blue heron holy ghost - shining through (2025)

As in shoegazey music I often look very closely at the quality of sound, DIY solo acts are particularly difficult for me to assess. I take into consideration how difficult it is to achieve the sound one can have in mind, so those artists have equal(ish) opportunities. And Michael from Tennessee, better known as blue heron holy ghost is a perfect example of an artist who should be given a chance.

I'm not saying the music he does is not good. But (I hope he'd agree), it could be better given better conditions. I like what he does with the backgrounds of his tracks: they are deliciously noisy in an abstract, cosmic way, they don't overwhelm, but are certainly visible. The soft, melancholic vocals are the bedroom shoegaze template and certainly feel right within the compositions. In his music, the slightly lo-fi vibes not only are not a problem, I'd say they add to the atmosphere of a noisy dream.

shining through costs 7 USD.

Check: In My Head

Country: Tennessee, US

Genre: bedroom shoegaze

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LOCKSTEP - Arrival (2023)

Tennessee

LOCKSTEP, the Tennessee-based project released already two fantastic EPs and so it's time for something a bit longer (but not LP-long) to arrive. Come Arrival, this year's (mini)album that's filled with heavy nugaze gold.

This doomgaze music is like a slower and heavier face of nugaze. It is very much focused on lead-heavy, crunchy, stoner-like guitar sounds that create a wall of sound with a super subtle, soothing vocals put on top. But the point is that the whole thing is extremely slow, as if an explosion was put in slow motion and served in perfect HD cause the quality of sound is fantastic. You can feel the weight of this sound on your shoulders and the slow pace only makes it weigh more and more. This album is filled with those heavy lullabies and the atmosphere of slow but steady sadness that crawls together with the notes is something difficult to shake off.

Arrival costs 5 USD.

Check: Hunger

Country: Tennessee

Genre: doomgaze

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Hammock - Love in the Void (2023)

Last week I posted about Hammock-inspired Driftless and now it's time for the OG band itself. The Americans consistently release new albums pretty frequently and it has to be stated that they are not short and never disappointing. It's the same with this year's Love in the Void.

The album is a way of breaking up with the pandemics lockdown monotony, "an album that looks to the future, seizes the present, and unabashedly relishes the experiences and bonds that bring meaning to our days" and the follow up to the most recent works of the band that were based on the feeling of grief after a loss of a close person. As always, the duo does everything from the instrumental ambient soundscapes, through loud post-rock compositions to dream pop bangers (like Undoing). The album's dreamy atmosphere lasts through all of this, creating this unique and coherent, well over an hour-long work of music. There are some heavier fragments, there are some fragments that immediately draw attention (like the clean-cut finish of Release), but with time, all the tracks blend into one, extremely oneiric whole. 

Love in the Void costs 11 USD.

Check: Release

Country: Tennessee, US

Genre: ambient post-rock

Label: Hammock Music

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Total Wife - A Blip (2022)

Luca Kupper and Ash Richter make music together as Total Wife. Currently based in Nashville, the duo released their third album in two years (!) recently and it's filled with very ear-catching and very lo-fi sounds of noise pop.

A Blip is a curious marriage of very subtle, sometimes barely audible vocals with exceptionally harsh and shoegaze-like ear-hurting guitar sounds. The music is slow and certainly takes it time to properly engage the listener. It is also not very loud, most of the time, it feels like shoegaze transformed into cosy ballads and I love this approach. As said, the compositions are low in volume but sometimes this is deceitful as in Mid-Fi where the drone pop song eventually becomes a quite loud experiment (so it really is not lo-fi but mid-fi indeed). And yes, the artists highlight that their projects is all about "experimental music" and it really feels. Not only the love for the lo-fi form, there are some super interesting sonic experiments that come and destroy the dream pop music (One to You) and then let it rebirth again so the audience can get back to the lazy trance that comes with the album up to my favourite, organ-like backgrounds of Hello.

A Blip costs 10 USD.

Check: Hello

Country: Tennessee, US

Genre: lo-fi noise pop

Label: Warehaus Recordings

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Dear Gravity & We Dream of Eden - Holocene (2022)

Two years after their previous release, Riven, two ambient artists - Minnesota-based Mike Graff aka Dear Gravity and Tennessee's Kirk Smith (We Dream of Eden) created together a short but beautiful EP. Released by Echoes Blue Music Holocene makes a fantastic blend of delicate ambient and neoclassical soundscape.

