NEW ARRIVALS

'I Bet on Sky' is the third Dinosaur Jr. album since the original trio – J Mascis, Lou Barlow and Murph – reformed in 2005. And, crazily, it marks the band’s 10th studio album since their debut on Homestead Records in 1985. Back in the ‘80s, if anyone has suggested that these guys would be performing and recording at such a high level 27 years later, they would have been laughed out of the tree fort. The trio has taken everything they’ve learned from the various projects they tackled over the years, and poured it directly into their current mix. J’s guitar approaches some of its most unhinged playing here, but there’s a sense of instrumental control that matches the sweet murk of his vocals (not that he always remembers to exercise control on stage, but that’s another milieu). This is head-bobbing riff-romance at the apex. Lou’s basswork shows a lot more melodicism now as well, although his two songs on 'I Bet on Sky' retain the jagged rhythmic edge that has so often marked his work. And Murph…well, he still pounds the drums as hard and as strong as a pro wrestler, with deceptively simple structures that manage to interweave themselves perfectly with his bandmates’ melodic explosions. After submerging myself in 'I Bet on Sky', it’s clear that the album is a true and worthy addition to the Dinosaur Jr. discography. It hews close enough to rock formalism to please the squares. Yet it is brilliantly imprinted with the trio’s magical equation, which is a gift to the rest of us. For a combo that began as anomalous fusion of hardcore punk and pop influences, Dinosaur Jr. have proven themselves to be unlikely masters of the long game.

Sufjan Stevens, Asthmatic Kitty, and Soundsfamilyre announce Sufjan's third full-length album, a collection of songs for his birth-state, MICHIGAN, "The Great Lake State." Composed as a geographical tone poem, MICHIGAN follows a metaphysical expedition through the idiosyncrasies of middle America. Drawing from personal anecdote, regional history, and state heritage, Stevens mixes social and political grievances with songs about snowmobiles, Henry Ford, the Detroit race riots, and love. MICHIGAN's songs resonate with a range of sources-Vince Guaraldi, Terry Riley, and Nick Drake as accompanied by Stereolab and The Sea & Cake-in executing Stevens' peculiar palette that is simultaneously rock and blue-grass, jazz and pop, a style The Village Voice appraises as "Arthur Lee meets the Book of Psalms." In MICHIGAN, Stevens combines intimate, soft-spoken songwriting with the dense compositional complexity displayed on his previous release ENJOY YOUR RABBIT, which XLR8R called "...a transgressive, majestic album conjuring an academic jam session of Stereolab and Luke Vibert conducted by Steve Reich." Guest artists include Elin, Megan, and Daniel Smith (of The Danielson Famile), and John Ringhofer (Half-handed Cloud). Album art features original hand-paintings by Martha Stewart crafts editor Laura Normandin. MICHIGAN is the inaugural entry of THE 50 STATES, a cumulative recording project by Sufjan Stevens unparalleled in its panoramic enterprise: a record for each state! You think he's kidding, don't you? Now available from Asthmatic Kitty and Soundsfamilyre. Distributed by Secretly Canadian: release date: July 1, 2003 (which happened to be Sufjan's birthday).

Born in a Fussa U.S. military house, Minyo Crusaders cut new ground by fusing Japanese folk songs with Latin rhythms, earning high praise both at home and abroad from media like NPR and The Guardian. Now comes From Japan With Love, their first new album in three years.

TMZ stood out as a fiercely unique presence on TRANSONIC COMPACT DISC 01 and 02, the compilation albums that marked the first standalone releases from the newly reborn TRANSONIC RECORDS. An existence that could well be called an out-of-place artifact in techno history, this debut album bridges the gap between a hidden past and the present.

A wave of global critical reappraisal is building around Japan's definitive techno label, TRANSONIC RECORDS. To mark the occasion, a two-disc compilation album showcasing the dawn of Japanese 90s techno is set for release.

