting title. 'Double Exposure', named after the photographic technique, is layers of ideas that weren’t written as parts but rather spontaneous melodies that form their own abstract picture. The album harks somewhere between the restless experimentation of Syd Barrett and the uninhibited analogue innovations of Tim Presley as White Fence. It very much is what it is.

TRACK LISTING

1. Regrets
2. Memory Lane
3. Worst Trip
4. You've Got The Key
5. Everything's Easy
6. Early Morning
7. Rear View Mirror
8. Time
9. Instrumental No.1
10. We Used To Be Good Friends
11. Mercy
12. Riverside Drive

Darkest clouds have sealed the sky, Powerplant is back and has brewed its strongest release yet. Bridge of Sacrifice emerges from the cauldron - a fun, black metal infused journey through all that is heavy and gothic.

Powerplant, the solitary project of Ukraine-born, London-based Theo Zhykharyev, is distinguished by its giddy bass, sizzling synth lines and melancholic vocal hooks. From the lo-fi synth-punk of 2019’s breakout debut album, People in the Sun to the instrumental 2022 dungeon-synth release, Stump Soup and the kaleidoscoping Grass EP (2023), to last year’s 80’s rock explorations on the moody “Crashing Cars’ 7” and the Michael Mann-inspired Heat EP.

On Bridge of Sacrifice, Powerplant’s second full-length album, Zhykharyev once again rebrands and reinvents Powerplant as a gothic beast. Zhykharyev’s voice takes centre stage with resolute and dramatic singing, dialled in after years of touring. The familiar Gary Numan-esque synth or early Powerplant works is elaborated with orchestral strings, grand piano and heavenly choirs. Heavy and full drum sound replaces the vintage digital drum machine samples. The musical pallet is further expanded with moving cello performances by Hani Hooper, adding a grotesque cherry on top of this musical cake.

Although the new release is styled in an eerie, extreme metal fashion, Bridge of Sacrifice is Powerplant to its core. The tracks on which it runs are founded from approachable pop songwriting, and melodic vocal hooks. The album’s quest for avid genre exploration keeps the musical journey fresh, as it carries you through the depths and extremities of metal-punk, blackgaze, industrial and acoustic campfire folk. New-found malevolence is neutralised by the familiar playfulness and humour of Powerplant, which, mixed like paint, absorb the first time listener in intriguing dichotomy of confronting elements.

The production has received a major upgrade. The album was mixed and mastered by Stanley Gravett (Idles, The Horrors, High Vis) in the heart of Hackney at Holy Mountain Studios. As a result of self-recording, Powerplant’s early releases had a nostalgic lo-fi warmth, smooth and blurry around the edges. It has since grown up into a professionally assembled effort, maturing alongside Zhykharyev’s songwriting, singing and playing. Powerplant’s rich atmospheric qualities comes from the textural layering, which receive more ground to shine on, by virtue of Gravett’s precise finishing techniques. Black metal has never sounded this crisp and pronounced.

Powerplant’s new full length release is full of highlights, as well as twists and turns. Each of the eleven tracks has its own unique aspect, theme and sound. It boldly steps out of the preconceived sonic aesthetics of the moniker, exploring niche corners of music in a more pop foundation. It offers space to mosh, to reflect, to laugh and to dance in a whirlwind of themes and emotions centered round a gothic aesthetic.

TRACK LISTING

1. Bridge Of Sacrifice
2. Running Cross
3. Florida
4. Transaxtions
5. The Fork
6. Hall Of Wolves
7. Bad Moon Motel
8. Last Wheel
9. Arborglyph
10. Red Death
11. Wingspan

Third solo album from Danny & The Champions of the frontman, Danny George Wilson.

TRACK LISTING

1. Strange Weather
2. Distant Seasons
3. Masquerade
4. Before September
5. Arcade
6. Golden Decay
7. Grain Of Sand
8. I'm Lost

Since the turn of this century, perhaps no other modern composition has had a more resonant healing effect than The Disintegration Loops. Composer William Basinski’s deteriorating analog tape loops evolved from melodic symphonies to melancholic silence over a span of time that uncannily turned passing minutes into pensive lifetimes. In her foreword for the new box set reissue of The Disintegration Loops, the pioneering multimedia storyteller Laurie Anderson describes the impact of this transformation in poetic detail: “These dissolving sounds, this emptying space, has gained my complete confidence. They are taking me somewhere. I am willingly following these sounds, becoming more and more transparent.” The Disintegration Loops – Arcadia Archive Edition is an expansive new box set that includes the entire 5-hour suite of iconic work. Newly remastered from the original recordings by Josh Bonati, the hefty package includes eight vinyl records (or four CDs for the less analog-inclined) in sturdy full-color jackets featuring the restored original artwork, and a new 1000-word foreword by Laurie Anderson – all housed in a striking heavyweight, case-wrapped box. It is the ideal encapsulation of one of the 21st century’s most truly transcendent works. As Anderson concludes in her foreword, “this music has created another world, a world to be carried away in.”

