Newcomers to Japanese shoegaze over the past decade – I’m looking at you, me – will have surely come across the name Burrrn and their 2011 debut album Blaze Down His Way Like The Space Show as must-listens, and indeed the My Bloody Valentine-admiration on that record treads just on the right side of slavish imitation, with just enough glide guitar and sweet boy-girl vocals. Those newcomers would also be forgiven for assuming that the outfit, like so many others, had quietly packed it up sometime between then and now as they’ve not released anything since.

But, as it turns out, they’ve just been biding their time. Effective right now, the debut is getting a reissue with remastering by Mark Gardener; while it was supposed to be out today, it’s not on streaming and the Bandcamp hasn’t been updated, so we’ll watch for that.

But what is out today is their second album, Without You, and is as excellent as it was unexpected. It might be a notch or two down from its predecessor in sonic mayhem, but it still barrels through 10 songs in less than half an hour and strikes a deft balance between intensity and beauty – “Vague Words” is the album opener and sets the tone for the remainder. Burrrn are not a band that’s been doing this a lot, but they have been doing it a long time, and the experience shows.

Welcome back, and hopefully it’s not another 13 years before we hear from you again.