A CLOSER LISTEN weekly #80

A Tribute to Jonathan Sterne, Ukrainian Field Notes, a new mix, and Mini-Reviews Marathon

Dear Listeners, Joseph here for our 80th installment. And it’s a double-issue, so you’re probably going to want to bookmark it and read it in chunks. Technically it was meant to come out last week, but just before spring break, I learned of the passing of Jonathan Sterne, who was one my professors at McGill and an influential figure in Sound Studies, Media Theory, Disability Studies, the cultural study of technology, and much more. So I ended up taking the week off so I could process and put together a small tribute here. I’ve mentioned Sterne’s work in passing many times over the years [for instance, see weekly #12, Back to the Lab, and Archives #14 , and several times in ACL reviews and mixes] and his influence is far reaching and deep. You can read more about him below.

But first, a few random thoughts.

While recently listening to Tribe’s Low End Theory (1991), I heard a familiar groove in the opener “Excursions” I had never clocked before. I’m not sample snitching here—these are all cleared and listed on the credits for LET. So, the opening bass line’s from the opening seconds of “A Chant for Bu” by Art Blakey and the Jazz Messengers from the 1973 classic Buhaina, while the drums are taken from Shades of Brown’s “The Soil I Tilled for You” (1970). The unique groove is really about how the two are put together. And I hear that same groove in Limp Bizkit’s “Nookie.” Sure, it’s got live drums, bass and guitar to impose a rock feel, but you can hear it especially when the live members of the band aren’t playing. That is to say, in the part of the song arranged by their DJ. (House of Pain and) Limp Bizkit DJ Lethal claimed in an interview that the drum sample came from "an Italian porn movie from the '70s or something," while WhoSampled credits the drum sample on “Nookie” to a 1974 record by Mandopop singer Yang Xiao Ping, though it could easily be a slightly sped up “Soil.” Am I hearing things, or did “Nookie” lift its groove from “Excursions”?

In other news, I’ve been thinking a lot about quitting lately. Or maybe better put, why I press on. Nothing new, I guess, but as the world gets grimmer by the day it becomes harder and harder to justify. I haven’t had a full time job since I started my MA in 2009, and teaching as a contacted course lecturer isn’t paying the bills and is increasingly looking less likely to ever lead to any kind of permanent teaching position. But even so, perhaps I should redirect the energy I expend here on applying for even more positions, publishing even more unremunerated academic work. It’s hard to be struggling financially only to receive emails everyday, from paid PR folks, asking do to work for them for free, to help them out. I know it’s not their fault is out site doesn’t monetize, but it’s not like Conde Nast owned publications or the few remaining magazines and alt-weeklies pay much anyway. And so we get sent hundreds of records every month begging for attention. As if writing about their record will move the dial in any meaningful way. Or maybe it does, I can’t really say anymore, but I doubt it. I do know our reviews will inevitably end up quoted in advertising copy or grant applications, and probably in whatever internal reviews those PR folks are subjected to measure the success of their campaigns. But for every time I go down that depressive spiral, I’ll hear from an artist who appreciated my words, who are just happy their work is connecting with people who give it the time and attention it needs.

And so I know I’ll keep listening to music and so I’ll keep writing about it and making mixes and sharing the stuff I like with you all. But I can’t say that the format and rhythm of this newsletter won’t begin to change. We’ll see. In the meantime, if you want to support me in some way, there are a few copies copies of the La Lumiere CD left at Elan Vital’s bandcamp. You can read more about that album, and watch more videos here.

I’ll also be performing in Brooklyn later this on this month, if anyone is around and able to come. Tickets and info available here. I’ll have copies of some recent tapes as well.

RIP Jonathan Sterne (1970-2025)

I first met Jonathan Sterne in the fall of 2009, when I arrived at the department of Art History & Communication Studies at McGill University, where Sterne was professor of Culture and Technology. I had decided the previous year to apply to graduate school, and, knowing I was interested in sound, was particularly drawn to Jonathan’s work, which I read in preparation for my applications. I was also devouring the work of others in the department, but I was particularly impressed at how prolific Sterne was, the strength of his arguments combined with the ease of his prose and clarity of his thought. He was my introduction to the field of Sound Studies, as he was for so many others.

Jonathan and his partner Carrie Rentschler, also a gifted scholar and professor in the department, were exceptionally generous and welcoming, hosting parties in their apartment and maintaining genuine curiosity and engagement. It was around that time that Jonathan was first diagnosed with cancer, which he documented (in writing and audio) on his Cancerscapes blog. So much of his work is available as PDFs on his website, Sterneworks.

Duke, his publisher, very concisely narrates his CV:

Sterne’s scholarship is concerned with the cultural dimensions of communication technologies, especially their form and role in large-scale societies. He is the author of The Audible Past (2003), a now-classic text that explores the cultural origins of sound reproduction; MP3: The Meaning of a Format (2012), which unpacked the history and meaning of a common audio format; and Diminished Faculties (2022), in which he wrote about his own impairment due to a paralyzed vocal chord. Sterne also wrote articles for the Duke University Press journals differences and Social Text. He was a co-editor (with Lisa Gitelman) of the book series Sign, Storage, Transmission, which publishes books offering new ways of thinking through the interconnectedness of knowledges, technologies, subjectivities, and cultures. Sterne also contributed chapters to two edited collections published by the Press: Keywords in Sound and Digital Sound Studies.

They neglected to mention The Sound Studies Reader (2012), published by Routledge, that Jonathan collected and edited and which has played such an important role in the development of the field.

Damon Krukowski highlights the following quote from near the end of The Audible Past in his newsletter, Dada Drummer Almanach:

“When one traces recordings back to their so-called sources, one finds the intersection of cultural forces that made initial and subsequent moments of reproducibility desirable and possible. There was no ‘unified whole’ or idealized performance from which the sound in the recording was then alienated. To whom we attribute the possibility and the desire to record or listen is entirely context dependent. Recording is a form of exteriority: it does not preserve a sonic event as it happens so much as it creates and organizes sonic events for the possibility of preservation and repetition.” Jonathan Sterne, The Audible Past (332)

Jonathan was an influential figure in Sound Studies and Disability Studies. An interest in the latter is already latent in his first book, The Audible Past, but comes to the fore in his most recent book, Diminished Faculties. As a result of a paralyzed vocal chord, Sterne used what he calls his “Dork-o-phone” to project his voice in public and seminars, a device to which he devotes the second chapter of Diminished Faculties.

Scholar and podcaster Mack Hagood featured Jonathan on several episodes of Phantom Power over the years, including an episode dedicated to the Dork-o-phone. Mack writes:

The sound studies community is reeling from the death of Jonathan Sterne this past Thursday. Jonathan’s presence and work were–and are–incredibly influential on the intellectual and ethical commitments of our field. He was a generous mentor to so many, including me. Do you know those “WWJD?” bracelets? I’ve been wearing one in my mind for about 15 years: “What Would Jonathan Do?” In this short, impromptu episode, I share a few thoughts about what he meant to me and to sound studies. If you want to spend some time with Jonathan’s voice, we were lucky to feature him in several episodes, but our Dork-o-phonics episode, based on his book Diminished Faculties, is certainly my favorite.

