Luis Vasquez never intended for The Soft Moon to reach the public’s ears; for him, music has always been about self-actualization rather than self-aggrandizement. Nevertheless, the bleak, hushed sounds he created years ago in his small Oakland apartment bubbled to the surface and 2010 saw his debut LP, The Soft Moon, released on Captured Tracks rise to critical acclaim. Pitchfork’s 8.1 review stated that Vasquez made “oblivion seems like an enticing prospect” and, indeed, listeners were immediately drawn into his murky musical wasteland, swathed in the moody atmospheres of jagged dark wave and wayfaring postpunk. For them, and for Vasquez, there was no turning back. The Total Decay EP and Zeros emerged soon after, and now Vasquez returns with The Soft Moon’s most introspective and focused album to date: Deeper.
Following live line-up changes and a lull in the The Soft Moon’s constant touring schedule, the year 2013 found Luis Vasquez lost in the void. Though he fatalistically stated that 2012’s Zeros would be the last album where he was the sole songwriter, Vasquez realized that The Soft Moon has always been one man’s vision. Over time, it’s been the one place where Vasquez can express himself, totally and singularly, on his own terms.
Thus, in July of 2013, Vasquez decamped from Oakland, CA to Venice, Italy, unsure of where The Soft Moon would land. While Zeros was written and recorded between long days on the road, Deeper was begat from an almost primal urge to recoil from the world and experience total solitude. During the writing process, Vasquez pushed himself to discover the reality and nightmare of living with yourself, in entirely foreign surroundings with nothing and no one to fall back on. Stepping back and letting inspiration fall where it may, Vasquez only had one goal in mind for his third album: to pen his most emotional record yet. Between frequent visits to Berlin, Vasquez retreated to Venice’s Hate Studios, located in the mountains near electronic guru and spiritual anchor Giorgio Moroder’s hometown.
At Hate, he worked for almost a year with producer Maurizio Baggio to piece together Deeper, only completing the album in August 2014. While maintaining the stark sonic formula so indicative of The Soft Moon’s music — that bass that reeks of chorus, those unrelenting, mechanized beats, that wailing synthesizer and those eerily, angular guitar lines that worm into your ears and never leave — Baggio also worked to refine the album’s gothic palette, leaving Vasquez to concentrate more intensely on songwriting and singing than ever before:
“I’ve never worked so closely with someone before. Working with Maurizio felt right and I completely opened up to him during the entire process. I finally felt the urge to express myself more verbally with this record and I was able to focus more on songwriting rather than just experimenting with soundscapes.”
The voice of The Soft Moon has never been more clear and honest than it is on this record. With eerie, immersive tracks like the dogged “Far” and slow, beautifully melancholic “Wasting” (the first track written for Deeper), the album is a penetrating portrait of Vasquez as he wrestles thoughts of suicide, vulnerability and what it means to heal. By facing the most hopeless parts of himself without illusion and putting his past demons to bed, the creation of Deeper was an intense personal exploration of existence for Vasquez — old wounds were forcibly opened, deep anger and paranoia were manipulated into song — and he did not emerge unchanged. Deeper may have delivered Vasquez back to the waking world, but it willingly drags us further into The Soft Moon’s dark, euphonic universe once more.

Foo Fighters frontman Dave Grohl rose to fame as the drummer for Nirvana, so it’s fitting that Foo Fighters bass player Nate Mendel is also stepping into the frontman role. Mendel is heading up a band called Lieutenant. The group will release its debut album, “If I Kill This Thing We’re All Going to Eat for a Week,” on March 10.
The first single off the album, “Believe the Squalor,” is currently streaming via Stereogum.
Lieutenant has Mendel singing lead vocals and playing guitar. The album also features a long list of guests, including Foo Fighters’ Chris Shiflett and members of Modest Mouse, Fleet Foxes, the Head and the Heart, Snow Patrol, Helmet and more.

It's been six years since the Leeds duo, real names Gavin Miller and Thomas Ragsdale, put out Arrivals, their debut full-length as worriedaboutsatan. Shortly after its release the project was put on hiatus, only to be resurrected in March 2014 in the form of single I'm Not / The Next Round. The pair immediately started work on the new LP, which takes its cues from techno, krautrock, drone and '70s prog rock. Even Temper will be released on digital, CD and vinyl formats via Miller's This Is It Forever label.

Paul Hartnoll (Orbital) is 8:58. Featuring a very impressive cast list of Robert Smith, Lianne Hall, Lisa Knapp, Ed Harcourt, The Unthanks and Fable. After a very successful reunion in 2008 that included sell out tours, headline appearances at festivals around the world, special guest Matt Smith as Doctor Who at Glastonbury, the Paralympics opening ceremony with Professor Stephen Hawking, and not forgetting the highly- acclaimed album Wonky, brothers Paul and Phil Hartnoll have decided to bring down the curtain on Orbitals remarkable 25 year career. And move on he certainly has. Paul Hartnoll has recorded his new album 8:58. The title of the album 8:58 comes from Pauls fascination with the theme of time. I've always had a thing for clocks and for time as a powerful force - but also the way it oppresses you, explains Paul. It's one of those things I keep coming back to. For me, 8:58 is a moment of choice. It's almost 9 o'clock. Are you going to school? Are you going to this job you hate? Everybody faces that decision now and again. 8:58 am is when you've got to make up your mind. As Cillian Murphy says at the very beginning of 8:58: brace yourself for freedom. Now.

