Back catalogue: Post Rock/Experimental

Review: Pierre Bujeau is the man behind the Megabasse alias and he crafts temporary escape zones through music that offer a break from the everyday. Whether performing with French groups Omerta and Tanz Mein Herz or solo, Megabasse creates a unique, rough-edged psychedelia armed with a double-neck guitar, cheap lager and Fender amps. He produces chiming patterns that blur the room's sound, transporting you to another world but his music isn't about wellness or self-improvement, but a communal, DIY dreamspace. This new release, previously available only on limited editions, features two intricate tracks and one shorter piece that show his shift towards burnt-out, beautiful guitar solos.

Review: You Never End, the third album from Moin (Valentina Magaletti, Tom Halstead, and Joe Andrews), released via AD 93, marks a new chapter for the band. The album features vocal contributions from Olan Monk, james K, Coby Sey, and Sophia Al-Maria, each bringing their distinct, enigmatic voices into Moin's evolving sound. The collaborators add layers of allure and depth: james K's ethereal, reverb-heavy vocals, Coby Sey's rhythmic reflections of London's urban landscape, and Olan Monk's emotionally charged songwriting. Sophia Al-Maria's contributions reflect her multidisciplinary artistry, seamlessly blending into Moin's sonic universe while expanding its possibilities. Moin continues to challenge the conventional band structure, using a mix of traditional and innovative production techniques. You Never End subtly redefines the boundaries of grunge, shoegaze, and indie rock, imbuing them with a melancholic yet comforting tone. The vocal collaborations bring clarity and emotion, maintaining Moin's signature sound while enhancing it with electronic elements. The result is an album that feels both familiar and refreshingly new, resonating with textural richness and emotional depth.

Review: Mount Kimbie's The Sunset Violent offers a deeply evocative, unsettling exploration of emotional dissonance. Opening with the single 'Dumb Guitar', the album vividly portrays a couple grappling with their fractured relationship amidst the beauty of a fictional Chinese beach resort. Andrea Balency-Bearn's serene vocals juxtapose against lyrics of personal turmoil, while buzzy synths, discordant pianos and overdriven guitars evoke an atmosphere of tension and heartbreak. Mount Kimbie, led by Dom Maker and Kai Campos, have expanded their lineup, adding Balency-Bearn and Marc Pell, crafting a post-punk sound with corroded guitars and skeletal drums. Their sonic evolution from their earlier work culminates here, drawing from influences like Sonic Youth and The Fall, while frequent collaborator King Krule contributes to the melancholic undercurrent. Recorded in California's surreal Yucca Valley and pressed on translucent petrol blue vinyl, this album mirrors the desolation and hope of the landscape. Tracks like 'Yukka Tree' and 'Fishbrain' dive into themes of isolation and disconnection, balancing dark tones with flashes of light. With The Sunset Violent, Mount Kimbie stretch their horizons, blending post-punk, dub, and indie influences into a compelling emotional journey.

Review: A new bedroom pop outfit, Mystery Time (Ayman Rostom aka. The Maghreban) paints a neatly outlaid sound-picture of quotidian lifestyles and humdrum joys, perhaps specifically those which are used to tape over the harder but more pronely repressible realities of grief and mourning. From the off of 'Thank You Deeply', we're told of "salad days in Archway" and being "on the phone in doorways", suggesting an attitude of listlessness and naivete as key to surviving the otherwise often excruciating experience of living in London. Its self-description as "maudlin" serves it just as well; the record wafts off a kind of haunted contradiction, describable only as the impossible mixture of post-punk and floral chintz, of wallpapering over the ability to feel fully and holistically with yet another lifestyle, pattern, habit, prescription. In Rostom's own words, "The title speaks for itself. Maudlin means emotionally sentimental. Tales, these songs are stories to me, about different times. Grief - there is much sadness and darkness in it, and Love - there is some light there too, a bit of joy, to frame the shadow." Rostom's vocals are just as listless and blinkered, tunnel-sung so as to express emotions through a drab medium.