The short album depicts "the concept of passing life down to the next generation" and tries to pour the artists' personal feelings onto the audience. Musically speaking it's an electronic soundscape that is first of all moody and, secondly, ready too strike awe in the audience with the tasteful use of synth sounds. Although there are traces of melodies (like the leitmotif in Adventus), the album's main goal has to be creating this audio place where a listener can get lost for a second - the slower, calmer tracks here (like Tragedy & Triumph) and their homogeneous, thick soundscape surely work that way.

Holocene costs 5 USD.

Check: Sojourn

Country: Minnesota/Tennessee, US

Genre: lively soundscape

Label: Echoes Blue Music

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Vespers - Dour (2021)

Dour is the second short album from the Tennessee-based band Vespers. It is filled with guitar-based post-rock music that surprises with some unique ways of presenting the instrumental music.

The album is kept in a rather gloomy atmosphere. The music starts slow and with huge dose of reflectiveness, but when finally gets louder, the guitars show how to crush the audience with steady and heavy sound. There's some of the stoner rock's atmosphere here that is being slowed down and made into what post-metal is for black metal I suppose. This is abruptly changed in Bloodletting and its metal-like fast pace. And this very heavy, stoner-like approach to post-rock with fluctuating pace is the main theme of the EP - one that perhaps doesn't shock with anything but is genuinely very enjoyable (especially in the album's best and noisiest The Oldest House), even if in a bleaker way.

Dour costs 7 USD.

Check: The Oldest House

Country: Tennessee, US

Genre: stoner post-rock

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WatchCamp May-June'21 with Domus & Dag Rosenqvist, elhombreanormal, LOCKSTEP, Luthia, PARDALS

Domus & Dag Rosenqvist - Transit​/​Sunrise

A collaboration between Domus - Henrik Sunbring-Thobias Eidevald duo, Dag Rosenqvist, a member of the Swedish post-rocking Ef, with the help of Daniel Johansson and his trumpet, resulted in two big tracks of instrumental ambient that smoothly transforms into mesmerizing post-rock. The two tracks cost 20 SEK (2 EUR).

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elhombreanormal - renacentismo

Noisy music from Argentina. The band make a blend of very guitar-based and coarse post-rock with psychedelic rock's vocals and compositions and they show their best at the short EP three years after releasing their debut (?) album. Two tracks cost 7 USD (!).

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LOCKSTEP - Lockstep 1

What an awesome debut. The Tennessee-based band released a short EP filled with high-quality psychedelic rock meeting noise rock meeting shoegaze with slowcore-like-paced vocals and super dense, mesmerizing guitars. This is the first of a series of self-produced short albums and I can't wait to hear more. Two songs cost whatever you want to pay.

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Luthia - Sleepwalker

The Scottish band involved in "exploring the terrain of song, structure, sound and harmony" but not, as one could assume, making ambient music. Instead, they create a unique slowcore/post-folk blend, very artsy and moody music with Irrepressibles-like beautiful vocals and extremely atmospheric spoken word elements.  Two tracks cost 2 GBP.

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PARDALS - III

Ibiza-based band who create a mainstream yet involving post-rock music. Their tracks are very much guitar-oriented and making the most of the genre's most recognizable themes. They are creating their debut EP and 'm looking forward to hearing them again. Two tracks cost 7 EUR (!).

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slush - slush EP (2019) EN

"Not your average EP" makes the whole description of this album by the one man shoegaze project from Tennessee. And indeed, you can safely say that slush has this thing that makes it stand out.

Airy atmosphere made even stronger by the lo-fi aesthetics and the beautiful cover art is the main characteristics of the EP. It's clear that it's a solo project so there's not much of the massive sounds and it's more about almost bedroom-pop-like themes (as in The Less You Do the More You Win). Especially worth listening to is the last but one track called Seriously and it's seriously a top class ethereal shoegaze, and this is what I'm counting on coming from the project on next albums.

slush costs whatever you want to pay.

