🐣 INNING — EXPENSIVE FLIGHTS

The name of the game here is hazy. It's also cloudy, misty, nebulous—it's all of those things. That insubstantial foggy-headed feeling, sun glinting in your eyes, all created by gorgeous washes of sound that swish and sway with lo-fi abrasions like some sort of dust storm just so that they graze your mind ever so slightly, so that all that loveliness can pour in, you know. It's called 'Expensive Flights' and it toes the line somewhere in the heavenly kingdom between chillwave and dream pop, a delicious combo of live drums and bass and guitar and synth in a soothing symphony of sound created by the Charlottesville-based Inning.

Like dream pop, it feels alive yet somewhere else, voices soaring in the sky, and the drums thump and rattle with a doofing pulse and scritch-scratch metallics – yet in a pattern that summons something more electronic-based, a slow house sorta pace; but though a 'real' instrument, the bass guitar coarse and grinding in low-slung indie-band fashion, it is founded on this sub-bass frequency that has that quality of being able to erase everything going on around you. And at a heavenly crescendo the guitar arpeggiates like glitter, like light, soft synth chords ever-present, everything slots into place as the vocals refrain enigmatic: "Are the things that I like me for the reasons I like you, or are things that I like you for the reasons I like me?" Self-doubt broiling beneath a calm exterior; a vocal that with its reverb and light decay feels faraway, like a vague worry.

This is a late afternoon sound, a montage of the day's move into night, with that beatless and wordless outro, cool and blissful, hitting just as the sun fades and dusk sets in, inky and purple, a watercolour in sound of the feeling that comes at the end of a good day with its effusion of doubt and its memories, when the passing of time is most visible and poignant in a dramatic colour-changing sky. And besides, Inning sang it at the start of the track:""Yeah I like you, but right now things aren't right." A breeze picks up, and your summer clothes feel suddenly inadequate.

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• 🔔 'Expensive Flights' is taken from Inning's recently released D.C. Party Machine EP, a 5-track exposition of thick body-wobbling low-end frequencies and hazy-headed washes of sound in patterns that evoke vague emotions amidst of chillment. You can listen to/download it on Bandcamp if that sounds like your thing.

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🐣 POOL BOY — OLD DOG NO TRICKS

The first thing here is a sense of familiarity. Though it is new and from a new artist going by the name of Pool Boy, the bassline is a constant refrain of the first four beats of the bassline in 'Don't You Want Me' by The Human League. Intentionally, it is an innocent nod to something everybody knows. Unintentionally, it shows the pervasive nature of "classics" of the late 20th century. Either way, there it is; and 'Old Dog No Tricks' continues with a clatter of disco percussion, scathing hi-hats, cool lounge bongos, smart handclaps.

The heaviest element of the track is that bass. Above that close-quarters groove the feel is one of haze and otherworldliness. A constant fog of ethereal synth creeping across the floor; and above that a twinkling cluster of notes hangs in the air. Lead melodies spin like submerged guitar solos, muffled and wavering. Against this mirage of sound, like a disco in a dream, real world noises pour in: birdsong, fresh and innocent, and the wash-crash of the sea, expansive and farsighted—as with the musical elements, it is light and heavy combining.

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• 🔔 This appears courtesy of London label Coastal Haze as a single ahead of the Pool Boy LP, scheduled for release on 22nd January. You can pre-order it digitally or on cassette from Bandcamp.
• 🔔 The description of the track reads: "Produced overlooking the port of Vancouver but ..who is Pool Boy?!" We have an inkling.

  1) The track itself was reposted by Cyril Hahn.
  2) One SoundCloud comment reads: "At last more music by Cyril!"
  3) Also he is Canadian, and it was produced in/near Vancouver.

  But we shall see.

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☟ Pool Boy Internet Presence ☟
?????

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🐣 MAHALIA — SOBER

This lovely track is arrives like a cool breeze through a window, contains within it that sheepish drowsy feeling that accompanies the delicate stages of the early morning following the inebriation and fun that bubbles between four walls and down corridors and in the garden, with its wonky boom-bap beat describing sonically that state of disarray as you awake from slumbering stupor and attempt to be a human, memories of the house party arising as you survey the room that was so hectic the night previously which now is filled with hangover and headache. "This story is totally about the morning after," says 19-year-old Leicester-based Mahalia about her track 'Sober'. "Thinking about the night before - all the mistakes you made, all the muddled texts you sent."

