Music exists everywhere in this world, yearning for freedom. Sounds enter the magical chambers of (The Game Is) Hypnosis by Joseph White as mundane, forgotten artifacts of the everyday, only to emerge as components of a warm, bubbling, beautiful work of art.

Blending folk legend and real history, Folklore shrouds in mythic imagery tales of violent worker exploitation met with unflinching bloodshed in return. But, this anonymous one man band asks, what is the victory worth, when the prize is the destruction of your homeland, stripping the forests and forever poisoning the lakes with coal tar?

We knew to expect an experimental turn for the next Ethel Cain record, but nothing could have prepared us for Perverts, a dark ambient record that experiments thematically, sonically, vocally, and structurally to present a nuanced philosophical system that addresses some of the deepest, darkest emotional hollows.

A lone hiker scrambles up a cliff face, sent on this harrowing journey by the thrill of the sublime and only now taking stock of the implications. The meditative, folk-inspired raga of Language of the Torch by Kelby Clark starts at this key moment, the inflection point at which headstrong ecstasy freezes into shuddering fear.

Industrial hardcore band Haunted Horses skirts the event horizon on Dweller, a relentless, terrifying record to guide you through the threshold of outsideness.

Split LP No esperan por nadie by Chilean bands Coclea and Canut de Bon dresses its ferocious, moshable hardcore riffs in classic emo darkness, with each band bringing their own flair to this harsh, angular, riveting sound.

The music of Meridian by Tanpopo Crisis continues the rich tradition of atmospheric black metal, a style which derives temporal intensity from a frantically blast beating rhythm section while harnessing all the melodic, harmonic, and sentimental power of a string orchestra through its sweeping guitar soundscapes.

 We’ve never been more spiritually free, we’ve never been so existentially hungry, and we’ve never been so essentially clueless. This directionless, all-consuming lack appears in fits and spurts across the epic compositions of Unlimited Violence Apologia by Bee Hive Ski Race, an emo album that effortlessly treads into hardcore, noise rock, and grunge with its versatile vocals and tight instrumentals.

At the core of the whimsical experimentation of So, Ho Hum, Moribet sits effortlessly compelling songs in the folksy singer-songwriter tradition, fighting desperately to shine their human radiance through a suffocating film of lo fi electronica.

A nuanced, uncomfortable flow of emotion springs forth from Death by Thisworldisnotkind, a post-rock-inspired skramz record that struggles through extreme, persistent loss by rejecting dehumanization from all sources and in all forms.

Fortifying strong bones of midwest emo and slowcore with the eccentricities of noise rock and post rock, Look Outside, We’re Dying by Sap House addresses the slow encroachment of death as those we love start leaving us behind.

Following up 2023’s lo-fi noise punk record Laurels of the End of History, the new The Cime Interdisciplinary Music Ensemble is bigger, louder, angrier, more vulnerable, and more joyous, bursting at the seams with emotionally volatile arrangements that straddle the line between exuberant chaos and careful composition. 

Trendy lofi flourishes sink into a sparse abyss, sharing this massive space with flowing piano, wispy noise, thundering synths, and odd percussion, all while a thin, defeated voice treads water against this sonic whirlpool.

Mounting bodily anxiety inspires the experimental music of Birds with Vertigo, a record that combines the eccentric poetry of Sammy J Matthews and the highly original electronic music of Cumsleg Borenail.

Full Spectrum Records has been operating for over fifteen years, and to cap off their impressive output, the label and their frequent collaborators came together to provide a final testament to the nature of experimental music.

On their new record Chewing Bread, Australian mathcore outfit Basil’s Kite asks the question bubbling below the surface for everyone with a watchful eye; who does our disengagement benefit?

However, a radically different relationship, a fierce, relentless antagonism, develops between structure and surroundings on Air Pressure by Philip Samartzis and Michael Vorfeld, an ambient record built primarily upon harrowing field recordings from a research lab in Antarctica.

The aggressive atmospheric black metal of Eiger by Aara recounts the story of climbers who lost their lives scaling a nearly vertical peak in the Swiss alps, meditating upon those vast natural monuments we were never meant to master.

Taking the dark, noisy, dissonant world of contemporary post rock and injecting a healthy dose of progressive rock extravagance, Un manual de signos y sintomas by Vientos Moderados del Este uses its extensive guitar solos and varied songwriting in the service of intense, abrasive emotional themes.

With all the grace of traditional country and all the angst of post hardcore, New Old Horse by Twine presents the perfect genre fusion to bolster lyrical sentiments of stagnation, decay, and melancholy.