As the story goes, Ed O’Brien had just released his first solo album, Earth, in 2020 and then the world shut down. He was barely able to promote it and then, like all of us, had to enter a period of isolation. Having that time alone, even while with his family, gave him time to brood, which led to a dark depression and a cataloguing of ideas that he kept for four years until he was able to take time away from being Radiohead‘s guitarist to write and record his excellent second solo album – Blue Morpho.
The album is named after a butterfly, and O’Brien does indeed spread his wings and transform across the album’s length. “Incantation” starts off the record with psychedelic folk flavor with O’Brien’s guitar sounding like it’s melting at one point. The title track unfurls like the titular butterfly enjoying the sun for the first time, and O’Brien did find a reconnection with nature while writing the album in Wales and spending a lot of time in the woods. The soft vocals of “Sweet Spot” reveal O’Brien’s vulnerability as he felt the world shifting around him (and the rest of us) and wasn’t sure what, if anything, to do about it.
The groove of “Teachers” is outstanding, reminding me a bit of Boz Scaggs‘ stuff. O’Brien has acknowledged that he wasn’t so much interested in rock on Blue Morpho as he was jazz and trip-hop. “Midway through life, I just lost my way,” he admits. Dude, been there. Also, O’Brien’s solo absolutely shreds on this track.
“Solfeggio” is an instrumental drone track that makes me think O’Brien was trying to capture the fuzz in his mind as he tried to wrangle all the thoughts he was putting to paper, and “Thin Places” is another instrumental that’s calmer and meditative…as if O’Brien found that the best way to wrangle all those thoughts was to set them free to land where they wanted and not grasp them so hard (if at all).
The album ends with the nearly ten-minute “Obrigado.” “Sunny days are awaiting me,” O’Brien sings, and you believe him. We can all have those sunny days where “every day’s a symphony” if we allow them to happen. The song is bright, lush, and brilliant.
The cover image of Tokyo Tea Room‘s new album, Feel Forever, is, if you ask me, perfect for the sound of the record. You might look at it and think, “It’s just a photo of crumbled aluminum foil.”, but after you hear the dreamy, soulful psych-pop of Feel Forever, you think, “Oh yeah, I get it.”
Sam Teather‘s opening drum roll of “Hypnotised” is a perfect start to pretty much a perfect record. Beth Plumb‘s vocal style is like hearing dandelion seeds floating on summer winds, and the rest of the band (guitarist / producer / songwriter / jack-of-all-trades Dan Elliott and bassist Ben Marshall) groove like they’ve been doing it since the mid-80s. “Eyes Off You” is a love song you’ll put on every mix you’ll send to a lover from now until the end of time. “Leave You” has Plumb wanting to stay with a lover a bit longer because returning to the rat race is just…so…boring.
“All Night” continues this theme (with a shimmering groove) of wanting to extend the joy just another night more instead of calling it quits. The slow, smooth sound of “Feeling High” is great, with Teather putting down tight, simple jazz beats and Elliott’s synths and keys acting as icing on Plumb’s vocal cake. Marshall shines on “Always in the Sun” as his bass dances along like a happy cat and the band shows off their love of soul.
Elliott’s guitar on “You’re Mine” moves from desert rock to jazz with ease. “Temporary Love” has Plumb wanting a one-night stand to become a several-night stand at least, and “Last Time” has her wanting to seize the moment with a lover before its over and they go their separate ways. “Slip Away” floats us to bed as Plumb encourages us to “Stay inside, the world outside can wait.”
Getting back to the cover image, Feel Forever is as shimmery and reflective as the pictured aluminum. It’s also just as tactile and malleable. You feel it when you hear it as it wraps around and forms to you.
In September, Adult DVD will be releasing their self-titled debut LP on Fat Possum Records. The Leeds-based sextet have become one of the most talked-about live bands in the UK over the last couple of years, playing festivals like Glastonbury, Green Man, End Of The Road, on the strength of their early EPs. Their momentum has continued gathering behind the band since the announce of their signing to Fat Possum, with the band making their US debut at SXSW earlier this year where they were hailed as one of the best bands of the festival. The band followed that up by touring Japan where they were greeted by fans in homemade Adult DVD merch, played a series of sold-out shows and saw posts about their performances go viral with millions of views.
