A CLOSER LISTEN weekly #86

Mid-Year Mini-Reviews Marathon Part 2: Under the Radar (A-L)

Dear Listeners, Joseph again. I’ll have my review of this year’s Suoni festival—along with the full interview transcript with festival director Kiva Stimac, for paid subscribers—out for our next newsletter. Some delayed reviews of three recent records I’ve really been enjoying, each of which were also accompanied by an interview with the artist(s), will also start trickling out soon.

Hopefully you saw our Ten Tracks That Sound Like Summer? Well, you can now re-listen to my mix of those ten summer songs—with a little Battiato at the beginning and two tracks from Jordan Christoff (and his duo with Patrick Dique, PJS) at the end. Rich’s First Half Highlights article went on the blog before our little summer vacation, and as he says in his preamble, that list of 20 was chosen by the staff from albums or EPs released from January 1-June 30 and covered on our site.

The records I’ve chosen for this Mid Year Mini-Review Marathon are similarly (mostly) released in the first half of the year, but drawn from records that we haven’t reviewed, but are still very much worthy of your time. Once again this edition has run very long, so I’ve split it in two. Part three soon.

Mid-Year Mini-Reviews Marathon

Short highlights featuring 25 releases we’ve enjoyed during the first half of 2025 that haven’t received full reviews

UNDER THE RADAR

Andrew Pekler ~ New Environments & Rhythm Studies
Pekler’s latest finds the artist “returning to the humid zones” of earlier records like Sounds From Phantom Islands and Tristes Tropiques, music that confounds any supposed binary divisions between organic and electronic.

Beatrice Dillon ~ Basho
Dillon’s kinetic Workaround topped The Wire’s 2020 end of year lists for good reason, while last year’s Seven Reorganizations found the UK DJ and composer working in a very different mode of through composed chamber music. Basho, a stunning 20 minute composition for GRM’s Portrait series, returns to the synthetic sounds and patterns of her breakthrough.

Bill Orcutt Guitar Quartet ~ HausLive 4
A recording of a live show from 3 May 2024, during the peak of the quartet touring together. Orcutt—joined by Wendy Eisenberg, Ava Mendoza, and Shane Parish—made a splash with their great Tiny Desk appearance, and this live recording provides even more hypnotic guitar riffing.

Black Swan ~ From the End of Time
Released just a month after the long form pieces of Bilateral Symphony, this new full length for our friends Past Inside the Present finds the drone artist working in a mode similar to 2024’s Ghost, short discreet tracks that form a broader narrative arc. Lovely stuff, as always.

Chuquimamani-Condori / Joshua Chuquimia Crampton ~ Los Thuthanaka
Fans of their individual work rejoice, as the siblings team up for Los Thuthanaka, a genre-transcending, alchemical fusion of worlds. Like Chuquimamani-Condori’s 2023 stunner DJ E, the duo draw on the Andean music of their Aymara heritage, with Joshua’s bass and guitar adding new dimensions

Colin Self ~ respite ∞ levity for the nameless ghost in crisis
On their long anticipated third album, Colin Self traverses realms, with a voice that fractures and reassembles, conjuring uncanny sonic spaces both intimate and otherworldly. With guest contributions including from Drew Daniel and M. C. Schmidt (Matmos) and Lyra Pramuk, Self’s songwriting—and singular voice—remain the centerpiece.

Deaf Center ~ Reverie
As much as we love their solo work, it’s always something to celebrate when Otto A Totland and Erik K Skodvin (Svarte Greiner) unite as Deaf Center. Their early 2000s work for Type are all certified classics, but the group entered a long silence after 2011, as the duo’s solo project took more attention. In recent year’s some newer material has trickled out on Sonic Pieces, most recently 2019’s Low Distance, which consisted of music recorded during sessions in 2017. But here we have raw live meeting from fall 2024, and it is a reverie indeed.

Derek White ~ tiki
I never liked the folktronica label (I generally find portmanteaus distasteful, and particularly so of genres) but that appellation might help captures something of the way White’s guitar floats above the wooden rhythms and lo-fi samples of tiki. There are elements of musique concrète, but despite being the result of studio tinkering, these tracks feel full of improvisational spontaneity. Much of this relies on the guitar playing, and while tiki would no doubt be compelling with the guitar erased, this acoustic element is a welcome glue that ties it all together.