TRACK LISTING

1. Dlp 1.1 (1:03:35)
2. Dlp 2.1 (10:50)
3. Dlp 2.2 (32:41)
4. Dlp 3 (41:53)
5. Dlp 4 (20:12)
6. Dlp 5 (52:19)
7. Dlp 6 (40:32)
8. Dlp 1.2 (20:41)
9. Dlp 1.3 (12:02)

A limited edition first ever pressing of Arca’s iconic '@@@@@' mixtape, the scorching of earth that preceded the launch of her 'KICK' series. Delivering 62 minutes of quantum states, this is some of her most delicate and astonishing work to date - hard, soft, emotional, brutal, sincere and playful. Presented on double vinyl with an etched D-side.

TRACK LISTING

1. Diva
2. Construct
3. Turner
4. Devastation
5. Survivors
6. Recursion
7. Monstrua
8. Bebé
9. Amputee
10. Chipilina
11. In The Face
12. Predator
13. Pacifier
14. Psychosexual
15. Mujere
16. Cypher
17. Murciélaga
18. Phantasy
19. No Lo Digas
20. Amantes
21. Membrane
22. Apuro
23. Saintly Pride
24. Avasallada
25. Dysphoria
26. Gaita
27. Form
28. Travesti
29. Heaventsent
30. X

Boomvision is an Italo-British multidisciplinary artist crafting bold, emotionally charged music that blends ambient electronics, glitchy pop, and punk-rooted DIY ethos. Their debut solo project ‘Arcade’ is a genre-fluid visual album steeped in queer identity, modern mythology, and emotional storytelling. Entirely self-conceived and co-produced, the album introduces Boomvision as a powerful new creative voice: visionary, vulnerable, and defiantly original.

TRACK LISTING

1. ELIZA/KEN
2. ROSE
3. HADOUKEN
4. HONDA
5. CHUN LI
6. BLANKA
7. RYU
8. BISON

Sleep Token returns with 'Even In Arcadia', their fourth offering and first under RCA Records. This new chapter follows 'Take Me Back To Eden' and continues the unfolding journey, where Sleep Token further intertwines the boundaries of sound and emotion, dissolving into something otherworldly.

TRACK LISTING

1. Look To Windward
2. Emergence
3. Past Self
4. Dangerous
5. Caramel
6. Even In Arcadia
7. Provider
8. Damocles
9. Gethsemane
10. Infinite Baths

Composed of 10 new tracks and clocking in at 42 minutes, 'Pink Elephant' is produced by Win Butler, Régine Chassagne and Daniel Lanois.

When experienced in its entirety, 'Pink Elephant' invites the listener on a sonic odyssey – a quest for life – that exists within the perception of the individual, a meditation on both darkness and light, the beauty within. The layers of this condensed epic unfold to reveal new dimensions with each successive listen.

TRACK LISTING

1. Open Your Heart Or Die Trying
2. Pink Elephant
3. Year Of The Snake
4. Circle Of Trust
5. Alien Nation
6. Beyond Salvation
7. Ride Or Die
8. I Love Her Shadow
9. She Cries Diamond Rain
10. Stuck In My Head

Zen Arcade is the second studio album by American punk rock band Hüsker Dü, released in July 1984 on SST Records. Originally released as a double album on two vinyl LPs, Zen Arcade tells the story of a young boy who runs away from an unfulfilling home life, only to find the world outside is even worse.

An absolute bonafide 10/10 classic album…

Bob Mould - Electric and Acoustic Guitars, Vocals, Percussion and Piano
Greg Norton - Bass and Vocals
Grant Hart - Drums, Vocals, Percussion and Piano

Produced and Engineered by Spot and Husker Du.
Recorded and Mixed in October 1983 at Total Access - Redondo Beach, CA.

TRACK LISTING

Something I Learned Today
Broken Home Broken Heart
Never Talking To You Again
Chartered Trips
Dreams Reoccurring
Indecision Time
Hare Krsna
Beyond The Threshold
Pride
I'll Never Forget You
The Biggest Lie
What's Going On
Masochism World
Standing By The Sea
Somewhere
One Step At A Time
Pink Turns To Blue
Newest Industry
Monday Will Never Be The Same
Whatever
The Tooth Fairy And The Princess
Turn On The News
Reoccurring Dreams

For nearly four decades, Alison Krauss & Union Station have upheld their legacy as one of the most influential and widely celebrated acts in bluegrass and roots music. Krauss is a 27-time Grammy winner and was inducted into the Bluegrass Music Hall of Fame in 2021. Known for an immaculately crafted but endlessly surprising sound that transcends the boundaries of roots, country, rock & roll, and pop, Alison Krauss & Union Station are making their long-awaited return with 'Arcadia' – their first LP since the 2011 masterpiece 'Paper Airplane'—a critically lauded, multiple Grammy Award winning LP that debuted at #1 on the Billboard Country, Bluegrass, and Folk Album charts. 

