★Kranky
The Ballasted Orchestra
2025 stock 2013 repress, originally released 1997. CD version of the new album by this Texas outfit, following 2 released on Sedimental. Purely droning ambiance. "...finds Stars of the Lid adding harmonica and didgeridoo to an arsenal of sound source…
New World, Lonely Ride
Michael Grigoni and Pan•American present their first collaboration. The album’s title, New World, Lonely Ride, gestures toward its meditative orientation. The duo offers a series of reflections on the zeitgeist of our present moment, the spirit of ou…
Only Hinting
The full-length debut by Detroit duo Giovanna Lenski and Christian Molik aka Clinic Stars both refines and redefines their pitch-perfect fusion of downer-pop balladry and featherweight shoegaze: Only Hinting. Recorded and produced at the band’s home …
Shards
Shards is a collection of pieces originally written for various film and TV soundtracks Tim Hecker has scored over the last half decade. These compositions were originally written for scoring projects including Infinity Pool, The North Water, Luzifer…
Realistic IX
Realistic IX, the third full-length by the duo of Michael Jones and Turk Dietrich aka Belong, is both an expansion and excavation of their signature acid-washed songcraft. Bleached guitars, metronomic drums, and buried voices rev, swirl, and seethe a…
Recollection
Jacob Long’s fourth full-length for Kranky began as a notion to reimagine Earthen Sea as a “piano trio,” inspired by a year-long immersion in the ECM label catalog, but the compositions soon grew more complex. Elements were chopped and resampled, the…
Triple Point
"Loscil — who may be more familiar to some as Scott Morgan, the drummer for indie-popsters Destroyer — is the exception that proves the rule. And his debut album Triple Point, an ambient-techno concept album about thermodynamics (no, really), is no l…
Temple IV
This is the first vinyl issue of Temple IV, arguably Roy Montgomery's finest solo album, originally released in 1996 on CD. The original album has been enhanced with two newer tracks that constitute side four of the album. Montgomery states: "The two…
Stars of the Lid and Their Refinement of the Decline
2023 Re-press. Triple LP. Painstakingly recorded, processed and assembled over the last five years, Stars Of The Lid once again deliver a massive work filling two compact discs and three vinyl albums, clocking in at over two hours. While most albums …
Tired Sounds Of Stars Of The Lid
2023 repress on triple-vinyl. "Are there other earthling-conjured soundworks rivaling the majesty of Henry Flynt's minimalist hillbilly fiddle fantasias or the heavens-rending power of Olivier Messiaen's works for organ? Undoubtedly, else why bother …
Avec Laudenum
2023 repress. "The first vinyl release in the U.S. for this, the fifth Stars of the Lid album, originally released by Sub Rosa in 1999 and then reissued by Kranky in the fall of 2002. A pivotal album in their career, this marked the first time the du…
No Highs
The latest by Canadian composer Tim Hecker serves as a beacon of unease against the deluge of false positive corporate ambient currently in vogue. Whether taken as warning or promise, No Highs delivers – this is music of austerity and ambiguity, purg…
Colours Of Air
The union of composers Lawrence English and loscil aka Scott Morgan is seamless, sublime, and long overdue. Born of a conversation centered on the notion of “rich sources” as a forge for electronic music, Colours Of Air is a collection of recordings …
No. 5
LP version. "While on the island of Syros in the Aegean Sea for a film festival performance, Christina Vantzou experienced what she characterized as 'a moment of focus' -- a specific vision for the sprawl of raw recordings she'd been amassing for her…
Gravitational Pull vs. The Desire For An Aquatic Life
2022 Repress ***Received a 7.7 rating from Pitchfork. The release of Music For Nitrous Oxide, the 1995 debut by Stars Of The Lid, heralded a new strain of the American underground music scene, one born of the heat and humidity, boredom, and the insul…
The Patience Fader
The glacial distillation of Pan American aka Mark Nelson’s “romantic minimalism” achieves unique fruition on his latest Kranky collection, The Patience Fader. A suite of solo guitar instrumentals accented with lap steel, harmonica, and twilit atmosph…
Coast/range/arc//
Loscil's dreamy 2011 ambient classic "coast/ range/ arc/" gets the deluxe reissue treatment with a fresh remaster and an additional track. Originally released in 2011, "coast/ range/ arc/" is a dense, evocative ambient record - the kind of album tha…