February roundup! This time with a graphic oooo (this is also the cover of the spotify playlist I made collecting all the tracks I posted to this account this month).
I kind of dropped the ball listening to new releases this month and my backlog is already out of control. My full list of February releases is pretty short so I think that providing the whole list of what I listened to in a month is not going to work as I tend to be playing catchup every month after January lol. I’ll think about a better solution for March, maybe a google doc?
Anyway, here are my highlights:
Bathe Alone - Last Looks
Last Looks is Bathe Alone's debut full length LP. While writing the majority of the music over the course of a year in 2019, Bailey's ultimate goal was to write a sonically cohesive experience you could lay on the floor and stare at the ceiling to.
Black Country, New Road - For The First Time
Recorded with Andy Savours (My Bloody Valentine) during the early part of this year and then finished at the end of the nationwide lock-down, the album is the perfect capturing of a new band and all the energy, ferocity and explosive charge that comes with that whilst also clearly the work of a group who have no interest in repetition, one-note approaches or letting creative stagnation set in. Featuring six new songs including reinterpretations of early tracks "Sunglasses" and "Athens, France," For The First Time is a sonic time capsule that somehow manages to bottle the past, the present and the future... Indeed the band found they had to stop themselves running too far ahead in order to document this album in a way that felt as truthful as possible.
Cal Fish - Plastic Flag
Plastic Flag as an effort began in Berlin in the summer of 2017. Admittedly listening to Calling out of Context most mornings, Cal was carefully piecing together loops from cassettes found on the streets and beats made on an iPad. Over the next year Cal built the songs through performance and experiment and when they returned to Europe the following summer began sewing together discarded and gifted polybags into flags to be shared and used in performance. The album plays with eclectic combinations made possible by bringing together the idiosyncratic clock of tape loops, highly quantized beats, and seemingly endless drones pursuing and freezing Cal's vocals and flute remarks. In content Plastic Flag is a whimsical snapshot of an earth filled with Plastic, Cars, Power, Dance, Love-Attempt, Poisoned Ecosystems, and Longing!
Mogwai - As The Love Continues
Scottish post-rock band Mogwai have released their ninth album As The Love Continues. The band has been a pioneering staple of the genre for over 25 years, expanding into soundtracks for documentaries and TV shows around the world that have allowed them to expand beyond just the dreamy rock music they create. Though their soundtracks can be intertwined with their regular artist albums at times, this has the feeling of a proper album to build on a legacy cemented among the greats...This isn’t an album where they completely rewrite their playbook and that is fine. They don’t need to do that. It is nice to feel relaxed with a new Mogwai album. Like most of their projects, the pacing is measured, but there are moments of exaltation where every element bursts with the energy of a kid at the end of a sugar high. (Magnetic)
White Ring - Show Me Heaven
With their DIY ethos while dwelling on the outskirts of pop music, White Ring have developed a unique style while pushing the boundaries of accessibility and musical genre. They have created a piece of art that is brimming with symbolism and underlying tensions, that seduces, scares and comforts in equal measure. (Darla)
And a couple leftovers from January:
Crystal Canyon - Yours With Affection And Sorrow
On its second LP, Yours with Affection and Sorrow, this Portland dream-pop quartet isn’t interested in the kind of hooks that reach out and grab you by the ear. These musicians are more concerned with creating atmospheres using shoegaze tempos, hushed vocals, enigmatic lyrics and layered guitars. If it takes a while to reach us, that’s OK. (Mainer)
Divide And Dissolve - Gas Lit
Gas Lit is our fight for Indigenous Sovereignty, Black and Indigenous Liberation, Water, Earth, and Indigenous land given back. Gas Lit is fighting against the dispossession of our people, land, water, and spirit. Gas Lit is a call to transformation and freedom. Gas Lit seeks to make a contribution to undermining and destroying the white supremacist colonial framework.
Albums I’m really looking forward to in march include releases from Pierce With Arrow, Xiu Xiu, and Ben Howard.
my last.fm ～ spotify