Shuta Hasunuma Team — consisting of Shuta Hasunuma, Shuta Ishizuka, itoken, Yu Oshima, and Ryosuke Saito — has released their first studio album, 17 years after the group’s formation. The album includes a cover of Tortoise’s “Seneca,” with mixing handled by Tortoise’s own John McEntire and mastering by Dave Cooley.

The definitive release of Dubhei & New Chanel, the extraordinary musical work by Shinro Ohtake, known as an artist. Shinro Ohtake is currently known as an artist, but his career began in music. JUKE/19., which was among the first in Japan to respond to NO WAVE and incorporate it into their work, was far ahead of its time in 1980. Yet, their work quietly influenced many later artists. Yamataka EYE of Boredoms, in particular, openly acknowledged its immense influence, and in the 90s, he even started a duo with Otake himself, PUZZLE PUNKS (the unit continues to this day).

Dabuhei & New Chanel represents the ultimate expression of Otake's musical vision. This band, featuring guitar, bass, drums, keyboard, and turntables, was entirely remote-controlled, creating an extraordinary system where each stage performance itself became a work of art. Yamataka EYE was once featured in this system, performing with Destroy All Monsters, and his collaboration with Kazuhisa Uchihashi was also released as a CD work.

This release captures Dubhei & New Chanel's performance at the Toyama Prefectural Museum of Art's TAD space on the final day of the touring “Shinro Ohtake Exhibition,” which began at the National Museum of Modern Art, Tokyo in 2022. It is presented across three analog discs and two CDs.

　For this performance, Toshiharu Toyama, a close ally who had worked with Ohtake and JUKE/19. since the early 80s, brought his own modified instruments and joined Dubhei & New Chanel mid-performance. Their playing plunged into a black hole-like sonic world that could never have emerged from Dubhei & New Chanel alone, creating an intense, condensed history of Ohtake's music starting from JUKE/19. , creating an intense experience that felt like a sudden condensation of the entire history of Ohtake's music, starting from JUKE/19.. Ohtake's live performance added to the ultimate industrial sound mass, creating a physical chaos.

Both the packaging and content differ between the analog and CD versions.

The analog packaging is unprecedented: a B-size silk-screen printed poster cut into three pieces, each housing one record, then all stored within a silk-screen printed clear case. When connected, they form a B-size silk poster. During cutting, the request was: “Blow out the bass at full volume—a lighter player might blow the needle off!”

Please note that the jacket image is a concept rendering and may differ slightly from the final visual.

Wind of Oirat is the full length debut by Mongolian independent musician and sound artist Ts Bayandalai. Following his acclaimed 2020 EP Kimel, he now presents a further matured, composed and refined version of his signature sound, which combines traditional Mongolian music and instruments with influences from experimental music and post-rock. Deeply rooted in the cultural traditions of his homeland, Ts Bayandalai, who grew up in a nomadic family in the Mongolian steppe, explores nature and its myths, his ancestral roots, and the relationship between humans, animals and nature.

“Baby It Cold Outside” is a new album by Lavurn. The music is a lovesick nod to the turn of the millenium and the ones who helped show us the way.

"A friend of mine told me he had visited the place that Cancer House live and record. He said they jammed together all afternoon. In the moment, in the zone so to speak, he became more and more convinced that what they were making together was the best music he had ever been involved with. As the afternoon drifted by, second by revelatory second, he began making grandiose plans to release the recording. By the time it was dark outside the windows he imagined it as a future lost classic, a key live document of a scene, a moment and an aesthetic. He thought about all the records he loved. He thought about the great, little known, statements of lo-fi, downer indie: dark, sweet, crawling guitar music by bands like Farewood, Bedhead, UN or The Sonora Pine. He could even picture the sleeve down to the last detail. The session ended and as they were all packing up he asked about the recording. And someone said ‘oh, we weren’t recording." -Jack Rollo

