Tag: ambient

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Not Marshall – UNKNOWN PRODIGY

Pretty sure I write a variation on this every time I post a Not Marshall track, but it is staggering they don’t get more attention. At time of write they have one (!) follower on Soundcloud and get 56 monthly listeners on Spotify. And I don’t think they even have a Bandcamp account. A ludicrous state of affairs. Their latest LP ELLIX is another masterclass in icy ambient and drone, even swerving into more trancey textures a la 36 and Lee Gamble. Should be massive, never will be 😦

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Barker – The Remembering Self

Barke’s new album Stochastic Drift is absolutely brilliant, and if it’s not in my top 10 of 2025 at the end of the I will be amazed. It’s not really fair to pick out a single track as you should really just dive in in its entirety, but The Remembering Self is the one that really stopped me in my tracks: probably the most purely ambient track Barker has ever produced, and achingly beautiful.

https://sambarker.bandcamp.com/album/stochastic-drift

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Jefre Cantu-Ledesma – The Milky Sea

Jefre Cantu-Ledesma’s latest LP Gift Songs is a sparse, meditative collection shaped by his life as a Zen priest, hospice worker, and Hudson Valley resident. Blending piano, modular synth, guitar, and acoustic textures with a small group of collaborators, the album evokes shifting landscapes and quiet inner states. Inspired by the idea of music as a “gift,” its five pieces – including the stand-out 20 minute opener The Milky Sea, unfold slowly; a distinctly human take on ambient minimalism.

https://jefrecantu-ledesma.bandcamp.com/album/gift-songs

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Tim Hecker – Sunset Key Melt

Tim Hecker Konoyo comes out Sept. 28.

Tim Hecker saves the best until last on his new album Shards with this extraordinary, amorphous ambient/electronic closing track. Released last week on krany, Shards is a collection of pieces originally written for various film and TV soundtracks Hecker has scored over the last half decade, with compositions originally written for scoring projects including Infinity Pool, The North Water, Luzifer, and La Tour.

https://timhecker.bandcamp.com/album/shards

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1000 Artists – Is This What We Want?

Over 1,000 artists – Kate Bush, Damon Albarn, Annie Lennox, and more – have released a (largely) silent album, Is This What We Want?, as a protest against UK government plans that could let AI companies use copyrighted music without permission. The album, made up of recordings of unused studios, is a statement on what happens when artists’ voices are taken away.

The musicians credited as co-writers include Tori Amos, Billy Ocean, the Clash and the Oscar-winning composer Hans Zimmer, and profits from the album will be donated to the musicians’ charity Help Musicians. According to the Guardian, Kate Bush recorded one of the dozen tracks in her studio. I’m choosing to believe this is true, and reckon it’s probably the track To as you can hear lots of bird in the background, which would be very Kate.

https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2025/feb/25/kate-bush-damon-albarn-1000-artists-silent-ai-protest-album-copyright

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Elori Saxl – It Will Be Gone

New York-based composer Elori Saxl’s score, Texada, is the official soundtrack for the film of the same name. Directed by Claire Sanford and Josephine Anderson, and produced by the National Film Board of Canada, the film charts life on Texada Island off British Columbia’s coast. On tracks like lead single It Will Be Gone, Saxl translates the island’s geological and human narratives into sound. Employing analog synthesisers, processed baritone saxophone (performed by Henry Solomon), and subtle field recordings, the score maps textures ranging from stone and water to the hum of industrial activity.

https://elorisaxl.bandcamp.com/album/texada-original-score

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Voice Actor, Squu – dYn

Stroom favorites Voice Actor team up with Squu for their second album, Lust (1), blending ambient dance, electro-dub, and trip-hop into 14 hypnotic tracks. Following previous LPs Fake Sleep and the mammoth Sent From My Telephone which spanned a frankly ridiculous 3+ hours, this release feels somehow sharper yet simultaneously dreamy, with soft textures, shimmering vocals, and hazy lyrics that float effortlessly, with the ambient dancehall vibe of dYn an early highlight.

https://stroomtv.bandcamp.com/album/lust-1

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William Basinski, Richard Chartier – Aurora Terminalis

Longtime friends and collaborators William Basinski and Richard Chartier return to LINE with Aurora Terminali, a 60-minute odyssey through drone and ambient that marks their first new work together since 2015’s Divertissement. Starting with a burst of bright, jagged synths it soon dissolves into something significantly calmer before leaning into darker, more paranoid tones in in second half.

https://lineimprint.bandcamp.com/album/aurora-terminalis

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Pefkin – Gossip In The Leaves

I alluded to this release last week, but it’s so good it deserves a bit more love. This is taken from the new album from Pefkin, aka Gayle Brogan, witten in autumn 2023, during a big life shift—including her move from Glasgow to Sheffield—this three-track album reflects the emotional journey of change. Using a stripped-back setup of viola (an instrument she’d never played before), synth, and voice, Gayle recorded each track in a single take. It’s deeply affecting and a late contender for ambient/drone album of the year.

https://pefkin.bandcamp.com/album/the-rescoring

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Not Waving, Romance – Love Pervade The Sinless Breast

Possibly my favourite ambient pairing, Not Waving and Romance, return with their latest LP Wings of Desire, inspired by Botticelli’s The Birth of Venus. And if that sounds catastrophically pretentious – correct! But ambient pretentiousness really does result in some of the best track names in music (honourable mention to Dylan Henner on this front). Love Pervade The Sinless Breast (!) is gorgeous, sweeping, mournful: everything you need to start your week with a bang.

https://notwavingromance.bandcamp.com/album/wings-of-desire