archived brainwashed reviews
Jim White & Marisa Anderson, “Swallowtail” (Thrill Jockey, 2024)
This unusual drum and guitar duo first surfaced back in the dark days of early 2020 with The Quickening, which they boldly recorded without ever having previously performed together. Obviously, […]
Celer, “Engaged Touches (Expanded and Remastered)” (Two Acorns, 2024)
Will Long’s ambitious campaign to remaster and reissue key highlights from Celer’s overwhelmingly vast discography continues with this expanded reincarnation of 2009’s Engaged Touches (appropriately released on fellow ex-pat/ambient artist […]
Six Organs of Admittance, “Time is Glass” (Drag City, 2024)
This latest release from Ben Chasny’s shapeshifting and long-running psych project is billed as a sort of homecoming album, as Chasny recently moved back to California’s famed Humboldt County region […]
Lise Barkas & Lisa Käuffert, “Lo Becat” (Soleils Bleus/Morc, 2024)
This album is definitely one of the more unlikely underground hits to cross my path in recent memory, as this strikingly unique bagpipe performance first quietly surfaced as an extremely […]
Moonshake, “Eva Luna” Deluxe Edition (Matador/Too Pure (1992), Beggars Arkive (2023)
I believe I stumbled upon Moonshake’s singular 1992 debut full-length by blind luck at a used record store, but I cannot remember if I picked it up because I was […]
Dean McPhee, “Astral Gold” (Bass Ritual, 2024)
This fifth full-length from Yorkshire-based guitar visionary Dean McPhee is actually a compilation of sorts, bringing together the pieces from his out-of-print Cosmos / Ether lathe cut 7″ (2022) with […]
Maria W. Horn, “Panoptikon” (XKatedral, 2024)
I tend to enjoy damn near everything that Sweden’s XKatedral label releases, but this half-disturbing/half-transcendent tour de force by co-founder Maria W. Horn still managed to completely blindside me. Panoptikon’s […]
Rafael Toral, “Spectral Evolution” (Moikai, 2024)
Before I heard this album, I mistakenly believed that I had a reasonable familiarity with Rafael Toral’s oeuvre, as I had heard and enjoyed a handful of his classic guitar-era […]