Music for 10/2/26!!! Xylitol

@@@ Xylitol: Blumenfantasie (Planet Mu, 2026). With a record title like Blumenfantasie you would expect continental European music some techno out of the emerging Nazi-ish Germany or some daft French poptronica, but this is a UK electronic musician and the record is out on Planet Mu, an imprint I really like. The opening track pops but to my chagrin it’s a glitched drum ‘n bass beat that I’ve as much as I’ve heard the Beatles tune Hey Jude, I’m done with both of them. I will give this record a couple more tunes because the top bits, the garnish, the melodic components are interesting and I do respect this label, maybe I’m fetishizing this beat negatively. I’m asking myself am I being a bitch? You listen to a rock record and you get a rock drummer and rock beats. Are they more varied than what’s happening here? Yes actually a great rock drummer has variation and sections and different flavored beats to draw upon. Can you make more beats with a drum machine than with a human drummer? Again, I think yes, you can use different kit sounds, you can strip out elements, you can break down sections into components and change the beat up, so to me to hear an almost identical beat for every track is a bit of a failure of imagination. The programmatic nature of the drum machine gives a lot of options. I’m not saying to eliminate that beat for now and forever I’m saying give the listeners a break and then return to it, switch up the tempo, switch the tones up, keep it moving like you’re already doing with the top bits. That’s where I’m at with this record, unfortunately. If you love drum ‘n bass have at it and enjoy and I mean it.

Music for 10/1/26!!! North Face Nace

@@@ North Face Nace: Living Type Dangerously Vol. 1 (StarkerLTD, 2026). Banging through the bottom end of the top 100 of 2026 thus far best records of the year from Quietus and it’s going pretty well. Gotta get some hip hop going, spread the reviews around break out of my left field hip hop devotion to Billy Woods, Open Mike Eagle and Kenny Segal. Oh Jesus, he comes out of the gate with some mellow sounds but some quick as fuck rhymes, putting a lotta energy into the tongue, it hits you, the words that is. This is 19 tracks in 22 minutes so these are quick hits, ain’t no shame in it. Outside of Mr. Nace’s energy his tone is gruff, not crazy gruff and not bad more like he sounds like he could use a beverage it sounds a little hoarse and gravelly up in there. You might not notice the arrangements that much but they fit what’s happening with the rhymes, they sync up extremely well. I like the rapid fire short tracks, it’s a celebration of rhyming, a lot of quickness and maybe trying to outdo one another. I’m guessing you can’t rap this quickly for three minutes straight so you break it up into smaller pieces. This record is right on the cusp of being on the year end list, I will be listening more and again when I have time. If you like hip hop you should check this record out it’s got a lot going for it.

Music for 9/30/26!!! Fire-Toolz

@@@ Fire Toolz: Lavendar Networks (Warp, 2026). There’s a little trend going right now where folks take mainstream pop sounds and make a giant super stacked sundae of sounds so you can get your pop on and your anti-pop satirical feels at the same time. There’s a moment here when the female singer who’s doing a pretty pop section segues into some sort of crazy ass ill orc voice, yowsa big jarring shift. The record is 10 tracks over 37 minutes, so not huge tunes but weird ass titles like Kiss the Bladed Cat Find Ways to Stretch Time, they’re all like this I’m not shitting on it I’m just informing you. This second track, fascinatingly, is a mashup of heavy metal sounds and ideas with pop and dancefloor ideas, it’s jarring and I can’t decide if it’s good or bad. I don’t have to decide right now, I’m not one of these dumbass pop enthusiasts that says if you don’t feel the track within 3 seconds or it’s toast. The formula does grab you, the question is whether this record is the best way to execute this formula only time will tell on that. I don’t know if it’s my ears adjusting or if this fourth track is the best deployment of the heavy metal pop mash em up cars, but I like the tune more than the other ones. I think the tunese where the metal influence is less do not work as well as the tunes that are more balanced. So the opening track hints at a big stacked sandwich of pop sounds but that’s not really true it’s just that she restricted the metal feels to the orc voice. The record would work better if she had maintained a more consistent blend of guitars, metal voices and thundering drums throughout, just my dumbass opinion. It is misleading to put a mostly pop tune at the top of the record and then proceed to undercut that with the next three tunes, a lot of people would say that doesn’t matter but I do. That first hit is important.