Following his run of downtempo Quiet Time offerings, Texan producer Gi Gi moves to Vancouver's Mood Hut and maps his "downtempo sampledelia" logic over a syrupy set of deep-as-fuck, back room rollers. Gi Gi's is motivated by the philosophy of sampling - his 2021 album 'Lumino Pleco' was built from textures snatched from Prince, Miles Davis and Erykah Badu records. But he appears to have settled more assuredly into his role at this stage, coining the "downtempo sampledelia" descriptor probably to stop people like us from perpetually reminding him that trip-hop already happened. To his credit, 'In Lieu' does veer further from the dubwise, slo-mo gear that propped up his last few releases, tightening the beats and sharpening those all-important hazy backdrops. And if you recognise a few of the elements, that's partly the point; Gi Gi bashes together the album like a rickety rope bridge between the contemporary listening bar and a half-forgotten record collection that stacks its 'ardcore vinyl alongside Weatherall productions, electro samba reissues, Chicago house and Alex Patterson's dream diaries. 'Pink Dirt' sounds as if it's burying Kirsty Hawkshaw's voice underneath its powdery syncopations and housey piano stabs and on 'Arque', featherlight string plucks are ducked behind rubbery pulses that Gi Gi excites with fractal psy inflections. And the specters of dub and jungle slow dance on 'Downswept', when Gi Gi marinades his expertly chopped breaks in a bubbling synth. It's the kind of gear that makes the most sense while the summer's still in full swing - balearic doesn't even do it justice.

Infant crafts eight immersive dub pieces built from echo-laden rhythms, shimmering ambient textures and spacious production. Drawing on Detroit techno and sound system culture, the album unfolds with patience and depth, favouring mood over momentum, with blissed soundscapes that ripple and refreact like liquid metal. Recommended for fans of the ambient side of echospace [detroit] axis.

Twenty years ago, somewhere in Scotland, an album emerged that felt like a missing link between The Black Dog, Chain Reaction and Irdial. It was released by the enigmatic Glasgow producer Pub on his equally mysterious label, Ampoule.

The album, Do You Ever Regret Pantomime? (2000), has since become the stuff of local folklore — a key work in the UK’s rich IDM and ambient lineage, and one of the most celebrated records of the early noughties. Bizarrely, it even made its way into the Billboard Top 100.

Do You Ever Regret Pantomime? also stands as a defining statement from a producer who has chosen to remain in their own space — one where everyone is welcome. Records like this are about losing yourself in sound and creating your own universe to explore.

Across its 70 minutes, you’re drawn into a deep matrix of spacious chords, abstract textures and gently shifting rhythms.

The 2020 reissue has been remastered and cut at Berlin’s Dubplates & Mastering, pressed as a 2x12”, and features new artwork alongside a bonus track.

Ampoule's Pub returns with a fresh remaster of the classic 'Summer' and a brand new track titled 'The Fragile Root'

'Summer' was originally released 20 years ago on the Vertical Form label - a result of a multitude of completely live and improvised studio sessions, that gently swell and evolve over the tracks 16 minutes.

'Fragile Root' is a brand new track, think vintage idm - intricate rhythms and melodies crossed with massive dub chords.

Mastered by Dubplates & Mastering

Epic 2 hour trip of astral-planing, ambient psychedelia shimmering with displaced traces of pop, slurred acid grooves and ample flange. Definitely one for the road or rail trip this summer, and FFO The KLF, Fennesz, Jefre Cantu-Ledesma, Eno. “From the edges of a hallucinatory torpor, Rue des Garderies continue their explorations in psychedelia — Femacosmé presents here a new piece recorded live at the Pe:rsona festival, at Domaine des Éveils in the summer of 2025. An adventure guided by blur, the intangible, the impermanent, where layers, voices, sounds, and organic and synthetic echoes resonate, emerge, then fade away — as if to deceive reality, or at least our perception of it. More than two semi-improvised hours in which Rue des Garderies (Sweetzak, Désiré Bonaventure & Vasco Cesaretti) summon us to an astral yet motionless journey — somewhere between ambient, IDM, and post-pop.”