Jonathan was quick to see the potential of the internet, participating in early online message boards as early as 1982, and went on to become a contributor to Bad Subjects, the first and longest running internet magazine (1992-2017). His first academic article, “Sounds Like The Mall of America,” was published in 1997, and considers the relationship between programmed music and commercial space. There is a political commitment undergirding so much of Jonathan’s work, and that early attention to relationship between capitalist and consumerist market structure and mass media is an important reminder that this dimension has always been present in his work. Jonathan was a supporter of unionization efforts and mobilization on campus (and more broadly), and personally supported many of our efforts during my time there. During the Quebec Student strike of 2012, he and other professors published a special issue of Theory & Event, in which Jonathan attended to the participatory and sonic elements of the casseroles, one of the signature forms of protest associated with the strike. With Natalie Zemon Davis, writing for the Globe & Mail newspaper, they connect the technique of casseroles (banging pots and pans) during the 2012 Quebec protests, to a 700 year old French tradition called “rough music.” Elsewhere in his work he considers “The Politics of Podcasting” (2008) and “The Politics of Academic Labor in Communication Studies” (2011), and asks “What is an Intervention?” (2018) for leftist academics today?

His politics also extended to his approach to collaboration, co-authoring articles not only with his colleagues but with many of his students. Consider “The Poetics of Signal Processing,” written with Tara Rodgers, “Command Tones: Digitization and Sounded Time” with Emily Raine, “‘The Recording that Never Wanted to be Heard’ and Other Stories of Sonification” with Mitchell Akiyama, and “Temperature is a Media Problem” with Dylan Mulvin.

He also extended that support to those he didn’t know directly. For instance, He included “The folded space of machine listening,” an article written by my friends Mimmo and Renato, in a graduate course he taught on Sound and AI in winter of 2022. I know my friends really appreciated the validation of that inclusion, and that also lead to Mimmo organizing a virtual panel on Jonathan’s book Diminished Faculties in Napoli later that summer, which I wrote about in a previous newsletter.

And we can go on at length about Jonathan’s intellectual contributions, but that was only a part of his life. I’d like to quote at length from Sterne’s obituary on Legacy.com, written by his wife and longtime partner, Carrie Rentschler:

…the state of not seeing, hearing, or feeling well could "lead you somewhere you absolutely don't want to go; it could also lead you somewhere new and beautiful." He knew this personally. Jonathan co-authored, edited and co-edited numerous other books, book chapters, and articles. At the time of his death, he was leading the "Jonathan Ensemble" (a collective writing project) on the book Sound and AI (Artificial Intelligence), on new systems of machine listening and automated sound generation, and the forms of power and ideas about hearing and listening built into them.

Jonathan organized his life around playing music with other people, an activity he found especially meaningful and enjoyable. He played in eight bands over this lifetime, two with his wife Carrie. A bass player, a touch guitarist, a player of modular and other synthesizers, and a budding pianist, Jonathan could do incredible things with sound. He played his main instrument, the bass guitar, as a melody instrument, delighting in breaking rules of expected play, and revelling in heavy grooves, the art of signal processing and the beauty of gnarly pedal effects. He loved to laugh and was an aficionado of the absurd and silly. He was an excellent listener, an incredible friend to hundreds of people, an unparalleled advisor and mentor, and a willing ear to many, including strangers. He transformed people's lives, and he was transformed by them.

While he was considered a "star" academic, many people describe how Jonathan never acted like one. He treated people as equals, and he saw the value, significance and uniqueness of each person. He always advised people to pay forward what they learned, including how to be in good relation with others, how to make things better for as many people as possible, and how to have fun doing so. He welcomed people's differences and embraced their vulnerabilities with care and grace. People felt seen, heard, and understood by Jonathan. This was especially the case for other people who live with disability and/or with cancer, as he did, or feel like they don't belong. In addition to his cancer blog, many people found his website (https://sterneworks.org) personally and professionally helpful.

It's important to know these things to really know who Jonathan was. He made friends easily, including on early internet bulletin boards in 1982. He was a very social person and LOVED a good party. He and Carrie threw some memorable ones, starting with the costume party that was their wedding in 1999 (or as they called it, their "meeting with the state"). In his senior year of high school, he was crowned homecoming king, of an nontraditional kind. Jonathan was a big man with a huge personality. He loved being seen, he loved performing music and giving talks, and he was known for his great hats and brightly coloured shirts. He had a deep love for cats, including but not limited to those with whom he and Carrie shared their life.

I first learned of Jonathan’s death from another former student, Tim Hecker, who wrote his dissertation, “The Era of Megaphonics: On the Productivity of Loud Sound, 1880-1930),” under Sterne’s supervision. I read touching tributes from Mitchell Akiyama and Jessica Holmes and so many other former students, colleagues, friends, and admirers, but I want to end with some reflections from his former advisee and our friend, Lilian Radovac:

As I sit with the news, I’m compelled to share a story about Jonathan, which will differ in tone from the scholarly accolades he will soon receive and richly deserves, but which speaks to his character as a person as well as an academic. … When we finished our lunches and coffee it was clear that we both wanted to continue our conversation, so I proposed a short walk to the lake, just a few blocks away, which is one of the best things about the neighbourhood I live in.

A note about the word “just.” Walking is now difficult for me, even with the use of an assistive device, because of a neurological movement disorder I’ve had for years but was only diagnosed with in late 2024. Because of this, I avoid walking with other people, especially academics, who as a group are neither renowned for their patience nor their proprioception. But Jonathan matched my pace exactly, treating my frequent pauses to rest as conversational accents and never once rushing ahead of me, even after we took a wrong turn down a winding road and nearly got lost. This instinctive responsiveness came, in part, from his understanding of the lived experience of disability, which his scholarship took a sharper turn toward when he acquired his own. But it was also because he was a musician, who knew in his bones how to navigate time and movement relationally. The way Jonathan was with other people, and with me that day, was ethically and effortlessly musical.

… As I told Jonathan in the card that didn’t quite make it to his hospice in time, the seeds he scattered will grow in ways that I’m certain will further extend his legacy as a theorist, practitioner, and activist. But it’s as much in these small, embodied memories that so many of us have of him that his relentless decency and optimism will live on, through us and on to the people who remain a part of our lives.

RIP Jonathan Sterne, whose work and memory will long live on.

Scott Alexander Howard and Stefan Christoff present A sonic window [mix]

Regular mix contributor Stefan Christoff is joined by Scott Alexander Howard for our first new mix of 2025, A sonic window. We’re pleased to announce that the duo will be releasing a joint album called Transit Assemblies on the Moon Villain label on May 30, with pre-orders beginning on May 2.

