Dark wave – 7th Level Music

Ora Cogan implores us to band together on “Division.”

“Division” Video Still – Directed by Ora Cogan, Micah Henry & Paloma Ruiz-Hernandez.

Ora Cogan releases “Division,” the second single/video from her forthcoming album and Sacred Bones debut, Hard Hearted Woman, out March 13th. Today’s single follows “Honey,” hailed for its “sweet Lauren Canyon haze” by Don’t Rock The Inbox and as a “cool, misty folk rock tune” by The Needle Drop. On “Division,” Cogan’s voice echoes across a stark, reverberant landscape. The song builds like a flare in the night, a plea against the numbing cruelty that’s come to feel routine these days: “Please don’t listen // Don’t give into the division // Feeding your lines // In some bitter mood again.” Cogan sounds like she’s summoning something, maybe a higher power, maybe the part of herself that knows how to sit with pain long enough to transform it.

“Division” arrives alongside an old world, horror-meets-fantasy video co-directed by Cogan, Micah Henry and Paloma Ruiz-Hernandez. Commenting on the video, Cogan says: “This video was filmed in Lilloet. There are three beings in this realm. The Human, The Oracle and The Demon. The Human is wrestling internally in a lonely world. They seek liberation from the torment inside. The Demon is the embodiment of the worst inclinations of the human. The oracle is the storyteller, urging the human to find understanding, to find a way through the internal battle.”

Watch the Video for Ora Cogan’s “Division”

Stream “Division”

Ora Cogan’s music is alchemical: part instinct, part ritual, and always conjured from the edges where life feels sharpest. With Hard Hearted Woman, she mixes haunted folk, psych rock, and a shadowy strain of country, building a realm where catharsis feels lush, mysterious and vital. Shaken by the tenor of modern life, Cogan pulled in a circle of kindred musicians and made a record shaped by someone who has looked into the abyss and decided, again and again, to choose curiosity.

Hard Hearted Woman grew out of a blur of cold-water plunges, long river swims, late-night ruminations with friends on art and politics, and long drives through the rural Lillooet landscape to visit her godmother. Alongside her band and guests from both the country and experimental worlds, she recorded with David Parry (Loving) at Dream Club in Victoria, B.C., as well as in her studio in Nanaimo, and remotely with Tom Deis. The result glows like something pulled from smoke and seawater — intimate, shimmering, and carved with wit as much as grief. It’s a swirling, jewel-toned ode to all the angels and the demons.

A work of devotion to mystery, to community, and to the strange power of making art in a fractured world, Hard Hearted Woman is a record about hardness and resilience; it’s the shell we grow so our most human, breakable selves can survive. Hard Hearted Woman is for anyone trying to stay open, even when the world makes that feel impossible.

Pre-Order Hard Hearted Woman

Watch the Video for “Honey”

Ora Cogan Tour Dates:
Fri. March 13 – Vancouver, BC @ The Pearl (Album Release Show)
Thu. March 19 – Brighton, UK @ The Hope & Ruin
Fri. March 20 – Oxford, UK @ The Nest
Sat. March 21 – Manchester, UK @ Yes Pink Room
Sun. March 22 – Newcastle, UK @ The Lubber Fiend
Tue. March 24 – Edinburgh, UK @ Sneaky Pete’s
Wed. March 25 – Glasgow, UK @ Room 2
Fri. March 27 – Galway, IE @ Roisin Dubh
Sat. March 28 – Dublin, IE @ Whelans
Sun. March 29 – Cork, IE @ Wavelength at Cyprus Avenue
Wed. April 1 – Sheffield, UK @ Sidney & Matilda
Thu. April 2 – Bristol, UK @ Rough Trade
Fri. April 3 – London, UK @ Dingwalls

Keep your mind open.

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[Thanks to Ahmad at Pitch Perfect PR.]