'Arcadia' was produced by Alison Krauss & Union Station with additional production by 10-time Grammy winning producer Gary Paczosa, who has worked extensively with the band. The players – Alison Krauss (fiddle, lead vocal), Jerry Douglas (Dobro, lap steel, vocals), Ron Block (banjo, guitar, vocals), Barry Bales (bass, vocals), and welcoming highly acclaimed and celebrated tenor vocalist Russell Moore (guitar, mandolin, lead vocal) as the newest member – are five distinct personalities, each of whom also enjoys a flourishing solo career. But when they come together, they transform into a peerless group of musicians who share a singular focus.

TRACK LISTING

1. Looks Like The End Of The Road
2. The Hangman
3. The Wrong Way
4. Granite Mills
5. One Ray Of Shine
6. Richmond On The James
7. North Side Gal
8. Forever
9. Snow
10. There's A Light Up Ahead

The Faint do it their way.

Before Electroclash and the wave of 00's Dance-rock there was The Faint, emerging in the late 1990s in Omaha, Nebraska - a place known more for stoic practicality than synth-punk. In that unlikely setting of beige restraint, they pioneered a sound that combined the melodic essence of new wave, the raw edge of post-punk, and the robotic futurism of Detroit electro. Breaking free from indie rock’s humble comfort, they arrived armed with synths, dark eyeliner, and a raw, frenetic energy that dared audiences to actually feel something real, something primal. The late ’90s and early 2000s indie scene was primed for a shock, and The Faint delivered - not just as a band, but as an invitation to cast off coolness, to sweat, to move, and to live fully in the moment.

The distinctive, synth-driven sound that brought The Faint to wide acclaim first surfaced on 1999's 'Blank-Wave Arcade'. The album was raw and daring, striking its own chord between early synth-pop pioneers (The Human League, New Order) and more recent heroes like Fugazi and Sonic Youth. The band's blend of new wave, post-punk and the DIY spirit of the independent music they were a part of was trailblazing, and when the new millennium dawned that sound took hold of the zeitgeist, launching the band to new critical commercial peaks with the release of their follow up 'Danse Macabre' and 2004's 'Wet From Birth'.

Twenty-five years removed from its release, The Faint are returning to announce a reissue of 'Blank-Wave Arcade'. The reissue includes the original release - meticulously remastered for vinyl from the original tapes by Justin Shturtz at Sterling Sound - a new remix from the band, remixes from the era, live tracks, and a rarity previously only available on an out of print 7”. 

TRACK LISTING

1. Sex Is Personal
2. Call Call
3. Victim Convenience
4. The Passives
5. Worked Up So Sexual
6. Cars Pass In Cold Blood
7. Casual Sex
8. In Concert
9. Sealed Human
10. Cars Pass In Cold Blood (Recordist Remix)
11. Worked Up So Sexual (The Laces Remix)
12. The Passives (AJ/DJ Remix)
13. In Concert (The New Gender Remix)
14. Call Call (Transistor3 Remix)
15. Sealed Human (][’m Remix)
16. Sex Is Personal (The Faint 2024 Remix)
17. Brokers, Priests, And Analysts
18. Cars Pass In Cold Blood (Live)
19. In Concert (The New Gender Remix (Live))
20. Call Call (Live)

Hailing from a place of ancient mariners' secret coves and vast moors beaten by the wind and rain, Backwater Collage is James Hoare's first solo album under the name of Penny Arcade.

Despite leaving London for the West country he grew up in, the Englishman is no stranger to the scene. He has been wandering around as if awakened from a long, not-so-peaceful sleep for some time now. You have most probably come across his washed-out blue eyes several times, in projects including Veronica Falls, The Proper Ornaments and Ultimate Painting.

For this dreamy, hand-stitched record, Hoare has taken his time. Maybe because he had to rescue his songs from various recording sessions tinged with a number of mishaps he amusedly admits he is accustomed to: broken multitracks, failing tape machines, rarely available drummers living in the capital. The eleven intimate and solitary songs which make up the album, delivered in the greatest home recording tradition, are nonetheless cautiously produced. James unfurls pure, uncluttered melodies in which his gentle, melancholic voice mingles with smooth, warm vocals by Nathalia Bruno. Barely saturated guitar solos sometimes disrupt the clear, unpolished musical line. Hopping onboard, longtime friend Max Claps has added keyboard parts which manage to embrace the minimal nostalgia of the tracks while preventing any teary pathos. Similar to Jack Name or Syd Barrett – only less psychedelic – in terms of songwriting and stripped back atmosphere, Hoare is sitting on the Velvet Underground's black-and-white sofa and gives his album a subter- ranean feel. At times restless but light-footed, deprived of any unnecessary effects, the record follows in the steps of a less noisy but just as raw and unadorned Jesus and Mary Chain.