And so the track bounces this off-kilter pathway, the low subtle bass groove which charts this fresh, clean feeling throughout, the wobbling nature of it all giving the track this post-spinning-room relief in drymouthed stability. Yet we also have the vocals of Mahalia herself, not wonky, nor hungover, but self-assured and epiphanous, silkenly spinning lines that represent a realisation of good sense; "This is me waking up and smelling the roses," she explains further her first official single. Smooth, hazy, soulful, 'Sober' is an analogy for turning your life around, a night of revelry illustrating past mistakes, maybe even a whole lifetime of folly, but realising in a moment of clarity that things should and could be different.

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• 🔔 You can download or stream 'Sober' in various ways via this link here.

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🐣 RADICULE — BLUE LOTUS

Visions of what you should be doing whilst this song is playing rise up like sea fog or hazy summer memories: should you be reading books in a minimalist European café, should you be wheeling your suitcase through the arrivals section of a white-tiled airport anticipating a new city, should you be melting on Monacan yacht? It has this rich mahogany-and-teak feeling to it, probably effused mostly by the wide robust warmth of those piano chords just lightly touched with the decay of existence, a conjuration of insta-sophistication that is very wooden floors and old world cocktails, image-heavy magazines and leather armchairs—ceilings high and jostling with spirits of the past who never left these rooms of leisure once they broke free of their skins.

This open-armed embrace of classic flavours is the main body of 'Blue Lotus' by New York beatmaker radicule, that piano really drenching the air with all the sensations that this warmest of seasons evokes and inspires, relaxation especially with the multiple thudding kicks and the wonky offbeat slide of hi-hats and snares that swaggers throughout. An undeniable thickness of life lounges in the cradle of gemstone clinks and pecuniary chiming clanks that flow tapestry-like scuttling sewn-together bag of jewels spilling out, a luscious lawn of legal tender lolling along for gorgeous texture, a vital candelabra of ornamentation, working with a small flute interlude to dutifully deck out this ephemeral track with the sparkle and glitz of idealism.

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• 🔔 'Blue Lotus' comes from radicule's 9-track beat tape COMFY CAR CHRONICLES out now via Grape Records. You can listen to it here if you like.

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🐣 STEW STIM — FEDORA

The glitter oh the glitter of this track, 'Fedora', the gleaming in-the-sky noises that veil this track with an intimate expanse of heavenly proportions. The liquid waterfall sounds give a sense of cool fluidity, a sloshing wateriness that feels refreshing, and twinned with the chimes and the tract of metallic objects tumbling teasingly throughout, these sounds provide an almost overwhelming blanket of texture, an intense eartickle of sharp glossy insectoid noises, like the piercing ambient noises that swirl in rainforests – the scratchy bugs, the rustling leaves, the crunch of feet on the ground, a neardistant stream – a thicket of sound that is undeniable in how it satisfies the listener as much as a close-up smell of something so beautiful it verges on unbearable, the scent of Earl Grey tea imprisoned and released from its tin, the zing of alcohol and rushing mellow sweetness of vanilla extract. It is a close-up sound, a minuscule sound, a microcosm of these minuscule sounds, a colony: in other words, as far as your senses are concerned, it is alive.

And with this bristling jostle of bright solar powered life glinting and clink clanking with sheen and sparkles Stew Stim adds the gentle haze of synth chords, breezy tones that herald peacefulness and relaxation, they way they rise into the atmosphere like distorted air on a hot summer's day, resonate gladly as the track introduces the beat—overdriven kicks bump into the halo of percussive minutiae, hi-hats shuffle, slapping hand-claps clatter in syncopation—a reflection of human clumsiness, heavy-handed violence in the purity of this delicate imaginary space. And in the midst of this robust clacking and banging the track continues to bubble and wobble with electronic chimes, melodies that appear and dissipate like clouds, small bopping arpeggios that appear to ascend like sped-up incense smoke. Sweet and substantial, this track has the power to lull as much as excite, a beat experiment firmly on the outer reaches, a blissful orbit of shimmering idealism.

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• 🔔 'Fedora' is the opening track to Stew Stim's recent album, a collection of introverted noisy beats and spacey experimentalism called Swine, though 'Fedora' isn't necessarily representative of the more leftfield, often dark bulk of the project. It was released via FRIGHT HOUSE, child-label of rising net-based sensation DESKPOP.

