What the Bandcamp Daily editors are listening to right now.
Acrelid
X Illegal Rave Tapes Selektion – 1999 – 2012
2 x Vinyl LP
I’m going to be honest with you: The first time Illegal Rave Tapes came up in my playlist of upcoming release promos, I thought it was a compilation. Take a stroll through the aisles of any physical record store (or even a glance at our own Best Reissues column) and you’ll quickly discover that nearly every nook and cranny of music history has been excavated at some point or another, parading an endless cast of overlooked geniuses across the stage for their hard-earned 15 minutes. Why not ‘90s rave? It wasn’t until I glanced over at the tracklist to see who was behind the manic, Aphex Twin-y stutter beats and spooky synths of “The Shakes” that I realized that all 15 tracks here are the work of one person—and that there are apparently 119 more where these came from. Indeed, John Lee Richardson–aka Acrelid—spent 13 years stockpiling hundreds of tracks, all of them inspired by the glory days of glow sticks and pacifiers. And he captures the sound so well, he fooled me into believing it was the real thing. It’s not just that the music is on point—the way the Twilight Zone string surge strikes terror into the aptly named jungle banger… “The Twilight Zone,” or the way the synths wobble like Weebles between the grooves of “Imaginary Garden.” Acrelid also nails the errata, never better than on the hilarious “Rave Clubs And Things,” which layers samples from what sounds like an early ‘90s BBC “rave panic” documentary aimed at terrified parents amidst a gaggle of icicle synths and insistent rhythms. It’s a blast from start to finish. It’s unclear what Acrelid has been up to in the years since, but his Bandcamp page offers endless wormholes to disappear into.
–J. Edward Keyes
Erick the Architect
I’ve Never Been Here Before
Vinyl LP
On first listen, you may peep the features and think you’ll jump track to track—the list spans James Blake, George Clinton, Joey Bada$$, Westside Boogie, and more—but Erick the Architect has made that impossible. As one song ends another equally as hooky begins, making I’ve Never Been Here Before damn near unskippable. Otherwise known as Flatbush Zombie’s Erick Arc Elliott, the Brooklyn rapper/producer’s debut solo project is a formidable collection from an evidently eclectic and introspective musician. A hypnotic blend of funk, soul, dancehall, and jazz seamlessly spiral inward as the album progresses, like a tilting kaleidoscope whose individual colors and refractions may escape full appreciation at first turn. Not that you would be to blame–Erick the Architect knows how to switch up his flow or pitch his voice to keep your ears piqued to the story he’s telling (or the rappers he’s clowning). Having left NYC for Los Angeles following the death of his mother, we see the rapper mining his own personal growth and desire for change as the album evolves, forging a newfound self-belief and even a villainous alter ego in “Mandevillain.” Tracks like “2-3 Zone” and “Colette” will blow out your subwoofers and subsequently your neck, while “Jammy Jam” and “Ambrosia” are a gorgeous, car-top-down type of vibe. The high priest of P-Funk features on the hypnagogic “Ezekiel’s Wheel,” playing hookah-smoking caterpillar to RÜDE CÅT’s chorus, echoing the Biblical metaphor of the title. The heart of the album, though, lies in “Breaking Point,” a song that Erick the Architect says gives him “the most emotional reaction…I’ve cried multiple times just playing it.” For a debut, the Zombie turned solo artist has skillfully weaved himself a coat of many colors; it’s Brooklyn-by-way-of-L.A., Flatbush grit meets sunny psychedelia.
–Stephanie Barclay
Gwendoline
C’est à moi ca
Compact Disc (CD), Vinyl LP
Ever find yourself listening to Joy Division and thinking, “Gee, I wonder what this would sound these guys were ruder, rowdier, sang in French, and occasionally rapped?” If you said no, you’re obviously asking the wrong questions. If you, like me, said yes — or you find yourself partial to any genre with “wave” at the end — then there’s a good chance you’ll enjoy the new one from Gwendoline, the French duo of Pierre Barrett and Mickaël Olivette. Juxtaposing angular, infectious rock hooks with queasy keyboards and depressive vocals, C’est à moi ca is an LP anchored in misanthropic angst that manifests musically (check the atonal synths and tense dynamics on opener “Conspire”) and for those fluent in French, lyrically. But just like good ol’ JD, Gwendoline, however gloomy, spend much of the album dishing out hits, not angst. For two prime examples, check out the surging “Rock 2000” (sonically indebted to the ’80s, contrary to the Y2K-referencing title) and “Héros Nationally,” which showcases the aforementioned raps alongside Afrobeat-inflected grooves. Even with all the mean-mugging, you can’t help but smile.
