Release Day Eve
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| MadhattanJack wrote: | | musicoed wrote: | | From what I gather, before dropping her own album, Caroline opened her own recording studio. It totally fits the whole vibe of self-promotion, which seems to be quite a headache for musicians these days. |
She actually started her own "imprint," sort of like a sub-label, called SUCK records. (The new album was recorded at Animal Rites studios in Los Angeles, which is owned by John Congleton, who used to be in The Paper Chase...) I haven't seen anything saying she opened her own studio too, though that's always possible.
| musicoed wrote: | Speaking of fire, I wanted to mention another release from this week that also has flames on the cover—a burning car, to be exact.
Shedfromthebody- We Fly into Windows (22/X-2026/43) (Album)
The music left me pretty indifferent, but it’s tagged as doomgaze, among other things, so I thought it might be right up your alley. |
Indeed, this is one of the most egregious examples of Bandcamp mis-tagging I've seen in a long time (and that's saying something, since I see that all the time). They've got themselves tagged as "metal alternative-metal doom-metal doomgaze post-metal Finland," and the only one of those tags that's even remotely accurate is "Finland." ... |
It seems I only remembered one part of the term—the bit about "record." On the other hand, it is precisely record labels that handle the promotion of releases these days. So, in the end, my two errors effectively canceled each other out—like two negatives making a positive.
Subconsciously, I wanted to believe that music promotion should be handled by companies that are also directly involved in the recording process. Otherwise, such organizations risk becoming little more than usurers—entities that might actually benefit from an artist’s financial failure.
This brings us neatly to the second point: the crucial role the first tag plays in promoting a release. As it turns out, Bandcamp treats the first tag as the primary genre for a release. This determines how an album ranks in global search results and whether it appears in the relevant genre-specific collections on the site’s homepage.
As it happens, an artist might make a typo or simply forget to add tags altogether, which leaves the album invisible to search. When you combine this with the default rules for selecting an opening track, the whole system starts to look like a kind of "controlled chaos."
Editors
I made a point of checking, and I’m relieved to see that the Editors’ album isn’t on your 2009 list.
Otherwise, my theory—that we have opposing tastes which somehow manage to coexist within the same musical sphere—wouldn’t hold any water. In my view, the band’s 2026 release is one of the dullest in their entire discography.
Thao
As for Thao, she recorded a very charming single with Neko Case, but beyond that, I haven’t found anything on her 2026 album that really stands out to me.
Yello
I don’t recall ever listening to a full Yello album before, but given the general lack of quality releases in 2026, this one actually seems quite interesting at first glance.
I was also looking forward to a few other albums; while they offered some compelling individual singles or tracks, none of them quite reached the level of "release of the week."
Lowly - Softy (30/X-2026/44) (Album)
Mechanimal - 15 (30/X-2026/44) (Album)
Контора Кука [Kontora Kuka] - Улица Мира (30/X-2026/44) (Album)
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| musicoed wrote: | | Subconsciously, I wanted to believe that music promotion should be handled by companies that are also directly involved in the recording process. Otherwise, such organizations risk becoming little more than usurers—entities that might actually benefit from an artist’s financial failure. |
Hmm... I don't mean to seem contrarian, but it seems to me that practically the entire history of recorded music, at least in the rock/pop idiom, involves artists trying to free themselves from record labels who constantly interfere in the recording process in such a way as to stifle their creativity and push them to do things that are at odds with their creative instincts and preferences. When "companies" obtain the kind of control they really want, you get boy bands, manufactured girlpop, and Nickelback.
