Category: Reviews

Tanya Tagaq doesn’t always sing specific words, sometimes she just makes a sound, builds an echo, a shamanic voice mixed with anger and evoking ghosts of the past. Tongues is an eloquent and very powerful reckoning with Canada’s current post-World War II colonial grip on the Inuits.

Marcel Baliński debuts with his trio with a separate, lyrical album, full of banter about the possibilities of a jazz trio. Trio_io shows how to think differently about contemporary improvisation.

Festival returns, remotely recorded albums, music highlighting local identity. My summary of 2021 in a few conclusions, 21 albums, 10 compilations and 10 songs.

From lyrical minimalism and soft melodies to black metal, free music and the landscape of everyday rituals. I have chosen five most interesting records released last year by Patrick Shiroishi – one of the most active musicians of 2021.

Futuristic sounds, sound sculpture, songs for quartet, unobvious percussion performances or electronics played on the piano. Here are 9 albums on which jazz is theoretically the starting point, but which lead into original compositional areas.

In finding spaces with unobvious acoustic properties, the Germans seem to have no equals. I write shortly about three albums, recorded in unusual circumstances.

Regional traditions, songs, field recordings, dark drones, and psychedelia – the French scene is in bloom. Join me for a run-through of the most interesting musical gems from France.

The albums of Tanz Mein Herz, Natural Information Society and Driftmachine present different perspectives on trance music and minimalism. When the sound motif is looped is when they sound best, functioning outside of time. Translation: Aleksandra Szkudłapska 6 minutes of reading, 210 minutes of listening. That’s how much time you’ll need for the three albums described below. Reading […]

Two brilliant albums by Anthony Pateras and the trio of Christer Bothen–masterful aural composition and alert improvisation – are strong entries in this year’s Bocian Records catalogue. *(that’s ‘bocian’ in Polish) Translation: Aleksandra Szkudłapska Once upon a time, in 2019, when concerts were still a thing, Anthony Pateras visited as many as three Polish festivals […]

Although they rely on completely different means of expression, Yvette Janine Jackson’s radio operas and heavy doom metal played by Divide and Dissolve both aptly recount the oppression suffered by minorities in a globalised world. Translation: Aleksandra Szkudłapska After the bizarre and sad 2020, the beginning of Yvette Janine Jackson’s Freedom is perhaps what we […]