Dystopian bangers, gothic swooners, country rock bristle, piano loveliness, dark industrials and tons more. It’s a great week!
Without Us is the third solo LP from Daniel Brandt and it is an absolute belter. Released on Erased Tapes, this is dark and dystopian electronic music - leading the apocalyptic rave in fact - but the density of the production and churning cinematic hues really take it somewhere quite unique. A dance-your-despair-away experience of the highest order. Record of the Week.
+ Pressed on Clear Vinyl with a limited postcard.
We’ve been talking about the return of Japanese Breakfast quite a bit this week already and we finally have the all-new For Melancholy Brunettes (& Sad Women) in the racks. The production - and the scale of the production - is just so lush. Produced with Blake Mills it has such gorgeous flourishes and Michelle Zauner’s voice is sublime. Tragedy has never sounded so dreamy.
+ Available on exclusive Frosted Shadow colour vinyl.
+ We have some copies with Signed Inner Sleeves.
Man alive do we ever love My Morning Jacket! Louisville’s finest have teamed up with producer Brendan O’Brien for their tenth (I think?!) album, Is. It’s warm and proper stadium ready, but also full of restless energy and country rock bristle. Did we mention how much we love this band? A right banger and getting played loads.
+ Available on limited Sea Blue colour vinyl.
When the Distance is Blue marks Macie Stewart’s dreamy debut with International Anthem. Returning to her first love - the piano - she crafts an otherworldly collage of strings, field recordings, and gentle chaos. International Anthem Recording Co. are always essential, but this really is a lush and cinematic swirl.
Tonky is the great Lonnie Holley at his most playful and profound - piecing together scraps of memory, sound and spirit. Named after a childhood nickname, it’s a generous ride through honky tonks and cosmic plains, where every guest gets a seat and every sound has a story to tell.
Two decades in and mutating gloriously, The Horrors return with Night Life - a sixth album that shape-shifts once more. From garage-goth to shoegaze to industrial clatter, they've never sat still. New sounds, new lineup, but the same devotion to creating sonic vastness.
+ Available on limited Clear vinyl.
Crush Me is the raw, weird, and wonderful new LP from Cross Record. Death doula Emily Cross channels two-and-a-half years of spiritual drift and daily overwhelm into songs that wobble, shimmer, and ache. It’s grief and grace in equal measure. Hardly easy going, but pretty essential stuff.
The EVEN MORE Freewheelin’ Jeffrey Lewis is a wordy wonder - recorded in just four days with his Voltage crew and packed with existential zingers, lo-fi bangers and Casio-fried folk magic. It’s tender, hilarious and strikingly profound. Life hurts, love’s weird, and Jeff is still channeling it all. Man, that sleeve!
Multi-instrumentalist Jefre Cantu-Ledesma releases Gift Songs on Mexican Summer and it really has a lush energy. We’ve been really rather taken with this one. 
Also this week; Duo Benefits return on Invada with Constant Noise, including some really interesting guest appearances. Tell Dem It’s Sunny is the new album from rising soul star Greentea Peng. more eaze and Claire Rousay have collaborated on the absolutely fantastic no floor LP, but we only have a couple, so first past the post on that one for assured sonic bliss. The Lottery Winners are flying for the chart summit with KOKO. We have a couple of Dinked Editions instock… now!
Lastly for today's new directions, Mountain is the solo debut form acclaimed composer Graham Reynolds and it is a right trip. His cinematic lilt is naturally right at the heart of this one as it builds and swoops, but his experimentalism is just something else, with the weirder textures crackling through. At times ominous, always propulsive and pretty fascinating.
+ Available on limited White and Purple Splatter vinyl.