Read a note from Stefan, and find the full tracklist, here.

Ukrainian Field Notes XLII

For this episode we travel to Ivano-Frankivsk to discover what DEDDOM does when he finds out the amount of his pension. Also in Ivano-Frankivsk we speculate on the meaning of Cringemodernism with Benjamin WiSE, and 5NONE5 distances himself from American musical influences.

Furthermore we talk folk and metal with Oleksiy Pominchuk, and Disco Borisco explains the unexpected results of listening to disco.

In Berlin, we revisit Christiane F. – Wir Kinder vom Bahnhof Zoo courtesy of Triš, whereas in Kyiv Ivan Shelekhov focuses on quality rather than quantity and Max Rakonto muses on listening during war.

Finally, KESER1 assures us that dreams do come true, and Olga Zaitseva-Herz pays tribute to Bakhmut, while Vladyslav Deboshyr has forgotten what nightlife is, Maksym Natalich uses creativity to protect his own mental health and Elvira Saryhalil explains the history of Crimean Tatars.

We also celebrate a boutiful crop of new releases with latest offerings from Poly Chain, Katarina Gryvul, Andrey Kiritchenko, Lvcerate, Noneside Records, NFNR, Roman Slavka, Drone of War, 58918012, King Imagine, Trinidad Shevron, Lu Joyce, Drudkh, Valentina Goncharova, Cryptic Chorus and their side project Dosenfett, and Italian producer IOSONOUNCANE with a soundtrack to the documentary Lirica Ucraina.

In the Viewing Room we feature the latest from Паліндром [Palindrom] and three recent sets from the popular Noise Every Wednesday series at Otel’ with Sominaryst, Kelsis and Parking Spott. Plus two sets from Berlin courtesy of Monoconda and Koloah.

Last, but not least, to celebrate Spring I am including the poem “Contra spem spero” by Lesia Ukrainka in a translation by the Ukrainian author Olesya Khromeychuk who recently delivered a speech on hope and democracy at the University of Notre Dame.

Contra spem spero

Away, dark thoughts, you autumn skies!
Springtime is here adorned with gold!
Shall youth be lost in grieving sighs,
Am I, in sorrow, to grow old?

No, through my tears I want to smile
Amid disaster sing my song,
It’s hopeless hope, but it is mine,
I want to live! Dark thoughts, be gone!

But to begin with, here’s the UFN monthly podcast on Resonance FM which looks at the connections between K41 in Kyiv and Bassiani in Tbilisi. Having recorded two interviews with Mariana Berezovska, Nastya Syradoieva from K41 and Standard Deviation and Giorgi Kikonishvili from Horoom, Hydrash, Wings of Desire and Bassiani, I have produced an extended version roughly divided into two halves the second half with Giorgi starting at 01:11.30.

Tracklist:

Mariana Berezovska, K41, Nastya Syradoieva and Giorgi Kikonishvili

PART ONE with Mariana Berezovska, Nastya Syradoieva (00:00:00 – 01:11:30)

• Maryana Klochko – “Babusia” [VA – Intermission – (Standard Deviation)]

• Kataryna Gryvul – “Ocean” [VA – From Ukraine, For Ukraine – (Standard Deviation)]

• XTCLVR – “Feel Me” [XTCLVR – Inverse (Standard Deviation)]

• Native Outsider – “Vertigo” [VA – Succession – (Standard Deviation)]

• Nana.ios – “Unknown” [VA – Women Against the Oppressive Regime (Diaci)]

• Mark Panghoud – “Kiki” [VA – Succession – (Standard Deviation)]

PART TWO with Giorgi Kikonishvili (01:11:30 – 02:15:18)

• Skyra – “Love” [VA – Milan_Tbilisi (Reclaim Your City)]

• Gacha Bakradze – “Elevate” [Extensions [Horoom] – (Bassiani Records)]

• Kancheli – “Everyday in a Struggle” [VA – BASDGTL001 (Bassiani Records)]

• Purple Flame – “U Cant Jail Revolution” [VA – Women Against the Oppressive Regime (Diaci)]

• Nikakoi – “26052024_Anthem_variation1” [Nikakoi – 26052024ANTHEM – (self-released)]

• Natalie Beridze – “Symbol Inside” [Natalie Beridze – Street Life (self-released)]

Read the entire piece, complete with interviews, here.

Mini-Reviews Marathon

Short highlights of recent and upcoming releases, aka new releases I’ve been enjoying

.618 ~ Goodbye ONY
I once saw Nick Rony perform at Mutek in Montreal under the name RONY, and while the title refers to a SONY television that lost its S it also seems to announce the end of an era and the beginning of a new one as .618. At Mutek, I recall thinking the Haitian-Canadian producer reminded me of Tim Hecker, so I wasn’t surprised to learn that the two share a studio. Some of that feeling is here in the airy synths and post-digital rhythms, but that said, .618’s sound is his own. Goodbye ONY explores the connection between land and memory, mining his Ayisyen heritage over six visceral tracks.

Alexander Grawoig ~ This Isn’t A Real Revelation
Having shed his ambient moniker Deep Magic, and retired his beat-driven project DPI, Alexander Grawoig’s recent work has mostly explored acoustic guitar in a kind of back to roots move. This new record appeared on Spotify without fan fare back in February and features more of Alex’s engrossing guitar noodling. Four parts over 38 minutes, a nice mood to inhabit for a rainy afternoon indoors.

Blockhead ~ It's Only A Midlife Crisis If Your Life Is Mid
The NYC producer is back with a new EP, a follow-up to last year’s full-length Mortality Is Lit! Six melody-forward tracks, and while there are no rappers in sight, there are plenty of vocal samples to help guide the way. Having just turned 40, maybe I’m in the sweet spot for these two records to resonate, but they’ve continued growing on me with each listen. Perfect background listening but as always Block has snuck in a tremendous amount of significant details for the close listeners.

Catherine Lamb x Ghost Ensemble ~ interius/exterius
Another stunning collaboration from the Greyfade label, enlisting New York’s Ghost Ensemble to develop and realize a new work with the Berlin composer known for her exploration of (micro)tonality, harmony, and collective resonance. I’m the kind of person who always reads the wall text at a museum, but only after I’ve spent time contemplating the work on its own first. Any successful concept should be legible in the work itself, an approach I also apply to my musical listening. And the structure of interius/exterius, with its interior movements (coming together) and exterior movements (moving apart), is obvious enough, but one’s appreciation of the work is deepened by learning more about Lamb’s practice. For this work, a harmonic series has been derived from the inaudible 10Hz frequency, creating a base-ten series with which the chamber nonet further developed, exploring the interplay between individual agency and collective resonance.