The band announced their record with the single “Cowboy On Aisle Three” last month, that Stereogum described as “a deranged banger….[that] explodes with DFA-indebted infectiousness.” Today, Adult DVD are back to share a new preview of the album, a track called “Rolling Face,” an acid house exploration of a wild night out that ends with its main character out of his mind.
Singer Harry Hanson says of the track: “A job in a suit can only get you so far, which is what the character from rolling face soon realizes, he’s at the deep end of a pretty ugly night out, which ends in him losing his mind and money.”
In the making of their exhilarating debut album, vocalist Harry Hanson and synth-player Greg Lonsdale, alongside Danny Blackburn (guitar/synth), Jake Williams (synth), Jonathan Newell (drums), and George Manson (bass), went harder on what was already working for them: witty observational songwriting based in real-life characters and a pulsating synth-punk sound perfect for both the rave and the mosh pit. Fusing together an intense musical workout with depictions of a motley crew of figures ranging from 5G conspiracy theorists to an existential cowboy, Adult DVD is the electrifying sound of a band exceeding their own expectations while going just as hard, if not harder than their adrenaline-fueled live shows.
Produced by the band at The Nave Studios Leeds , the general theme of the album is to let go and take life a little less seriously. Simmering with boredom, wasted time, scams and a preoccupation with death and sex, the Adult DVD universe is a place to escape to and also get lost. These are songs that untangle the complicated ways in which people find themselves living, mining both laughter and energy from thinking. “There isn’t that much down time on the album,” Hanson says in reference to its pulsating energy and high BPM count. “It’s got harder in both directions. It’s like the EPs but on steroids.”
Margate, UK’s Tokyo Tea Room release “Always In The Sun,” the third single from their new album, Feel Forever, out September 18th via Nice Guys. Following the “slinky, funky” (Brooklyn Vegan) “All Night,” “Always In The Sun” has future live favorite written all over it, evoking Random Access Memories-era Daft Punk with its fluid funk guitar, swaggering bass and shimmering synths. Vocalist BethDunn sings about a love so intense and radiant that it completely transforms her life. Almost utopian in spirit, “Always In The Sun” captures all of love’s joys.
Tokyo Tea Room— Dunn, Daniel James Elliott, Ben Marshall, Sam Teather, and Sam Ewens—is a timeless project whose message transcends the music itself. The band arouses passions and emotions, taking listeners on a journey within a tender, comforting bubble. Their debut album, No Rush, established them as one of the most compelling emerging acts in alternative music, resonating with a growing global audience. With millions of monthly listeners and a sold-out debut North American tour, the band are rapidly building momentum, particularly in the US, where their audience continues to expand. With Feel Forever, Tokyo Tea Room are entering a defining new chapter, evolving their sound while staying rooted in the emotional depth that defines their work.
Feel Forever was written and produced by Elliott with co-production by Kristofer Harris, marking the first time Elliot worked with a producer. Of the recording process, Elliot says, “We took a yacht rock approach to the recording, taking our time to smooth all the edges and make something that felt more polished than the last record. Both of us spent hours obsessing over the smallest detail, which felt very apt for this album. The result is something that we are all very proud of, it’s a different kind of Tokyo Tea Room that has come out the other side of it, but it feels right and I hope people enjoy listening.”
Tokyo Tea Room will return to North America this fall touring in support of forthcoming new music. A full list of dates are below and tickets are on sale now here.
