Crate Digging: July 2024
Last month we introduced Crate Digging, a new column intended to give us a platform to write about and recommend the music that we’ve discovered and which has captivated lately but which doesn’t fit into our typical coverage schedule. None of it is newly released, some of it is in fact quite old, and it’s—for the most part—new to us. But sometimes they’re also re-discoveries (this month features some dusted off old favorites alongside the more revelatory discoveries). The common thread is that these 14 albums are all what we’re obsessing over now when we’re not writing about the latest Album of the Week or wrapping up our Treble 100 series.
As a sort of companion piece to this new feature, we’re posting Now Playing playlists on our Patreon, with commentary, of all the random odds and ends that are spinning on our speakers and headphones in between the new releases.
Here’s what we’re pulling from the crates this month.
Note: When you buy something through our affiliate links, Treble receives a commission. All albums we cover are chosen by our editors and contributors.
Anadol – Felicita
Anadol, a Turkish artist based in Berlin, doesn’t make music that’s easy to summarize in a sentence, or even a whole-ass blurb. Listening to her 2022 album Felicita is as much an act of decryption as it is art or entertainment, though it seems to draw the listener in closer even as it disorients them. This is melodic music that takes curious shapes, oozing in on Twin Peaks noir-jazz struts, bursting into a cosmic krautrock pulse, or riding an organ preset into the netherworld. In only five tracks (three of which are fairly lengthy), Anadol burrows into a subterranean dreamworld that only feels more peculiar and surreal the deeper it goes. Particularly in the 15-minute “Istasyon Plajinda Bir Tren Batti,” a dark ambient noise drone that slowly yet climactically takes shape as cinematic Blade Runner groove. I might not have cracked its code, but I know enough to know that Felicita is amazing. – Jeff Terich
Listen/Buy: Bandcamp | Amazon (vinyl)
Caroline K – Now Wait for Last Year
So much of my favorite industrial music is the kind that’s meant for mystical rituals in a moonlit forest; think Coil’s Musick to Play in the Dark or Nurse With Wound in drone mode. The lone solo album by British producer Caroline Kaye Walters is a gorgeously haunting piece of synth music, blending menacing industrial textures with synth tones that seem to capture something eerily spiritual. Though I bring up Coil, whose aesthetic is somewhat aligned with Caroline K’s, a closer analog might be a more menacing Dead Can Dance. Moments like the side-long opener “The Happening World” bridge the gap between industrial and new age, while the shorter tracks on side two lean heavier into minimal wave pulse. The album’s achieved a kind of cult status over the years, a sought-after artifact for listeners of avant garde electronic music, but it’s been reissued by Mannequin Records, who now give us the opportunity to light some candles, burn some sage and become consumed by its enchanting mystique. – Jeff Terich
Listen/Buy: Bandcamp
Doss – 4 New Hit Songs
Since 2014, Doss has been batting a thousand. Her eponymous debut is flawless and 2021’s 4 New Hit Songs is just that; zero misses. There’s very little information on the New York/Baltimore producer but the more you listen, the less that matters. “It’s the music” reads the EP’s liner notes, the fifth truth Doss speaks on 4 New Hit Songs. Breakbeat, downtempo, shoegaze and more is distilled into Doss’ gobstopper pop, everlasting and addicting. Each track on 4 New Hit Songs is better than the last, but your favorite will change every time, never mind how you listen. On shuffle, in a playlist, on repeat–Doss always hits. – Patrick Pilch
Listen/Buy: Bandcamp | Rough Trade (vinyl)
Dün – Eros
For fans of zeuhl, this hardly counts as cratedigging, but considering as how most are only familiar with Magma, it feels fitting to include here. One of the first works largely built around Frank Herbert’s Dune, this French brooding jazz-rock classic, blending prog and chamber music in the same startling and provocative way that This Heat would deliver in albeit a much punkier context, feels like a wolf scraping its teeth across the nape of your neck. The moments of transcendent beauty don’t diminish the terror; it taunts, like honey before a trap. – Langdon Hickman