Child Actor and August Fanon ~ Here & Now
Two of Backwoodz’s most interesting and prolific producers deserved something more formal than a beat tape showcasing their work, and their divergent but complementary styles find a deserving physical medium in Here & Now, released on Steel Tipped Dove’s Fused Arrow Records. Child Actor’s melodies warble and his rhythms sit slightly off kilter, having honed an idiosyncratic approach to beat making that makes him instantly recognizable. While he favors shorter tunes—25 in total—showing off his range, Fanon sticks to ten tracks on his side, with his signature vocal tags and political samples.

Circuit des Yeux ~ Halo on the Inside
Haley Fohr returns with a stunning new album showcasing her unique vocal stylings. Includes production from by Andrew Broder (Armand Hammer, Joe Rainey, Bon Iver, Moor Mother). Deep vibes.

Damon Locks ~ List of Demands
In the running for my record of the year, Chicago artist Damon Locks’ debut solo album List of Demands combines manipulated vocal samples with deep grooves and experimental sound collage techniques. And while it is technically a kind of debut, Locks is no stranger, as a member of Rob Mazurek’s Exploding Star Orchestra as well as New Future City Radio, not to mention Lock’s own Black Monument Ensemble, whose previous record, NOW (2021), remains one of our favorite statements on the uprisings of summer 2020. “Isn’t it beautiful?”

Ethel Cain ~ perverts
On her first new studio recordings since her 2022 full-length debut, Ethel Cain embraces slowness for 90 minutes of drone and dark ambient. I didn’t pay much attention to Preacher’s Daughter when it was released, but seeing as perverts has inspired a new generation to seek out antecedents to Cain’s sound, and since many of those antecedents are our bread and butter, it seemed worth mentioning this self-released oddity here. I guess I feel somewhat similarly to how I did about New Blue Sun; the music is alright, and though I’m glad new folks are discovering niche genres, I’d probably rather listen to something else.

Fred Moten & Brandon Lopez ~ Revision
No one is ever in as much demand as a good drummer. On Revision, poet and scholar Fred Moten and double bassist Brandon Lopez return in a duo formation, after two records with Gerald Cleaver. I’m sure we’ll hear more from that trio soon enough, but for now the pairing down is a welcome change. I’m going to need more time to process (in fact I feel like I’m not done absorbing last summer’s the blacksmiths, the flowers) but already in the running for best of 2025.

Giuseppe Ielasi ~ an insistence on material vol.1
A last minute addition to this list in the form of a surprise digital album from our favorite Italian producer, an insistence on material vol.1 inaugurates a new series exploring for Ielasi. So much his material recorded since 2020 has featured a return to exploring the guitar as a sound source, but these 12 tracks delve back into Ielasi’s old bag of tricks. In fact, this may be the most diverse group of tracks Ielasi has assembled on one release, touching on nearly all aspects of his practice over the decades, from the more droning and dub sensibilities of Bellows to the sampledelia of his work with Andrew Pekler, and even the left-field techno of Rain Text.

Ian Wellman ~ Can You Hear The Street Lights Glow
An ex used to send me iphone recordings of mercury lamps and neon signs, knowing I was interested in their strange harmonic drones. Wellman must have a similar fixation, as Can You Hear The Street Lights Glow began with a fascination with the sound of mercury vapor street lights and expanded to investigations of other urban sounds, from gas pipes to sidewalk grates.

indigenous resistance ~ Dreams Are Dub But Genocide Is A Reality
Ugandan label indigenous resistance brings together performers and producers from various backgrounds, nations, and languages to reflect different stories of genocide connected to dub mixing and dub as a practice of resistance. Purchase also includes a PDF of the IR book A Mongolian Dub Sublime .Nine moments of dub experiences in Mongolia.

Ivo Perelman & Tyshawn Sorey ~ Parallell Aesthethics
Ivo Perelman likely needs no introduction. I’m particularly partial to his many records with Matthew Shipp, but he has a deep catalog of recordings stretching back to 1989. On Parallel Aesthetics, the Brazilian-American tenor saxophonist is joined by Tyshawn Sorey, an accomplished percussionist, pianist, and composer in his own right. I’ve been a fan of sax and drum duos since I downloaded Trane and Ali’s Interstellar Space as a teenager, and when a combo like this hits it really hits. That said, Sorey tickles the ivories here as well, granting some variety over the course of these two CDs, continuing to support Perelman’s playing rhythmically, but also introducing some harmonic elements. I’ll be spending some more time with these discs for sure.

JEREMY YOUNG ~ CABLCAR
Montreal-based tape looper extraordinaire (and one third of beloved trio Sontag Shogun, as well as the poetry-sound duo Cloud Circuit and analog electronic ensemble Associated Sine Tone Services) Jeremy Young returns with his latest solo work, a suite of ten sketches for magnetic tape and analog oscillators. Album artwork and video for first single “Judy” courtesy of Charles-André Coderre’s chemically-deconstructed 16mm celluloid imagery.

Jules Reidy ~ Ghost/Spirit
14 more tunes from Berlin’s microtonal guitar visionary, finger-picking alternate tunings and ethereal vocals augmented by manipulated samples from an array of their trusted collaborators, personal transformation roots their exploration of mysticism as a basis for a compositional strategy based on transformation and reconstruction.

Kevin Drumm ~ Sheer Hellish Miasma II
Sheer Hellish Miasma (2002) remains an era defining masterpiece that lives up to its name. Could a sequel ever live up to that reputation? Here joined by Greg Kelley on trumpet, Drumm crafts an admirable follow up, two long tracks across two CDs. I tend to prefer Drumm at his more gentle, but Sheer Hellish Miasma II is a welcomed treat from one of Chicago’s legends of sound.

more eaze & claire rousay ~ no floor
The duo have previously come together for If I Don't Let Myself Be Happy Now Then When? (2020, respect for the Jimmy Eat World reference), An Afternoon Whine (2021), and Never Stop Texting Me (2022). But this time, rather than manipulate field recordings, the two have relied on their instruments (pedal steel, violin, guitar and other instruments) and various processing techniques to coax their own unique sound world. Both artists’ profiles have been steadily rising, and as no floor is on Thrill Jockey, even more listeners are sure to become enraptured by their work. Starting off strong, no floor gets better and better over its five tracks. Looking forward to more from them.

Nazar ~ Demilitarize
I’ve fawned over Nazar’s ‘rough kuduro’ since first encountering him performing at Unsound in 2018. His previous records, Enclave (2018) and Guerrilla (2020), have topped our end of year list, but the Angolan artist has been quiet in recent years. So it was a welcome treat to see him pop back up on Instragram announcing a new full-length, Demilitarize, out later this month on Hyperdub. While still muscular and dance-floor ready, Demilitarize is a dreamier affair, more relaxed and down-tempo, and punctuated by Nazar’s air and gentle vocals submerged in the mix.