Dustin Wong ~ Gloria
2023’s Perpetual Morphosis was a favorite of our’s at ACL (see David’s interview), and Gloria, Wong’s celebration of the life of his grandmother, with whom he took a west coast road trip before her passing, is a fitting follow-up. Part travelogue, part memoir, part loving tribute, Gloria merges dense beds of samples and digital murmurs with Wong’s glittering guitar lines. Sculpted and meticulously edited from long improvisations, full of surprising transitions and moments of emotional power, Gloria is a joyous ode to the power of kindness and the importance of our elders.

Ellen Arkbro ~ Nightclouds
Nightclouds traces a meditative arc through five solo organ improvisations, where resonant harmonies hover between sacred solemnity and minimalist restraint. Slowly unfolding reveries balance structural precision with fleeting emotion, a glacial drift of sustained tones that should help elevate Arkbro to wider acclaim.

Fatalism ~ (n)ether
(n)ether is the latest work from the Bangkok and Tokyo-based sculptor of post-industrial unease; its distorted waves belie a profound sense of calm just below the surface, if only you give in to its ambivalent anesthetization.

Felicia Atkinson ~ Promenades
Gorgeous synesthetic drifts for Nord Keyboard from another longtime site favorite. Made in winter while dreaming of spring, Promenades is the soundtrack to your next meandering walk. Go get lost and soak in the colors.

Flora Yin Wong ~ Dead Loop
Flora Yin Wong’s Dead Loop refers to both musical fragments and a banned gymnastic maneuver. Two fractured études for kemençe, a stringed Eastern Mediterranean instrument that she bows, picks and plucks, processed and manipulated to conjure the perilous rotations of two Soviet gymnasists from half a century ago.

Francois Bonnett / Sarah Davachi ~ Banshee / Basse Brevis
I’ve tended to treat these side-long split LPs as discreet releases, but as we’re longtime fans of both artists and both sides will no doubt be of great interest. Bonnett draws on the famous figure of Gaelic mythology in his transformations of raw material recorded in the Inner Hebrides, equal parts lament and warning from beyond. In contrast, Davachi’s side is predictably restrained and minimal, yet no less poignant.

Giovanni Di Domenico & Rutger Zuydervelt ~Painting a Picture / Picture a Painting
As the title suggests, Painting a Picture / Picture a Painting consists of a pair of expansive, complementary pieces with swapped methods; Di Domenico’s recordings are sculpted by Zuydervelt, and vice versa. The two drift in dialogue, sharing textures and gestures while conjuring something that transcends their individual contributions.

Hannah Marcus ~ Ten Bones from a Virgin Graveyard
This long-shelved dark gem of early 2000s poetic folk-Americana and post-rock from singer-songwriter Hannah Marcus has finally been shared with the world. As on her wonderful 2004 record, Desert Farmers, Nadia and Jessica Moss, and multiple Godspeed members round out the songs, with other contributions from Matana Roberts (Marcus played on their Coin Coin 4) and drummer Kevin Shea.

Ian Hawgood ~ well, here we are
Another stalwart site favorite, Home Normal/Folk Reels boss Ian Hawgood delivers a stunning ode to recovery for Quiet Details. Hawgood’s well, here we are is an album of quiet resurrection, self-reclamation, and acceptance, shaped by trauma, kindness, and the slow return of light. Weaving melodies that feel both fragile and unshakable, the radical, radiant honesty of well, here we are is a gift to us all.

IE ~ Reverse Earth
Minneapolis deep psych quintet returns for a full-length that explores songform without abandoning their penchant for meditative minimalist excursions; the additional emphasis on driving kick drum and melodious vocals are just another ingredient in the stew that is IE. Reverse Earth is a celestial slow-burn, patiently luxuriating in a shadow elongating at dusk.

Jacaszek ~ Idylla
The final installment of the Polish composer’s trilogy of nature-based recordings for the venerable Touch label. Classical instrumentation traces the contours of a vanishing world, delicately poised between lamentation and bliss.

Jim O’Rourke ~ Steamroom 66
O’Rourke has done it all—from the most abrasive extremes of the avant-garde to the pure joy of simple pop songs—and one never knows what side of the artist will appear on his long-running Streamroom series. #66 seems to be closer to the former, without ever crossing the threshold to lacerating, and indeed by the end spectral runs and drones have become comfortable in the enveloping totality.