Multi-instrumentalist, producer & composer memotone (Will Yates) announces the release of his album Warm Shadows and a homecoming on Accidental Meetings. The record will arrive on May 15th and the album shows a glint of itself through the single ‘Round The Bend’ which features Jabu's guest. Warm Shadows sees Yates’ discography continuing to flourish and traverse into new territory once again, his ever-growing sound palette commands total attention throughout the LP, within the album sees delicate collaborations with Lithuanian artist Ugné Uma, Jabu’s guest and percussionist, Typesun. Memotone (Will Yates) is a learn-by-playing multi-instrumentalist and producer, working with minimal, ambient and contemporary classical music. Predominantly an improviser, recent years have seen memotone lean towards a more free-form approach, exploring jazz, drone and more meditative music, also showing a keen interest in sound design and textural experimentation. Will has released music with various labels over the years to critical acclaim, most notably; World of Echo, The Trilogy Tapes, Sähkö Recordings, Accidental Meetings, Patience/Impatience & Black Acre.

Vital 1977-’79 dubs by the wee legend, all cooked up long, strong and odd at his fabled Black Ark Studio for DJ play and dancers’ satisfaction. Holding 40 minutes of golden era dub heat, ‘Disco Devil Vol. 1’ spotlights Lee “Scratch” Perry at a crest of his innovative powers. The title cut is a certified all-timer, full of chants, cauldron bubble and ten tonnes of bass that would be sampled in a ‘90s anthem by The Prodigy. Likewise he takes all the time needed to crease your Clarks with a 9 min discomix of Junior Murvin’s sparrow-voiced trotter ‘Roots Train’, and nearly 10 mins of the unreleased Seven Leaves disco mix to ‘Such is Life’, cooling Lord creator’s croon on duskiest sway and FX balm, next to soul-stir fire of Winston Watson’s ‘Dispensation.’

FELT survey Copenhagen's contemporary jazz scene with RMC graduate Vincent Yuen Ruiz’s intimate and strikingly minimal rendition of stifled percussion, spacious piano and precise double bass work, tipped FFO of The Necks x Talk Talk, naturally. Ruiz is a seasoned jazz player who's also nursed a parallel reputation as a post-rocker, formerly playing bass in Plaistow. And it's this knowledge of a world outside of jazz that gives 'Trio' its edge. It's not a post-rock record, by any means, but it's not pure jazz either - or at least, it doesn't sound as if it's confined by the aesthetic. The ensemble formed in 2019, but their last record together, 2021's 'Le seul salut que je connaisse', was recorded as a six-piece. Ruiz strips the sound to its bare bones on 'Trio', relying on unusual percussive sounds (provided by drummer Anders Vestergaard) to fill in some of the gaps. And although Rasmus Kjær takes a de facto lead roll on piano, it's the rhythm section, commanded by Ruiz on double bass, that makes 'Trio' so fascinating. There's an almost meditative sense of calm to opener 'Choral', with Vestergaard's bowed cymbal tones providing a neat bed for Kjær's Bach and Ravel-inspired flourishes. The tension is only released when Ruiz's soft bass enters the frame, played somewhere between improvisation and composition, minimalism and decelerated chamber jazz. Just as he slimmed down his ensemble, Ruiz slims down the pieces themselves, condensing and distilling his ideas so the record never gets busy, or outstays its welcome. Just head to the central piece 'Weaving', beautifully balancing its measured piano with Vestergaard's odd flurries of percussion that sometimes appear for just a second. We can hear post-rock - particularly the variety that Talk Talk perfected - but our brains are also directed into filling in the gaps. 'Trio' is an album that lives and dies on its pauses, focusing on decaying notes and echoing rhythms in all their quiet beauty.