Music for 9/29/26!!!! Serakolo 7

@@@ Serakolo 7: Maramfa Musick Pro (Nyege Nyege Tapes, 2026). #100 from The Quietus’ top 100 records of the year, a list that came out in July. This outfit is from Uganda, and it’s a stew of layered rhythms, mostly brisk, whistles, retro cheesy synths, vocal bits and vocal performances at certain points. It’s loose and chaotic but funky. Regular readers of this blog know that I’m very partial to African electronic music and this is no exception, the energy here is hip and abundant, I dig it. It is pretty hard in places to distinguish what is drum machine action and what is hand drumming done by humans, I certainly hope it’s a blend because the contrast between the two works for me. This not your typical West African guitar based African business, it’s synth driven and I’m not sure I’ve heard a bass yet. I’m on the fourth tune and when you can insert yourself and just listen closely to what’s popping and pushing through the mix it’s really really quite funky and weird and joyous. Maybe some folks who like 3 minute indie tunes will be like this is too it’s not like a song I know and I be like yeah let’s do it, it’s loose and wild. Most assuredly going to make my best of year list. How these musicians can carry on their traditions while they renovate and keep shit fresh is inspiring. Don’t sleep on this record, it’s bangers bangers bangers.

Music for 9/28/26!!! Metropolis Ensemble

@@@ Metropolis Ensemble/Erik Hall/Sandbox Percussion: Canto Ostinato (Western Vinyl, 2026). Sneaking into #92 on a list of the best albums thus far of 2026, hey they made it to the list and I will peep it! I’m guessing that this is gonna be some classical crossover, or collective jazz-ish type record and there’s no shame in that, just a prediction. This is a big record, and it’s a classical crossover record out on Western Vinyl which usually doesn’t release music like this, big respect for switching it up. 9 tracks over 65 minutes with an opener that spans 11 minutes. The opener is piano, vibes (?) and strings in some places. It’s a pretty restrained vibe here, this is not some stormy Wagner or Beethoven symphony, it’s circular and measured. What do I think of this record? It’s for people with good paying jobs who don’t want to sweat or pay attention, it’s background classical music which I don’t think is great for listeners or for classical music. My son studies cello at a conservatory and I’ve gotten an appreciation for abstract and/or passionate works of classical music, this is not one of those. Feel free to like this if you want, it’s most definitely your choice but I find it mad snoozy. Listen to some Bach Organ fugues if you want some devastating symmetrical classical music.

Music for 9/26/26!!! Olaf Dreijer

@@@ Olaf Dreijer: Loud Bloom (dh2, 2026). Another electronic release off the Guardian’s best of year thus far and I’m feeling the opener, it’s got a crispness and focus that works for me. And a unique funkiness, very clean but hard hitting at the same time. Ostensibly it’s got a techno beat though with a shaker added but then the melody starts and it twists and convolutes and gets blurped and undercut with some thick halfway between bass and mid range instruments, no that’s a bass slicing away and I’m there for it. Let’s hope this continues! Please Jesus let it roll on. Extreme attention paid to details pays off here, let’s kick it to track 2. This tune Plastic Camelias is cuter, but it’s just the intro it could blow out into something different, oh there it is in comes the thickness beneath the stick percussion and we are most definitely getting pushed around by the wambly bass. I clicked through to the third track, I didn’t not like the second track, but it didn’t move me like the opener. The third track is working again — a trippy melodic synth run on top of multiple layers of percussion and a super tastefully banging bass. The sounds are clear as day it’s just sitting there gyrating and radiating a somewhat unique funkiness, it has some pop in places, the stack of voices is growing here and it’s evolving at a brisk and impressive pace. This is the formula for the record thus far so I’m gonna circle back on this record but I’m guessing it will makes its way to my end of year list. Extreme attention paid to details, that’s the jam here. Hyper arranged and there’s a lot to groove on here, don’t sleep on this record.