Review: Scattered Purgatory – Post Purgatory

I’m not sure how to accurately describe Scattered Purgatory‘s new album, Post Purgatory, but I’m also not sure it’s possible. The Taipei duo blend multiple genres well: Trip-hop, industrial, motorik, synthwave, a bit of goth. The cover looks like an upside-down photo of a flooded underpass with a city (Taipei?) in the background. The world was turned upside-down for the band during the pandemic, and they emerged from it, like all of us, a bit puzzled by how time and space worked and what was certain. Human relationships and airy expanses craved during isolation now felt kind of weird. Time felt like “it can heal or it can destroy,” as they mention in the notes for the album.

“Atata Naraka” has wild tenor saxophone (courtesy of Minyen Hsieh) that blasts like its being played in that flooded underpass while you cruise over the floodwaters in a sleek Miami Vice-era boat. The thick bass and fuzzy guitar chords of “Wunai” sound like the set-up to a seduction sequence in a vampire thriller.

“Ephemeral Mind” is a good name for a good track that describes how most of the world felt during and after the pandemic. Our minds, preoccupied with distractions before the pandemic, and calmness of mind, became ephemeral to our doom-scrolling. Emerging from our cocoons made some of us realize we need to put the phone down, while others rushed to fill the silence of the world and our heads with even more distractions. The 1980s goth guitar chords on it are damn cool.

“Thundering Dream” is heavy with low bass and synth stabs that sound like they’re played by robots underwater. dotzio‘s guest vocals on “Moonquake” create a gorgeous trip-hop / chillwave track that you’ll probably put on romantic playlists all year. “Above the Clouds” has heavy metal guitar chords combined with soft vocal sounds and tripped-out synths to make something unpredictable…as is the short “KL20,” which is like Blade Runner background music.

“Ocean City, Mirage Tower” would also fit into a science fiction film as the lead character slurps noodles in a tiny place off a neon-lit alley waiting for robot bounty hunters to show up and ruin everything. It floats along like lotus petal along the rain-filled underpass, drifting from synthwave to dark funk to cinematic piano paranoia.

Time is weird. Scattered Purgatory figured this out years ago and made an album that has a title symbolizing multiple things: Emerging from the weird time of the pandemic (which felt like purgatory for many), becoming new versions of themselves (Post “Scattered” Purgatory), no longer dwelling on the past, mistakes, and regrets (essentially what purgatory is).

Time constantly happens, and yet it doesn’t. No is one really sure what the hell it is. It heals all wounds and also withers away everything. Now is the only part of it that exists. I’m writing this in my present and in your past. You’re reading it in my future and your present. All of those things are now, like this record.

Keep your mind open.

[Don’t leave the subscription box in purgatory.]

[Thanks to Kate at Stereo Sanctity.]

ADULT. wants you to know that “No One Is Coming” with their new single.

ADULT. is not cooperating. For over 25 years, the dystopian Detroit synth-punk institution founded by Nicola Kuperus and Adam Lee Miller has embodied steadfast frustration, distrust, and apprehension. One might expect the edges to soften with time, but ADULT. is not interested in the comforts of legacy. The duo’s music has never sounded as visceral, urgent, and downright angry as it does on the culminating, uncompromising Kissing Luck Goodbye, their scorched-earth 10th LP and fourth with Dais Records.

Built with upgraded gear and a whole new library of sounds, the material is crushingly dynamic, louder yet clearer, with Kuperus’ commanding delivery given greater prominence in the mix, outlining an arsenal of vivid, caustic calls, chants, and musings. Laughter, whether in the lyrics or as a possessed presence, serves as a leitmotif that speaks to the menacing absurdity of modern times.