With Backwater Collage, alone at the helm under a stormy sky, James Hoare invites his listeners to s ettle in the sheltered comfort of a cup of tea.

TRACK LISTING

A1. Jona
A2. Don’t Cry No Tears
A3. Want You Around
A4. Dear John
A5. Prodigal Son
A6. When The Feeling Is Gone
B1. Black Cloud
B2. Mr. Softie
B3. Dennis
B4. Garage Instrumental
B5. One More

Ramona Lisa was an early alias of Chairlift's Caroline Polachek. This is Polachek’s first self-produced solo record. Completely composed in MIDI, it is a concept album of love songs that are nature allegories, and vice versa, which Polachek calls "Pastoral Electronic Music". The making of Arcadia was a year¬long process that began and ended in an empty studio in Rome's Villa Medici and while on tour with her band, Chairlift. The record was made entirely on a laptop without instruments or external microphones - all vocals were sung directly into the computer, making use of hotel closets, quiet airport gates, and spare dressing rooms. Although the album was created on a laptop, the result is a lush and uncannily tangible world of warm textures, reminiscent of analog tape processes rather than a hard drive. Virtual oboes and organs interweave with synthetic insects and quivering sine waves, animated by Polachek's vocal at it's most delirious and intimate yet.

TRACK LISTING

1. Dominic
2. Arcadia
3. Backwards And Upwards
4. Arcadia Reprise
5. Izzit True What They Tell Me
6. Getaway Ride
7. Wing Of The Parapets
8. Avenues
9. Lady's Got Gills
10. I Love Our World
11. Hissing Pipes At Dawn

Denver producer and visual artist John T. Hastings aka RUMTUM returns to Bastard Jazz for his second album on the label, "Arcadian Daze". The album is a contemplative drive down a nostalgic highway, reflecting on a period of his late adolescence growing up in Ohio, spending time at Arcadia Beach on Lake Erie and discovering the likes DJ Shadow, Madlib, Fila Brazilla, early Four Tet, the original Ninja Tune roster and more. Revisiting these coming of age memories, John purchased an older MPC 2000XL and set out to musically capture the excitement of putting his first nascent loops together, inspired by this pivotal era of electronic music that has since birthed movements like such as Lo-Fi/Chillhop, Vaporwave, LA's mid-2000s Beat Scene / Low End Theory, etc.

The end result of "Arcadian Daze" is indeed filled with that nostalgic spirit paying homage to those aforementioned sounds, but also presents a forward thinking musical palate that's very much grounded in RUMTUM's sensibilities as a producer and time spent learning to program new & vintage outboard gear. The album moves away from the warm, dreamy sounds of last year's "Isles in Indigo" LP, and touches more into a mystical, pensive vibe with elements of darkness and light.

TRACK LISTING

1. No Drugs Needed
2. Echo Drift
3. Arcadian Daze
4. Utopia Dock Lab 1986
5. Bike Race To Nowhere
6. Under 1000 Clouds
7. Pier Light
8. Vapor Sun
9. DaBrye Squared
10. Life In Reverse
11. Sand Spirit

‘Barefoot On Diamond Road’ is the third album from Dutch singer/songwriter Amber Arcades. A record of engaging maturity, filled with slow motion builds and epic lifts that elevate it to dizzying heights.

Immersed in an all-consuming wall of sound, ‘Barefoot On Diamond Road’ is like My Bloody Valentine gone acoustic, it shouldn’t work but it does; it’s a juxtaposition of textures, from skittery, uneasy dancefloor beats to symphonic kosmische, a baroque pop tapestry side-stitched with cellos and harps with a plaintive steel guitar echoing in the distance.

Conceived remotely with original sparring partner Ben Greenberg (Danny Elfman, Depeche, Ryley Walker) in New York and Annelotte in Amsterdam. It’s a coming of age set in a new town with a new positivity underpinning her, as ever, beautifully crafted and highly personal observations on life, love and how it all should or could work.

“This record really reveals parts of me and my relationship with being a musician and making music. It’s like a reckoning, more in the moment, realizing how important it is to do things for the right reasons and how that can change your process into one that embraces what exists, including yourself.”

Amber Arcades’ new album ‘Barefoot On Diamond Road’ marks a new phase for a highly respected musician.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Amber Arcades' third album sees Annelotte de Graaf eschewing to some degree the woozy acoustic balladry of the brilliant 'European Heartbreak' for a much more electronic influenced sound, with fractured pads and grand percussion working their way underneath De Graaf's hypnotic vocals. It's a new direction, but couldn't be any more appropriate a development for a musician of her calibre.

TRACK LISTING

Side A
A1 Diamond Road
A2 Odd To Even
A3 Contain
A4 Water Stains
A5 Life Is Coming Home
Side B
B1 Through
B2 True Love
B3 Just Like Me
B4 I'm Not There
B5 You Could Never Let Me Down

“Recorded at Zebulon in Los Angeles as a warm-up show for a show I had booked in Holland. What was meant to be a jumping point for the ‘first show’ ended up being a real burning set. A slightly more stripped-down version on the ten piece band [Bent Arcana] (for sake of ease) keeps it nice and concise. Nerves sometimes bring out these little lost jewels of which this recording is full of…gotta love improvisation for fleeting moments.

