Earl Patrick pivots sharply away from his usual indie-folk and guitar-driven comfort zones for his newest release, the wildly inventive album "Conditioned By Machines". The Portland, Oregon-based composer, singer-songwriter, producer, and multi-instrumentalist has spent over two decades building a dense, eight-album catalog. Here, however, he entirely flips the script. Feeling that classical flute music too often prioritizes gesture over pure melody, he set out...

With The Mortal Prophets and the release "Hide Inside The Moon", John Beckmann isn't just making a record; he seems to be curating a gallery exhibit for the ears, where the paintings are made of reverb and the sculptures are built from anxiety. It’s a curious, swirling thing a "gentle psychedelic weather system," to borrow a phrase, that hits you with the specific humidity...