Check: Seriously

Country: Tennessee, US

Genre: lo-fi dream pop

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slush - slush EP (2019) PL

"Nie taka zwykła EP" jest całym opisem albumu shoegaze'owego jednoosobowego projektu z Tennessee. I rzeczywiście, można powiedzieć, że slush ma coś, co ją wyróżnia. 

Eteryczna atmosfera pogłębiona jeszcze lo-fi'ową estetyką i pięknym cover artem, to motywy przewodnie EP-ki. Słychać, że jest to album solowy a więc brakuje potężniejszych dźwięków charakteryzujących gatunek, a więcej jest niemal bedroom popowych tematów (tak jak w The Less You Do the More You Win). Zwłaszcza interesujący jest przedostatni kawałek Seriously, to już jest wysokiej klasy eteryczny shoegaze i na takie kolejne kawałki projektu liczę.

slush kosztuje tyle, ile zapłacisz.

Sprawdź: Seriously

Kraj: Tennessee, US

Szufladka: lo-fi dream pop

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Tape Deck Mountain - Echo Chamber Blues (2018) PL

Gdy łączy się ze sobą wiele gatunków powstaje czasem nowa jakość niedająca się zamknąć w ciasnej szufladce. Tape Deck Mountain poszli tym tropem grając na swojej nowej płycie coś między grunge'owym shoegaze'em a noise'owym dreampopem. A przede wszystkim prezentują doskonale napisaną muzykę.

Już jakiś czas nie słyszałem płyty, na której każdy utwór od razu wpada w pamięć, każdy jest warty odnotowania i zapamiętania. Tak jest z "Loopers of Bushwick", "Morse Code", "Elephant" i każdym kolejnym. Każda buduje osobną historię, nierzadko zahaczają o naprawdę interesujące tematy, zagłębić się warto zwłaszcza w religijne metafory "Elephant". Dzieje się tak nawet gdy utwór pozbawiony jest tekstu ("Bueu") - wtedy to wciągająca melodia nie pozwala się od niego oderwać.

Wysoki i wyprany z emocji wokal Travisa Trevisana nasuwa mi skojarzenia z bardziej eksperymentalną muzyką Suuns, a niezwykle wyraźne i rzucające się w uszy gitary mają w sobie dużo z post-punkowego grania. Kolejnym dowodem na multigatunkowość muzyki zespołu są ich eklektyczne inspirację obejmujące shoegaze'owe MBV, eksperymentalne The Spookfish czy punkowe WRITER. Świetna i wyczuwalna na płycie mieszanka.

"Echo Chamber Blues" kosztuje 24 złote (7 USD).

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Tape Deck Mountain - Echo Chamber Blues (2018) EN

When you blend a variety of genres, sometimes you get a new quality that can hardly be labelled with existing tags. Tape Deck Mountain followed this thought by populating their new album with something between grunge shoegaze and noise dreampop. And what's most important, by making a great and well-written music.

I haven't heard an album where each and every song is instantly being remembered and worth remembering. Not in a while. This is how it goes with the album's "Loopers of Bushwick", "Morse Code", "Elephant" and the following ones. All of them build their own separate story, sometimes covering really interesting topics, especially the religious metaphors of "Elephant" are very much wort diving into. It even happens when a track has no lyrics at all ("Bueu") - in that cases, the mesmerizing melody won't allow you to stop listening to.

The high-pitched and emotionless vocals by Travis Trevisan makes me think of more experimental music by Suuns and the super clear guitars are pretty much of post-punk origins. Another proof of being connected to many genres are the eclectic inspirations the band enlist with shoegaze MBV, experimental The Spookfish and punk WRITER. A mixture that is great and very tangible on the album.

"Echo Chamber Blues" costs 7 USD.

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Denney - home/room EP (2017) EN

The Denney - Adam Norris duo shows on their EP how interesting the combination of poetry and beautiful, dreampop-like music is. Denney writes that he is "too young to be a poet, yet too old to have an imagination". I doubt it's true but if so, it's good that this album is built on poems he created some time ago in high school.