“Recorded super-hot by none other than our sound person Liza Boldyreva. Selections of songs from Bent Arcana and Moon-Drenched-cockpit stoned space jazz here you come. Mixed by John Dwyer and mastered by JJ Golden. This hunky double disk sports a zoetropic screen-printed animation of the Death’s Head moth circling on its D side that works with a strobe light off yer phone...fucking cool. Fucking hot. Dig in and be well. ” - John Dwyer.

TRACK LISTING

1. The Gate
2. Misanthrope Gets Lunch
3. Oblivion Sigil
4. The War Clock
5. Psychic Liberation

Produced and recorded by Arca, The complete Kick Cycle; KICK ii – kiCK iiiii. The Grammy nominated Venezuelan star, showcasing the multiplicity of her artistry. The distinct collections span moods and modes, featuring her visionary avant-garde cyber-reggaeton production, operatic range, unexpected collaborations (including Sia, Shirley Manson, Oliver Coates, Planningtorock, Ryuichi Sakamoto), and a boundary-smashing approach to genre and identity.

TRACK LISTING

Side A
Doña
Prada
Rakata
Tiro
Luna Llena
Lethargy

Side B
Araña
Femme
Muñecas
Confianza
Born Yesterday Ft. Sia
Andro

Produced and recorded by Arca, The complete Kick Cycle; KICK ii – kiCK iiiii. The Grammy nominated Venezuelan star, showcasing the multiplicity of her artistry. The distinct collections span moods and modes, featuring her visionary avant-garde cyber-reggaeton production, operatic range, unexpected collaborations (including Sia, Shirley Manson, Oliver Coates, Planningtorock, Ryuichi Sakamoto), and a boundary-smashing approach to genre and identity.

TRACK LISTING

Side A
Bruja
Incendio
Morbo
Fiera
Skullqueen
Electra Rex
Ripples

Side B
Rubberneck
Señorita
My 2
Intimate Flesh
Joya

Produced and recorded by Arca, The complete Kick Cycle; KICK ii – kiCK iiiii. The Grammy nominated Venezuelan star, showcasing the multiplicity of her artistry. The distinct collections span moods and modes, featuring her visionary avant-garde cyber-reggaeton production, operatic range, unexpected collaborations (including Sia, Shirley Manson, Oliver Coates, Planningtorock, Ryuichi Sakamoto), and a boundary-smashing approach to genre and identity.

TRACK LISTING

Side A
Whoresong
Esuna Ft. Oliver Coates
Xenomorphgirl
Queer Ft. Planningtorock
Witch Ft No Bra
Hija

Side B
Boquifloja
Alien Inside Ft. Shirley Manson
Altar
Lost Woman Found
Paw

Produced and recorded by Arca, The complete Kick Cycle; KICK ii – kiCK iiiii. The Grammy nominated Venezuelan star, showcasing the multiplicity of her artistry. The distinct collections span moods and modes, featuring her visionary avant-garde cyber-reggaeton production, operatic range, unexpected collaborations (including Sia, Shirley Manson, Oliver Coates, Planningtorock, Ryuichi Sakamoto), and a boundary-smashing approach to genre and identity.

TRACK LISTING

Side A
In The Face
Pu
Chiquito
Estrogen
Ether
Amrep
Sanctuary Ft. Ryuichi Sakamoto

Side B
Tierno
Músculos
La Infinita
Fireprayer
Crown

Produced by Nigel Godrich, Win & Régine, and recorded in multiple locales including New Orleans, El Paso and Mount Desert Island, WE paradoxically distills “the longest we’ve ever spent writing, uninterrupted, probably ever" (per the band’s Win Butler) into a concise 40 minute epic – one as much about the forces that threaten to pull us away from the people we love, as it is inspired by the urgent need to overcome them. WE’s cathartic journey follows a definable arc from darkness into light over the course of seven songs divided into two distinct sides -- Side “I” channeling the fear and loneliness of isolation, and Side “WE” expressing the joy and power of reconnection.

On the album’s cover, a photograph of a human eye by the artist JR evokes Sagittarius A*, the supermassive black hole at the center of the galaxy. This stunning image -- embellished by the distinctive airbrush color tinting of Terry Pastor (utilizing the same physical technique he employed on David Bowie’s iconic Hunky Dory and Ziggy Stardust covers) – is the visual expression of WE.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: 'We' takes Arcade Fire back to their orchestral roots, eschewing the mind-bogglingly diverse range of sounds on 2017's 'Everything Now'. Pieces here sound like classic Arcade Fire but imbued with the real-world concept of tension and release, manifested as a taut musical energy offset by a jubilant orchestral bliss. Massive and euphoric and quintessentially Arcade Fire.