“No One is Coming”, the album’s lead single is a poignant, bassline-driven industrial anthem that turns feedback into melody, the track attacks inaction in the face of fascism —

NO ONE IS COMING TO YOUR RESCUE… A lyric that was written in early 2025 and is even more relevant on its release date a year later. A song speaking to moral collapse and political corruption “to a T”. These subhumans attempting to run the show are more concerned with cashing in and political cosplay than the well being of mankind. While working on this album, I read an article from an esteemed environmental scientist about “what’s coming in the future”. What stuck with me was their point that we are entering a new phase in existence where the most important thing we can do is know our neighbors and know the strengths of each other and what resources everyone has. Who needs extra care? Who is on their own? This song was written as a call to arms. Be alert. Be aware. Be prepared. Stand up for yourself and look out for your community. We are better when we are united. Social media is wearing us down. Deluding us. The political landscape is horrifying, distracting, deranged and unhinged. We are seeing this go down in real time right now in Minneapolis… NO ONE IS COMING TO YOUR RESCUE… except ALL OF US! Keep speaking up! Keep using your right to protest and most importantly keep showing kindness to one another.

– Nicola Kuperus

Listen / Share / Playlist “No One Is Coming” | Official Video

ADULT. is known for high-stakes catharsis on stage, and recently deployed their back catalog of bass guitar songs from the 2000s, retracing the prescient Anxiety Always era partially out of necessity given the temperature of today’s political and technological dread. The response was instant and palpable: “We were in Paris, and the kids were stage diving. And I was like, this is rad. This is kind of the energy I want to get back into,” Kuperus says. The epiphany coincided with a series of setbacks — Kuperus’ bouts with chronic vertigo, the loss of their close friend and collaborator Douglas McCarthy of Nitzer Ebb, whom the album is dedicated to — all made profoundly worse under the looming regime. “We were stuck in the mud for quite a while after the election,” Miller says. “We had all the concepts, but we would just be like, ‘What’s the point?’” With failing studio air conditioners and dead car batteries (their sacred space for listening back to recordings), they often joked that the album might be cursed. Kuperus adds, “We’re just like everything’s breaking. We’re breaking. We’re broken.”

The sentiment didn’t stick, however, as they found themselves ultimately too super-charged by fury to sit still. From watching Musk’s disgusting nazi salute to seeing their community struggle under the new regime to waiting months for a tariff-inflated replacement subwoofer, the vibe heading into Kissing Luck Goodbye was four middle fingers pointed straight up.

Rather than retreat, ADULT. focused on the process, revisiting their setup, complete with their first new mics in 20 years. They obsessed over textures, amassing a massive sample library taken from old thrift-store albums, previously used and unused ADULT. ingredients and new field recordings, running myriad items, including the buzz of shop vacs, through various pedals. Pause Kissing Luck Goodbye at any moment, and you’re likely to count a dozen things happening at once in strange, dizzying, and dissonant harmony. Together with producer Nolan Gray, whose involvement resulted from a chance encounter (he happened to be the host of the short-term rental property where the two stayed — maybe there is still some luck, after all), the band pushed themselves harder than ever before to build a world with this record.

Songs took shape from unusual places: “No One Is Coming” got its tempo from a skipping record they captured through a cell phone during a bnb stay for Kuperus’ 50th birthday. “None of It’s Fun” blitzes with breathless urgency, high-speed glissades, and pointed lines like “OH I AM TEARING MY GUTS OUT / LOOK AT ME…DO YOU THINK THAT THIS IS AMUSING?” The closer, “Destroyers”, was the last song they recorded and encompasses the techniques that ADULT. has learned not just throughout the making of Kissing Luck Goodbye, but across their quarter-century as a pioneering collaborative project.

ADULT. Live Dates:

Apr 10: Pittsburgh, PA – Spirit Lodge
Apr 11: Baltimore, MD – Ottobar
Apr 12: Brooklyn, NY – Good Room
Apr 14: Raleigh, NC – Kings
Apr 15: Atlanta, GA – The Earl
Apr 16: Jacksonville, FL – Jack Rabbits
Apr 17: Orlando, FL – The Social
Apr 18: Miami, FL – TBD
Apr 21: New Orleans, LA – Gasa Gasa
Apr 22: Houston, TX – White Oak Music Hall (Upstairs)
Apr 23: Austin, TX – 29th Street Ballroom
Apr 24: San Antonio, TX – Paper Tiger
Apr 25: Denton, TX – Rubber Gloves
Apr 28: Albuquerque, NM – Sister
Apr 29: Phoenix, AZ – Rebel Lounge
Apr 30: San Diego, CA – The Casbah
May 01: Los Angeles, CA – Hollywood Forever (Masonic Lodge)
May 02: San Francisco, CA – Rickshaw Stop
May 04: Portland, OR – Mississippi Studios
May 05: Seattle, WA – Barboza
May 08: Minneapolis, MN – 7th St. Entry
May 09: Cudahy, WI – X-Ray Arcade

