New Music Drops: September 2022

​New Music Drops is a monthly series on T&E where we share some of our favorite new releases from this year in rock, pop, metal, punk, hip-hop, and global. In the September edition, you'll find avant-garde jazz, disgusting goregrind, gabber-influenced industrial metal, and so much more.

New Music Drops gets posted on Bandcamp Friday, so if you enjoy any of these releases, purchase today so that all proceeds go directly to the artist!

All selections from this list written by Parisa except for where otherwise noted.
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Rock/Pop
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Welt Star - Ich Hasse Blumen 
Genre: Garage rock/garage punk
A rad debut LP from German garage trio Welt Star. Fuzzed out, lo-fi guitars with minimal synth lines that give it that post-punk edge. Aggressive but doesn’t lose its cool with the unaffected vocal delivery. If you dig bands on Goner or Slovenly Records, you’d dig this band and label too.
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Ghost Funk Orchestra - Death Waltz
Genre: Funk
Producer Seth Applebaum combines “tape-saturated drums, gratuitous spring reverb, surfy guitar, Latin-style percussion, odd time signatures, and Spanish-language female vocals” on this very moody ‘n groovy release. The kind of funk that’s less about slap bass and more about a-t-t-i-t-u-d-e. These songs were originally made for two EPs in 2016 and released on a limited run of cassettes, but is now being fully released together for the first time this year.  
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Marina Herlop - Pripyat
Genre: Experimental
A classical pianist from Barcelona that creates experimental music influenced by the Carnatic music of Southern India. A unique experimentation in extracting minimal piano and voice music and layering it into a complex web of rhythmical loops. A release that beautifully transcends musical cultures and geographical inspirations.
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Kikagaku Moyo - Kumoyo Island
Genre: Psychedelic rock
Japanese psych band Kikagaku Moyo release what is officially their…*sigh*...last album. It’s a bittersweet goodbye, because as disheartening as it is that they’re disbanding, they’re leaving off on a fantastic high note. Kumoyo Island is one last invitation to get lost in their ethereal soundscapes. It's a reflection on the band's decade long career and a testament to their masterful take on Japanese acid folk. Pairs well with laying in a grassy field and watching the clouds pass you by.  

V/A - Songs of Townes Van Zandt Vol III
Genre: Folk
The third installment in the Songs of Townes Van Zant series, featuring nine covers by black metal-influenced folk singer Marissa Nadler, Belgian sludge metal band Amenra, and Steve Brodsky of Cave In. They all do great renditions, but Brodksy really shines on this for me.
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Perfume Genius - Ugly Season
Genre: Chamber pop
Perhaps some of the most immaculate baroque pop in the past five years…maybe even the last decade. I’m listening to it now as I write this blurb and I can’t even conjure the words to describe it succinctly. Ugly Season is the absolute peak of Mike Hadreas’ career so far and I’m just in awe of how grotesquely beautiful this album is. Note that it is available to purchase on Bandcamp but for some reason or another can’t be streamed on there. (And if you haven’t heard before, this isn’t a “singles” album, it needs to be listened to from beginning to end!)