Tokyo Tea Room Tour Dates: Thu. Sep 24 – Vancouver – Hollywood Theatre Sat. Sep 26 – Seattle WA – Neumos Mon. Sep 28 – San Francisco CA – Bimbo’s 365 Club Wed. Sep 30 – Los Angeles CA – Teragram Ballroom (SOLD OUT) Thu. Oct. 1 – Los Angeles, CA @ Teragram Ballroom Fri. Oct 2 – San Diego CA – Quartyard Sat. Oct 3 – Tucson AZ – Club Congress Mon. Oct 5 – Austin TX – 29th St. Ballroom Tue. Oct 6 – Houston TX – White Oak Music Hall Wed. Oct 7 – Dallas TX – Club Dada (indoors) Fri. Oct 9 – Atlanta GA – Terminal West Sat. Oct 10 – Durham NC – Motorco Music Hall Sun. Oct 11 – Washington DC – The Atlantis Tue. Oct 13 – Brooklyn NY – Music Hall of Williamsburg Wed. Oct 14 – New York NY – Bowery Ballroom Thu. Oct 15 – Boston MA – The Sinclair Fri. Oct 16 – Montreal QB – Bar le Ritz Sat. Oct 17 – Toronto ON – Mod Club Mon. Oct 19 – Chicago IL – Lincoln Hall Sat. Oct. 31 – Amsterdam, NL @ London Calling Festival Sun. Nov. 1 – Hamburg, DE @ Nochtwache Mon. Nov. 2 – Berlin, DE @ Mikropol Wed. Nov. 4 – Cologne, DE @ Yard Club Thu. Nov. 5 – Paris, FR @ Bellevilloise Thu. Nov. 19 – Brighton, UK @ Dust Fri. Nov. 20 – Southampton, UK @ The Joiners Sat. Nov. 21 – Bristol, UK @ Exchange Sun. Nov. 22 – Manchester, UK @ YES (Pink Room) Tue. Nov. 24 – Glasgow, UK @ Mono Wed. Nov. 25 – Leeds, UK @ Hyde Park Book Club Thu. Nov. 26 – Nottingham, UK @ Bodega Wed. Dec. 2 – London, UK @ The Garage
Keep your mind open.
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MAQUINA. (João Cavalhiero – guitars and effects, Halison Peres – drums and vocals, and José “Mendy” Rego – bass) took more time to craft their second album, Body Transmission, than their debut album (Prata, which more more focused on improvisation), but that only means they had plenty of opportunities to make sure it would be relentless.
The opening riffs and beats of “dança” (with Dame Area helping on vocals) are your passcode to the dance floor and also the lock on the door as it closes behind you, because you won’t be leaving for a while. “4-to-the-floor” has Cavalhiero chugging out near-metal riffs while Peres’ vocals take on gritty, distorted, growling menace.
Already feeling tired from the dancing? No worries, because “collapsing” will keep you from doing just that with its wild vocals, chainsaw guitars, and driving bass line. Rego’s bass on “agony” is designed to push you through the aches and dehydration of all the dance floor aerobics…because we’re not even halfway through the album. Cavalhiero’s guitar work on “bizarro” sounds like a sawmill full of hornets.
The short instrumental “valve” gives you just enough time to chug a small bottle of water before the great-for-grinding (either hunks of metal on a stone or bodies on bodies) “simulation.” Then, is it just me or do the opening drums of “step on me” reveal Peres’ love of ZZ Top‘s Billy Beard? Rego’s bass on it is perhaps his grooviest of the whole album.
Peres shouts / roars his vocals through “out of fear” to encourage us to shake off our fears through action (in this case, dancing). The album ends with “pressure / pleasure,” a sweaty, sizzling, throbbing dance-punk track to leave you exhausted and a bit euphoric.
Body Transmission is another winner from MAQUINA. The album’s title fits, as the songs feel like they’re being directly transmitted to and through your body from them. The way it makes you move transmits signals from your body to others, which repeats the process throughout the room, club, bus station, or wherever you are.
Keep your mind open.
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Today, Adult DVD are announcing their hugely anticipated self-titled debut album which will be released September 25th on Fat Possum Records. The Leeds-based sextet have carved a niche as one of the most talked-about live bands in the country and an irreverent new voice existing in the space between electronic euphoria and spiky hardcore energy.
Both unique in their approach and thrilling in impact, the band’s music has been shown love by Stereogum, Rolling Stone and The Line of Best Fit among others. Their breakout moment came with the single “Bill Murray,” an incessantly catchy distillation of people on the internet believing Tom Hanks and Bill Murray are the same person. More recently, the glitchy and anthemic “Real Tree Lee” was an A-list record at BBC 6Music and had support from BBC Radio 1.
