No Vacation – “Days”

I went to see San Francisco’s No Vacation on Monday night, and while there’s never a bad time to take your band on tour – though playing your first-ever Toronto show in early February might not be the most sensible thing – the timing of this cross-country outing is a little odd by conventional standards. […]

Della Zyr – “봄: 별은 노​래​한​다 (Constellation​’​s Song)”

There’s anti-marketing, and then there’s what Seoul’s Della Zyr is doing. If you were to stumble across her YouTube channel, you’d find a handful of videos of a young woman playing shoegaze cover songs in her bedroom; excellently done, certainly, but not unusual in 2024. Her Instagram offers somewhat more; it’s only four posts deep, […]

Swiimers – “Woodstock”

Here’s another entry from the promising Asian bands who may or may not still exist. Swiimers hail from Seoul, South Korea and released a handful of singles a few years ago that were compiled as a self-titled EP in 2016. Combining the delicacy of dreampop with some of the dynamism of post-rock and glitchy electronic […]

Pinkshinyultrablast – “Umi”

While I’ve had some Pinkshinyultrablast in my library for a while, it hasn’t been in heavy enough rotation such that when I discovered and fell for fellow Saint Petersburg shoegazers Blankenberge, they stylistic parallels weren’t immediately obvious to me. But now that I hear it, I can’t really unhear it. And it figures – Pinkshinyultrablast […]

deary – “2000 Miles”

As mentioned, London’s deary have had quite a good year, the high point probably being a toss up between releasing quite an excellent debut EP or playing to thousands when opening for Slowdive’s UK dates. But they weren’t stopping there, instead offering fans a final holiday gift in the form of a dreamy cover of […]