Triangulo de Amor Bizarro “Triangulo de Amor Bizarro”

Triangulo de Amor Bizarro “Triangulo de Amor Bizarro” (p)2020 Mushroom Pillow

This album is the sonic equivalent to seesaw. It starts in the way of forcing the listener into the pretty uncomfortable state: listening to the first track "Ruptura" almost causes you the physical pain. The next two tracks "No Eres Tu" and "Vigilantes Del Espejo" are more conventional in terms of 'classic' sound of Triangulo. The furious fourth piece "Cancion De La Fama" is up to try your auricular system out again. Then it abruptly comes to the three consecutive tracks of celestial beauty ("Fukushima", "Asmr Para Ti" and "Acosadores"). Then the album's landscape changes one more time to wrap you with the sonic entity I would like to tag 'emogaze' - only to morph again into the drones of the last track "Los Golpes Olvidados". An uneasy listening as it is, this album can amaze you with its most beautiful moments while soaking you into the perks and pains of a bipolar disorder.

SPTF

Mist3rfly “Vortice”

Mist3rfly “Vortice” (p)2020 Flor Y Nata

Decades ago, the freshman year of college my posse tried to convert me into a rave music fan. For my hardcore grunge/ black metal soul it felt strange to switch from MTV's Headbangers Ball to MTV's Chillout Zone, and though I didn't get fully into it I managed to find myself a niche where I could stay on [more or less] the same grounds with my friends who embraced the likes of the happy hardcore acts Westbam or Marusha never getting through any aesthetic concerns I got through (despite the fact some of them played in death metal band). It was the mere border of progressive techno and electro industrial with Biosphere and Banco de Gaya on one side, :Wumpscut: and X-Marks The Pedwalk on another and Prodigy’s “The Fat Of The Land” as the [theoretically achievable] arithmetical mean of both. "Vortice", though 25 years younger, sounds like the integral part of that era. It sounds like flesh and bones of that time and place. Where is my compact cassette player? I need to listen to a string of Moonraker compilations right now, and maybe to record “Vortice” on the B side of a 90M cassette whose A side is Leftfield's "Leftism".

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Beladrone “Andévalo”

Beladrone “Andévalo” (p)2020 El Genio Equivocado

The evocative shoegaze Sevilla-based combo consists of the former members of Blacanova and Tannhauser. The guitars are swirling, the guitars are droning, the guitars are crashing through your eardrums all in the same time (I guess, really, how many guitar tracks were recorded for the mix?) which creates the effect of speedball consumption* when the depressant and anti-depressant components of a drug make you soothe and agitate simultaneously. Concurrently hypnagogic and upbeat. The pulsating rhythm section that shifts from post-punk’y marches to hypnotizing semi-tribal kind of drumming and back adds another dimension to dive into. I would like to emphasize the title track as one that showcases the band's modus operandi the best way: the multilayered guitars are curling around the drum patterns and bass lines as minimal as captivating. By the way, the adjective "captivating" fits perfectly for describing "Andévalo" as a whole.

* I never used speedball as well as any other drug in my life but through the mass media and contemporary arts I can imagine what kind of effect it may cause.

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Poomse “Les Gravacions De La Pandemia Vol.1”

Poomse “Les Gravacions De La Pandemia Vol.1” (p)2020 Espora Records

The fourth longplay of Mallorcans Poomse was created, recorded and mixed completely within the most severe phase of COVID19 outbreak in Spain, and it marks another shift in the band's convoluted trajectory: 'lo-fi - sadcore - indie - post-rock'. The band returns to show its potential to create overcompetent music within the frames of any given genre along with the ability to cross those frames if the situation needs this. Moreover, those changes seem neither like facelift nor like a halfway station in the desperate searches of its own way. Rather it's like another stage of constant progress, a slice of some unstoppable motion’s current phase.

P.S. The track “Confinament #5” uses a speech of a Russian politician (I can’t identify him via his voice) on a meeting with the president biggest liar in the history of Russia whose voice we can also hear in the very end of the track. I’m unaware of what it could mean, though.