Meanwhile, I could go on for pages and pages about record labels steering bands into financial failure, if not catastrophe — I'm an XTC fan, after all — but I'd say it's pretty rare for a label to actually benefit from those catastrophes. Still, if there's a way to do it, you can absolutely bet that they've thought of it, used it, and kept using it, assuming it did indeed work to their benefit somehow.
| Quote: | | As it happens, an artist might make a typo or simply forget to add tags altogether, which leaves the album invisible to search. When you combine this with the default rules for selecting an opening track, the whole system starts to look like a kind of "controlled chaos." |
I think you can still search on the artist/album names, though the results are skewed and manipulated more than I'd prefer. As for the controlled chaos, that's almost inevitable. You've got people who don't want to be tagged or categorized in any way, trying to succeed within a system that increasingly can't function at all without extensive tagging and categorization. Some recording artists can see what's happening and have begun to accept it... others, not so much. I'm not saying it's good, it's actually really bad, but I just don't see a practical alternative as long as the barriers-to-entry remain almost non-existent, like they are now.
| Quote: | Yello
I don’t recall ever listening to a full Yello album before, but given the general lack of quality releases in 2026, this one actually seems quite interesting at first glance. |
I prefer their early stuff (I know, what a shock), so if you're interested in them I'd recommend listening to Side 1 of Solid Pleasure first, so that you have a healthy amount of respect for them as you work your way through the other albums — some of which are quite disappointing by comparison.
| Quote: | | Lowly - Softy (30/X-2026/44) (Album) |
Hey, I like that one! Kind of soft without being too pleasant... Added! 😄
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SUPPLEMENTAL
First off, I believe I may have been right about the new LP by The Church — in fact, it might be even better than Hologram of Baal, which would make it their best since Priest = Aura, despite it being a double-album. (It's 17 tracks, but the last one, "Sacred Echoes," turns out to be three different pieces strung together, I guess because 19 is an unlucky number in Australia.) I do realize this all means nothing to most of you out there, but trust me, it's vitally important to us "Church people."
I was definitely right about the new Wavves album being rescheduled — it's been moved to Friday, Nov. 13, the same day as the new U2 album, Carnaval de Luz. There are preview tracks on some of the streaming services now, and they're not bad, though they do sound sort of emo-ish... "Pinesol," which appears to be the first single from it, is a real "banger" actually. I'm going to try to be cautiously optimistic about this one.
More (mostly) good stuff
 
- Mystic Tea Party, Slipstream
This debut LP came out with no pre-announcement, which makes sense because otherwise it would just be like any other tea party, I guess... They're a male-female tripgazer/dreampop duo from Melbourne, Australia, and I have to say this album is really good for a completely DIY effort — somebody should sign them immediately. (Assuming people still do things like that...?)
- Bad Waitress, In the Hollow
Bad Waitress are an all-female punk quartet from Toronto who seem to have taken a turn towards the goth genre with this album. Personally I really like it, and they even remind me of Shana Falana now, but I'm concerned they're only doing this to take advantage of the special tax breaks you get in Canada for being in a goth band.
- Slough, S/T
Slough is a 4-piece grungepop band from Kitchener, Ontario, led by the unfortunately-named Marcus Wanka, who used to be in Hank (the band, that is, not just some guy named "Hank"). This album is their debut, and it's got a 90s-era Teenage Fanclub, maybe Ash-like infectious-power-pop vibe to it. If this were the 90s, I'd say there was hit potential here, but now that it's 2026... hard to say. They might warrant continued monitoring. (Not that kind of monitoring.)
- Clinic, Wild in the Streets
Album number ten for Clinic sounds fairly similar to the previous nine, basically psychedelia-tinged electro-dreampop with a strong hint of weirdness and a vague sense of tension and unease. The late David Lynch might have liked them, but I don't recall any of their material being used in any of his movies...?
- The Oscillation, Interference
This appears to be a solo artist from Czechia named Demian Castellanos, who does psychedelic drone-rock jams pretty much all by himself (usually jamming is done in groups of at least three, so I'm not sure you can even call it that if it's just the one guy). I'm not sure why he calls himself "The Oscillation" either, since most of these tracks only use one or two chords, but it could have something to do with the fact that "I, Demian Castellanos" is an anagram for "Man Seed Oscillation." (If so, that's very clever, and he gets a cookie for sure!)
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MadhattanJack
