Category: Music

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Music

Sevdaliza – Habibi

Habibi, the new single from Iranian-Dutch singer, songwriter and record producer Sevdaliza, is extraordinarily good. Beautiful, delicate piano and her trademark otherworldly strings pitched against churning, seething, raging background atmospherics and the occasional apocalyptic bass note to remind you not to get too comfortable. It’s a masterclass in tension and a reminder that Sevdaliza is operating in a space entirely of her own making.

https://www.sevdaliza.com

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Music

A. G. Cook – Acid Angel

If you’re not familiar with him, A. G. Cook made his name as the founder and head of PC Music, which is either one of the most groundbreaking labels of the last decade, or an infuriating in-joke that should be erased from history, depending on your point of view. Over the last few years he’s become one of the go-to producers for Charli XCX, and together they’ve made some quite astonishing pop. Acid Anger is taken from his new album 7G (which comes in at a frankly intimidating 49 tracks and 2+ hours) and reminds me quite a lot of Mylo’s Destroy Rock & Roll in its glitchy treatment of vocals, with a dose of glacial Aphex-esque melodies thrown in for good measure.

https://agcook.bandcamp.com

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Music

Tomberlin – Wasted

Tomberlin’s 2018 debut album At Weddings is without doubt one of my favourite of the last few years, and one I go back to on a pretty much weekly basis. It’s stripped down, fairly mournful folk: utterly beautiful and almost unbearably sad in parts. By contrast, her latest single is positively upbeat, at least in its buoyant rhythm and big, open melodies. But lyrically there’s still that same sense of melancholy that makes her work so personal and unique: “I try to write it out / Make sure nothing sounds weird / Make sure it’s not half bad / Do you think this songs sad?” The answer? Yes, a little, and I’m very much looking forward to the new EP Projections which is due out 16 October via Saddle Creek. 

https://tomberlin.bandcamp.com/

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Music

Loscil – Coasts

I watched The Lighthouse last night, so the sound of rolling waves at the start of Coasts immediately caught my attention. But while the film is a claustrophobic, paranoid, hallucinatory nightmare (but also really good, honestly), Coasts – from Loscil’s most recent EP Faults, Coasts, Lines – is expansive and soothing: more akin to a glassy lake than a churning sea. It’s ambient at its most tranquil and conciliatory and is really rather wonderful.

https://loscil.bandcamp.com

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Music

Black Noi$e – Glitch feat. duendita

Nova Scotia-born and Detroit-raised producerBlack Noi$e put out his debut album OBLIVION last week on Earl Sweatshirt’s Tan Cressida label which, over the course of an extremely lean 24 minutes, is packed with some pretty punchy features, including Danny Brown, Mr. Sweatshirt himself, and my personal favourite, duendita. Glitch is moody and sinister, built from tight loops and even tighter drums, with duendita’s vocal moving from low drawl to soaring melodies absolutely effortlessly.

https://blackxnoise.bandcamp.com/

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Music

All We Are – Beauty In Loss

A little peek behind the curtain of The Predatory Wasp: I have had a pretty testing week to say the least, for a variety of reasons – some of them heat-based, some of them not. So to wake up to a new album from one of my very favourite bands was a very welcome way to usher in the weekend. I’ve seen All We Are live a few times now and they are amongst the most compelling, energetic bands out there. Like a lot of their music, Beauty In Loss is strikes a brilliant balance between being poignant and funky as fuck, and I can’t wait to get back in a club/basement/field with them.

https://www.thisisallweare.co.uk

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Music

Oklou – Fall

There’s not a lot to Fall – the opening track on Oklou’s new EP Galore – but what’s there is really rather special: subdued synth line, gently swelling pads and the hushed, intimate vocal. It must have taken a lot of restraint not to push everything into overdrive in the final third, but it works so well. The below video is from her recent Colors show and further highlights how much can be achieved with so little.

https://soundcloud.com/oklou93

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Music

JPEGMAFIA – ROUGH 7 feat. Tommy Genesis

ROUGH 7 rolls along with a stumbling rhythm that – like a lot of JPEGMAFIA’s music – seems to be doing it’s very best to trip you up, briefly heading down tangents for a few bars before turning back, or stopping altogether, glitching back to the backbone of the track with a jarring quality that makes his music quite unlike anyone else working in rap. It’s unsettling, brilliant and sleazy as fuck.

https://www.jpegmafia.net

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Music

Quicksails – Melrose Move

Quicksails is the recording project of Chicago-based producer and multi-instrumentalist Ben Billington, and Melrose Move is taken from his latest album, Blue Rise. Starting life as a relatively ominous, almost funereal three-note bassline, it quickly transforms into something celestial and expansive; like a fountain of glittering stars shooting upwards from the dank earth before gently fading into hazy-white oblivion.

https://hausumountain.bandcamp.com/album/blue-rise

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Music

Anderson .Paak – Lockdown Remix feat. JID, Noname & Jay Rock

At time of writing it’s a steamy one billion degrees and London is slowly losing its mind, suffocating: pedestrians melting into pinkish-red puddles on searing hot tarmac or quietly expiring in dimly-lit rooms with the shades pulled low, fans on full blast doing precisely nothing to mitigate the searing heat. So thank fuck for Anderson .Paak who rolls through with an all-star lineup and a fresh take on last month’s Lockdown. It’s literally all I can handle listening to today, and even writing this is taking up way too much energy. Enough is enough.

http://www.andersonpaak.com