At both Brighton’s The Great Escape and SXSW in Austin this year the band were championed as one of the buzziest acts of the festival with snaking queues of people waiting hours to see them perform . A relentless touring schedule in 2025 saw them hone their status as festival headliners in waiting, picking up a global army of new fans and playing to huge crowds at Glastonbury, Green Man, End Of The Road and more. The band recently toured Japan where they were greeted by fans in homemade Adult DVD merch, played a series of sold-out shows and saw posts about their performances go viral with millions of views.
To announce their debut, the band are sharing a new single entitled “Cowboy On Aisle Three.”
In the making of their exhilarating debut album, vocalist Harry Hanson and synth-player Greg Lonsdale, alongside Danny Blackburn (guitar/synth), Jake Williams (synth), Jonathan Newell (drums), and George Manson (bass), went harder on what was already working for them: witty observational songwriting based in real-life characters and a pulsating synth-punk sound perfect for both the rave and the mosh pit. Fusing together an intense musical workout with depictions of a motley crew of figures ranging from 5G conspiracy theorists to an existential cowboy, Adult DVD is the electrifying sound of a band exceeding their own expectations while going just as hard, if not harder than their adrenaline-fuelled live shows.
On Adult DVD Hanson and Lonsdale continue to take a screenwriter’s approach to songwriting, filling their lyrics with stories pulled from the outskirts of society yet painting a vivid and comic picture of modern Britain. “We don’t take things too seriously,” Lonsdale explains. “The lyrics have got sillier, the songs have got sillier. We make music for people to enjoy, so let them have a laugh.”
Produced by the band at The Nave Studios Leeds , the general theme of the album is to let go and take life a little less seriously. “Cowboy On Aisle Three” conjures an image of a wrangler swapping the rodeo for a supermarket over a swaggering synth riff . It’s an EQ-pushing beast that merges an existential crisis with the band’s playful spirit and relentless pursuit of bangers.
Speaking on the new single, the band’s frontman Harry Hanson says:
“I came up with the idea when I was in Lidl. I’m sure everyone has thought, ‘Imagine if I just went nuts now,’ to get out of doing the big shop.”
Today we’re excited to announce the 50th anniversary celebration of Mort Garson’s beloved cult classic Mother Earth’s Plantasia, with Sacred Bones presenting the first-ever authorised eco-friendly reissue of the highly sought-after record. Originally released in 1976, the record was created for the listening attention of house plants and was one of the first ever to use a Moog. It’s available digitally now with the anniversary edition set for physical release on Sept 4th.
To coincide with the anniversary Sacred Bones have also announced two very special Plantasia events in Chicago and Kingston, NY.
The long-running celebration of ambient and electronic music returns at Garfield Park Conservatory in Chicago on September 10th and 11th, taking place over two beautiful days at the end of summer across the entire conservatory nature campus, including a new expanded outdoor stage. Brought to you by Sacred Bones, Empty Bottle Presents and Garfield Park Conservatory Alliance, this year’s event features Helado Negro & Reyna Tropical, james k, Makaya McCraven, Flore Laurentine, and many more unmissable acts.
At Seed Song Farm in Kingston, NY on September 19th and 20th Sacred Bones will celebrate for a weekend of music, botanical arts and crafts, workshops, a curated market, plant sales, alongside performances by Gigi Masin, SPELLLING, Mary Lattimore, Green-House, Alabaster DePlume and more. This event is on sale now, grab your ticket while they last.
Julliard-educated and active as a session player in the post-war era, Mort Garson wrote lounge hits, scored the 1969 moon-landing and plush arrangements for Doris Day, and garlanded weeping countrypolitan strings around Glen Campbell’s By the Time I Get to Phoenix.
