Dash Hammerstein is an alternative folk singer from Brooklyn who upholds musical traditions while imbuing his songs with a modern perspective built around spiritual disenchantment and the absurd. His latest EP, “Time Travel – Hot Pretzel”, is a waggish and exciting take on coffeehouse folk, chamber pop and folktronica thatContinue Reading
Ruins are a Liverpudlian alternative pop-duo who create emotive soundscapes with rock-steady drum machines, gentle guitars, and falsetto vocals. Vocalist Lloyd Rock has a dulcet and high-pitched voice, and when coupled with the sometimes bizarre music of Nik Kavanagh, Ruins create a highly distinctive sound. There is a calming gushContinue Reading
LA-based Thai musician Saun Santipreecha knows about dichotomies. His recent album “Dandelye” juxtaposes surreal ambient soundscapes with mysterious musical structures across six tracks of sprawling scope. Dandelye is an anglicized form of the Thai word for ‘dandelion’, a flower seen as a weed in LA but rare in Santipreecha’s native Thailand. ThisContinue Reading
Le Days is the moniker of Swedish experimental musician Daniel Hedin, and his visceral new album “Stuck In My Head (Alternate Recordings)” takes the listener to the depths of his dark and troubled soul by way of abstractly constructed music-cum-performance art. Most tracks here are reinterpretations of songs which originally surfaced onContinue Reading
War in Ukraine, inflation, rising temperatures, and a widening political divide between left and right. One has many reasons to feel an apocalyptic dread when considering our outlook. On “The World Is Ending And I Love U”, Margate-based musician Jack Goldstein hosts a cast of collaborators to create a remarkablyContinue Reading
Vitalism is a belief that living things and non-living things are fundamentally different. Living things have souls, or what vitalists call “élan vital”. It sounds harmless, but according to Dr William F. Williams, it forms the basis for pseudoscientific medical practices that claim many health problems are caused by imbalancesContinue Reading
Photo by Athena Quade – Spiral art rock A single in two parts, “Spiral” by Bristol four-piece art-rock outfit Quade is a mysterious musical endeavour, combining post-rock, neoclassical, and spoken word. The tense mood builds and is released by mourning strings and shifts in rhythms, but the sinister feeling itContinue Reading
In 2015, professor Mark Hamilton from the University of Connecticut published a paper titled “Astrology as a culturally transmitted heuristic scheme for understanding seasonality effects: a response to Genovese (2014)”. It put forward that our zodiac signs are just a handy way for us to remember and quickly recall informationContinue Reading
The history of mosaic art can be traced back to the 3rd millennium BC when temples in Mesopotamia were decorated with seashells and stones. While abstract, these primitive works birthed an artistic medium found worldwide and known for its intricate beauty. Seattle sonic-wizard Brandon Isleib, aka Restless Mosaic, approaches musicContinue Reading
Photo by Emma Filer Alex Crispin – Listen & Learn alternative/jazz From Norwich, UK, Alex Crispin absolutely delights on this cut from his forthcoming self-titled album. The groovy intro and pensive vocals develop like a child at play, with saxophone and flute, erratic shifts in time, and an unexpected, spaceyContinue Reading