Tag: bdrmm

Categories
Albums

Best albums of 2025: Honourable mentions

I know most people are not a fan of Mondays, given that it’s the start of a new work week and all that that entails, but I like the idea of new starts and all of the potential they bring. And what better day than a Monday to start a new series… and one that celebrates another year of great music at that.

Yes, indeed, it is that time again.

And though I’m not one to want to wish the days away, I gotta say I won’t be sad to kiss 2025 goodbye. It’s been, for the most part, an uneventful year, but also one that I won’t ever forget. I’ve spent the lion’s share of it in recovery mode. Health concerns that I don’t really want to get too deep into here but ones that, at many times this year, have had me worried that I’d never fully recover from. I am only now just returning to work after a long period away and that in itself is its own challenge.

All this to say, there were but a few bright spots to point out from 2025. I can include all the precious time I was able to spend with my lovely wife as one, of course, and all the quality time whiled away listening to great music as another. Yes, I devoted as much time as I could spinning records and exploring new music and old favourites on the streaming sites on the old Internet. The pure joy of music was almost as much a part of my recovery as the balance of rest and calm and fresh air.

So, yeah, by my quick glance at the calendar, I see we’ve got just over five weeks left of 2025 and my plan is to share, interspersed with my regular blog programming, some of my favourite albums that the year has offered. I’m starting today with some honourable mentions, albums that didn’t quite crack my top ten but that are definitely worth your time, and I’ll be back soon with a start to the countdown of my ten faves. Enjoy.

bdrmm “Microtonic”:  Hull, England based outfit imbues electronic dreams into their shoegaze arsenal for their third outing with brilliant results.
Check out: “John on the ceiling”

Ezra Furman “Goodbye small head”:  Always raw and immediate, the American singer/songwriter’s 10th album is filled with personal tales that at the same time feel quite universal.
Check out: “Grand mal”

Just Mustard “We were just here”:  The Irish quintet’s third album smacks equal parts of the haunting goth of Cranes and the noisy experimentation of Sonic Youth.
Check out: “We were just here”

Amy Millan “I went to find you”:  The Stars’ co-frontwoman’s* third solo album moves away from the folk/country of her first two releases and into an indie pop sound that feels like a warm comforter on a cold Canadian winter morning.
Check out: “The overpass”

Pale Blue Eyes “New place”: More beautiful and danceable dream pop ecstasy from the trio originally from Sheffield, songs that feel blissfully eternal.
Check out: “Scrolling”

Sloan “Based on the best seller”: The Canadian alt-rock icons doing what they do best on their fourteenth studio LP – just keeping on keeping on bringing the rock.
Check out: “Dream destroyer”

The Veils “Asphodels”: The latest by Finn Andrews’ musical vehicle is typically dramatic and epic, and worthy of another David Lynch soundtrack.
Check out: “The ladder”

*Whose last name I learned this year that I’ve been mispronouncing for two decades.

I’ll be back very soon with albums #10 through #6 for my Best albums of 2025 list. In the meantime, you can check out my Best Albums page here if you’re interested in my other favourite albums lists.

Categories
Playlists

Playlist: New tunes from 2023, part two

Happy Friday all!

For me, it’s an especially happy Friday because at the end of today’s work day, I’ll be off on vacation leave, taking a much needed break from the office and at the same time, these pages, for just over a week and a half. I’ll be sure to take full advantage of the time away and not think of anything except that moment and the next, and come back fully recharged and refreshed. But before I go, I’ve got one more blast of music to share with you all: part two of my ongoing New Music of 2023 playlist.

To be truthful, I can’t believe I’m posting another one if these already. I typically do each instalment of these four part series of new tunes for the year once every three months but it feels more like three minutes rather than months since the last time I did one. I can’t really recall very much of what I’ve done during the second quarter of 2023. It’s not that I haven’t appreciated each breath I’ve taken, moments shared with my lovely wife, etc and etc, but there’s been so much sameness, it’s hard to extract one moment from the next. It’s been working, eating, sleeping, and mostly more of the same.

Interestingly, the music I’ve been listening to hasn’t quite reflected this same feeling. It’s been for the most part very reflective and present and self-aware. Music that breathes with you and embraces you. It’s not something I purposely sought out but it found me nonetheless. Have a look through and see if you disagree, and don’t worry, it’s not all work and no play. There’s a bunch of fun jams thrown in there to shake things up for you as well.

But I won’t guide your thoughts too much, I’ll present the music that I’ve ridden on during these second three months of 2023. If you’re not sold on checking out all twenty-five, perhaps sample from a few of these highlights:

      • Daughter sets us off on the right track with “Be on you way”, the beautiful and breathless track from “Stereo mind game”, their first album in seven years
      • The brash yet melodic garage rock feels of “Love beyond the grave” reminds us all why we love what Crocodiles are all about
      • Montreal-based dream pop duo Bodywash and their track “Kind of light” had me wondering why on earth I’d never heard of them before this
      • The National are back up to their old tricks with “New Order t-shirt”, weaving stream of conscious narratives and haunting melodies that I dare you to not adore
      • Olivia Jean’s “Trouble” is dark, grimy, and glamourous, not to mention chock full of attitude
      • The ever brilliant James has released a new double album in celebration of their 40 years in existence, reimagining many of their iconic tunes with an orchestra and it includes wonderful new number called “Love make a fool”
      • Pond frontman Nicholas Allbrook is channeling Bowie in “Jackie”, an amazing tune off his new solo album, “Manganese”

Here is the entire playlist as I’ve created it:

1. “Be on your way” Daughter (from the album Stereo mind game)

2. “Sepsis” Blondshell (from the album Blondshell)

3. “Love beyond the grave” Crocodiles (from the album Upside down in heaven)

4. “Rushin’ river valley” Fruit Bats (from the album A river running to your heart)

5. “Major league” The Tallest Man on Earth (from the album Henry St.)