In the mid-1970s, a force of nature swept across the continental United States, cutting across all strata of race and class, rooting in our minds, our homes, our culture. It wasn’t The Exorcist, Goodbye Yellow Brick Road, or even bell-bottoms, but instead a book called The Secret Life of Plants. The work of occultist/former OSS agent Peter Tompkins and former CIA agent/dowsing enthusiast Christopher Bird, the book shot up the bestseller charts and spread like kudzu across the landscape, becoming a phenomenon.
Seemingly overnight, the indoor plant business was in full bloom and photosynthetic eukaryotes of every genus were hanging off walls, lording over bookshelves, and basking on sunny window ledges. The science behind Secret Life was specious: plants can hear our prayers, they’re lie detectors, they’re telepathic, able to predict natural disasters and receive signals from distant galaxies. But that didn’t stop millions from buying and nurturing their new plants.
Perhaps the craziest claim of the book was that plants also dug music. And whether you purchased a snake plant, asparagus fern, peace lily, or what have you from Mother Earth on Melrose Avenue in Los Angeles (or bought a Simmons mattress from Sears), you also took home Plantasia, an album recorded especially for them. Subtitled “warm earth music for plants…and the people that love them,” it was full of bucolic, charming, stoner-friendly, decidedly unscientific tunes enacted on the new-fangled device called the Moog.
Plants date back from the dawn of time, but apparently they loved the Moog, never mind that the synthesizer had been on the market for just a few years. Most of all, the plants loved the ditties made by composer Mort Garson. Few characters in early electronic music can be both fearless pioneers and cheesy trend-chasers, but Garson embraced both extremes, and has been unheralded as a result.
The album gained an enormous cult following decades after its release. Sacred Bones’ 2019 reissue helped introduce Plantasia to a wider global audience, sparking a remarkable second life for Garson’s unlikely masterpiece. What was once a strange artifact of 1970s plant-mania has become a beloved evergreen, rediscovered and re-embraced by a new generation of listeners and flourishing far beyond its original moment.
Now, 50 years after its original release, Mother Earth’s Plantasia marks a major anniversary moment. To honor Mother Earth, Sacred Bones is releasing the first authorised eco-friendly reissue of Plantasia, pressed on 100% recycled eco-green vinyl and printed on 100% recycled paper. It is housed in a 100% recycled jacket, wrapped in bio-based shrinkwrap, and includes the original Mother Earth’s Indoor Plant Care Booklet alongside a digital download presented on a real seed-paper card.
Half a century on, Plantasia continues to resonate – an enduring reminder of Mort Garson’s ability to make the synthetic feel strangely alive and the whimsical feel oddly profound.
What if you made something for absolutely nobody? This is the question Fling ii asked before making their newest album, 3. They, like all of us, were exhausted by every click, view, and preference being commodified and resold to us and the world at large. Could they make an album that offered nothing to anyone? What could an album that, according to the press release I received, was inspired by “the vastness of parking lots, the prismatic strangeness of online advertisements for walking tai chi, and the passive performance of a basket of fruit sitting in a gas station” have to offer the band or anyone else?
As it turns out, a pretty cool record of krautrock / no wave electronica that borders on New Age music and vaporwave. Opening track “lau” pops and bubbles like the sound of a robot’s Zen alarm clock. “inke” drifts like a leaf on a stream that has no particular place to go and no timeline to get anywhere.
“bant” sounds like the opening to a weird VHS home course on meditation or computer science. “beem” takes on a slight country twang with its guitar tones but doesn’t lose the motorik beats or 32-bit synths. The electric piano takes the lead on “ilia,” creating a sound like an android’s morning commute radio station broadcast.
The album ends with “mago,” a trippy electro / krautrock cut that stretches to nearly sixteen minutes and takes you out of your current headspace and into some sort of forest that you’d find in the world of Tron.
This album immediately intrigues you and is the kind of record that will reveal something different every time you hear it…or maybe it won’t. After all, it was made to present you with nothing in particular. Again, from the press release, the band even states the album was “made especially for us and not for you, with all the gear we could get our paws on.” and that it “…stands as a quiet argument for surprise, accident, and the possibility of making something simply because it felt worth making.”