Pink Siifu ~ BLACK’!ANTIQUE
While Liv’s fans haven’t been going hungry (with a tape as B. Cool-Aid and further collabs with Real Bad Man and Anakin, not to mention four volumes last year of GOT FOOD AT THE CRIB'!!!! with his GKFAM crew), BLACK’!ANTIQUE is Siifu’s
first proper full length since 2021’s GUMBO'!. From the lo-fi psychedelia of ensley (2018), the punk-infused aggression of Negro (2020), and the soulful southern flavor of GUMBO’!, Siifu has continued to innovate with each new record, and BLACK’!ANTIQUE is no different. Again, he retreats from the more accessible lane towards industrial beats and avant-garde production, often jazzy, though the production also leans into the conventions of mainstream trap beats at times. While there is still a simmering anger, it is more restrained and refined into something much smoother. Production from Roper Williams, Fatboi Sharif, Apollo Rome, iiye, Conquest Tony Phillips, Nick Hakim, and a host of others.

Riccardo La Forresta ~ ZERO,999...
Drummophone (2020) introduced the world to the Italian percussionist and sound artist’s idiosyncratic approach to electronically treated acoustic drumming. Now, ten years since first developing his drummophone techniques, La Forresta emerges with his proper full-length solo debut, announcing a new phase in his research. ZERO,999... is comprised of fragments of live performances and site-specific installations, both with and without the drummophone. He is also joined by an impressive array of collaborators, with additional textures from sound explorers Valerio Tricoli, Anthony Pateras, Aleksandra Słiż, Renato Grieco, heavenly vocal contributions from Antonina Nowacka and Sara Persico, and the singular guitar of icons Ale Hop and Stefano Pilia.

Sarah Hennies & Tristan Kasten-Krause ~ The Quiet Sun
Dinzu Artefacts is a tape label, so you know when they release an LP it’s bound to be something special. We’ve been fans of Hennies for some time, with 2020’s The Reinvention of Romance included in our end of year lists, and most recently I shouted out Motor Tapes in my best of 2024 lists here in this newsletter. Tristan Kasten-Krause is a Brooklyn-based bassist and composer, a member of several contemporary ensembles, and has previously collaborated with artists including Sigur Ros, Caroline Shaw, David Lang, Alvin Lucier, Jessica Pavone, Steve Reich, Henry Threadgil, and many others. His solo work explores close tones and subtle gestures, making for a generative encounter with Hennies, as the two explore the hypnotic interplay of timbre and time in their debut duo album. Two long-form pieces—"Axo" and "Axonic"—unfold with meditative precision, blending bowed vibraphone, resonant gongs, and double bass harmonics into a slowly evolving soundscape. The Quiet Sun is a mesmerizing exploration of sustained tones and textural alchemy, where percussion and bass dissolve into a single, evolving organism.

Smalltown Supersound ~ Jordsvingninger
Olso’s Smalltown Supersound and the Munch Museum have collaborated on this 17-track compilation (and limited edition double LP), in which 18 of the venerable label’s artists take inspiration from Edvard Munch’s atmospheric canvases. A sonic dialogue with the Munch exhibition Trembling Earth, the resulting tracks channel Munch’s cosmic visions into experimental electronic textures, pulsating rhythms, atmospheric soundscapes, jazz-inspired harmonies, and spontaneous improvisational processes. Includes work from Kara-Lis Coverdale, Lindstrøm, Lasse Marhaug, Actress, Kelly Lee Owens and many others.

Tim Hecker ~ Shards
I’m on record as a massive Tim Hecker fan, and have written about much of his music over the years. There’s a lot I liked about No Highs, his 2023 foray into exploration of rhythm and monotony, and I’m looking forward to the eventual release of another full studio album. But in the meantime, we have Shards, a collection of work written for cinema and television. Hecker has been doing soundtrack work for well over a decade now, though it was only more recently, with the release of The North Water (2021) and The Infinity Pool (2023) that fans were able to hear some of that work on its own. I found more to like in the latter than the former, but Shards is all the more successful in that it brings together work from a variety of projects, and an album such as this benefits from that diversity over cohesion.

Queen Herawin ~ Awaken the Sleeping Giant
Queen Herawin is best known as a member of the Juggaknots (it’s a family affair, see “sMiLe”) and as a member of the legendary underground rap super crew the Indelible MC’s (eg. “Weight”), but after Awaken the Sleeping Giant there’s no doubt she can stand on her own. This was true on Metamorphosis (2015), but she still felt the need to present herself as Queen Herawin (of the Juggaknots). She released an EP in 2019, and has appeared on some standout features more recently, including on Previous Industries’ Service Merchandise. With first single “Anger” released in 2022, it’s clear that a lot of work went into the making of Awaken the Sleeping Giant, and Herawin’s pen is more focused than ever. Each track has a one word title underscoring a particular emotion or affect ("Focus," "Denial," "Shame," "Love" etc), and rich with a unity of form and content, with Herawin’s performance matching the needs of the music. Features include Open Mike Eagle, Poison Pen, and of course brother Breeze Brewin.

RECENT REVIEWS
Reviews are at the heart of ACL. Here are selections from a few of my favorite reviews we posted on the blog in the last few weeks.

CEM ~ FORMA
FORMA is a very unusual album, one that many will not expect from the renowned DJ CEM. Composed to accompany a live painting performance by Mauro Ventura, the album opens plenty of room to dance, just not in the expected, club-like way. One might instead call the album club-adjacent, especially its center cuts, or an expansion of club themes. Allusion is also central to the release, personified by the sound of bells: as listed, “doorbells, meditative bowls, farm cowbells, Shinto bells.” The first is an interruption, pleasant or not; the second and fourth are used in worship and ritual; the third connotes a lazy afternoon and a song by Blue Oyster Cult. The overall sense is that there is tension between the regimented and the freeform, the bells that rule the night and day an implied presence, along with the timers and work bells, the warning bells, and the belief that every time a bell rings, an angel gets its wings. Many angels are elevated in the course of FORMA.

Din of Celestial Birds ~ Live at dunk!fest2024
Belgium’s dunk!festival is celebrating its twentieth anniversary this year, and doing so in style. Tickets are already available for the event, taking place May 29-31; a pre-festival event took place in early March, including Godspeed You! Black Emperor, This Will Destroy You and God Is An Astronaut. One of the greatest joys of a festival is discovering up-and-coming acts, and Din of Celestial Birds falls into this category. The Leeds, UK quintet is comprised of three guitarists, a bassist/synthesist and a drummer. We reviewed their debut album back in 2023, and the band has continued to pick up steam since then. Their live set includes four tracks from that LP and two from 2019’s EP 1. Live albums are rare events for a band this young, but Live at dunk!fest2024 is more than just an advertisement for the upcoming event or a souvenir of the one that has passed. It’s evidence of a band that should be on the radar of every post-rock fan, as it proves that they are even more vital live than in the studio: an essential ingredient of an extended career.