Joe Jackson – Night & Day
So I recently was lucky enough to catch Joe Jackson live in concert, and it was eye-opening. The second half of the show was dedicated to his new alter ego endeavor, Max Champion, the fictional music hall performer from the East End of London circa 1882—it was interesting. But the first half of the show focused on his discography from the late ’70s into the ’80s, and yes, I was there for “Stepping Out,” his timeless bit of ’80s sophisti-pop. Night & Day is forever engraved in that early ’80s playlist—as kids, we used to clown “Stepping Out” with the made-up name of ET’s Alive. But Jackson’s impetus for the song was the time he spent in New York City during that era. He new-fangled up some piano chords around pop showmanship and drum programming, making this audio interpretation of what a night out in New York City sounded like. I can attest, that all New York radio agreed. They played the bejesus outta it. Once again, I heard it first on WBLS, the biggest Black-owned radio station in the country. In concert, his treatment of it was just him on an electric keyboard and that voice…and dammit, that’s all you needed. – John-Paul Shiver
Listen: Spotify
Koenjihyakkei – Nivraym
Now for some Japanese zeuhl. This is a side group of famed avant-jazz rock group Ruins which is functionally the pseudonym of its drummer and vocalist. Here, he expands to incorporate a full chamber orchestra of jazz and rock instrumentation delivered with a manic and feral energy that feels legitimately more unnerving and dangerous than most black metal. The deliberately gibberish lyrics are shrieked and muttered, chanted and barked. The music wheels about like the circuits of hell. I learned eventually that while I love heavy metal’s sonic palette, I love its spirit more, of which this is bountifully rich. – Langdon Hickman
Listen/Buy: Bandcamp | Amazon (vinyl)
LAM – LAM
A composer classic of minimalism and jazz in my view. This album-length composition from a Polish ensemble comprising Wacław Zimpel, Krzysztof Dys, Hubert Zemler and Mooryc begins with lush tension, like the surface of a pond in gentle rain, the piano like disruptions of the plane. Slowly, slowly, everything erupts. I write to this, read to this, sleep to this. It’s been a constant companion for the past year or so for me. – Langdon Hickman
Listen/Buy: Bandcamp
Rod Lee – Vol. 5: The Official
I started working out again, and I exclusively listen to Vol 5: The Official by Rod Lee when I do. Often referred to as the “Don” or “Godfather” of Baltimore Club, Rod Lee is heavily credited for pushing the highly regional genre into the mainstream. Vol. 5 was the first Baltimore Club CD to be nationally distributed, and its influence can be heard in many pop and dance hits produced in its wake. Which makes sense, because Vol. 5 fucking thumps. The 30-track mix is a nonstop rhythmic barrage that gets in your face and demands you to move. Lee is a relentless DJ who balances pace-setting transitions with bold, erratic pivots, both which charge the jam-packed Vol. 5 with an unyielding energy. Blending lust, urban realism, and absurdist humor into larger-than-life house beats, Rod Lee’s pulse-raising Vol. 5 continues to dictate pop culture today. – Patrick Pilch
Listen/Buy: Bandcamp
Møster! – Dust Breathing
This album was my introduction to the label Grappa Musikkforlag, a brilliant Nordic fusion label that leans on the more rockiest edge of the sound, with plenty of gnarly psych and nearly heavy metal sonics to boot. I go back to this one frequently; it’s hard for me not to hear the constant magic that put me on to that brilliant roster each spin. – Langdon Hickman
Listen/Buy: Bandcamp
Pretenders – Pretenders
I’m in the process of sweating it out, waiting to hear if I’ve achieved the press credentials for Pretenders when they come around in San Francisco in early August. I rarely say an album is consistently great all the way through, but Pretenders is on that list—not to mention how cool its cover photo with Hynde in a red leather jacket is, too. This is punk, new wave, post-punk, rock moving in a new direction being laid down by a band that doesn’t even care if you catch up—that’s your problem. “Precious,” “The Phone Call,” “Up The Neck,” and mos def especially that time-signature beast of a creation “Tattooed Love Boys.” Jesus.