Keep your mind open.

[Do some adulting. Subscribe today.]

[Thanks to Bailey at Another Side.]

New German Cinema releases her debut single – “My Mistake.”

Today the voice and songwriter of Fear of Men, Jessica Weiss, announces details of her debut solo album under the moniker New German Cinema. Set for release on March 27th via Felte, her new album ‘Pain Will Polish Me’ is preceded today with lead single “My Mistake”, which features guest vocals from Merchandise’s Carson Cox.

Weiss carries lyrical precision and emotional intensity into the stormy dark-pop gems on her debut solo album. ‘Pain Will Polish Me’ has been five years in the making, stretched between London and LA, built from late-night files, long silences and the quiet persistence of trying to finish something beautiful. Produced with Alex DeGroot (Zola Jesus, Cate Le Bon), it feels both forensic and devotional, the product of someone who doesn’t rush catharsis. It presents both solitary and connective, as if built from long-distance transmissions between two dream states.

Weiss calls the album a meditation on pop and European art-house auteur Rainer Werner Fassbinder. It tracks the ways intimacy and control fold into one another until it’s impossible to tell where one ends. The songs are about the parts of yourself that dissolve in love, and the small acts of violence that come with being known. They move through claustrophobic relationships, obsession, surrender, cycles of suffering that start to feel like devotion. The language is pop but the feeling is something stranger, colder, more interior.

The album’s lead track, online today, is “My Mistake” – a collaboration with Carson Cox of Merchandise, who comments “I was going to produce Fear of Men and instead we made something totally different I think. True collaboration which is my preferred way to work on music”. What began as an Italo disco experiment evolved into a goth club anthem, charged and restless. It captures the push and pull of Weiss’s themes – devotion as both destruction and release. Weiss has a knack for making pain feel both exquisite and familiar.

Speaking on the accompanying video, Weiss comments: “The video sets the emotional tone for the record, suspended between eroticism and nightmare. It draws on cropped mirror framing – a favourite device of Douglas Sirk used to explore themes of emotional and physical entrapment and characters’ inner psychological conflicts – moments of dissociation, and the television as a symbol of alienation, inspired by my perennial inspiration, RW Fassbinder.”

Video director Luke Bather adds: “Our initial starting point was, predictably, the New German Cinema movement. However, when we discussed the themes of the song in more depth, the video evolved into its own beast. Sex, death, repressed desire, and good old-fashioned Catholic Guilt all loom large in the video through a series of performance vignettes inspired by everything from the films of Rainer Werner Fassbinder through to the paintings of Francis Bacon and everything in between. Adding to this, we have the spectre of Carson haunting the video as a ghostly analogue broadcast interspersed with archival footage of Berlin in the 1970s; an inescapable reminder of the past and a nod to the original New German Cinema movement.”

“My Mistake (ft Carson Cox)” official video: https://youtu.be/3TVLCRnr2KM
‘Pain Will Polish Me’ album links: https://felte.lnk.to/new-german-cinema

The songs on ‘Pain Will Polish Me’ move in shadow. Layers of synth, vocal and guitar fold over one another, drawing from the cinematic tension of Fassbinder’s New German Cinema and the quiet dissonance of modern Berlin, where Weiss recorded fragments of the record, drifting between places that carry uneasy ghosts. Between dinner conversations about the city’s buried history and the surreal comfort of its present, she found herself tracing the outlines of love and loss, identity and dissolution. “Germany’s history is everywhere but it’s unsaid,” she notes. “Fassbinder brought it into view. I wanted to approach the same sense of unease through sound.”