Where do you start talking about a suite of recordings so concerned with the commonalities between beginnings and ends? You could start by saying that Living Fields is an album of catharsis and redefinition, born of a desire to create newness out of loss and change. You could also say that the band Portico themselves have undergone a process of ending and re-beginning, but none of this quite captures what you will hear.
The best thing you can do is listen. Portico make music which moves forward towards distant places while offering rare intimacy as well, arriving somewhere between structured pop songs and a disintegrating ambience, a unique blend of the sublunary and the celestial. Reverb drenched piano meshes with swathes of studio noise while vocals float high above a world of textural atmosphere.
Drum machines crisply puncture the air around shimmering arpeggios of synth and electric bass.You can be untethered, detached in space only for a moment of detail to rush into focus. Melancholia and euphoria sunk into each other. The effect is profoundly emotional without ever needing to emote.
Portico are Duncan Bellamy, Milo Fitzpatrick and Jack Wyllie. Previously they were three-quarters of the highly successful and critically-acclaimed Portico Quartet. But Living Fields is no continuation under a shortened name. As far as the band are concerned this is a debut.
There are three remarkable singers on this record:Jono McCleery, Joe Newman (Alt-J) and Jamie Woon. These are not just guest performances and it shows. Woon shared a house with Portico in East London when they were writing and recording the album that would become Isla and he was working on “Mirrorwriting.” Joe Newman is a childhood friend of Wyllie's and Jono McCleery was introduced to Portico by Jamie Woon and has opened for them in the past. These existing relationships allowed for a consistency of thought and expression which makes this a truly remarkable record.
Where do you start talking about a suite of recordings so concerned with the commonalities between beginnings and ends? It doesn’t really matter so long as you listen.

"The Long & Unwinding Road" was recorded entirely after an hour-long meditation. The recordings got some edits here and there, straight after the recording was done. Nevertheless, the sequence in which the tracks have been recorded has been maintained.
I had been contemplating this release for a long time, made a couple of maquettes with music I had lying around, but nothing was quite satisfying me. And then I made this, which made sense to me.
To me this album is about meditation as much as it can serve for meditation. This album is about directness and flow, darkness and glow, directions to grow.

See the film here:

Over the course of its two-decade existence, Lightning Bolt has revolutionized underground rock in immeasurable ways. The duo broke the barrier between stage and audience by setting themselves up on the floor in the midst of the crowd. Their momentous live performances and the mania they inspired paved the way for similar tactics used by Dan Deacon and literally hundreds of others. Similarly, the band’s recordings have always been chaotic, roaring, blown out documents that sound like they could destroy even the toughest set of speakers. Fantasy Empire, Lightning Bolt’s sixth album and first in five years, is a fresh take from a band intent on pushing themselves musically and sonically while maintaining the aesthetic that has defined not only them, but an entire generation of noisemakers. It marks many firsts, most notably their first recordings made using hi-fi recording equipment at the famed Machines With Magnets, and their first album for Thrill Jockey. More than any previous album, Fantasy Empire sounds like drummer Brian Chippendale and bassist Brian Gibson are playing just a few feet away, using the clarity afforded by the studio to amplify the intensity they project. Every frantic drum hit, every fuzzed-out riff, sounds more present and tangible than ever before.
Fantasy Empire is ferocious, consuming, and is a more accurate translation of their live experience. It also shows Lightning Bolt embracing new ways to make their music even stranger. More than any previous record, Chippendale and Gibson make use of live loops and complete separation of the instruments during recording to maximize the sonic pandemonium and power. Gibson worked with Machines very carefully to get a clear yet still distorted and intense bass sound, allowing listeners to truly absorb the detail and dynamic range he displays, from the heaviest thud to the subtle melodic embellishments. Some of these songs have been in the band’s live repertoire since as early as 2010, and have been refined in front of audiences for maximum impact. This is heavy, turbulent music, but it is executed with the precision of musicians that have spent years learning how to create impactful noise through the use of dynamics, melody, and rhythm.
Fantasy Empire has been in gestation for four years, with some songs having been recorded on lo-fi equipment before ultimately being scrapped. Since Earthly Delights was released, the band has collaborated with The Flaming Lips multiple times, and continued to tour relentlessly. 2013 saw the release of All My Relations by Black Pus, Chippendale’s solo outlet, which was followed by a split LP with Oozing Wound. Chippendale, an accomplished comic artist and illustrator, created the Fantasy Empire’s subtly ominous album art, and will release an upcoming book of his comics through respected imprint Drawn and Quarterly. Brian Gibson has been developing the new video game Thumper, with his own company, Drool, which will be released next year. And, of course, Lightning Bolt will be touring the US in 2015.