TRACK LISTING

“I”
1. Age Of Anxiety I
2. Age Of Anxiety II (Rabbit Hole)
3. End Of The Empire I-IV
“WE”
1. The Lightning I, II
2. Unconditional I (Lookout Kid)
3. Unconditional II (Race And Religion)
4. WE

Ft. John Dwyer, Ryan Sawyer, Peter Kerlin, Tom Dolas, Brad Caulkins, Kyp Malone & Marcos Rodriguez “This is the first interstellar transmission from five days of electrified and improvised sessions recorded at Stu-Stu-Studio, edited down to forty minutes for your earballs. “Bent Arcana is the inceptive chapter in what I hope to be several releases showcasing these types of off-the-cuff musical compositions. So you can try your fry on and turn off. This one is very much on the ECM / ’70s hard fusion / prog-kraut tip. It is a many pronged weapon, swung by the spontaneous sentinel.” —John Dwyer

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Jazzy hooks and careering free-psych freakouts are tempered by more restrained moments of groove that only the culmination of talent such as this can achieve. A group perfectly in tune with the skills and intentions of all the rest is an exciting prospect indeed. Bent Arcana is a force to be reckoned with.

TRACK LISTING

1. The Gate
2. Outr? Sorcellerie
3. Misanthrophe Gets Lunch
4. Mimi
5. Oblivion Sigil
6. Sprites

Produced and recorded by Arca, KiCk i defines a new era of multiplex harmony for the Venezuelan artist, singer, DJ, performer and experimental music composer. With appearances from Björk, Rosalía, Shygirl and SOPHIE, this is the first time Arca has invited collaborators into her world, previously having lent her sound to some of the decades most avant-pop artists. With the release of “Nonbinary” kicking off the new era, today Arca shares the first single from KiCk i called “Time”:

“Time” originally premiered in September 2019 at Arca’s Mutant;Faith, a four-part experimental performance cycle at the new NYC performing arts space The Shed. The performance “stood to prove why Arca’s work is beyond innovative, and why her vision for the future of pop is so thrilling,” declared them., with Pitchfork revering Arca’s ability to “continue to create a singular world.” Captured on the fourth-day of Mutant;Faith performance cycle, the video for “Time” was conceptualized by Arca, Carlos Sáez and MANSON, who directed the video in front of a live audience at The Shed and on the streets of NYC.

KiCk i is a celebration not only of the joy Arca’s been able to find in her life, but the sometimes arduous journey it took for her to find it. Her struggles to reconcile her Venezuelan heritage and her trans Latinx identity emerge as reggaetón and pop en Español. But KiCk i isn’t just a pop record, or an experimental record, or even simply a mix between the two, but rather all of them at once- and so much more. Depending on where you drop the needle you’ll find bubblegum, harsh noise, electronic psychedelia, balladry, bangers, laughter, tears, passion, and expressions of faith - sounds and ideas that don’t simply blend together, but coexist simultaneously in quantum superposition made possible inside the sonic worlds Arca builds in her music.

“I don't want to be tied to one genre,” Arca explains. “I don't want to be labeled as one thing.” Where she is now, being nonbinary doesn’t end with her gender identity. It’s become a mindset where no one thing has to be just one thing, where multiple meanings, multiple realities can coexist in superposed balance. In this space between states, where one thing is the other, Arca has discovered a vast field of untapped creative power. KiCk i is the sound of her plugging in.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Venezuelan sound artist and synthpop wunderkind Arca brings all of the heat from their hugely popular last two releases into the first of a quadrilogy of releases. If this is anything to go by, it's sure to take the synth world by storm. Vapourwave meets glitch via everything else.

TRACK LISTING

1. Nonbinary
2. Time
3. Mequetrefe
4. Riquiqui
5. Calor
6. Afterwards Ft. Björk
7. Watch Ft. Shygirl
8. KLK Ft. Rosalía
9. Rip The Slit
10. La Chíqui Ft. SOPHIE
11. Machote
12. No Queda Nada