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🐣 THE ANALOG GIRL — MORE THAN YOU KNOW

Into a world that seems far from our own, a world of swirling intoxicating fog and mists of multicolour dust, a hazy rainbow, slow-dance smoke machine sensibilities as the morsel of music moves along andante, the sashay of the bulging bass bloop and popping drum machine thud of the kicks and snares, a creeping walking pace, a poised-to-pounce looming approach, the click of heels on a marble floor, a cyberpunk sky clouded over outside, retro-futurism propelling into your brain. A world far from our own for sure, that's what Mei Wong aka Singaporean musicmaker The Analog Girl paints with the sparkling-abrasive glitter of 'More Than You Know'.

Glassy synth arpeggio melody gives off a touch of upscale fragility, something digital and cutting-edge but with a decidedly retro air of obsolescence; a more piercing sound than this lances over the top, doused in reverb and resounding into the cold quiet patches of the track, sharp and needling, lo-fi glimmer like television static in pastel and neon; towards the end a more robust flavour of synth comes into view, thick saw-wave. And then you have The Analog Girl's voice, a collection of whispers, clusters of slow threatening vocals, whooshing and distorted, simultaneously organic and glitch-laden, harsh yet floating, the reflective representative human voice to this dreampop noise, this aesthetic dystopia of sound.

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• 🔔 'More Than You Know' is taken from The Analog Girl's recently released album Golden Sugar Crystals, available for purchase via download on Bandcamp.
• 🔔 The abstract video for this track was created by digital fashion artist Laura E Shepherd LS528 (formerly known by her glove line Glovedup Gloves). "Her fashion animations were more than fashion" says The Analog Girl; "they carried a sense of mystery, intrigue and pop artfulness. One look and I knew I had to feature them on my music video."

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🌭 CULT EXCITER — GET

A warped tropical island feel permeates this track, a wash of what might be steel pans muffled and softened and stretched out into languorous mists of sound, little clouds of chill ambience that summon breezeblown beaches and blue skies as much as the sultry potential of nocturnal outings. Like palm trees in the calm croon of coastal air, these nebulous sounds sway in slow-motion as the the dancehall-flavoured beat skips onwards—the party continues to pop all around but the focus is on this feeling, this fluid electric connection, this illustration of amorous aurae by LA-based duo, Cult Exciter.

Having their origins in Dominican Republic, the musicmakers understandably infuse 'Get' with Caribbean lilt, in that rhythmic swing of the beat, in the smooth fragmented bass that grooves gently throughout. Elsewhere this is a dreamlike excursion. The vocals, indistinct and slurred and doused with reverb, seem to come from elsewhere, from a memory, from a premonition, and fit effortlessly with the fumes of sound that soothingly intoxicate—all this, plus the brushstrokes of spontaneity in the sudden sprinklings of bubbling chiptune bleeps with their matter-of-fact anything-could-happen-ness, generates a sense of magical realism, where something about this club experience is not altogether of this world, where a dream materialises on the dancefloor.

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• 🔔 'Get' is taken from Cult Exciter's debut EP, out 23rd June on Point Records.

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🐣 NAKURY — AUNQUE QUIERAS

With soothing plumes of bass glooping behind a laid-back slowdown boom-bap beat 'Aunque Quieras' begins, the chilled and subtly dynamic vehicle for the words and voice of Costa Rican artist, Nakury, formerly of graffiti crew Pintores Sin Kontrol and breakdancing veteran.

In the singular groove crafted by San José-based producer Barzo, saw-wave synth and glittering trails of ambient computerised sound lend a heavy misty atmosphere to the instrumental, a sultry melting vibe that solidifies and buzzes with electricity when it comes to the hook—"aunque quieras…" Nakury sings anthemically, the vocal soaked in reverb, adding to the thick delicious haze of the instrumental, bounced and pockmarked by the shuffle of the beat.

As for the verses, Nakury shines. Her flow is breathless, skipping along, pursued by itself, layered with hypnotic monotone harmonies, the vocal resonating with its rapid staccato and Latin lilt. Though low-slung and casual, the rap feels extra-explosive above the robust calm of the instrumental, its speed is satisfying, the tone sumptuous, and it gleams poised to pounce, pushes clouds across the sky: it feels vital, elemental.

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• 🔔 'Aunque Quieras' is taken from Nakury's recent album VIA, released by Lácteo Cósmico back in April—it's packed with tracks, including another standout, 'Rima Que Ilumina'. You can download the album here here.

