Cocteau Twins / Twinlights

I’ve been filling a few longstanding holes in my Cocteau Twins collection, most recently getting the Lullabies To Violaine, Vol. 1 compilation of all their 4AD-era EPs – easy enough, as it’s still in print in CD – but the second volume, which covers their Fontana years but was also released by 4AD, is somewhat […]

Burrrn – “Vague Words”

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 […]

Slowwves – “SWS”

Though newcomers to the scene – that’s the Thai shoegaze scene, but music in general – with a discography just four songs deep, Bangkok’s Slowwves have already shown themselves to be a name to watch. The bio from their Bandcamp (which has only one track to stream) details their origins as: Peem (guitar) got to know Jill […]

Blankenberge – “New Rules”

A lot has happened since Saint Petersburg’s Blankenberge released their 2021 album Everything – Russia invaded Ukraine, the band relocated to somewhere/anywhere else (their last publicly announced whereabouts was Serbia), and I fell in love with their music. Not necessarily in that order. But given the extenuating circumstances, it’s understandable that it took the band […]

DIIV, Live at KEXP – June 2024

Seattle’s KEXP is making hay from the Summer touring schedule, welcoming New York’s DIIV into their studios for a four-song session and interview during their tour in support of Frog In Boiling Water (I caught the Toronto show at the start of August). Compared to their past works, Frog is far less immediate, eschewing easy […]