Kate Carr ~ Rubber Band Music
Yet another longtime favorite, Kate Carr continues to move away from field recording based compositions in favor of furthering her explorations with self-made experimental noise boxes. Rubber Band Music does not sound as playful as the title and cover art might suggest; no surprise to fans, Carr’s soundscapes are deeply compelling and full of sonic intrigue regardless of sound source.

Kara-Lis Coverdale ~ From Where You Came
Kara-Lis Coverdale first appeared on many of our radars due to her collaborations with Tim Hecker, but early solo efforts A 480, Aftertouches, and the particularly exquisite Grafts (an all-time favorite) left no doubt as to her talents as a composer. Indeed, since the 2017 release of that last album, Coverdale has eschewed recorded music in favor of commissioned ensemble compositions. It’s now been eight long years and From Where You Came From was worth the wait, as K-LC weaves rich lattice of sound that blur the line between acoustic tradition and electroacoustic revelation.

Lea Bertucci + Olivia Block ~ I Know the Number of the Sand and the Measure of the Sea
Two artists whose solo work we’ve long admired on one of our favorite labels sets a high bar, and Bertucci and Block don’t disappoint. Years in gestation, their first collaboration transmutes remote exchanges into a toxic liturgy inspired by the Oracle at Delphi. Mythic inspiration meets demystifying modernity, as Block’s synth-and-tape oscillations merge with Bertucci’s reel-to-reel voice and microcassette field recordings, thickening into a haze of prophetic vapor.

Lino Capra Vaccina and Mai Mai Mai ~ I Racconti di Aretusa
This cross generational collaboration has been percolating for a while, with Vaccina having previously contributed to both Phi and Rimorso, with multiple live collaborations since. Maestro Vaccina is renowned as founding percussionist of freak folk-jazz pioneers Aktuala and the composer and performer of Antico Adagio (1978), a classic of Italian minimalism. Toni Cutrone (Mai Mai Mai) also cut his teeth as a percussionist, with the younger’s more intense electronics tempered by the delciate vibraphone patterns and gong flourishes of the venerable composer. More or less divided into 10-minute quarters, I Racconti di Aretusa (The Tales of Arethusa) conjures the myth of a nymph fleeing Arcadia for Sicily, summoning rites of music memory and the palimpsest of time in the ancient crossroads of the Mediterranean.

Lucrecia Dalt ~ cosa rara
More than just an appetizer to warm us up for a full-length coming in September, this 7” packs a wallop. The a-side of cosa rara features a rare appearance from David Sylvian, who contributes vocals, feedback guitar, and mixing. If that’s not enough, Mabe Fratti’s more languid, cello-centric interpretation and Matias Aguayo's dopamine dub ensure this single is more than worth the price of admission. Records like Lucy & Aaron—Dalt’s 2021 collaboration with Aaron Dilloway—and ¡Ay!—her breakout record for RVNG—demonstrated that the Colombian artist has a knack for writing compelling and accessible pop music, even when she’s at her weirdest. Consider our appetites whet!

UPCOMING RELEASES

(complete list with Bandcamp links here)

We’ve been waiting all year for summer, and now it has finally arrived! Schools are out, vacations are planned, cars are packed and the beaches beckon. The music release schedule slows down to make space for the concert season, but there’s still plenty of brand new music to look forward to: a steady stream of new releases eager to serve as the soundtrack to summer. We hope you find your next favorite album right here!

zakè & Pallette ~ Somewhere (18 June)

Chad Kouri ~ Mixed (20 June)

Chamber Winds of South Dakota ~ Moxie (Aerocade, 20 June)

Clara Kim ~ our little matches (New Focus, 20 June)

Eduardo Ella ~ Desvíos (577 Records, 20 June)

Elskavon ~ Panoramas (Western Vinyl, 20 June)

Hampus Lindwall ~ Brace for Impact (Ideologic Organ, 20 June)

Julien Mier ~ Gradually (Lapsus, 20 June)

Lia Kohl & Zander Raymond ~ In Transit (Un je-ne-sais-quoi, 20 June)

Matmos ~ Metallic Life Review (Thrill Jockey, 20 June)

Mosley Jr. ~ Rollerskate (Mood Family, 20 June)

Osmium ~ Osmium (Invada, 20 June)

Raimund Wong and Suren Seneviratne ~ A Record of Living Beings (Kit Records, 20 June)

Sally Anne Morgan ~ Second Circle the Horizon (Thrill Jockey, 20 June)

Susana López ~ Materia Vibrante (Elevator Bath, 20 June)