"It’s about the concepts and stories we invent to understand our experienced reality and feel like we matter somehow, and about the fluid and sometimes contradictory nature of these stories. Like the concept of romantic love, for example. Is this actually a thing? Sometimes it seems so tangible it becomes my whole world, other times I’m convinced it’s just a scam I keep falling for. Both of these sentiments feel equally true at different times. The same with politics and identity. When I’m in the Netherlands I don’t really pay much attention to being “Dutch” or “European”, and I think politicians who focus on a shared Dutch culture are lame at best and dangerous at worst. Then when I’m in the US being Dutch all of a sudden seems to be a huge part of my identity. I guess the point is, whatever idea I have about myself or about love, politics, morality, and anything at all, is so fluid and relative that I’m finding it hard to say that I trust any of my own views, ideas or perceptions anymore. Which sucks, because I really want to find meaning to this life, and it’s hard to find that when you don’t trust any of your own experiences. For example, happiness: I have this Calvinistic idea that in order to achieve happiness, I have to struggle, I have to earn it by overcoming challenges, developing myself, etc. But the end-result will just be the same as if I did nothing: you die and then nothing you’ve done or achieved matters anymore. So does a human life move upwards towards a certain goal, or is it just a chain of random events? And what about our collective history, does it move towards a goal, is there progress, or is it just a random collection of events? I think most people like to think there is progress, both in their personal life as well as in the world at large, that we are working towards being a better more developed person and also towards collectively building a better world. At the same time, we tend to romanticize the past and think everything was better “back in the days”. Something I’ve always wondered is whether these concepts and experiences can be translated from the individual to the masses, and from the psychological to the physical. For example this last sentiment: that the past somehow always feels like it was better in some way than the present. I’m definitely guilty of this on a personal level. When I think about being a kid and growing up, all those memories are kind of covered in a warm and golden haze. You remember the good stuff very clearly, and all those moments when you were just bored sitting in front of the TV or staring at the clock in school waiting for the bell to ring kind of fade away, even though that was probably about 50% of your time being a kid. This same process seems to happen in whole nations, too, where we collectively decide that the past was better than the present and we feel the need to “take back control” or “make something great again” and all that jazz. And the same with romantic love. The minute you’ve broken up with someone and you’ve walked out the door, you start to idealize and romanticize what it was like being in that relationship and forget about all the fucked up thing that came with it. In a way it makes sense to romanticize the past. Maybe it’s one way to feel like the time we’ve spent in this mortal life was worth something, that it wasn’t all bad. We need to be able to tell a story about it, if we encounter a challenge we want to feel like it meant something, it made us grow. Just accepting that some bad shit happened to us for no good reason is hard. It’s pretty impressive how positive and hopeful we are as a species. Just like most of the movies we make always have a happy ending. It wouldn’t feel right if they didn’t. And even in these times, when we’re apparently on the brink of a sixth wave of extinction, climate scientists who say that they are certain the human species doesn’t have much of a future still also say they are sure something will happen or be invented to save us, even if they have no idea what or how. In a way being a tourist is like a condensed version of all these hopes and dreams and disappointments. We went on a road trip in California right after we finished recording in LA and it was pretty fascinating. Like, why do people even go on vacation? I guess for a lot of people it’s a way to escape fixed patterns, to go out and have “real experiences”, to “feel alive”. But then you’re on this road trip and internally you’re still the same old human, who is still plagued by the same insecurities and boredom and is wondering where the nearest bathroom is and are we there yet because it’s so hot in the car and the AC sucks.

And voila, I guess the record is about my personal, mundane, relative and subjective experience of the human condition so far in this life." - Amber Arcades

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: It sounds amazing, beautiful nuanced journeys through acoustic balladry and heavier, driven sections, bolstered with those unmistakeable vox.

Now that that's out of the way, how many yellow suits does De Graaf have? Having seen them play, and seen her sporting the exact same costume, it made me wonder how i've never seen one in the wild but would assume that being on tour, she must have a few? You should buy this anyway, it's dead good.

TRACK LISTING

1 Simple Song
2 Hardly Knew
3 Oh My Love (What Have We Done)
4 Goodnight Europe
5 Alpine Town
6 I've Done The Best
7 Self-Portrait In A Car At Night
8 Something's Gonna Take Your Love Away
9 Antoine
10 Where Did You Go
11 Baby, Eternity

Our review from 2007 - Building on – rather than shrinking from – their tenure as coolest rock band on the planet, Montreal's finest follow up "Funeral" with a record at once more furious, more melancholy and more widescreen. Drawing strength from their solidarity and unique musical empathy, "Neon Bible" is borne of the same impulse that fired Echo And The Bunnymen to record "Ocean Rain"; epic choruses played from the bottom of Arctic caverns by a junk-shop orchestra. The subject matter manages to encompass the personal and political without missing a beat, state-of-the-nation addresses and post-millennium blues in the same heartbeat. The result is a record destined to fill teenage bedrooms and concert arenas alike.

Arcade Fire return for their latest album since 2013's 'Reflektor', Quickly following the snap-release of their 'Everything Now' 12" released last month, 'Everything Now' (the album) bursts into the limelight. 'Everything_Now (continued)' precedes 'Everything Now' (i'm sensing a theme here), both of them working together to ease you back into the orchestral, epic ways Arcade Fire have long been known for. As soon as we kick in to the titular piece proper, we get longing but upbeat piano blazing a path melodically for Butler's unmistakeable vocal affectations, before introducing swarming strings and frantic pizzicato bass. It's not surprising that the piece ebbs and flows through minimalistic orchestral lulls to euphoric, instrumentally dense passages with ease, that being the Fire's Raison d'être, and it is achieved without any trouble here.