The album artwork picks up these themes, hovering between the everyday mundanity of a Fassbinder domestic scene, and something less recognisable, punctuated by surreal elements that move us into dreamscape, both familiar and disquieting. The shell and sea reference Botticelli’s Venus: a figure born from sea foam created when Uranus’s severed genitals fell into the ocean – an image of creation through destruction. The shell becomes her vessel of birth, representing transformation, protection and fertility – the bridge between divine creation and human life. Weiss extends this theme of renewal to the personal; her baby daughter’s babbles feature on the record.

Weiss has long been fascinated by the seam between pop and theory, art and feeling. While Fear of Men continue to work on their next record, this solo project opens up her own private language- a collection that feels at once personal and archival, haunted and alive. Between finishing a Masters in Early Modern Literature at Oxford, starting a PhD, moving countries and jobs many times, she’s been piecing together a body of work that sits somewhere between diary, research and séance.

It’s an album about losing yourself in order to see what’s left. A document of love as obsession, repetition, survival. A meditation on love as both mirror and undoing, crafted in fragments, then pieced together into something whole.

New German Cinema live dates:
28 February – London, UK @ Sebright Arms
15 April – Brighton, UK @ The Folklore Rooms

Keep your mind open.

[Don’t make the mistake of not subscribing.]

[Thanks to Kate at Stereo Sanctity.]

Rewind Review: Belaria – Boost & Doubts (2022)

One of the descriptors for Belaria‘s Boost & Doubts EP on the record’s Bandcamp page is “dark disco.” That’s perfect. The sultry electro beats and vibe of the record is palpable. It sinks into you, moves you, and…alters you.

“Boost” blends disco with krautrock and synthwave into a pulsing, sexy smoothie. The beats on “Rest in B” (Does the “B” stand for “Beats?” Or “Boost?” Or “Belaria?”) pop and drip, while menacing synth chords wash over you like spotlights from an off-world colony ship. “Burning Inside” is the song spun by the replicant DJ on that ship as you walk into the exclusive lounge reserved for people who can afford the trip…or the android assassins who are there to deliver a message to those rich fat cats.

“Esteem” sounds like the theme to a forgotten late 1970s science fiction show that aired for perhaps half a season but was so brilliant and ahead of its time that the network didn’t know what to do with it. It’s fun, sexy, and practically makes you imagine a cavalcade of TV stars in tight outfits and slightly retro space ships.

The EP includes 12″ remixes of “Rest in B” and “Burning Inside.” The “Burning Inside” remix is the first song I heard from Belaria, and I was instantly intrigued. I love how her vocals are barely comprehensible or even noticeable in some cases. They sometimes sound like she’s speak-singing through a silk scarf, which only makes you lean in more to the song and the mysterious feel of her music.

Lean into this record. You won’t regret it.

[I’ll get a boost if you subscribe.]

Review: Odonis Odonis – self-titled

“We just started writing without any kind of preconceived notion of what we were trying to make. A lot of the songs just came from jamming…We wanted to make an emotive record and relay how we were feeling about all these massive changes that have been happening, not just in our lives, but in general. Like, where the fuck is the world heading? How is that affecting us? And how can we express it in a way that people can relate it to what’s happening in their lives? If we can make an honest record and put as much of ourselves as we can into this thing, you can’t replace that with a machine.”

Those are quotes from Constantin Tzenos, one half of Odonis Odonis (the other half being Denholm Whale), about their new self-titled album. The duo decided to create something that would push back against not only the stresses of the world at-large, but also their demanding other jobs (concert promotion for Whale – a field that’s always feast or famine – and film and TV composition for Tzenos – a field being taken over by AI programs).

