That’s the People’s mini-review! Well, mostly, anyway… Thanks for pointing out many of our lacunas in music knowledge! To another great year of music discovery!
Shabaka and the Ancestors is a band from Johannesburg, fronted by tenor saxophonist Shabaka Hutchings. The aim of Wisdom of Elders is to create British jazz through South African musicians, with their own, very different experience with music. The result is an entrancing seventy-six minutes of jazz that’s, yes, very British, but that’s also slightly ethnic and always true to the musicians’ origins. Truly, a must for the jazz passionate.

Lerdo is a Chilean progressive … Read more

Switzerland’s Eclecta is an art pop/jazz duo comprising Marena Whitcher (of her famed Shady Midnight Orchestra) and Andrina Bollinger. A Symmetry was released earlier this year and unfortunately slipped under my attention, but it’s a very enjoyable album! Although not as out there as Marena’s avant-jazz ensemble, Eclecta brings to the table intellectual and thoroughly pleasing jazzy pop tunes that are minimalistic yet harmonically full and complex. These songs are sure to be stuck in your head, and you’ll love every bit of it.
Levels is an American progressive metalcore/deathcore band, and Exist, their debut EP, came out in … Read more

That’s the sum of many Christmas releases and catching up on some stuff.
Canadian grindcore band Wake have put Sowing the Seeds of a Worthless Tomorrow for free, for Christmas. I own their 2013 False, but totally forgot to keep track of them, so thanks for that! Like what I remember of them, it’s straight up brutal, blackened grindcore with some slight emphasis on dissonant intervals. The songs are fast-paced and short-lived, just how we like them here.

Pilot have unofficially released their latest album, Damar, on Youtube, with a release on other platforms due soon. The Turkish … Read more

Travis Orbin is a musician I highly respect. From his role in many bands as a full-time member or a session drummer to his set of solo compositions, the result is always excellent! Finite is an artistic exercise in self-limitation. The six pieces here are written strictly for a quartet of drums, bass, viola, and violin. The end result is a highly engrossing and unique experimental math metal EP where the drum-and-bass foundation is embellished by organic and amplified strings. Yet another magnificent EP, signed Travis Orbin.
Guilt Noir is multi-instrumentist Michael Arthur Holloway‘s debut solo album. Labeled as … Read more

Yet another track-EP from Mesarthim. The last one isn’t even 10 days old and Type III is already succeeding it. I have to say that there’s something different, here. The piano introduction sets the tone, and then guitar palm-muted chords come and increase the momentum of the track to an epic level. That being said, I’m really not a fan of epic metal – imagine all those Skyrim OST metal covers -, but I appreciate the little bit of diversity the project is putting in its music.
British mathcore band Zilf released, earlier this year, the cleverly-titled (not) PrEPare … Read more