'Signs Of Life' walks a little more towards the disco dancefloor end of the spectrum, with old-school hip-hop affectations segueing easily into stabbing horns and rolling, grooving bass guitar. It's another sign of a well-heeled group of composers that they can flit between their oft-repeated (but unmistakeable) trademark sound and something a little more off-piste.  

Move On a little bit, and 'Chemistry' is a blazing walk across a tropical Caribbean beach, with throbbing tropical percussion ducking the rest of the instrumentation, lending a noticeable compressor thump. Saturated, balmy swarms of reverb lurching into distorted guitar and multi-part vocal harmonisation for the call-response chorus.  

While the duo of 'Infinite Content' and 'Infinite_content' seem identical (try telling that to a C++ programmer), they actually represent different sides of the same coin, with the blazing post-punk distorted power chords of the former being re-interpreted by the same band but on a beach, mojito in hand, and sun blazing down for the underscored iteration. 

As we roll into the latter half of the album, 'Electric Blue' cuts an impressive shape with it's neon synths and treble-heavy falsetto putting things firmly into 70's disco territory, while the pulsing motorik rhythms and gothic sulk of 'Put Your Money On Me' and the stunningly evocative atmospheric longing of 'We Don't Deserve Love' are bookended with a closing version of 'Everything Now (continued)' but this time, minus the underscore. Details are everything (now). 

TRACK LISTING

1. Everything_Now (Continued)
2. Everything Now
3. Signs Of Life
4. Creature Comfort
5. Peter Pan
6. Chemistry 
7. Infinite Content
8. Infinite_Content
9. Electric Blue
10. Good God Damn
11. Put Your Money On Me
12. We Dont' Deserve Love
13. Everything Now (Continued) 

“Here’s my voice and all my guts: feel free to judge it. It’s like a bullfight: you’re watching emotional violence for pleasure. So this is a character who, almost as a mockery of the transaction, goes uncomfortably deep, into selfmutilation. ‘You want gore? Here’s gore.’” - Arca on ‘Arca’

Arca releases his third full length album. The selftitled record will be the Venezuela-born, London based artist’s first on XL Recordings and follows the release of his two previous albums: 2014’s ‘Xen’ and 2015’s ‘Mutant’

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Riding the spooky post-dubstep wave, Arca smashed it out of the park with 'Mutant' and this is unbelievably, one step further. Futuristic swarms of crackling percussion, constantly evolving synthwork and haunting omnipresent vocals. Deeply rewarding downbeat synth anthems.

TRACK LISTING

Piel
Anoche
Saunter
Urchin
Reverie
Castration
Sin Rumbo
Coraje
Whip
Desafío
Fugaces
Miel
Child

‘Garden Of The Arcane Delights’ / ‘The John Peel Sessions’: ‘Garden Of The Arcane Delights’ is the only EP released by Dead Can Dance, coming out in 1984 and acting as a bridge between their first two albums. Its sleeve a sketch by Brendan Perry, depicting “primal man deprived of perception, standing within the confines of a garden containing a fountain and trees laden with fruit... a Blakean universe in which mankind can only redeem itself, can only rid itself of blindness, through the correct interpretation of signs and events that permeate the fabric of nature’s laws.”

This new expanded version sees the EP faithfully pressed on to one piece of a vinyl at 45rpm with a second disc being added, compiling both of the band’s sessions for John Peel, recorded in the same time period.

Kermit Leveridge was an original British B-boy, a Ruthless Rap Assassin whose rhymes were hailed by Roots Manuva as the “the roots of grime.” A subsequent founder member of Black Grape, alongside ex-Happy Mondays frontman Shaun Ryder, Kermit scored a number one album in the UK charts.

When hedonism took him to the brink of selfdestruction, writing music kept Kermit going through his introspective recovery and when he was finally fit enough to return he had amassed a wealth of material aching to break out of his countless notepads.

Featuring swooping, choppy strings and a rolling, funky hip hop style break, 'Give It Away' is brought to life by the commanding voice of London-based songstress BB James and delicately supplemented by The Reynolds. Includes 'Club Dub', 'Radio Mix' and 'Radio Radio Mix'

Our Review from 2004 - Get ready for a splendid new band, everybody. Their sound is a mixture of Canadian folk, new-wave disco beats, quirky David Byrne-ish vocals, Pixies' agression, Mercury Rev's sense of magic, big band drama, organic chamber pop and just an all round multi-instrumental sense of anything's possible, that you'll be setting up your own toy orchestra and playing along. Though talented players, and loads play on this record, it's this sense of fun and cookiness that pervades; this lot are clever but well beyond cool. It's music ripe with the joys of music-making. And the songs are really catchy. that always helps. Maybe chuck a bit of Sugarcubes and a bit of New Order even, into their melting pot, stir in with crashing operatic crescendos and tiny, sweet lullabies and you'll be a little bit nearer to the sound of this band. They're making a splash Stateside. It's obvious why.