–Zoe Camp
Omni
Souvenir
Vinyl LP, Compact Disc (CD)
Over the course of their existence, post-punk trio Omni have more or less been at home in the “reliably good” category. Fourth LP Souvenir does nothing to change that at first blush, remaining an excellent example of the boingy-sproingy blah-blah-blah post-punk Omni (and twenty billion other groups) could make in their sleep. That said, things get interesting fairly quickly with spacey production and smeary synths giving the Atlanta trio’s established wiry sound an an appealing zoned out quality and a little more breathing room than normal. Omni’s best trick has always been their way with the melodic quick change, a show-off-y bit of arranging that injects their songs with unpredictability and momentum; but on Souvenir the unexpected comes in unexpectedly sideways in the form of a country breakdown, a blues band bit, a Beatles guitar tone. There’s also some nice guest vocals from Izzy Glaudini of Automatic to break up the dude vibes, always an issue with this kind of music. So never let it be said that all Omni records sound the same—this one kinda doesn’t!
–Mariana Timony
Ptaki
Przelot
2 x Vinyl LP
Originally released in 2015 and finally available on vinyl, the first and only album from Polish duo Ptaki is the closest you can get to crate-digging in Warsaw without, you know, actually going there. Constructed entirely of samples—the overwhelming majority of which are credited to Polish artists, according to their Whosampled page—Prezelot illustrates the pair’s world-building prowess through 14 immersive tracks reinforced by decades’ worth of hidden gems. Ptaki don’t seek to replicate this musical past, nor do they rely on nostalgia as a crutch. Rather, like all great crate-diggers, they assemble familiar sounds into a portal into uncharted territory that bears their unique signature. On “Nie Zadijaj,” they filter Jamaican dub through Balearic pop; on “Za Daleki Sen,” they infuse contemporary trap beats with vocals and guitars sourced from vintage folk and funk records; “Jelitkowo” courts new age fans with slack acoustic guitar leads and hand percussion, before pivoting to a crackling spoken-word sample delivered in — you guessed it — Polish. With all these compelling fusions in mind, it’s no wonder the vinyl’s almost sold out.
–Zoe Camp
Sucker
Seein’ God
7" Vinyl
With a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it run time deserving of the (in the band’s words) “classic black vinyl with small hole” 7-inch format you can buy it on, Seein’ God from Oakland band Sucker doesn’t skimp on hooks but also doesn’t care about sounding like shit as the group mopes through four tracks of gnarly in-the-red noise pop, all distorted guitars and too cool vocals just like in the ’90s.
–Mariana Timony
Wrecked Lightship
Antiposition
Vinyl LP
Like a lot of people, I’ve always had a natural attraction to artists about whom it is impossible to learn anything. Does the music sound like you’d find it on a mangled cassette in a drainage ditch along the side of an interstate highway? And what’s that you say? The person behind it doesn’t do interviews? Sign me up. It doesn’t even have to be aesthetically difficult—just mysterious in some way. Lately, the L.A. label Peak Oil has been scratching that itch for me—to the point that I was somewhat hesitant to assign a feature on it a few years ago because I almost didn’t want to know anything about it. Fortunately, the spell was not broken, and the label’s latest release, a six-track dive into the dance underworld from the German duo Wrecked Lightship, is as beguiling as ever. The songs on Antiposition are all supported by deep, hypnotic rhythms, atop which Laurie Osborn and Adam Winchester layer all manner of digital hiss and groans. It reminds me, in a lot of ways, of one of my favorite records of all time, Raime’s classic Quarter Turns Over a Living Line—the sensation of feeling your way through some subterranean tunnel as fluorescent lights flicker on and off above you. The vinyl sleeve sports a lenticular version of the album’s robot-insect cover art that changes in shape and definition as you move it. Wrecked Lightship accomplish the most by saying the least.