Tassery ~ My Own Mirror (Comme dans les films, 20 June)

Vanessa Tomlinson ~ The Edge is a Place (Room40, 20 June)

Various Artists ~ Blackout Tape (20ft Records, 20 June)

ZÖJ ~ Give Water to Birds (Parenthèses, 20 June)

When Colors Are Fading ~ September Sun (21 June)

Giovanni Di Domenico – Alex Zethson ~ Edge Runner – Noema (defkaz, 22 June)

Universal Affirmation Ensemble ~ Unconditional Propositions (Katuktu Collective, 24 June)

Jonathan Schenke ~ Passages (No-Gold, 26 June)

Sveið ~ Latent Imprints (577 Records, 26 June)

Alec Goldfarb ~ Shadows (Long Echo, 27 June)

Black Sites ~ R4 (Tresor, 27 June)

Brighde Chambeul ~ Sunwise (Glitterbeat, 27 June)

Canzonieri ~ All Creature (Kuboraum Editions, 27 June)

Cate Francesca Brooks ~ Lofoten (Clay Pipe Music, 27 June)

galen tipton & Shmu ~ dewCLAWS (Orange Milk, 27 June)

Jasmine Guffond ~ Music for the Encouragement of Unproductivity (LINE, 27 June)

knox ~ Fragments (27 June)

Sonologyst ~ Planetarium (Cold Spring, 27 June)

Client_03 ~ Testbed_Assembly (Client_03, 4 July)

Darragh Morgan ~ For Violin and Electronics – Volume II (Diatribe, 4 July)

G Clef Fusion ~ With Dark and Light (27 June)

Jonathan Uliel Saldanha ~ Surface Disorder (Perf, 27 June)

Merzbow ~ Sedonis (Signal Noise, 27 June)

Nev Lilit ~ Hyperit (Moloton, 27 June)

Nitrada ~ Everything That Is Not Counted Will Be Lost (2nd Rec., 27 June)

Pan American & Kramer ~ Interior of an Edifice (Shimmy-Disc, 27 June)

Sary Moussa ~ Wind, Again (Other People, 27 June)

Simonel ~ Cartographies of Silence (LINE, 27 June)

sofii ~ i want this feeling to last forever (Soul Feeder, 27 June)

Stephen O’Malley ~ But remember what you have had (Portraits GRM, 27 June)

Tropos ~ Switches (endectomorph music, 27 June)

Various Artists ~ Resilient Resistance (BSR, 27 June)

VOLTU ~ The Violets Are Blue (27 June)

Zimoun ~ Harmonium I-IV (Room40, 27 June)

Zoh Amba ~ Sun (Smalltown Supersound, 27 June)

Haarvöl ~ Horizons of Suspended Zones (Cronica, 1 July)

Amina Hocine ~ ātamōn (Subtext, 2 July)

Dmitry Evgrafov ~ Research Center (Open Pathways, 4 July)

Marc Neys ~ Sanctuary (Audiobulb, 4 July)

Rival Consoles ~ Landscape from Memory (Erased Tapes, 4 July)

SJUSH ~ Temper Shift (Intrepid Skin, 4 July)

skanderjaibi ~ Who has the right to closure? (Uncloud Editions, 4 July)

Traverse ~ It’s Broken (Somewherecold, 4 July)

V/A ~ Gost Zvuk 10 Years (Gost Zvuk, 4 July)

V/A ~ Perceptions Vol. 6 (Bigo & Twigetti, 4 July)

Yann Novak ~ Continuity (Room40, 4 July)

Fabrizio Cucco ~ Tempo Firmo (577 Records, 5 July)

Lewis Fautzi ~ Unwritten Chapters (Faut Section, 7 July)

7XINS ~ One Knob Per Function (Live Cuts) (Severn Electronics, 9 July)

Aho Ssan & Resina ~ Ego Death (Subtext, 11 July)

Alan Noblock, John Butcher, Mark Sanders ~ Tectonic Plates (577 Records, 11 July)

Annie Blythe, Bendon Randall-Myers ~ Only in the Dark (cmntx, 11 July)

Benoît Pioulard ~ Stanza IV (Disques d’Honoré, 11 July)

Colin Andrew Sheffield ~ Serenade (Elevator Bath, 11 July)

Fuubutsushi ~ Columbia Deluxe (American Dreams, 11 July)

Hammock ~ Nevertheless (Hammock Music, 11 July)

