reviews of contemporary underground psych, drone, sound art, and electronic/experimental music from the fringes
Clarice Jensen, “In holiday clothing out of the great darkness” (130701/FatCat, 2025)
Borrowing its title from a passage in Rilke’s “Letters to a Young Poet,” this fourth album from composer Clarice Jensen marks a return to the solo cello fare of her […]
Helena Silva, “Celeste” (Self-Released, 2025)
This debut full-length from Portuguese violinist/composer Helena Silva is a collection of pieces for violin and electronics that first began its life during a 2023 artist residency in Bali. Notably, […]
Saapato, “In Alaska” (AKP Recordings, 2025)
This latest one from upstate New York sound artist Brendan Principato is a collection of site-specific pieces inspired by field recordings made during a 2023 residency with the Alaska Park […]
Romance, “You Must Remember This (Expanded Edition)” (Ecstatic 2020/2025)
Newly issued on vinyl in remastered and expanded form (and almost instantly sold out), 2020’s You Must Remember This was the mixtape that first introduced this anonymous London-based project to […]
The Bug vs. Ghost Dubs, “Implosion” (Pressure, 2025)
The Bug’s Machine collection was one of my favorite albums of 2024 by a landslide, as it felt like Kevin Martin’s culminating and defining masterwork as far as his industrial-damaged […]
Kali Malone & Drew McDowall, “Magnetism” (Ideologic Organ, 2025)
This synth-centric debut collaboration between two longtime friends was recorded over the course of a single day in McDowell’s home studio back in 2022. Normally, a one-off recording session that […]
Läuten der Seele, “Unterhaltungen mit Larven und Überresten” (World of Echo, 2025)
This latest opus from Bavarian hauntological supernova Christian Schoppik is a bit of a departure from his excellent “Water” trilogy in a couple of significant ways. The big one is […]
Nurse With Wound/Diarmuid MacDiarmada “Lung Oysters” (United Dairies/Arcana Hibernia, 2025)
In recent years, the most compelling Nurse With Wound albums tend to be collaborations with other artists and this latest opus reaffirms that trend in impressively decisive fashion. Unsurprisingly, Irish […]