expect delay
Despite being probably the heaviest rotation artist for me in the past year and having discovered them through my investigations of Japanese dreampop, I’ve not written anything about Hitsujibungaku because, well, I don’t really think of them as dreampop. As I mentioned in my 2023 wrap up I’d grant you adjacent, maybe, as Moeka Shiotsuka […]
From the relatively familiar to the new , Hokkaido’s Plums, who despite being wholly un-Googleable, have put out a number of excellent EPs of fuzzy power pop since 2019, including a new one just this past February in Life. At least those exist on streaming, and they’ve got a YouTube channel so folks can stumble […]
The first post from Tokyo proper – Kon’nichiwa! – should be the band that kick-started this whole J-pop/J-gaze obsession that’s been going on hereabouts for over a year, and is in no small part one of the reasons I’m here right now (don’t tell my family) – the dear departed For Tracy Hyde. I’ve celebrated […]
Nagoya duo Blurred City Lights are one of the newer Japanese dreampop artists to have caught my ear, with their debut album 天使のいない街で (In A City Without Angels) one of the genre highlights of the year so far. Though quite fresh-faced and with an unabashed bedroom studio aesthetic, they’ve crafted a debut that demonstrates both […]
On paper, this should have been a huge deal – a collaborative album between the musical mastermind behind alternative godheads Cocteau Twins and frontman for shoegaze legends Ride – but Universal Road, the 2015 release from Robin Guthrie and Mark Gardener, didn’t seem to make much of an impression on anyone. Part of it was […]
If you thought you’d somehow missed out on Daughter’s tour to support last year’s Stereo Mind Game, don’t fret – you didn’t. Aside from a single in-store performance at London’s Rough Trade last year to mark the album’s release, the trio haven’t played a live show since November 2017. And while disappointing for fans, it’s […]
Comprised of a pari of married couples, Austin, Texas’ Blushing proudly wear their shoegaze influences on their sleeves and their pedalboards – think a punchier, poppier Lush. They’ve been winning audiences over the course of two records – 2019’s self-title and 2022’s Possessions – and are set to continue doing so with their third album […]
Uchuu Nekoko are a duo from Kanagawa, Japan whose name translates to “Universe Neko”, which should mean “Universe Cat”? Or “Space Cat”? And they could very well be a couple of intergalactic felines named Nemuko Yamanaka and Kano because they’ve opted to keep their identities hidden behind a couple of anime avatars by artist Tomoko […]
Here’s one to put on in the background while you do other things – an interview Dean Wareham gave to the Life Of The Record podcast back in 2021 about the making of Luna’s majestic 1995 album Penthouse on the occasion of the album’s 25th anniversary. Well it’s not an interview, really, but 45 minutes […]
Brooklyn’s DIIV announced their fourth album Frog In Boiling Water – first since 2019’s Deceiver – last week with the chilled-out dirge “Brown Paper Bag”, but they first previewed the new record way back in October while in the midst of their tour supporting Depeche Mode. They dropped the website soul-net.co, a Geocities-saluting doomscrolling eyesore, […]