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Biscuit "Negligencia Programada"

 Biscuit "Negligencia Programada" (p)2020 La Castanya

For the first half of “Negligencia Programada” the coastal art-punks from Vilanova I la Geltru switch from the redd kross'y power-pop of the previous self-titled record (the only one of Biscuit’s back catalogue I have been initially familiar with – so I’m kinda destined to compare “Negligencia Programada” to “Biscuit” all the way) to the spaced-out psychedelic rock. Then for a couple of songs they switch back to the “Biscuit” sound only to sandbag a confused listener with flamenco-ed hard rock when the aforementioned couple of songs is over. These stylistic escapades result in the playing time clocking over an hour. It all may sound quite unsettling and cause awareness of getting buried beneath the album’s collapsed structure but, frankly speaking, in case of this particular album it works great as “Negligencia Programada” has got a lot to offer while having no weak points at all.

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Pinpilinpussies "Fuerza 3"

Pinpilinpussies "Fuerza 3" (p)2020 Aloud Music

A nice fem punk record with cool melodies and the sound that's simultaneously elaborated enough for not to be considered 'underground lo-fi' and rough enough for not to be allocated into 'pop-punk' trashbin. "Noventas" is the 21st century's "Devil Came To Me".

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Fred Fredburguer "Fred Fredburguer"

 Fred Fredburguer "Fred Fredburguer" (p)2020 Elefant

Disarmingly charming sunny indie pop/power pop that is the most enjoyable in the form of singles or the Instagram Stories' snippets. Being consumed as a whole the album, though quite short and cushy, sounds relatively samey. But for fans of Cola Jet Set and Los Fresones Rebeldes or, internationally speaking, the bands of Sarah Records/ Shinkansen Records' roster it's a nice piece of music to fall for.

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Mariana "A Partir Del Final"

 Mariana "A Partir Del Final" (p)2020 Discos Delejos

It's sad, it's slow and it's quiet. The dreamlike (and the dream is rather unsettling) acoustic folk songs that sound like the silence occupies the major part of the album, and the music and words are in minority - just like in the earlier Low or Songs:Ohia records.

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Gyoza "Early Birds"

 Gyoza "Early Birds" (p)2020 The Braves Records/ Ciudad Oasis/ Bandicoot Records/ other labels

The band's line-up contains a name that looks familiar: Antonio Postius. You may know him for performing the drumming duties in Mourn – the Catalan band that gained some international exposure in the recent years. Nevertheless, Gyoza and its emocore-tinged alternative rock has little in common with the drummer’s extra job both in music and in international fame potential. It’s just too edgy for getting huge even when the synths are smoothing the picture enough to add some 'big name' flavor, namely of Bring Me The Horizon. “In My Room” starts like Helmet’s “Betty”-era lost song. To round up the list of influences, there is a couple of 'Motorhead-meets-Queens Of The Stone Age' tracks closer to the end of the disc. Well, getting the parts together I’d like to describe this record in the simplest of ways: an epic win. A puzzle where every piece is in its right place.

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Campeon "Dios/Naturaleza"

 Campeon "Dios/Naturaleza" (p)2020 self-released

It's a fantastic album, I'm not kidding. This pack of masterully crafted songs is so melodic, honest and soulful so I can’t help but fall in love with it. Regarding the influences/referential points the first name that comes to mind is obviously Hüsker Dü but the second part of the album rather leans toward the British acts like Echo And The Bunnymen or Teenage Funclub. And if you wonder if switching from angst-ridden art-punk to more textured sound of the Britpop precursors could be quite painful and/or disturbing - please don’t worry, you’re not gonna notice the moment of transition.

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Not A Number "A Life Made Of Wood"

 Not A Number "A Life Made Of Wood" (p)2000 El Hombre Bala Records

The ideal emo-rock of the 21st century as it should be if it only skipped its appalling third wave and jumped from Braid, Rainer Maria & "Clarity" straightaway to the fourth one – the rough, spiny and disheveled as a canary pinetree pictured on the disc’s front cover. With greater exposure this band and this album could rival this year's heatseekers like Sorry or Retirement Party on an equal.

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Ajeeb "Toss And Turn"

 Ajeeb "Toss And Turn" (p)2020 El Hombre Bala Records

This album by a Lanzarote-based threesome is the inflammable – and highly enjoyable – alternative rock seasoned with the lesser amounts of psychedelic rock, post-hardcore and alt-metal much in the vein of the British rockers Pulled Away By Horses and a bunch of American bands that single out Husker Du as their main influence. Genre-wise it’s not the most apparent entry for El Hombre Bala's back catalogue – but this imprint never (and when I say ‘never’ I mean exactly ‘never’) submerges below ‘very good’ notch.

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