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🐣 MEN I TRUST — YOU DESERVE THIS

It's the atmosphere here, the atmosphere whipped up with the warm synth chords, their heavenly modulation, the uncomplicated simplicity of it, the watery refrain of the guitar thin and tactile above the thick haze of the track, and then there's the swaying motion of it, the slow oscillation as the sharp clipped snares and hi-hats tick-tocking finely against the amorphous bed of velvet sounds and the aching slow-slow jwang of the bass. There is a feeling of the comfort, detached but comfortable. Alone and a part. The vocals linger with their layers languid and lost in dislocated dreamlike longing.

Created by Montreal-based three-person musical unit ("Jessy, Dragos and Emma") Men I Trust, 'You Deserve This' contains within it something very akin to the insta-nostalgia conjured by the homely wilderness of the Twin Peaks theme by Angelo Badalamenti, rich but not extravagant, universal but not cold, not meant for you but nor for anyone in particular. It is a wandering feeling, formless, a freefall into this cyclical formula, the feeling of going around and around without realising it, the seamless repetition of sound, the sparse groove, the ascending-descending melody, slowly softly slowly softly up and down the stairs, head full of chill, heart full of warmth.

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• 🔔 'You Deserve This' can be downloaded for free from Men I Trust's Bandcamp.

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🐣 OKPK — PARADISE [初演 • PREMIERE]

The opening seconds of sound in this track are transportive. It becomes very clear very quickly that you're no longer where you thought you were. The damaged digital synth that pings out wonkily as if you've just stumbled on some ancient technology and somehow awakened it, a sound that conjures something between earthly magic and inexplicable otherworldliness, spiritual electronics, familiar yet foreign, exotic and integral. That remoteness is echoed eerily in the vocal samples crying out pitch-shifted unfamiliar; and the doomful gloopy modulated synth sound that plays the robust refrain, arriving obtusely, keeping sparse abnormal rhythm; here is 'Paradise', an arid yet living melted-sky landscape.

Created by Victoria, Canada-based musicmaker okpk, this morsel of music is a dream-gone-wrong of subtle menace and narcotic haze. The sounds are immediate in their emotivity, their power to transport, with crackling arpeggio music box twangs, phasing columns of electric crunch, and plosive percussion clustering infrequently with glutinous kick flurries and thin rollicking snares and ts-ts ticking hi-hats and smart fingerclicks set out in the quivering crumbling space. With the legibility of vaporwave's decayed scene-setting, its inherent neither-here-nor-there extradimensional quality, 'Paradise' paints a surreal soundscape, a beautiful wasteland of an inverted paradise.

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• 🔔 This sonic scene turns out to be at the heart of the Pleasure Seekers EP from which this track is taken, being a "soundtrack to an imaginary film about a pair of lovers trapped in a disintegrating virtual paradise," but with the twist that "their collapsing environment is a manifestation of the unspoken problems in their relationship." That's thematically very vaporwave. The EP is set for release on 30th June via r/n collective and features artwork by multimedia artist Arya Hawker, who has created six videos, one for each of the EP's tracks.

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🐣 GLADES — REAL [初演 • PREMIERE]

Stomping onto the scene is the pump-action rhythms of 'Real', a frosty frenzy of dancehall flavours and futuristic leanings from Colorado-born New York-dwelling musicmaker Glades or sometimes GLZDES. Overdriven kicks provide necessary fidgeting bounce, icy synths paint spooky gleaming sparklescapes from space operas freeflowing and far off, thin misty lasering sounds that provide sufficient otherworldly ambience. As a sidenote, beginning at 1:22 the pingpong syncopation summons the plinky noises that appear in the theme for Stage 3 of Streets of Rage—recollections empower music.

And amidst the luscious shaker sounds with its textured bristling and the clacking percussion that drive the track forward and lend it a popping atmosphere, the thuddy kicks that help it sway away from the "real real real real real" parts, amidst this and between them is the voice of Yoh, his words distant and whirled in fogs of synth and skipping with jazz inflection and agility.

Glades tells us over email that 'Real' is inspired by "the relationship btw Honesty and Promiscuity." Indeed there are two contrasting facets of the track: the unrelenting faster sections vs. the soft nebulous parts. This duality could be mirroring those conflicting concepts. "In Western culture ~ we don't like to let these coexist," he explains. "We like to demonize, shame... we talk about sexual freedom and like to think we are free sexually as a culture, but I don’t believe that’s true, I don’t believe as a culture that we can handle it emotionally."