“The Same” has them wondering why so much of everything feels familiar, and not in a good way, while they spin a bold sound that blends shoegaze with dark wave. “Hijack” continues this, with a thick Cure-like bass line and lyrics about reclaiming one’s narrative (“Don’t let them talk to power.”). That bass cranks up the power on “Come Alive” and yet the track is one of the trippiest on the album. “Work It Out” is a call for the band and their peers to get out of their doldrums and fix the stuff their parents and grandparents let go fallow (“My generation’s so dumb,” Tzenos complains.).

“When you’re breaking me down, well, I hope you had fun,” they sing on “Consumed” – a dark one that layers the synths and echoes the drums to nice effect. Then comes “Hunter,” which roars during the chorus and growls during the verses – much like some kind of predator…which might be a corporation, a billionaire, a politician, or in some cases all three in one.

The drum work on the nearly instrumental (the few lyrics are so layered with reverb that they become incomprehensible) “Distraction” is sharp, blending rat-a-tat snare work with crispy cymbal snaps. You can hear the duo’s “Let’s just jam and see what happens.” idea for the album in full here, and it makes me want a whole album of stuff like this from them.

“We Are Gods” is a punch at toxic, rich elitists who think they’re above everything and can’t admit how secretly miserable they are. Finally, on “Bliss,” Tzenos realizes that he, Whale, and the rest of us can find the very thing in the title (and “the sunshine,” as he keeps repeating) if we wish, are willing to do the work (or, in some cases, give up the work that’s been stifling us), and accept it.

It’s a good message to end an album and start a new year. We don’t have to keep doing the same things, voting for the same people, or putting the same job before our bliss. It’s there for the taking – as is this record.

Keep your mind open.

[Can I hijack a subscription from you?]

[Thanks to Alex at Terrorbird Media.]

Daniel Avery announces new remix album and tour.

Revered producer and composer Daniel Avery announces his new album, Tremor (Midnight Versions) — a reimagining of his acclaimed sixth studio album Tremor — out March 6th via Domino with lead single “Haze w/ Ellie (Midnight Version).” Remixing the entirety of the record himself, Avery presents a nocturnal counterpart to last year’s Tremor with a collection of darker, club-focused reworkings, drawing the record firmly into the late-night hours. Today’s announcement lands alongside news of a spring North American DJ tour.

Tremor (Midnight Versions) continues the world Avery created on Tremor, reframing its material through a techno lens and speaking directly to the dancefloor. Stripped back, intensified and retooled for the strobe light, these tracks channel Avery’s long-standing relationship with club culture while maintaining the emotional weight and textural depth that defines his work.

Two Midnight Versions have already surfaced, “Rapture In Blue w/ Cecile Believe” and “Greasy Off The Racing Line w/ Alison Mosshart,” offering a first glimpse of this shadowed universe. The full project expands on that energy, positioning itself as a vital bridge between Tremor’s expansive, collaborative spirit and Avery’s enduring techno lineage. Avery comments: “For every tremor, there’s a reaction. These are the Midnight Versions. Songs reimagined and sent directly into the night.”

On Tremor, Avery welcomed an inspiring cast of collaborators, including the likes of Alison Mosshart (The Kills), Walter Schreifels (Quicksand / Rival Schools), bdrmm, Julie Dawson(NewDad), yeule, Ellie, Art School Girlfriend, yunè pinku, and Cecile Believe. Each artist left their indelible mark, yet the record’s true power lies in the communal spirit at its core. Marking his debut on Domino, the album was mixed by Alan Moulder (Smashing Pumpkins, Nine Inch Nails) and David Wrench (FKA twigs, Frank Ocean), and mastered by Heba Kadry—each vital to the creative fabric of the record.