I was at a rock DJ gig years ago when the selector was just dropping dart after dart after dart, and he dropped this and it just leaped off the turntable, jumped out of the speakers, and destroyed a dance floor. “Space Invader” was the outro song for the Cheech and Chong Up In Smoke flick; they knew what was up. “Private Life” was such a jawn, that Grace Jones turned around and covered it in the same year, back when that was in fashion. Listen, “Brass In Pocket,” the damn hit song, was probably the weakest song on the album. God Bless ya Chryssie Hynde—hopefully I’ll see you in a couple of weeks. – John-Paul Shiver
Listen/Buy: Spotify | Rough Trade (vinyl)
Yasuaki Shimizu – Kakashi
A prolific art pop artist and member of the Japanese avant-garde new wave group Mariah, Yasuaki Shimizu has released more than two dozen albums in his career as well as having recently done some film scoring. Kakashi is one of his most celebrated, if still underrated (at least stateside), intertwining jazz and art-pop with a playful sense of pop immediacy. As the saxophonist in Mariah, he added fascinating dimensions to that band’s sound, while here he incorporates other woodwinds like clarinet, all of which take the lead role in what otherwise feels like a bright and stimulating gallery of sensory rewards. – Jeff Terich
Listen/Buy: Spotify | Amazon (vinyl)
Solange – When I Get Home
I was ear-hustling at a bar last week and there was a couple who met on the apps and were having their first face-to-face meetup. Both were skittish, as one would be in the situation. This Brother, dude was like 6-foot-9, a former basketball player (I heard), and the woman was fine enough to make any dude nervous. While they were searching for conversation starters, Solange’s When I Get Home came on, and the mixtape type of informality put them immediately at ease. They started making references to songs, discussing the Beyoncé vs Solange conversation, and the next thing I knew, they had moved to the back room seating area.
Now, I reviewed this album, so I’m familiar with the excellence at hand, but I gotta admit this is the first time I’ve heard it live, amongst the people. I mean, Beyoncé, with all her Conquer the World albums, gets heard 24/7, but When I Get Home feels like a Miles album where he’s calling the chord progressions in colors. Solange’s mixtape is the ultimate mood fugue: Social Music is what Miles would call it. As always, she’s concerned with making music for the world, not trying to conquer it.
I saw the couple slide out the door three hours later, smiling and holding hands. – John-Paul Shiver
Listen/Buy: Spotify | Turntable Lab (vinyl)
Soulwax – Nite Versions
Time and maturity has significantly changed my perspective on both live albums and remix albums, which certainly can be revelatory but often are released as contractual obligations. But recent explorations into the history of the remix along with a current obsession with dancepunk and electroclash from 20 years ago (thanks to my wife for reminding me how much that era slaps) eventually led me to Soulwax’s Nite Versions. A remixed version of their 2004 album Any Minute Now takes a good album and makes it spectacular, dialing into the disco pulse and deep bass grooves to deliver something that both defines an era and transcends it. It was something of a sensation when the Belgian group released it back in 2005, coinciding with their alter-ego transformation as 2manydjs. It’s a one-hour dance party, just wall to wall bangers: “Miserable Girl,” “Slowdance” (punk sax!) and the awesome DFA remix of “NY Excuse,” titled “Another Excuse.” The inclusion of this album (along with one or two others—see above), goes against our implicit rule that any album here is one we haven’t covered in depth, and we did review this back in 2006. But then again, that was a long time ago, and there are still so many who haven’t basked in the joyful glow of Nite Versions‘ endless groove. – Jeff Terich
Listen/Buy: Bandcamp | Turntable Lab (vinyl)
Alamaailman Vasarat – Käärmelautakunta
Translated to Hammers of the Underworld, this Finnish group plays a specific folk-infused approach to avant-rock. Their claim to fame? No traditional electric instruments; those are cellos, double basses, horns, clarinets, but not a single guitar or electric bass, no matter how distorted. There’s a real menace here, one that has ensnared me for about 20 years now in its brooding and malevolent cloud. People misunderstand death metal and it’s like as aggressive music; it’s not, closer to a Van Halen style explosion of the senses. This, meanwhile, is music for bleak and brutal dreams. – Langdon Hickman
Listen: Spotify
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