6. “Kind of light” Bodywash (from the album I held the shape while I could)

7. “Gamma rays” Temples (from the album Exotico)

8. “Slow burn” Rose City Band (from the album Garden party)

9. “American daughter” Beach House (from the EP Become)

10. “Flight paths” Great Lake Swimmers (from the album Uncertain country)

11. “New Order t-shirt” The National (from the album First two pages of Frankenstein)

12. “Time back” Indigo De Souza (from the album All of this will end)

13. “Gaagige” Zoon (from the album Bekka ma’iingan)

14. “Trouble” Olivia Jean (from the album Raving ghost)

15. “True mirror” Esben and the Witch (from the album Hold sacred)

16. “The likes of us” Lanterns on the Lake (from the album Versions of us)

17. “Visions” Frankiie (from the album Between dreams)

18. “Pretty Boy” Noel Gallagher’s High Flying Birds (from the album Council skies)

19. “Love make a fool (Orchestral version)” James (from the album Be opened by the wonderful)

20. “Jackie” Nicholas Allbrook (from the album Manganese)

21. “Joy’all” Jenny Lewis (from the album Joy’all)

22. “Social lubrication” Dream Wife (from the album Social lubrication)

23. “Silver girl” Spoon (from the EP Memory dust)

24. “Mór” Sigur Rós (from the album Átta)

25. “It’s just a bit of blood” bdrmm (from the album I don’t know)

Apple initiates  can click here to sample the above tracks as a whole playlist.

And as always, wherever you are in the world, I hope you continue to be well. Above all, enjoy the tunes.

If you’re interested in checking out any of the other playlists I’ve created and shared on these pages, you can peruse them here.

Categories
Tunes

Best tunes of 2020: #23 bdrmm “A reason to celebrate”

<< #24    |    #22>>

From Urban Dictionary:
“Bedroom pop – A genre DIY indie music, bedroom pop is characterized by its lo-fi quality and often contemplative lyrics. Bedroom pop share elements with other indie genres including shoegaze, dream pop, jangle pop, and emo. Guitars and vocals often feature heavy use of reverb or delay.”

From Wikipedia:
“The rise of modern digital audio workstations dissolved a theoretical technological division between professional and non-professional artists. Many of the prominent lo-fi acts of the 1990s adapted their sound to more professional standards and “bedroom” musicians began looking toward vintage equipment as a way to achieve an authentic lo-fi aesthetic, mirroring a similar trend in the 1990s concerning the revival of 1960s space age pop and analog synthesizers.”

Bedroom pop and rock feels almost like a dirty word to me. I can appreciate the DIY-ness of it all and the ability for anyone with a laptop, a guitar, a synthesizer, or maybe just some good software to create something out of nothing and let it loose on the internet. But on the other side of this shiny bitcoin, there’s also a lot of it out there to wade through, kind of the like the explosion of wannabe YouTubers and influencers. Whenever I hear the term “bedroom” to describe the next big thing, I shudder a little bit on the inside. And then, I proceed to give the act in question a chance, because I’ve discovered more than a handful of artists that got their start in this way.

Hull, England five-piece, Bdrmm*, actually started out as a bedroom project for frontman Ryan Smith. Listening their 2020 debut full-length, “Bedroom”, you’d likely never guess it, though both the band name and album title are none too obvious hints. Theirs is a fully realized shoegaze sound, more guitars than keys, and sounding to this old school shoegaze fan’s ears like the brightest points of early Ride and Chapterhouse. Smith put together the group with family members, friends, and musicians he’d worked with before and released an EP that had them catching the eye and signing with the noisy label, Sonic Cathedral. The debut longplayer was released just a few months into the pandemic, when it seemed like everyone would be chained to their bedrooms for the foreseeable future.

“Well, it’s okay
For you to walk away”

The last song recorded for the ten track album was “A reason to celebrate”, which given that these words don’t appear in the song, feels more like a feeling and an exultation. Though it happens to be my favourite of the bunch, it’s not by a long shot. There’s lots of reverb and layers of guitars to stare at your fingers to, crossing your eyes at them and waggling them about. It’s a blast of inspiration to stir your languid and lazy afternoon on a grey day into something worth exploring. It’s bursting forth from the bedroom into that big old world out there, anxiety and fear be damned, and that’s just damned exciting.

I can’t wait to hear what this group comes up with next!

*You can guess how that’s pronounced.

For the rest of the Best tunes of 2020 list, click here.