Stream “Haze w/ Ellie (Midnight Version)”

Pre-order Tremor (Midnight Versions)

Stream / Purchase Tremor

Daniel Avery Tour Dates
Sat. Jan. 31 – Brighton, UK @ Patterns ^
Sat. Feb. 21 – Brussels, BE @ Fuse ^
Fri. Feb. 27 – Birmingham, UK @ Hare & Hounds ^
Sat. Feb. 28 – Geneva, CH @ Audio ^
Fri. March 6 – London, UK @ Phonox Residency ^
Sat. March 7 – Bognor Regis, UK @ Bugged Out Weekender ^
Fri. March 13 – London, UK @ Phonox Residency ^
Fri. March 20 – London, UK @ Phonox Residency ^
Sat. March 21 – Manchester, UK @ Victoria Baths ^
Fri. March 27 – London, UK @ Phonox Residency ^
Thu. April 2 – Glasgow, UK @ Queen Margaret Union *
Fri. April 3 – Dublin, IE @ Opium *
Sat. April 4 – Belfast, UK @ Ulster Sports Club (b2b Richard Fearless) ^
Fri. April 24 – Toronto, CA @ Standard Time ^
Sat. April 25 – New York, NY @ Public Records ^
Thu. April 30 – Washington, DC @ Tigres de la Noche ^
Fri. May 1 – Chicago, IL @ Smoke & Mirrors ^
Sat. May 2 – Miami, FL @ The Ground ^
Thu. May 7 – Portland, OR @ Process ^
Fri. May 8 – Los Angeles, CA @ Into the Woods ^
Sat. May 9 – San Francisco, CA @ SquishFest ^
Sat. May 30 – Edinburgh, UK @ Dark Days (b2b Helena Hauff) ^

^ = DJ Set
* = Live Set

Keep your mind open.

[I’ll have tremors until you subscribe.]

[Thanks to Ahmad at Pitch Perfect PR.]

Review: Lowsunday – Low Sunday Ghost Machine – White EP

Coming back with their first new music since 1999, Lowsunday bring you a lot of heavy shoegaze riffs, post-punk bass, and psychedelic reverb on their Low Sunday Ghost Machine – White EP.

“Nevver” (Or is it “Newer?”) has lead vocalist Shane Sahene musing over how apathy has overcome him (“I used to care too much. Now I can’t care less.”) while Bobby Spell‘s near-disco bass line rumbles around him. “Call Silence” is a slick track of gothic shoegaze about missing a loved one after a breakup or a death when you realize they’re no longer going to answer your call.

On “Soft Capture,” Sahene realizes he’s the problem with lyrics like “I wish I believed you and I weren’t sick of me.” The Joy Division influence on the track is evident with its thick bass, spacey guitars, and distant vocals. “You Lost Yourself” reminds me a bit of early stuff from A Place to Bury Strangers, and has sharp lyrics about games played in relationships like “Some pretend to love while others love to pretend.” The bass and drums work especially well together on this track, too.

The EP closes with the sharp yet heavy “Love Language.” It could be a new darkwave smash. The wall of sound it creates is impressive and a bit intimidating, and Sahene’s hope that learning to love someone will at least slow down the pain inside him resonates with anyone who’s been lonely (AKA all of us).

It’s a good return for these chaps, and an EP that will help you drift into a different headspace for a little while.

Keep your mind open.

[You’ll be speaking my love language if you subscribe.]

[Thanks to Shauna at Shameless Promotion PR.]

Review: LUCKYANDLOVE – Humaura

LUCKYANDLOVE‘s new album, Humaura, has an interesting dichotomy running through it. The band love analog synths, Moog synthesizers, drum machines, and other electronic instruments and deftly use them to create lovely synthwave and dark wave music…

…and yet Humaura opens with “I Am Human” – a song that encourages us to “cut the wire” and back out of all this technology that consumes and does more to separate us than keep us together. Shut off your phone, stop binge-watching shows, get outside and breathe for a bit.

Then come back for the dance party that is “Feelz So Good,” because you do feel good after a break from the cyber-world. You always do. You always remember how good it feels to be present. “Run on Run” is a saucy tale of finding and walking away from love with April Love repeating “Just let me go.” to her former lover, as they’re not “the only one who can have some fun.” Speaking of love, “Name of Love” has some of Love’s best vocals on the record as the song goes from dark wave to electro-disco.