That’s accurate. Not everything has to be catered to your likes. Discovery, and being able to sit content with a discovery instead of seeking instant pleasure from the “next thing” is a lost passion. 3 proves this in every track.
Keep your mind open.
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How to describe Wheelchair Sports Camp? Are they a rap group? A punk band? A dance-rock band? A performance art duo? All of the above? I think that might be the answer, and their new album, Oh Imperfecta, is a wild ride of fuzzy beats, squeaky bars, and goofy jokes.
“Make It Make Sense” (guest starring Jello Biafra) is a plea for some kind of understanding from lead singer Kalyn Rose Heffernan in these weird times of 2026 across grungy beats from Greggy and guest guitar from Radio Pete. “You can’t make me want to change,” Heffernan proclaims on “Eat Meat!”- a song about going through the motions while the world is burning down around us. “Yess I’m a Mess” spins things around with a slow-jam groove and warped dream-psych guitars while Heffernan drops slick rhymes. I mean, it even has a horn section and organ riffs in it.
“They wanna lock me in a closet, wanna lock me in a box,” Heffernan growls on “Slumber Party.” She’s here to takedown people upset over her sexuality, gender, and / or health and those profiting off a system that’s destroying most of us. “Keep Scrolling” is a spoken word riff on social media making us dread each other.
“Denim” is a wonky, wooly experimental rap track. It’s almost acid jazz at some points, and guest-rapper RAREBYR$ provides extra sizzle with her verse. “Bring Some Room” is a quiet warm-up for “Dead” – another Biafra-team-up punk rager that will have the mosh pit bouncing whenever they play it.
“On Hold” is one of three tracks featuring Junia-T as a guest. It and the second one, “Summer in the City,” are trip hop slow burners. The third, “No Stopping No Standing,” is bigger, with heavier drum beats, angrier vocals (“If you can’t hang, get the fuck out of the way.”), and groaning, almost moaning synths.
I must note that the album is sprinkled with little interludes that are snippets of phone conversations between Heffernan and her mother, the funniest of which might be her pretty much ordering Heffernan to have grandchildren, and that Heffernan and her girlfriend’s cats don’t count.
It’s an odd record, but endlessly fascinating. There’s nothing really to “get” about it, which is kind of the point. It also hides a lot of talent under its queer-rock / glam-rap / wheelchair-punk hood. Don’t miss that. You’ll go from laughing with Heffernan and Greggy to thinking, “Whoa…There’s something deeper here.”
Hailing from Austin, Texas, Almost Heaven (Stefan Barazza – production and vocals, Jaelyn Valero – drums) have come to party on their debut EP, Raw Cranium, and they want you to join them. After all, one of their messages is “Dance or die.”
Starting with “Power Music (Electrik Revival),” the EP embraces its krautrock / Berlin-industrial / and dance punk love as Barazza sings about an “organutan spilling zombie juice all over the stage” and the perils and pleasures technology can bring. It will have you jumping right away. “Oscilation” starts off with crowd cheers, brings in fuzzy guitars and synths, and vocals that might belong to Valero or to Barazza. It’s difficult to guess because they could be altered with vocal effects. It works well either way to create an uplifting Justice-like dance track.
“Fever Trying to Blow” is a standout with Barazza asking anyone who wants to dance to the front because he wants to “let loose” after a long week at work. “I deserve this,” he says. We all do. Valero’s beats on this are downright wicked while Barazza’s synths and vocals skitter around the room like water thrown onto a hot frying pan.
“Wherever you are, come away from the TV and come to the dance floor,” Barazza implores on “Commotion,” a song that fully intends to cause such a thing. The wild beats of “Hypnoxia” echo around you while the synth-bass elevates your pulse and Valero’s post-punk beats make you twitch.
The EP ends with the lovely “Baby Teeth” – a song that borders on MGMT electro-house and synthwave. “Make sure it’s tough, so they never know your weakness,” Barazza suggests. It builds to a big, bright payoff that will have you bouncing with new breath.
Like any good EP, Raw Cranium leaves you wanting more. You’re a bit exhausted from all this dancing, but you’re ready for more. Dance or die, after all.
