Release Radar: January 2022
At the end of each month, Afterglow presents a staff-picked list of new albums and singles that left an impression on our ears.
Written by Afterglow Staffers
Photos courtesy of Rosebud, Domino Recording Company, and Phoebe Fox
Here are our favorite albums and singles released during January 2022. For more reviews of recent releases, check out our album review page.
Shiny Singles We Loved This Month:
“So Cool” by Low Girl
Low Girl’s dulcet voice set over ‘80s roller rink synths evokes the sort of nostalgia that settles in your bones. The hazy guitar and thumping percussion wrap this song up to deliver a beautifully crafted musical package.
“Hold Me Down” by Niko Rubio
Starlet Niko Rubio’s first single of 2022 is the elusive “Hold Me Down,” where mischievous melodies match the temptation evident in her rich vocals. Electric guitars lead the track’s static instrumentals while a stationary bass line is Rubio’s accomplice as she belts each lustful lyric with unfaltering gusto.
“Rubberneckers” by Christian Lee Hutson
Melancholic troubadour and Phoebe Bridgers accomplice, L.A. musician Christian Lee Hutson put out this drum machine jam to announce his second album, Quitters. It’s a lovely, sunny little indie rocker with a neurotic instrumental bridge and an airy, catchy chorus.
“Funny Girl” by Father John Misty
Indie pop’s most self-aware “pretentious” man is back with a romantic single. Backed by a nostalgic orchestra, the singer-songwriter delivers a romantic ode to his eponymous lover with a dash of his trademark sardonicism.
“Call Me Home” by SASAMI
Trading abrasive metal tributes for '70s space rock transcendentalism, the fourth single off sophomore album Squeeze spirals out of SASAMI’s enigmatic, ever-shifting tonality. Listen for a self-described “creeping ache of apathy” beneath folksy guitar and the deluge of nebulous synths that swallow the song whole.
Afterwards (事後叙景) by Suisoh (水槽)
Image courtesy of Suisoh
What happens when a cover artist tries to make a name of their own?
All of the elements of Afterwards (事後叙景) glide smoothly over the electronic mixtape, rejecting the inhuman vocals and quasi-emotionality typical of the vocaloid covers Suisoh’s best known for. Each segment of the concept album draws on a fictional futuristic neon-lit city, anthemic of the different personas that inhabit it. Opener "Afterwards (事後叙景)" restrains itself to a cool anticlimactic vibe as subdued discotheque beats pass under a stream-of-consciousness ("Hit it and fix it like an NES / It hurts but I didn't stop"), while "Taxi Hijack (タクシー・ジャック)" and its brass fanfare only use the titular crime in fantasy to run away from the mundanities of school and work. Suisoh's tone rarely supersedes the temperamental production of each track, their spacious vocal quality imparting even the most melodramatic rapid-fire verses with a smoggy, far-away temper. Only on the finale “Wishing (白旗)” do the classic power chord and electric guitar trappings of vocaloid resurface, though it still admits the same flavors of defeat and diffidence offered throughout (“Please don't forget the hand that shook the white flag”). A door slam and the click of a CD player’s STOP button bring back the ambience of city life at the album’s end, signaling even the record’s own self-critical takes on electronic music’s dramaturgy as yet another artificial escape from reality. —Raymond Lam
Support Suisoh (水槽) on Spotify.
Under the Black Flag of Satan by Wolven Daughter
Image courtesy of Wolven Daughter on Bandcamp
Wolven Daughter’s second EP since its 2021 conception brings forth an offering of blackened metal with which to craft a blade. Under the Black Flag of Satan devotes itself to ‘90s black metal, plunging into the fiery pits of the devil’s favorite genre. The project’s bleak disposition matches well with the lo-fi production and what sounds like a banshee behind the mic. In essential black metal style, the screaming is guttural, as the guitars are abrasive, and these are usually at the forefront. But it’s not minor chords all the way down: one deviation sees the drums take precedence during “May Serpents Drink from Your Wounds.” They’re intercut by screechy feedback, before guitars, vocals, and bass circle like vultures again, as the song croaks its last bloody seconds away. Many of these songs feel like the last few moments of a walk towards death, particularly the closer and title track. The menacing main riff circles hypnotically at a helling and daunting marching pace. Across the EP, Wolven Daughter matches the infernal mood it sets with leftist politics — check the bottom of the cover captioning the album art “The Werewolf of Anarchy.” Lyrics aren’t public on Bandcamp, but the “Black Flag” the title references isn’t about gothic aesthetics: it’s a symbol of anarchic passion.
— Felix Kalvesmaki
Support Wolven Daughter on Bandcamp and Spotify.
Fall in Love Not in Line by Kids On A Crime Spree
Image courtesy of Slumberland Records
Releasing a sophomore LP ten years after a debut is no easy feat, but Kids On A Crime Spree didn’t miss a beat. On Fall in Love Not in Line, the Oakland trio stakes its claim for nostalgic noise pop's existence in a corner of modern music. The album’s fuzzy production captures a fashionable retro sound that listeners long for in an age of sonic clarity. It’s not mere noise, though — the riffs are catchy and energetic, rocking over a casual vocal coolness. Any track on the album could back a TikTok montage of an aesthetic/indie movie/coming-of-age lifestyle, but not in the factory-manufactured way listeners are accustomed to. There’s a certain intangible authenticity to Kids On A Crime Spree’s sound — perhaps amplified by the members’ home-recording methods and total absence from social media — that feels fresh despite its basis in nostalgia. A quick 10 songs in 24 minutes, Fall in Love Not in Line reminds listeners that music need not always innovate or elaborate on the past: oftentimes, a guitar, bass, and drums is plenty. — Ellen Daly
The Overload by Yard Act
From the exotic, faraway land of Leeds, South Yorkshire comes Yard Act with The Overload, a work defined more by its scathing criticism of Post-Brexit England than its melodies and rhythm. The latest album to carry on the traditions of English punk, its title track smoothly details “the overload of discontent” surrounding the state of English affairs , where getting a gig now necessitates that acts stick to "the standards and don’t get political.” The song serves as an upbeat opening, setting the stage for anger that is more seething than loud — an anger that is contained, civilized, and melodical, but only barely. The album immediately pivots to its most political track, “Dead Horse,” a not-so-subtle metaphor for England, a nation that “has left its humor” and “Fell for the fear mongering / Of the national front's new hairdo.” Yard Act’s criticism doesn’t stop at England’s renewed xenophobia and racism. In “The Incident” the group condemns the nation’s tendency to desperately cling to its past, now-irrelevant imperialist successes. The album slows down a little afterwards, its sword now pointed at a more personal type of anger, such as the suffocating dullness of English countryside life explored in “Tall Poppies,” before closing with the "hippy bullshit" of talking about the pointlessness of life in “100% Endurance.” All in all, The Overload is the perfect album to play at your next lockdown work meeting (bring your own booze!) that most definitely is not a party. — Wonjune Lee
Support Yard Act on Spotify.