“Lonely at Night” is pure goth-wave as Love relates to all of us feeling isolated in the darkest hours of the evening. “You’re the only one who gets me,” Love sings on “Down to Black” – in which she happily (as happy as you can get in a goth dance tune, that is) sings about finally finding someone who understands her.

Loren Luck ups the percussion on “Secret Is Out,” which is about a vampire who needs to reveal their nature to a lover but is debating the decision. Will it bring relief or misery? “Hawks Do Cry” is another showcase of Love’s excellent vocals. “Melt in Sunshine” might refer to the vampire in “Secret Is Out.” It’s a slick track, with some of Luck’s best beats. It almost becomes dream pop at some points.

Again, it’s an interesting dichotomy – An electro record made with modern and analog technology that encourages you to put away technology, investigate yourself, and find love and human connection. In other words, LUCKYANDLOVE have delivered one of the most important messages of the year.

Keep your mind open.

[Yes, cut the wire, but subscribe first.]

[Thanks to Shauna at Shameless Promotion PR.]

Levitation Austin 2025: Day Two recap

“This is gonna be a sweat-fest.”

Those were the first words I heard about Day Two of 2025’s Levitation Austin musical festival as I walked toward the entrance of the Palmer Event Center. Some guy said this to his pal as they steeled themselves for the day to come. The guy was right, as the bright sun was brutal at times — especially at the outdoor stage.

I started indoors, both to avoid the peak sun and to see Hooveriii put on a solid set of psych-rock that bordered on grunge rock a couple times (which was fine by me).

Hooveriii (pronounced “Hoover Three”, not “hoovery.”)

Many of us ventured out into the sun to see Dutch disco funkers Yīn-Yīn play for the first time anywhere in the United States. They had the afternoon crowd jumping and were having a great time despite not being used to such heat.

Yīn-Yīn getting their sweaty groove on, and on all of us.

I had time for a chicken shawarma wrap (possibly the best food bargain at the festival) and some ice cream before heading back to the outdoor stage to see Model / Actriz put on a blistering set of queercore post-punk with lead singer Cole Haden prowling through the crowd while his bandmates played tight, snappy beats and riffs. Guitarist Jack Wetmore knows not only how to play, but the right moments not to play — a skill overlooked by many.

Model / Actriz bringing more heat than the afternoon sun.

I took some more time to hydrate and get a full meal (It’s a marathon, not a sprint.) before heading back indoors to join the large crowd for The Brian Jonestown Massacre, who played to a happy crowd — many of whom (at least around me) hadn’t seen them before now. It was a good set, with only minor issue when, believe it or not, Anton Newcombe decided his microphone had too much reverb.

The Raveonettes were a welcome return to Levitation. I hadn’t seen them since 2013 when Levitation was still the Austin Psych Fest (which has returned in its own form). They still sound great and played classics and newer stuff.

The biggest show of the night, and for the entire festival for me, belonged to TV on the Radio. I wasn’t sure I’d ever get to see them, so their appearance at Levitation made the decision to fly here a no-brainer. They slayed it and had everyone jumping and moving. Their energy was infectious and immediate, and a great way to close the night.

TVOTR didn’t close my night, however. I was so wired after their set that I walked over a mile to Elysium to see Past Self and Urban Heat. I knew we were in for a treat when Past Self’s bassist started the show by playing his guitar with a bow. What followed was a mix of desert rock (They’re from Las Vegas, Nevada.), New Romanticism, and dark wave.

Past Self. Are they ghosts, musicians, past incarnations of you?

Urban Heat are local heroes who play aggressive shoegaze mixed with post-punk anger. It’s good stuff, and they seem destined for big things. They reminded me a bit of early TVOTR, which was fitting because I bumped into TVOTR’s guitarist / multi-instrumentalist Jaleel Bunton at their show and got to thank him for the great set.

Up next, psychedelia, indie rock, and a couple sets that might cause you to seek a chiropractor afterwards.

Keep your mind open.

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