Oli Steidle and the Killing Popes – Ego Pills (Shhpuma)

Shhpuma, a derivative of Clean Feed, continues to solidify its position as a purveyor of awe-striking music. The newest demonstration is Ego Pills, an album by the experimental jazz-rock unit Oli Steidle and the Killing Popes. As you can imagine with the above video, the entire album deals in the psychedelic and the musically abstract, as the aberrant, incongruous compositions show. The entire fifty minutes on disc are vibrant and varied, and offer numerous surprises and rewarding moments. It’s a very notable album.

Pixvae – Cali (Compagnie 4000)

Caleb Burhans – Past Lives (modern classical)

A gorgeous grouping of the composer’s pieces offering a great deal of variety in terms of approach and texture, Caleb Burhans certainly lives up to his “emo-classical” moniker with this effort. The ability of the composer to define and convey subtle emotion through his music is exceptional. Also notable is the fact that each of these … Read more

Joey Molinaro – Tale of the Lovelorn Outlaw

My previous encounter with Joey‘s music was with his Awash album, which was a really interesting mix of hardcore or metal music firmly rooted in folk. The Tale of the Lovelorn Outlaw stays within this realm, but seems slightly less experimental to my ears, given Joey’s cleaner vocal performance in general. It’s truly an amazing spin on modern folk music, and, being a concept EP, there’s a strong sense of continuity throughout, which helps keep all the individual songs together. We need more of this to reinvigorate folk music.

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