Bicep – Isles

Slow tempo melodic techno sound with straight beats and some breaks. But other than that it’s an epic classic of an electronic music record, that’s what it is. Every single day I have to realize that such evergreen music is still being released, continuously. I can see how this builds on everything from Four Tet to Rival Consoles and everything in between, but it stands so well in its own right. Beautiful music.

Moin – Moot!

It’s some alternative post-rock, sometimes I feel it’s shoegazer style but then often it’s much more upbeat and lively than that. The percussion grooves are killers. It’s rare that I hear a drummer and start looking up other projects by them just based on the beats played—this is one of those cases. But all other aspects are amazing too, like bits and pieces of melodies, and some well-placed spoken word segments or samples. It’s a record that I have a hard time putting into words: I feel like I don’t have the right dictionary to describe what I hear, but I love it so much. It’s really surprising and absolutely amazing.

Chris Liebing – Another Day

It’s really hard to pin down the genre for this album. The atmosphere is moody electronic music on mid tempo, city music, walk in the rain music. On Basecamp it self-defines as techno and downtempo by tags. But I’d argue that the reality of it is mostly progressive breaks. In any case, Circles is my track of the month: this is most definitely prog breaks, with a fantastic melody, beautiful vocals, and such a well crafted arch for the whole song.

Weval – Changed for the Better

Overall a nice electronic music record, and I couldn’t be more specific than that—it’s like those Booka Shades of the musical spectrum that could fall in many sub-genres depending on how you look at it or where you come from. That said let’s focus on the title track, which just knocks my socks off. It is some amazing achievement in being soothing and calm, but also high in energy and making me move right away with floaty-wavy arms. I can imagine listening to it on a dancefloor and rise to melodic mid-tempo electro heaven. It’s been a while that I listened to something and wanted to reach for remixes; I just wish there’s a slightly higher tempo version of this as well.

Djrum – Portrait With Firewood

Nice to mention this record right after Tides as this is a great example for the same vibe but with originality that I felt lacking there. Nice atmospheres on the slow-to-mid tempo electronic axis with lots of live-sounding orchestration, even more Floex vibes, but the more complex drum patterns and the post-dubstep bassline aesthetics package it into something fresh and exciting. I really like that this is a moody record without the sadness aspect—it’s like watching rain through the window but with inspiration and wondering. Actually it’s also like a new take on nu jazz.

Sunda Arc – Tides

From ambient to mid-tempo, from moody electronics to modern classical. A debut record that sounds like a debut record: full of references and inspiration but I have yet to hear the dintinct voice of Sunda Arc. I can hear the blue electronics of Moderat, the piano play of Nils Frahm, also the clarinet comes with a Floex reference to me. Nice sounds overall, just needs more originality next time.