HxH ~ STARK PHENOMENA
Perhaps the best description of HxH (H by H) comes from the duo, who describe their music as “almost sculptural.” The sonics are undulating and smooth, but comprised of granules of sound. In the opening minutes of “BEACH,” one can easily hear the static-charged portions as the approach and withdrawal of waves from the sand. Chris Ryan Williams’ trumpet echoes the vast surface of the sea while Lester St. Louis’ cello reflects the unvisited depths. As label founder KMRU notes, there is also an “in-between layer,” an ineffable portion one might call intuitive or empathetic, characterized by the sense of flow. The tracks share an obvious connection; whether returning to ancestral lands, the primordial sea or the spirit, they connect with forces that existed before humankind. As the duo’s first recorded output, STARK PHENOMENA is a genesis in more ways than one.

Laurie Torres ~ Après coup
The essence of now may assume its body and weight or even lightness in-between the before and after of experienced time. Between the before and after, the just before and the shortly after, one can often find a window of infinity, a moment of peace, pause and deep reflection. This is at least the case with Laurie Torres’s new collection, Après Coup. Torres is of Haitian-Canadian origin; her musical upbringing is of an adventurous nature with quite a wide array of references and inspirations, but also professional contributions as a studio and stage performer. In Après Coup, a follow-up to the EP Correspondances, the listener comes into close contact with a series of intimate improvisations recorded within a short window of time in-between touring and performing, on the edge of a lake in St-Zénon, Québec. The world of Après Coup is a made of a vibrant and vivid cluster of soft, bright, mellow, quietly paced compositions that is familiar and surprising, soothing and uplifting. Torres’s musicianship eloquently moves from one instrument or genre to another, offering a pleasant journey through her small yet infinite window of freedom and creativity, between the before and after.

Marc Namblard ~ arctic summer
In conjunction with [the first ever World Day of Glaciers], ACL’s 2024 Label of the Year forms of minutiae, under the leadership of Pablo Diserens, is embarking on the year-long ice sounds series, beginning with today’s release from Marc Namblard and continuing with recordings from Ludwig Berger, Yoichi Kamimura, Cheryl E. Leonard, and Pablo Diserens. Read more about the Art for Glaciers Preservation here. The richness of these recordings cannot be overstated. Namblard is a generous director, and contributes a wide variety of sounds, from fragile to dramatic, soft to nearly overwhelming. Parts of “hot springs” are so dense they sound like drone music. As the icebergs split and fall into the sea, the avian community seems particularly agitated, like dogs in the presence of thunder. … We seldom notice ice melting in a drink; we only notice that is has melted. In the same way, the icebergs are drifting, the glaciers are melting, the seas are rising, and we barely notice; but one day we will. The Year of Glaciers’ Preservation, the World Day of Glaciers and arctic summer are all meant to call attention to what is already happening in hopes that the worst scenarios can be averted.

Natasha Barrett ~ Toxic Colour
Natasha Barrett tells stories in sound. Her new album uses field recordings as a starting point, then obscures and in some cases enhances the original recordings in the service of a higher cause. These “ambisonic” pieces not only reflect the world, but comment upon it. The abrasion of “Toxic Colour” is meant to disturb and alarm; it would be hard for a pure field recording to spark such a reaction. Even when Barrett relents, she uses a buzzing fly: nature as annoyance, ruined by man. One begins to imagine the running water as runoff, perhaps a toxic green. In telling her stories, she imagines an even more degraded future, a dystopia which will occur should we allow it to unfold.

Olga Anna Markowska ~ ISKRA
Olga Anna Markowska’s ISKRA is a journey of search for this spark, an attempt to break away from a certain bubble of the past, an ignition towards a new way of making and thinking about music and a search for new values. Beautifully crafted, ISKRA’s sound textures balance between the modern classical and ambient genres, always moving between the two with delicately performed melodies on cello, zither and electronics as in tracks like “A heart is an eye.” ISKRA offers a deep, inviting and engaging listen through Markowska’s new microcosm in the making. We hear her intimate past resurfacing as a fleeting memory through her experimentations on her instruments of choice. Each piece marks a closure and a departure and it forms a kind of tribute to places, sounds and memories as they are revisited and metamorphosed through new lenses of making and being with sound and music.

risus ~ From Ziduja to Veil
Belgian electronic producer risus has been releasing EPs consistently over the course of the past two years, to date totaling 20 tracks and 90 minutes of music and no album. The method of release calls into question the entire concept of an album, as the digital era no longer requires physical formats; but we can’t help pointing out that his first-half output in 2025 alone would fit beautifully on two sides of vinyl. While it would be appropriate to add the word “mysterious” to the moniker, risus does provide clues about the inner workings of his mind and the themes of his EPs. Each release is accompanied by a short sentence, which one might consider clues or koans. From this point forward, risus might head in any direction, from ambient to deep house to techno. We do glean an overriding theme: the artist is following his dreams, and encouraging listeners to do the same. In doing so, we may find “refuge from an imperfect world.”

Use Knife ~ État Coupable
Belgian-Iraqi trio Use Knife resurrects the grand industrial tradition of pairing political indictment with intense percussion, producing an extremely danceable and meaningful record. The influence of Front 242 can be heard, along with Nitzer Ebb; the listening experience is a delight, the intellectual experience a boon. Is it wrong to dance as one cries, or to dance in anger? One might say that it is necessary, that to give up dancing is to abandon life. This is the tension that exists in all political-industrial music. The electronics of Stef Heeren and Kwinten Mordijck are not dehumanizing, but re-humanizing, restoring a sense of dignity among the debris. In “A Reckoning,” the only words are “We are lost / Why me,” but the musical framework is energizing. Traditional Arabic dohola, darbuka, tar, daf, raq and kishba add to the authencity; the connection formed across countries is crucial to the understanding of the theme, amplified by the presence of Uganda’s Spooky-J (Nihiloxica). The LP closes with “Che Mali Wali,” a traditional Iraqi song in a new form. Perhaps this is what is needed: old wisdom, respected traditions, eternal philosophies, in order to form a new world from the old. Society is in a time of dissolution; the intercontinental collaborations of Use Knife model a different approach.

UPCOMING RELEASES

(complete list with Bandcamp links here)

We’ve already previewed over 300 spring albums, but our Spring Music Preview was just the start! New announcements arrive daily, and new music is sprouting like daffodils and crocuses, bursting through the rain-soaked soil. We hope you’ll find your next favorite album right here!