And they are very grown-up. A są one bardzo dojrzałe. "You loved the creator not the product/ Now dear, please love the man I’ve become/ I’m walking out my demons/ I’ll never forgive myself if I brought even one of them home" ("home")  and filled with unique metaphors: I was born to a dying glacier/ My mother melted on me, never could firmly embrace me/ Said my daddy was a snow-capped mountain, and my sis a valley" ("room").

Denney's vocal doesn't sound really typically hip-hoppish. It's more spoken words with no fear of showing emotions. Also the backgrounds are far from what we know as hip-hop ones. They sound as if they were generated in a smoke-filled bar with keys, guitar and automatic drums. And it all fits perfectly.

"home/room" costs whatever you want to pay.

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Denney - home/room EP (2017) PL

Duet Denney - Adam Norris pokazuje na swojej EP-ce jak interesujący jest mariaż poezji i pięknej, dreampopowej muzyki. Denney pisze o sobie, że jest zbyt młody by być poetą lecz za stary by mieć wyobraźnię. Wątpię żeby to była prawda ale jeśli tak jest to dobrze się stało, że na płycie pokazuje wiersze, które napisał jeszcze w liceum.

A są one bardzo dojrzałe. "Kochałaś stwórcę, nie wytwór/ teraz kochana, obdarz uczuciem mężczyznę, którym się stałem/ wyprowadzam swoje demony/nie wybaczę sobie jeśli choćby jednego przyprowadzę do domu" ("home")  i pełne niezwykłych metafor: "urodził mnie umierający lodowiec/ moja matka na mnie stopniała/ nie zdążyła mnie właściwie chwycić/ powiedziała, ze mój tata był pokrytą śniegiem górą a siostra doliną..." ("room").

Wokal Denneja nie brzmi tradycyjnie hip-hopowo. To bardziej melorecytacja, w czasie której nie waha się pokazywać emocji. Także podkłady dalekie są od zwykłego bitu. Brzmią jakby były wygrywane w dusznym barze na klawiszach, gitarze i automacie perkusyjnym. I pasują absolutnie znakomicie.

"home/room" kosztuje tyle ile chcesz zapłacić.

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Wolves Asleep - Angel's Crossing (2017) EN

Experimental lo-fi recorded in a bedroom, inspired by both The Beatles and Sigur Rós. Sounds good? It is.  Wolves Asleep, one man project from Tennessee, rich in melancholy and modest, sad catchiness.

"angel's crossing" is an acoustic shoegaze in which the wall of electric guitars is replaced by a delicate cardboard box wall of acoustic guitar. And it is a background for airy vocals having a lot, a lot lot, in common with Simon Phipps of Engineers. The whole thing sounds las if it was one gloomy song with amazing atmosphere triggering a massive sadness within the audience. For instance, there is a lot about dead friend who is either found in water (“in the lake”) or on a bedroom floor (“wash away”). If it’s not a metaphor of loss and loneliness then I don’t know what is.

The album is absorbing from the first to the very last sound. A real crossing angel.

"angel's crossing" costs 7 USD.

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Wolves Asleep - Angel's Crossing (2017) PL

Eksperymentalny lo-fi nagrywany w sypialni, inspirowany i Beatlesami i Sigur Rós. Brzmi dobrze? Bo takie też jest. Wolves Asleep to jednoosobowy projekt z Tennessee, z którego muzyki bije melancholia i skromna, smutna przebojowość.

"angel's crossing" to akustyczny shoegaze,w którym ścianę elektrycznych gitar zastępuje delikatna kartonowa ścianka akustycznych dźwięków. A na jej tle wybrzmiewa eteryczny głos mający w sobie bardzo dużo z Simona Phippsa z Engineers. Bardzo dużo. Całość brzmi jak jeden, smutny utwór zachwycający atmosferą i zmuszający do markotnienia. Często pojawia się motyw martwej towarzyszki a to wyciągniętej z jeziora ("in the lake") a to leżącej na podłodze w pokoju ("wash away"). Jeśli to nie jest zawoalowany opis straty i samotności to nie wiem, co mogłoby nim być.

Płyta jest wciągająca i nie daje o sobie zapomnieć aż po ostatnie dźwięki. Prawdziwy przechadzający się anioł. 

"angel's crossing" kosztuje 30 złotych (7 USD).

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