This is the first time in a while that I’ve managed to get two Capsule Gardens out in a month, and considering everything else that’s been happening in June, that’s a miracle.
As ever, thanks for reading, and thanks for the support. New Morning Sounds recordings were shared recently. The Jewel Garden continues ahead with the latest from The North Sea, and the next issue of Stupid Dreams will be out next month. And there’s always more.
But for now, some wonderful music.
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Ron Carter & Yotam Silberstein Duets (Jojo)
An intimacy and restraint run through the core of this collaboration between guitarist Yotam Silberstein and the all-time great Ron Carter on bass. Produced to heighten the warmth and closeness of this session, Duets is languid and melodic while imbued with a wistful air. Through a combination of standards and originals, the duo dance into something where a real emotional gravity endures. Silberstein’s guitar arrangements are enchanting in the way he picks his notes carefully, only laying down the intricate runs the songs call for. Carter acts as the rudder, his considered basslines bounding forward while staying tethered to the ground. The force of this music is in what is implied.
galen tipton tide pools (self-released)
Wonder comes in countless organic tones and synthetic textures on tide pools. tipton builds intricate, living worlds from sound, and here, those worlds are submerged in neon aquifers and bubble castle reveries. Whimsical harmonics float in asymmetric sequences. There’s always a divergent cadence in this music, though it never feels random, and the myriad, layered melodies are specific, built with care. Coral-like structures are filled with icy bell-like resonances, muted crystals, and winding patterns. Glitchy music box dances atop a gentle rush of digital water. A longing lives in chord arrangements written with humming pads. Rhythms emerge from darker waters, still aqueous but more solid, like liquid metal globs flickering in the deep. All the movement, all the dreams, never stop, and I never want to leave this place tipton has crafted.
Leslie Keffer Embody (Frolic Press)
From the opening moments of the title track, Embody has a dystopian undercurrent, a dissociative sheen. Buoyant rhythms are undercut by dark synth timbres and Keffer’s monotonic incantations. These are incremental slogs through drying concrete, a sonic monument falling apart before it’s fully set. High-frequency howls slice through this feeling of mundane resignation, giving this music emotional claws. Lithe melodies disintegrate into pad washes, like ethereal dreams in grayscale. Even with the progressive cadence of Embody, this music slows time to a crawl. It’s like a stomach filled with dread butterflies. Each pointillistic tone or rhythmic scratch is a speck of dust on my skin, scrawling codes and building tension. At the end, Keffer sings back from the void we’ve been circling, recoloring the world and moving forward again.
Turn On The Sunlight Featuring Sam Gendel Warm Waves (Tokonoma)
Turn On The Sunlight’s latest, Warm Waves, exudes light in every musical phrase and free-flowing composition. Tenderness runs through this music, sending lyrical tendrils into every part of the work: levitating whistle tones, resonant guitars, woodwind clouds, and encompassing birdsong. “Wander The Open Sky” pushes further into bliss with a guest appearance from Laraaji on vocals and zither. His wordless spells are both earthy and prismatic, wrapping the willowy melodies and soft rhythms in a golden glow. Hope seeps into all the crevices of these songs. TOTS leader Jesse Peterson crafts these open world expanses where, at any point, something quiet and reassuring drifts from the speakers. It’s weightless and ponderous at the same time, music as a place to simply sit and be with it all.
Liis Ring Nest (Breton Cassette)
I love soft things. Nest is glowing and textural, with a dimly lit atmosphere. Liis Ring’s voice is the thread woven into these 11 songs, accentuated by plucked strings, languid pump organ chord progressions, ethereal drones, and a rainstorm. The rhythms of Nest are minimal, sometimes barely audible, but they always push this music forward. Melodies are catchy and tender, sweet nothings mouthed across the room. Ring uses field recordings to make this environment feel more lived-in and real, with birdsong as codas and a six-minute rain recording dividing the album in half. Nest is unobtrusive, which is how it gets so close, moving gently across the skin.
Ángeles Rojas Open the windows and let the spirits in and out (Warm Winters Ltd.)
Immediately, I have to stop. The opening moments of Ángeles Rojas’s Open the windows and let the spirits in and out is simple yet so warm, so entrancing. A single chord played on a Klais Opus 1912 organ that resonates like a vaporous heartbeat. The sustained drone slowly grows, each moment subtly building on the previous breath until sound becomes a physical, almost immovable weight. When the ensemble-parts – violin, cello, soprano flute, piccolo, baritone sax, trombone, and bass clarinet – fade in from the margins, they become a channel for a release. Thoughts and ghosts, circling around the dulcet glow of the organ, find somewhere else to go. Harmonies glide across the root structures, and somewhere in the margins, the audience breathes with it. A small breath, a quiet shuffle. Rojas weaves this spellbinding sonic architecture into something that feels alive. Suddenly, Open the windows and let the spirits in and out becomes lighter, spacious. Suddenly, it lets go.
Ghazal Faghihi Penumbra (Relative Pitch)
Penumbra is completely improvised, which translates into a series of clarinet explorations pulled directly from Ghazal Faghihi’s spirit. This is a visceral, searing debut. Emotive tonal fragments from her clarinet are stitched into shapeshifting figures on an altar, a phantom presence felt in each sorrowful expression, each winding run. It is music that moves slow with an eye always on the horizon. Even the various accoutrements – shruti box, electronics, objects – make this album more immersive through tonal and tactile variation. There’s a breathlessness in her playing, a mercurial approach without obvious destination. Screeches ring into midnight hues sustained by natural reverb, connected to skronks and extended tones where, for a moment, something close to light sneaks in. Penumbra is a look into a patinated mirror.
Acid Twilight Trippo Nova (Not Not Fun)
Neon lights must be hidden somewhere in the jungle because it all comes out in the dub-inflected romps of Trippo Nova. Bass lines grow from saw waves, modulating beneath the undulating lead melodies. Hypnosis lives in these sequences, the movements pulling a gyrating echo from the rich soil. Maybe it’s the heavy dose of mysticism giving these 12 songs tape-saturated atmospherics, but this music is like a future dream from the distant past. Muted glass melodies and angular guitar twang are organic and rain-soaked, and they cradle the tropical aura shrouding all of Trippo Nova. The air of mystery layered in the heart of this music makes it feel like a b-movie-style plot, where the danger is a pantomime, and being lost in the haze is the real adventure.
Foxy Digitalis depends on our awesome readers to keep things rolling. Pledge your support today via our Patreon or subscribe to The Jewel Garden. You can also make a one-time donation via Ko-fi.