Bryn Davis ~ Sometimes Things Change (Edições CN, 27 March)

Florence Cats ~ shell I (Edições CN, 27 March)

Slow Learning Club and Charlie Usher ~ Learning (Edições CN, 27 March)

Aaron Shragge ~ Cosmic Cliffs (Adhyâropa, 28 March)

Adam O’Farrill ~ For These Streets (Out of Your Head, 28 March)

Andreas Lutz ~ Aura Trans (Kasuga, 28 March)

Annie A ~ The Wind That Had Not Touched Land (A Colourful Storm, 28 March)

Apparitions ~ Volcanic Reality (Deathbomb Arc, 28 March)

BOW & Aidan Baker ~ FR/DE (Cruel Nature, 28 March)

Bus Gas ~ Mercy View (We All Speak in Poems, 28 March)

Catapult Elpam ~ Boredom and Other Evil Spirits (Cruel Nature, 28 March)

CEM ~ FORMA (Danse Noir, 28 March)

Collateral ~ Flickering Cotillion (Cassiar, 28 March)

The Corrupting Sea ~ Political Shit (Somewherecold, 28 March)

Dawn After Dawn ~ Home is where You Are (577 Records, 28 March)

E Ruscha V ~ Music to Watch Seeds Grow By 004 (Secret Circuit, 28 March)

Gagi Petrovic ~ Music for Dance and Theatre 2011-2024 (Moving Furniture, 28 March)

Gianni Brezzo ~ Sprechiamo! (Jakarta, 28 March)

Heroarky ~ Healing Process (okla, 28 March)

Katelyn Clark & Mitch Renaud ~ Ouroboros (Hallow Ground, 28 March)

melondruie ~ Invisible (Cruel Nature, 28 March)

Mute Branches ~ Us Without the World (okla, 28 March)

Natasha Barrett ~ Toxic Colour (Persistence of Sound, 28 March)

Pierce Warnecke ~ Music from Airports (Room40, 28 March)

Reptile Reptiles ~ All Things Return to One (Constructive, 28 March)

R.L. Huber ~ Hafgufa (28 March)

The Silent North ~ All Kinds of Light (Cruel Nature, 28 March)

Salin ~ Rammana (28 March)

Sullivan Johns ~ Pitched Variations (Moving Furniture, 28 March)

Use Knife ~ État Coupable (VIERNULVIER, 28 March)

Various Artists ~ I Only Like Difficult Art (and music) (Difficult Art & Music, 28 March)

Yelena Eckenoff ~ Scenes from the Dark Ages (28 March)

Miłosz Kędra ~ their internal diapasons (Pointless Geometry, 29 March)

Angèle David-Guillou ~ Music from PAN TO MIME (Akrotiri, 1 April)

Dustin Wong ~ Gloria (Hausu Mountain, 1 April)

Philippe Petit ~ Closing Our Eyes (Cronica, 1 April)

Michael Grigoni / Pan American ~ New World, Lonely Ride (kranky, 2 April)

Dronal ~ If We Land (Supple9, 3 April)

Fraufraulein ~ greater honeyguide (mappa, 3 April)

Jäverling ◇ von Euler ~ Musik för vänskap (Flora & Fauna, 3 April)

Lauri Lest ~ Undercurrents (3 April)

Perila ~ The Air Outside Feels Crazy Right Now (Vaagner, 3 April)

Andreas O. Hirsch ~ The Salamander Treaty (makiphon, 4 April)

Barker ~ Stochastic Drift (Smalltown Supersound, 4 April)

Bodil Rørtveit ~ DJUPNA (Rainshine, 4 April)

Calming River ~ Macdui (4 April)

Cameron Knowler ~ CRK (Worried Songs, 4 April)

Curve Ensemble ~ Towards the Light (Bigo & Twigetti, 4 April)

David Cordero & Rhucle ~ So Far, So Close (Home Normal, 4 April)

David Lee Myers ~ Sensus (LINE, 4 April)

David Wunder Brägger ~ Séance of Sleep I: The Saraswati Dreamcraft (The Parlour Recordings, 4 April)

Drank ~ Breath in Definition (Trost, 4 April)

Gamelan Salukat x Jan Kadereit ~ Áshira (One World, 4 April)

Gelbart ~ Liquids & Flesh (4 April)

Gūsū ~ The Ending Was a Typical Part (Subject to Restrictions Discs, 4 April)

Hair & Treasure ~ Disc Rot (Discrepant, 4 April)

The Hemphill Stringtet ~ Plays the Music of Julius Hemphill (Out of Your Head, 4 April)

Hüma Utku ~ Dracones (Editions Mego, 4 April)

j.o.y.s. ~ j.o.y.s. (Whited Sepulchre, 4 April)

Lea Bertucci + Olivia Block ~ I Know the Number of the Sand and the Measure of the Sea (Room40, 4 April)

Matthew Muñeses and Riza Printup ~ Pag-ibig Ko, Vol. 1 (4 April)

Nico Giroris ~ Music Belongs to the Universe (Leaving, 4 April)

Nicolás Melmann ~ Música Aperta (Umor Rex, 4 April)

Paweł Szamburski ~ Długo, długo nic, a potem wszystko (Ropę Worm, 4 April)

Penelope Trappes ~ A Requiem (One Little Independent, 4 April)

Pidgins ~ Refrains of the Day, Volume 2 (Lexical, 4 April)

Pluhm ~ L’Anticristo (O L’Accettazione Del Male) (Dissipatio, 4 April)

Sausha ~ Sausha (Halcyon Veil, 4 April)

Sergei Khramtcevich ~ Other Colours (Incompetence, 4 April)

Simon Heartfield ~ The State of Social Movement (Machine Records, 4 April)

Sissy Spacek ~ Entrance (Shelter Press, 4 April)

Stéphane Odrobinski ~ Le bleu de la rivière tournesol (4 April)

Tam Lin ~ bluelight, no voice (Flaming Pines, 4 April)

V.Vecker ~ Heavy Gestures (Obscure & Terrible, 4 April)

Jeremy Young ~ Cablcar (Halocline Trance, 5 April)

Laszlo Umbreit, Sirah Foighel Brutmann & Eitan Efrat ~ Là (Futura Resistenza, 7 April)

Thomas Trueman ~ Aeons Apart (SoundGhost, 8 April)

Katarina Gryvul ~ SPOMYN (Subtext, 9 April)

The Album Leaf ~ ROTATIONS (Nettwerk, 11 April)

Araz Salek ~ Peripheries of Nahavand (Worlds Within Worlds, 11 April)

Ben Shirken ~ H.D. Reliquary (11 April)

Big Hands ~ Thauma (Marionette, 11 April)

Charif Megarbane ~ Hawalat (Habibi Funk, 11 April)

Connected View ~ Lost Acres (11 April)

Fredrik Rasten ~ strands of lunar light (Aspen Edities, 11 April)

Jonathan Hannau, Sleeping Streets & Jeff Roy ~ Sundial (Bigo & Twigetti, 11 April)

Larum ~ The Music of Hildegard von Bingen Part II (Puremagnetik, 11 April)

Lullahush ~ Ithaca (Future Classic, April 11)

Phonolab ~ Disturbia (Subsound, 11 April)

Raining Drones ~ Take Flight (Fluttery, 11 April)

Riccardo La Foresta ~ ZERO,999…. (OOH-sounds, 11 April)

Sheldon Agwu ~ Kintsugi (11 April)

Sonic Chambers Quartet ~ Kiss of the Earth (577 Records, 11 April)

Sons of Ra ~ Standard Deviation (The Laser’s Edge, 11 April)