Punk & Metal
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Trocar - Four Forfeit Digits
Genre: Goregrind
A debut release that fulfills anything you could want from a goregrind demo. A truly disgusting array of sounds and samples on top of programmed blastbeats and savagely fast riffage. Features four tracks that clock in at about 5 minutes total, including a great cover of Ministry’s “(Every Day Is) Halloween”.
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Feather River Canyon Blues - Pigeon Pit
Genre: Folk punk
At its best, folk punk lies somewhere in between the genres, perhaps incorporating the best of both worlds.  Pigeon Pit is one of those bands!  -A. Iwasa
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Petbrick -  Liminal
Genre: Industrial
An industrial album that leans almost more on the hard techno/gabber side than on the expected metal influence. I could imagine this album working well for both an extreme metal pit or for a bunch of Dutch dudes at Thunderdome ‘97 to gnash their meth-laced GBH jaws to (and I mean that with my highest regards). Ebbs and flows from ambient, heady spaces to bursts of aggression, akin to Roots-era Sepultura. Includes some great features from Steve Von Till (Neurosis), Jacob Bannon (Converge), and more.
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Belphegor - The Devils
Genre: Blackened death metal
This band has consistently been putting out my favorite blackened death metal albums since I started listening to them fifteen years ago, and they’re still delivering ‘till this day. Another blasphemous and absolutely crushing release from the Salzburg-based band, but with a surprising dive into the more symphonic and melodic aspects of black metal. 
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Äbaddohn - Witchcult of Madness
Genre: Dungeon synth
Welp, it’s almost October, so time to start curating your ooky-spooky playlists with all your favorite Swedish one-man band dungeon synths projects! This short EP is a lo-fi, raw black metal recording at its core but embellished with more ominous synth parts. Shout out to Battleflutes & Sideways Skulls on Gimme Metal for introducing me to this and a lot of other ridiculous and amazing obscure black metal bands that have probably never been previously heard outside of the artist’s basement.
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ZWETWEZEN - Lord of Misrule
Genre: Ambient black metal
Another brand new release that I just discovered from the BF&SS radio show. Extremely lo-fi Belgian black metal with an atmospheric and depressive ambiance, which really comes through in the standout track for me would be “Raging Dark Divinity”. I would guess that this is mostly an instrumental album, but the production on this is such shit that it’s hard to tell what I’m hearing anyway. 
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Wormrot - Hiss
Genre: Grindcore, fusion
This album goes far beyond anything I’ve heard in grindcore before. While it falls within the relative grind song structures, the band incorporates elements of death metal, black metal, and thrashcore throughout each track. I never thought I’d describe a grind album as a “masterpiece” but this sure as hell is. A chaotic frenzy that is somehow so technically precise and methodically thought-out. And a solid reminder that the Singapore metal scene is a force to be reckoned with!
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Hip-Hop and R&B
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Magro - II
Genre: Neo-soul
Berlin drummer and producer Magro lays down ten tracks of sultry R&B instrumentals with spacey jazz rhythms. Includes features from several rappers and neo-soul singers, but I appreciate that he also lets the instrumentals do a lot of the talking throughout the album. Varied production styles, i.e. “Flow (feat. BIGYUKI)” with an eletronic hip hop beat to it, akin to a Kaytranada type-production.
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Moor Mother - Jazz Codes
Genre: Experimental, avant-garde
Pure poetry through music. Jazz Codes explores a variety of Black musical forms and recontextualizes them - traversing free-jazz, abstract rap, spoken word poetry, all through Moor Mother’s deconstructed, avant-garde approach. There’s no way to pin down a genre or description for this album, which of course isn’t at all the point. This music is an experience that you’ll just have to hear for yourself.
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Danger Mouse & Black Thought - Cheat Codes
Genre: Conscious hip hop
Even with all the years of hype, expectation, and assumption that this album was going to be a match made in heaven…it still doesn’t prepare you for just *how* incredible this collaboration is. Black Thought complex verses flow effortlessly over Danger Mouse’s absolutely flawless production. No skips on this record, each track is an essential listen, and overall an absolute favorite of the year.
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Electronic
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TSHA - Capricorn Sun
Genre: House, garage
A set of singles teasing what seems to be a promising full-length release from the London house/pop producer TSHA. Heavy vibes of 90s UK garage with some soulful singing, and sharing influences of Bonobo and Four Tet. Favorite track is “Water”, featuring an entrancing repetitive vocal sample from Malian griot and activist Oumou Sangaré.  
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Author & Punisher - KRÜLLER
Genre: Industrial, synthwave
The one-man-industrial-doom-band Author & Punisher shows on his latest LP that you can evoke deep emotions and organic beauty in even the most mechanical sounds. A total evolution for his style, incorporating more synthwave influence in the melodies. KRÜLLER released back in February but had to drop this here for those who haven’t discovered it yet!
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Hudson Mohawke - Cry Sugar
Genre: Hyper pop
Trashy, overly saturated and sweet bubblegum pop mixed meets heavy club bangers. While I haven't been too keen on a lot of the hyper pop releases in the past couple of years, this album has such a twisted sense of humor that I can't help but absolutely love the shit out of it. The textures on this album are so bouncy  and squelchy and playful, you really can't guess what direction a song will go in. For fans of Eprom, Iglooghost, etc.

altrice - Compciter EP
Genre: House
Entrancing lo-fi house from Tucson's best producer. Warm textures atop of cold club production, will definitely hook you on your first listen. For fans of Caribou and Four Tet (who are frequent collaborators with altrice). Favorite track: "Yoni"

Global
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Dirtmusic - Hum Hum
Genre: Global fusion, psychedelic, electronic
A two-track single from the Dirtmusic collective, featuring Hugo Race (Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds), Chris Eckman (The Walkabouts) and Murat Ertel (Baba Zula). Heady, fluid synth grooves infused with Anatolian psych rock and spoken word poetry. It’s what I imagine a collab between Chris Liebing and Balkan Taksim would sound like.


I also share dozens of new traditional and contemporary global releases on the Global Rhythm Radio show right here on T&E! Join me in discovering sounds from around the world as I share two hours worth of music and delve into the history during the talk breaks. Click the “DJ Mix” tab on the right sidebar to stream the latest episodes. - Parisa

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