Back catalogue: Post Rock/Experimental

Review: Something of a best-kept-secret in the drone hinterlands, France's Natural Snow Buildings have quietly been making avant-garde masterpieces that delve into nocturnal dreamscapes and otherworldly sonic textures for the best part of two decades. Moreover, with as little fanfare as we've come accustomed to, they've come up with a masterstroke in 'Terror's Horns', which blends psychic assaults that would satisfy fans of both Skullflower and the Kranky Records stable with both folk-tinged delicacy and macabre atmospherics. Haunting, harrowing and possessed of a strangely understated intensity all the band's own. this 21st album, were there any justice, would elevate them from slef-imposed obscurity forthwith.

Review: Rachika Nayar's album 'Fragments' is a collection of sonic miniatures constructed from guitar loops and in the familiar comforts of her own bedroom. First released as a limited edition cassette by RVNG Intl's Commend THERE imprint, it now comes to the main label in full vinyl LP glory, thanks to its sublime working of cyclical, processed, meditative guitar loops into a distinct oeuvre. Nayar is no less than a sonic alchemist, transmuting tactile guitar loops into repeating textures, in a style that seems to continue in the tradition of The Field or Fennesz.

Review: The Necks return with their latest album Bleed, a single, expansive 42-minute composition that delves into the delicate beauty of decay and space. As one of Australia's most daring and long-standing minimalist-jazz groups, the trioiChris Abrahams on piano, Tony Buck on drums, and Lloyd Swanton on bassicrafts yet another unique piece in their vast body of work. Formed in 1987, The Necks have become known for their extended, improvisational compositions that patiently unravel, building subtle intensity through repeated musical motifs. Bleed is no exception, but the atmosphere they create here feels both familiar and fresh. The album masterfully balances stillness and tension, exploring themes of desolation and transformation with understated elegance. Released to mark the group's 35th anniversary in 2022, Bleed showcases their remarkable ability to evolve while staying true to their distinctive sound. The slow, meditative pace allows each note and texture to breathe, inviting listeners to get lost in its spacious, evolving soundscape. With this release, The Necks continue to push the boundaries of minimalist jazz.

Review: Neu! 75 was the third and final studio album from Klaus Dinger and Michael Rother, and many years on it stands proud as a great piece of electronic rock history. Released in, you guessed it, 1975, the album's signature insistent rhythms, phased guitars and propulsive drums continue to sound fresh and retain a vitality that feels futuristic even decades later. This official reissue is a great way to get back into the raw energy and precision that made Neu! 75 so influential with their groundbreaking fusion of motorik beats and experimental soundscapes. It was their finest work, frankly.

Review: It's hard to sum up the brilliance of the interconnected bands which emerged out of Dusseldorf in the 90s, but Neu! are about as perfect a place to start as any. Klaus Dinger and Michael Rother left Kraftwerk and, sparring with Conny Plank in the studio, came up with album after album of steadfast, motorik grooves that stretch out for miles on end. You can dive into any part of the Neu! legacy and it won't disappoint, but Neu! 2 is especially wonderful thanks to the visionary approach to remixing Dinger and Rother took to fill up the second half of the album when the label withheld any more money to record the album. Short-sighted of the label maybe, but it pushed the pair to create something far wilder with wrongspeed manipulation - just listen to 'Super 16' and you'll understand.

Review: This reissue of Janitor of Lunacy recaptures Nico in a stark, spellbinding 1983 live performance at Manchester's Library Theatre during a period when she called the city home. Spread across 20 tracks on double vinyl, the album distils her haunting presence and singular voice into raw, intimate recordings that draw from four of her solo records as well as Velvet Underground classics like 'Femme Fatale' and 'All Tomorrow's Parties.' The set also includes a brooding take on Bowie's 'Heroes' which is, like the rest of the pieces, minimalist and emotionally charged. This was Nico stripped down to her essence, namely bleak, beautiful and moving.

Review: Nico's Marble Index was the first album to establish the German musician's home in the avant-garde; the story of the fashion model turned "legitimate" artist is as old as time, yet is rarely told today. In contrast to her first album, Chelsea Girl, which consisted almost entirely of pop chansons, Nico's sophomore LP here tracks nicely with her working introduction to John Cale in his harmonium era, drawing inspiration primarily from modern European classical music, not three-minute hookcraft. Long out of print, this slow-burner of a critical classic now hears a worthy reissue via Domino.

Review: As part of a new looking back on German art rocker Nico's esteemed career by the indie label Domino, Desertshore chronologically follows The Marble Index, and is her third album, following the prior project's establishing her as an avant-garde artist with one foot in the mainstream, in stark defiance of the the prejudiced poo-poohs that followed her first (baroque pop) album, Chelsea Girl. Desertshore is more of a reconciliation of her prior two projects, bringing back the initial western pop sensibility while now firmly basking in a newfound weirdness-and-she-knows-it. From the opening dark waves of 'Janitor Of Lunacy' to the piano-balladic injection of sadness that is 'Afraid', this is another avant-garde masterpiece by the musician, never justifiably passed over.

Review: South Carolina singer and producer Niecy Blues describes her songwriting process like an undertow: "I feel a strange pull, and let it carry me, following swirling leaves/whole days roll by, forgetting about the body." Their full-length debut, Exit Simulation, captures this sense of deep-rooted divination, cycling between simmering ballads, ghosted r&b, downtempo gospel, and looped vocal improvisations - often within the same track. The title is taken from a science fiction novel she read during the purgatory of the pandemic, alluding to a dimensional ideation of departure - "the permission to imagine leaving." Recorded in her current home of Charleston, she characterizes the album's mood in terms both reflective and raw: an exploration of things suppressed, foundations beginning to crack, "talking myself off a ledge." The music of Niecy Blues transposes reverie and reckoning into emotive devotionals of keys, guitar, bass, synth, and bewitched voice, steeped in sacred atmospheres gleaned from a youth spent in a religious Oklahoma household: "My first experience with ambient music was church - slow songs of worship, with delay on the guitar - even if you don't believe, you feel something."

Review: Sonic Cathedral share the debut album of Not Me But Us, Two, facilitating the Neapolitan duo's astonishing talent for production and pitch-bent melancholy. Made up of Bruno Bavota and Fabrizio Somma (aka. K-Conjog), this new effort blends each of their influences with echoes of ambient, techno, 2000s club culture, postclassical music and hints of post-rock, making for a fascinating electronica cocktail. Lending well to Bavota's usual piano-based pieces, the new collaborative approach, which fed a new interest in analog gear, also resulted in an effective vehicle to process grief and gaze into new horizons for the artists.