Stephen Roddy ~ Corpus/Mimesis (11 April)

Theresa Wong ~ Journey to the Cave of Guanyin (Room40, 11 April)

Triology featuring Scott Hamilton ~ The Slow Road (Cellar Music, 11 April)

YUNIS ~ Ninety Nine Eyes (Drowned by Locals, 11 April)

Daniel Blinkhorn ~ Wave Function (Audiobulb, 12 April)

Dylan Ryan ~ In The Same Room With A Cactus (ears&eyes, 15 April)

Yuki Fujiwara ~Glass Colored Lily (defkaz, 15 April)

Adventsong ~ Verdancy (18 April)

Divide and Dissolve ~ Insatiable (Bella Union, 18 April)

Gryphon Rue ~ I Keep My Diamond Necklace in a Pond of Sparkling Water (18 April)

Luca Nasciuti ~ Bart Yakan (Flaming Pines, 18 April)

Odalie ~ Optimistic Nihilism (Mesh, 18 April)

Rindert Lammers ~ Thank You Kirin Kiki (Western Vinyl, 18 April)

Sieren ~ Emergence (Friends of Friends, 18 April)

Ursula Sereghy ~ Cordial (Mondoj, 18 April)

Zosha Warpeha and Mariel Terán ~ Orbweaver (Outside Time, 18 April)

Out of Context ~ Live at the High Mayhem Festival 2006 (20 April)

Conrad Praetzel ~ Angels Set In Motion (23 April)

Myriam Boucher, Gabriel·le Caux, Simon Chioini & Antonin Gougeon-Moisan ~ Montréal rivières (Label formes-ondes, 23 April)

Sinnway ~ Eon Step (23 April)

Anzû Quartet ~ adjust (Cantaloupe Music, 25 April)

Ayane Shino ~ River せせらぎ The Timbre Of Guitar #2 – Rei Harakami (musicmine, 25 April)

Batu ~ Question Mark (Oath, 25 April)

Billow Observatory ~ The Glass Curtain (Felte, 25 April)

Gilles Sivilotto ~ handmade (Zeitkratzer, 25 April)

Gloorp ~ Gloorp ‘Em Up (Jolt Music, 25 April)

Lila Tirando a Violeta ~ Dream of Snakes (Unguarded, 25 April)

Michael Sarian ~ Esquina (Greenleaf Music, 25 April)

Michael Vallera ~ The Other World (Torn Light, 25 April)

Poly Chain ~ Nemesis (Lightronics, 25 April)

Purple Trap ~ The Stone (Karlrecords, 25 April)

Robert Mills ~ Interior Music (Discrepant, 25 April)

Roberto Cassani / Graeme Stephen ~ Pictish Spaghetti (577 Records, 25 April)

SUMAC and Moor Mother ~ The Film (Thrill Jockey, 25 April)

Violeta García & Hora Lunga ~ I’ll Wait For You In The Car Park (~OUS, 25 April)

Will Graefe ~ Compositions for Guitar Vol. 1 (25 April)

Will Graefe ~ Compositions for Guitar Vol. 2 (25 April)

William Tyler ~ Time Indefinite (Psychic Hotline, 25 April)

wzrdryAV ~ Wave Resource (LINE, 25 April)

Andrey Kiritchenko ~ Ultra Marshes (Flaming Pines, 26 April)

Bill Orcutt Guitar Quartet ~ HausLive 4 (Hausu Mountain, 29 April)

Jules Reidy & Sam Dunscombe ~ Edge Games (Futura Resistenza, 29 April)

Marc Kellaway ~ Most Visible (The Cat Box Corp., 30 April)

Asher ~ Untitled Fictions (Room40, 2 May)

The Balloonist ~ Dreamland (Wayside & Woodland, 2 May)

Bellucci ~ Seta (Vaagner, 4 May)

Celestial Trails ~ Observation of Transcendence (Fluttery, 2 May)

Eric Shorter ~ Shorter Bendian Shields (577 Records, 2 May)

Loscil ~ Lake Fire (kranky, 2 May)

Max Walker ~ Chronostasis (Orenda, 2 May)

Stereo Minus One ~ Dead Petals At The Other (Machine Records, 2 May)

Surgeon ~ Shell~Wave (Tresor, 2 May)

Pruski ~ Lark (IIKKI, 5 May)

Jacobo Vega-Albela ~ Un-Belonging (577 Records, 6 May)

Devin Sarno ~ Low Endings (Perceived Sound, 9 May)

Jacobo Vega-Albela ~ Un-belonging (577 Records, 9 May)

Lars Fredrik Frøislie ~ Gamle Mester (Karisma, 9 May)

Luke Hess ~ Arkeo (DeepLabs, 9 May)

SIGILLUM S ~ Aborted Towns, The Deadly Silence Before Utopia (Subsound, 9 May)

Surface Detail ~ Marea Nera (9 May)

The Vernon Spring ~ Under a Familiar Sun (RVNG Intl., 9 May)

Rumpistol ~ Nebula (The Rust Music, 13 May)

Alex Paxton ~ Delicious (New Amsterdam, 16 May)

Beatrice Dillon / Hideki Umezawa ~ Basho / Still Forms (Portraits GRM, 16 May)

Charles Chen ~ Building Characters (Cellar Music, 16 May)

David Handler ~ Life Like Violence (Cantaloupe Music, 16 May)

François J. Bonnet / Sarah Davachi ~ Banshee / Basse Brevis (Portraits GRM, 16 May)

Makeshift Spirituals ~ Volume 1 (577 Records, 16 May)

Michelle Helene Mackenzie & Stefan Maier/Olivia Block ~ Orchid Mantis / Breach (Portraits GRM, 16 May)

Rolando René ~ Pra’ (Prata Veituriorum) (Torto Editions, 16 May)

Zoo Too Trio ~ Poetry Legroom (Shifting Paradigm, 16 May)

Midi Neutron ~ whosgonnafeedyou likeThis (18 May)

Michael Begg ~ WITNESS. Ambient Chamber Works 2020-2024 (Omnempathy, 18 May)

Michelle Helene Mackenzie & Stefan Maier / Olivia Block ~ Orchid Mantis / Breach (Portraits GRM, 18 May)

emptyset ~ Dissever (Thrill Jockey, 23 May)

Joke Lanz ~ Zungsang (23 May)

Novoa / Kamaguchi / Cleaver Trio ~ Vol. 2 (577 Records, 23 May)

Hari Maia ~ The Endless Hum (Room40, 30 May)

Elizabeth Klinck ~ Chronotopia (Hallow Ground, 6 June)

IDTIL ~ A Screensaver of Emotions (Machine Records, 6 June)

Goldmund ~ Layers of Afternoon (Western Vinyl, 13 June)

Lyra Pramuk ~ Hymnal (7K!, 13 June)

Elskavon ~ Panoramas (Western Vinyl, 20 June)