More top tier biz from a resurgent Scenic Route label, this time in a more bare-boned and classic sounding singer-songwriter mode courtesy of Oakland-raised and Brooklyn-based singer-songwriter Ivy Knight, produced by Deer park (fakemink, Ecco2k, evilgiane) and tipped if you’re anywhere on the line from Joanne Robertson to Sam Amidon, Dagmar Zuniga to Mark William Lewis. "Ivy Knight’s songs reflect a city dreamer creating a new world to sink into: across Iron Mountain, she conjures imagery of barren Southwest American landscapes as she recounts memories that feel beamed from generations past, channeling folk melodies and old trail ballads of the late 50s and early 60s. Much of her work has been created both within, and in reference to the Hudson Valley, where she met frequent collaborator Deer park (fakemink, Ecco2k, evilgiane) who produced and engineered."

Copenhagen’s meme-able, custom line of genre-blurring songwriters yields Lithuanian talent, Gintè Preisait, fresh from the conservatoire and an LP with Toshimaru Nakamura, on an enchanted, waking dream blend of lower case concrète, trip hop and avant-classical experimentation calling to mind the refined crafts of ML Buch, Ugné Uma, Svitlana Nianio, Smerz, Lucrecia Dalt, Julia Holter or Martyna Basta, thru the reaches of Finland’s Fonal Records. It was bound to happen at some point, right? We've written more than enough about how Copenhagen's Rhythmic Music Conservatory has become the central node in a scene that's prioritized the permeable membrane between pop, classical training and unhinged technological experimentation - honestly where else are you gonna find Clarissa Connelly, Astrid Sonne, Erika de Casier, ML Buch and Fine? Gintė Preisaitė pushes even further into uncharted waters on her debut album, letting the pop forms evaporate like vapors around her intricately woven experimental collages. We're already off to a good start with 'Vigilance', a lengthy introduction that pays its respects to Preisaitė's past, present and future. The classically trained improviser, producer and composer begins with an ensemble of moaning acoustic instruments that she gradually chips into, tearing through the acoustic sounds with electronic treatments and introducing subtle, grounding field recordings before adding her voice and completely shifting the direction. The unwieldy blend of elements prepares us for an arguably bolder experiment, 'Summary Saint Mary', where Preisaitė matches her gamelan-like prepared piano phrases with Björk-ish vocal loops, OPN-inspired electronic touches and wheezing processed acoustic sounds. And it's remarkably well controlled; even in capable hands, it's a tough palette to work with and Preisaitė makes it look almost easy, never stepping too far in any direction or another. Because it's not really a pop record at all, it's an album that's aware of pop, doesn't avoid its charms, but manages to corral its characteristics into the avant garde's misshapen spirit. Even the relatively upbeat, straightforward 'Aéroport', a track that would have sounded stylistically comfortable on Smerz's RMC love-in 'Big city life EDITS', she never goes full James K, letting the melodies curve towards freeform abstraction in the final act before hitting us with three tracks of choppy, half-dissolved prepared piano. It's ambitious stuff, and all the better for it.

Originally released in 1999 on the German sound‑minimalism stronghold ~scape, Kit Clayton’s debut album Nek Sanalet stands as a landmark work of minimal dub and clicks & cuts.

"Linear ancient voltage-controlled sound rituals. Alien liturgical tones" Convergence is an ambient album formed through a series of morning rituals during rehabilitation following a severe medical event and an extended hospital stay. After weeks immersed in the constant alarms, beeps, and environmental signals of medical equipment, the act of listening itself became recalibrated. The music was performed and assembled using glass marimba, flute, and analog synthesizers, with each instrument treated as a source of resonance and gradually dissected through spectral analysis—allowing melody to emerge from fragments through repetition, attention, and daily practice, where synthesis functions not as traditional composition but as an exchange of signals. Working slowly and intuitively, Stardust Multiplier approaches sound as a communicative medium between humans, the natural environment, and non-ordinary states of perception. Motifs evolve through repetition and subtle variation, informed by ceremonial music, mythic structures, and speculative communication frameworks associated with non-human intelligence—not as narrative devices, but as metaphors for attuned listening and pattern recognition. Rather than moving toward resolution, Convergence documents moments of alignment—instances where intention, system, and environment briefly synchronize. The result is a restrained, deeply focused record, less concerned with atmosphere than attention, where synthesis functions as both a grounding practice and a method of inquiry.