'Real' pops with minimalism and intensity, compels with hazy floating sounds and crucial tactile ones, grounded but cloudbound, it's the far-off future where things merge and work together and concepts are as free and flexible as the ones that dream them, a heartgasm of isolation in idealism.

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• 🔔 'Real' follows two weeks in the wake of 'Turbulence', another track taken from a forthcoming release called VISCERAL. Glades revealed that all its songs were all like a purge the past few years, the times I could let it all go and be most honest."—"Now I realize the best way for us all to live is to be full honest all the time, but I did not know this at the time." The project is due for release on 2nd June.

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🐣 BAKALIS — REGAL

On this bed of lo-fi grandeur Maryland rapper Bakalis spreads a rhythmic rapid-fire flow, crowding the aching slow beat with thickets of heartfelt words, a seeming contrast to the laid-back instrumental as much as vibrant splashes of oil paint on a hazy wash of watercolours. The lyrics chart ambition, hard work and self-belief, the vocals skipping acrobatically from syllable to syllable, sometimes rising to a crescendo of passion at the end of a bar, as in the glittering hazy intro: "but what's a spotlight to some blind eyes / feel like i'm in a dog fight to survive i / ain't been missing sleep just to achieve a couple high fives"—and then the beat of 'Regal' kicks in like a slice of slow-dance introspective vaporwave, corroded and crackling yet emotive and emblematic.

Guitar like a far-off wolf howling plays a lamenting melody throughout, muted chimes glimmer above indistinct rumbles of bass, the beat itself, distorted and decayed, thudding dusty kicks and abrasive handclap-snare combo and shuffling shaking hi-hats drags itself slow fatigued, all of it contrasts the delivery whilst simultaneously providing an unexpected mirror the lyrics: these are the slow steps of the sleepy, the tired mind and body of someone focusing all their energy, the soundtrack to sleepless nights. There is a lonely feel, especially in that lilting almost Hawaiian-style guitar, but also in the general haze of the track, a neurotic and nocturnal heavy-eyes-staring atmosphere.

ut still, in the adversity of graft and grind and taking it day by day, the gradual climb to the heights of recognition and beyond, there is confidence: "got tabasco in my suitcase / cause i bring the heat everywhere that i go / got em pleading me please don't show up at my show." This is a wonderful illustration, sonically and lyrically, of the internal struggle between doubt and belief, weakness and strength, and against fear, when chasing a dream.

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• 🔔 The beat has been created by Task* with additional production by Marvillous Beats.
• 🔔 'Regal' is taken from Bakalis' new project, a mixtape, EP, album, who knows, out 3rd June.

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✿ RYCE ✿ – FLOWERS

One commenter on this track said "gotta watch out the young ones are murking everyone in the game right now." And to some extent that may well be true. Not necessarily that they're already better, or that they are actually actually murking everybody, but the sentiment still stands. Why is it that a younger person might be better? Well, firstly it's easier to learn things when you're younger. Your brain is more malleable, skills and things sink in more easily. Secondly, there's less bias! If you've only just started making music at 20-something, it might be the case that you're more biased towards one sound, or less inclined to experiment with other sounds.

If I had more time to explore the differences more thoroughly with actual evidence, etc. then obviously I would sound less like I am totally going on conjecture and "what I think" i.e. "my opinion". But I digress.

I speak of youth because the producer of this track is, apparently, 14-years-old. Really? If so, that's amazing, big talent. But it's not the reason I'm writing about the track. I'm writing about it because I heard it and liked it! :)

Created by Finnish producer ✿ ryce ✿ – or for brevity's sake let's say just plain ryce (no pun intended) – the track is called 'f l o w e r s' or 'flowers' and it's a slow melding of luscious sounds twisting together to a gloriously textured beat twinkling with metallic and glassy chimes of percussion. It's underpinned with supple columns of bass, a sample, with pitch-shifted vocals and slow guitar twangs, from I-don't-know-where winding its way gently across the track. It tastes like vaporwave with hints of hip hop, but it feels more unique than that. It feels like liquid treasure, a bypassing of ontological worries to simply float through life with bliss free-flowing all around you. If only〜

The real beauty of being this young and this creative and talented, however, is anticipating how these skills and this vision will evolve over time. Here's hoping for the literal best song ever from ryce one day in the future.

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• ryce is part of collective/label/genre (???) BAEWAVE, which has like 24 artists on its roster. 10 Reasons Why The Internet Is So Nice.

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☟ ✿ ryce ✿ Social Media Presence ☟
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