Music for 9/25/26!!! Crystalpunk

@@@ Crystalpunk: Chalk (ALTAR, 2026). Off the Guardian’s best of 2026 thus far. It is labelled as punk on Apple Music and how you feel about that label depends on how you define punk which has never really been done well. To me it’s more a spirit, and that spirit says to bite the hand that feeds in the name of what’s right. And on top of that it does appear that a lot of folks pretend to be biting the hand that feeds though they’re really jerking off the hand that feeds. This is a hundo percent bombastic, but bombastic is a big arena rock thing and a big mainstream pop music thing, hugeness, I always thought punk was local. What do I like here? I’m on the third tune and the answer is not a ton. Now on the fourth tune and I would relabel this as rock dancefloor, or slightly confrontational electronic music. This fourth track is mostly Oasis with a synth in the background, same set of beats coming from the drummer. Some PR person got this record on this list and good for them and not great for listeners. I don’t feel this is my punk, I’d rather listen to a metal record with some hardcore feels than this pretty boy art school preening. Shame on whoever labelled it thusly.

Music for 9/24/26!!! Beth Orton

@@@ Beth Orton: The Ground Above (Partisan Records, 2026). Also off the Clash Magazine best of 2026 thus far, though we’re closing in on the end of this shithead year defined by cruelty, racism, and domination. That’s certainly not Beth Orton’s fault that America is going through a fascism phase (another) but it does effect the listening environment. I like her voice a whole bunch and by the time the drums come in this could be a Emmylou Harris record, or another getting on in years spacious record of world weary rock. I like her voice more than I like the band, but that’s just me. Oh wow and 8.5 minute opening track is brave for sure, I didn’t make it through, I need a quicker hit to pull me in. The first track is very important to the rest of the record in my dumbass opinion. The second track is 6.5 minute shot across the bow and the whole record is 8 tracks clocking in at 47 minutes. My feeling is that these tunes are too long and there could be more adventuring, I’m grateful to hear and interesting bassline in the third tune, to me this could use more interesting sonics than relying mostly on her personality/voice to get it across the finish line. This is most definitely a rock record and rock is a hard sell for me, but she coulda used a bit more fire to go with the sadness and the emotion, they’re not fully apart from each other, I’m both sad and angry most of the time, how about you out there? How you doing with this ride we’re on?

Music for 9/23/26!!! Genesis Owusu

@@@ Genesis Owusu: Redstar Wu & The Worldwide Scourge (Ourness Party Ltd, 2026) I got to this record via the best of the year 2026 from Clash Magazine. I’ve found a couple of bangers on that list, most of all GENA a electro funk record I recommend. This is a topical, political record, I’m down with that, and it unfolds within an electronic music/rock sound palette (mostly) which isn’t super common. I’m super into this third tune, HELLSTAR, it’s got a slinky feel and a formula that I can get with bigly, this is looking mostly like a mixed bag leaning towards I like it and the spirit going here. The tunes where he goes with the New Wave flavors are less appealing to me, and other superficial references to punk music don’t work for me, but when he goes funky his shit is funky and I feel those tunes. Would I take a 100% funk record with super political lyrics, oh yeah I would. Is that what’s on offer? No it is not. There are moments where he really hits hard and then other parts where he brings in pop and mainstream musical ideas and I’m just confused and less satisfied. Other folks don’t think like me, once in a blue moon somebody will make a record that jumps around and I’m like I get that, I get that. This is not one of those records, unfortunately cuz full funk and I would shit my pants.

Music for 9/21/26!!! Beck

@@@ Beck: Ride Lonesome (Capitol, 2026). I’ve never been slack, I’m opposed to slack, I like fire, I like passion, so take that into consideration because Beck is slack personified. Even when he rocks it’s snoozy. As expected it opens lush and slack as fuck with country feels. The second tune Run Away is worse than the opener, these are huge slow halfway to rockers, I guess they’re designed to comfort folks during the difficult time and I’m the outlier cuz I’m not feeling it. First off, way too much reverb on his voice at certain points. The production is slick and it kinda works against the tunes a bit, they’re just so manicured and inflated I notice it, I shouldn’t have to notice it. The third tune, In the Night, brings in the predicted string sounds and the fourth tune brings in the piano ballad, I’m sorry I can’t get with it because it’s just too mushy and soft and without contrast, it’s a bowl of sweetened oatmeal it is most definitely some high end oatmeal I’ll give him that and even though oatmeal has a reputation for really filling you up I’m super hungry for something more here.