Kiji Suedo ~ Velvet Textures (Hobbes Music, 11 July)

Molly Joyce ~ State Change (Better Company, 11 July)

Patricia Wolf ~ Hrafnamynd (Balmat, 11 July)

phase space ~ Degrees of Freedom (11 July)

Reid Willis ~ Reliquary (Mesh, 11 July)

Siavash Amini ~ Caligo (Room40, 11 July)

V/A ~ Hardwired – curated by JakoJako (Air Texture, 11 July)

Yearns ~ Fata Morgana (Room40, 11 July)

Ement ~ Choice Paralysis (PZ, 17 July)

David Donohoe & Kate Carr ~ A Storm and its Aftermath (Flaming Pines, 18 July)

DJ Haram ~ Beside Myself (Hyperdub, 18 July)

KILN ~ Lemon Borealis (A Strangely Isolated Place, 18 July)

Nizar Rohana Trio ~ The NCO Session (Worlds Within Worlds, 18 July)

Norman Westberg ~ Milan (Room40, 18 July)

Paul Pèrrim ~ Itara (Discrepant, 18 July)

Sarah Wilson ~ Incandescence (Brass Tonic, 18 July)

Shrunk feat. Fabiana Striffler ~ Pixie People (577 Records, 18 July)

Sudden Voices ~ Scruples (18 July)

Thee Reps ~ Cryptocarography (Gold Bolus, 18 July)

pdqb ~ The Electrifying Dojo (Synaptic Cliffs, 19 July)

The Vardaman Ensemble ~ FR FR (19 July)

Giant Claw ~ Decadent Stress Chamber (Orange Milk, 24 July)

The Allegorist ~ From Birth Until Death (Awaken Chronicles, 25 July)

Autistici ~ Familiarity Folded (Audiobulb, 25 July)

Duchamp ~ The Wild Joy (Torto Editions/Ramble/Atena, 25 July)

Eric Siereveld’s Organic Quintet ~ Sweet William (Shifting Paradigm, 25 July)

Flying Sutra with Ayumi Ishito ~ Out Beyond Orbit (577 Records, 25 July)

John Also Bennett ~ Στον Ελαιώνα / Ston Elaióna (Shelter Press, 25 July)

leon todd johnson ~ wa kei sei jaku (Whited Sepulchre, 25 July)

Manslaughter 777 ~ God’s World (Thrill Jockey, 25 July)

747 ~ Pacific Spirit (Aquaregia, 25 July)

Shelley Burgon ~ The In Between (Thin Wrist, 25 July)

Sideways Ebb ~ Sad Buffer V (28 July)

Teddy Abrams ~ Preludes (New Amsterdam, 25 July)

Kory Reeder ~ In Place (thanatosis, 29 July)

Andy Graydon & Klaus Janek ~ A Book of Waves (Room40, 1 August)

Brian Wenckebach ~ Memory & Anticipation (Somewherecold, 1 August)

Caimin Gilmore ~ BlackGate (New Amsterdam, 1 August)

Eva Novoa ~ Novoa / Gress / Gray Trio, Vol. 2 (577 Records, 1 August)

Felicity Mangan ~ String Figures (Elevator Bath, 1 August)

High Gardens ~ Secret Places of the Lion (Not Not Fun, 1 August)

Keefe Jackson, Jakob Heinemann, Adam Shead ~ Stinger (Irritable Mystic, 1 August)

Madeleine Cocolas ~ Syndesis (Room40, 1 August)

Stephen Finn, Sylvain Monchocé, Jung-Jae Kim ~ Quark (Creative Sources, 1 August)

Viv Corringham ~ Soundwalkscapes (volume 2) (Flaming Pines, 1 August)

Professor Flitch ~ Uneven (3 August)

Meitei ~ Sen’nyū (Kitchen, 8 August)

Tom Gershwin ~ Wellspring (8 August)

Tony Orzano, Bryan Rohmer, Jeremy Wexler ~ Balloons on Grass (577 Records, 8 August)

Erik Griswold ~ Next Level Avoidance (Room40, 9 August)

Jake Baldwin ~ Vanishing Point (Shifting Paradigm, 15 August)

Dan Rosenboom ~ Coordinates (Orenda, 29 August)

Oren Ambarchi & Frederik Rasten ~ Dragon’s Return (Viernulvier, 12 September)

Grandbrothers ~ Elsewhere (_and_others, 26 September)