Melody's Echo Chamber: "Crystallized"

Seems like I just covered these guys. That's alright, it's a good 'un. Especially like the fuzz bomb rhythm guitar that busts up the joint about three minutes in. Rawr.

Keep Shelly In Athens: "Madmen Love"

Perhaps in response to EDM, the more experimental frays of electronic music are increasingly eschewing the soft edges of chillwave and dream pop for more incisive, cutting synth lines. So it shouldn't be surprising to see Keep Shelly In Athens employing a darker feel on "Madmen Love", the first single from their upcoming debut LP (through they have so many EPs and singles out over the last few years the whole scenario just shows how ridiculous the idea of a "debut LP" is in 2013).

Look for that on Cascine, a label with amazing taste but a correspondingly infuriating refusal to provide up-to-date release info via their otherwise snazzy website.

Morri$: "Things Behind Glass"

Cloud R&B is all the rage right now, but this is one of the first choons I've heard that actually seems to have an honest-to-goodness old school soul jam at its gauzy heart, even though vocals are nowhere to be found. The title "Things Behind Glass" could be construed as pornographic in the wrong hands, but the bittersweet distance behind the production points to a more appropriate theme of unattainable objects.

In the spirit of gratis jams that is part of the whole "rebuilding fan support for the music industry" thing, you can snag the fuck out of the Young Love Heartbreak EP - a split with the hilariously named Sweater Beats - over at Morri$' Soundcloud.

Purity Ring: "Lofticries"

Production values are definitely of an era: it's easy to imagine "Lofticries" coming out back in the late 90's with more of a hazy, slowed down trip hop vibe. All of which is to say that the central melody has a timeless pop quality to it, not dissimilar to what Grimes is pimping these days (both 4AD artists, none too coincidentally). The Shrines album came out last summer - and singles from it were already being released in late 2011 - so presumably this is the last of the OG shit we'll see until the sophomore material is prepped.

Chromatics: "Cherry"

Mexican Summer may have chillwave on lock, but if anyone can crack the safe it's Italians Do It Better. Label co-founder Johnny Jewel's band Chromatics are one of the best dream pop acts out there, an argument for which the relative throwaway nature of "Cherry" - it's set to be dumped off on the label sampler After Dark II in a hot minute - attests to the depth of the young band's catalog.

Majical Cloudz: "Turns Turns Turns"

This cat Devon Walsh collaborates with Grimes but a bit, which you can kinda tell from his washed out, chill room ambient pop style, but the vocals turn an already laid back affair into a somber, introspective slice of affecting soul.

The Turns Turns Turns EP will be released December 3 on Arbutus (US/Canada) and Merok (UK).

Melody's Echo Chamber: "You Won't Be Missing That Part of Me"

If you're looking to parlay in the psych-pop conversation you could do worse than nab Tame Impala's Kevin Parker as your personal translator. Parker produced the self-titled debut by Melody's Echo Chamber, kind of a surprisingly cohesive/accessible cross between La Sera and Tame Impala itself. Melody Prochet's prior band, My Bee's Garden, opened for TI on a previous tour. It's kind of unclear whether MBG is still on an ongoing concern with MEC being a side project for both "members" or what, but you almost need a degree in fluid dynamics to keep track of what's what in the indiesphere these days.

Tamaryn: "The Garden"

Dusted MBV worship is all the rage right now, but there is arguably no one that does Loveless-era shoegaze better in 2012 than SF-via-NZ chanteuse Tamaryn. Signed to (where else?) Mexican Summer since 2010, Tamaryn and semi-anonymous guitar player Rex Shelverton play it a smidge less obtuse than Kevin Shields and co. but their hearts are clearly in that 88-91 halcyon sweet spot.

Tender New Signs is already out. Yeah, WKMR is playing catch up... sue us.

KILLER COVERS || Dum Dum Girls: "Trees and Flowers"

Strawberry Switchblade had one album in 1985, bookended by a small handful of non-LP singles that stretched their oeuvre out from 1983-86. Dum Dum Girls have covered their final single, "Trees and Flowers", on their new End of Daze EP. The EP is largely a collection of material that was recorded for last year's Only in Dreams album but left off for not fitting in with the upbeat, girl group pop sound that the LP represented. The shoegaze/dream pop sound of the EP is definitely a right turn from the sound DDG have become known for, but considering how many bands are revisiting the dream/noise pop template in 2012 I wouldn't be surprised to see this become a permanent direction for the band.

Fight Bite: "Charlotte Iris"

Heard of Neon Indian, right? They got this keyboard player, Leanne Macomber; she does this extracurricular thing, Fight Bite, on the side. Those may be her titties, I don't know. Your move, America.

Frankie Rose: "The Fall" [Fort Romeau remix]

We've showcased Frankie Rose before, but this one is all about the remix, and for that you can thank Fort Romeau. This bad boy is set to be released on a "Night Swim" single along with two demos and another remix (of the same track? Dunno, it's confusing) from The Go! Team. Come get some.

Twigs: "Ache"

If we're going to recognize the legitimacy of "cloud rap" then surely in the brief time of its ascent it has already been eclipsed by "cloud soul", an ethereal dream pop version of R&B kickstarted a year or so ago by The Weeknd and since paraded through a procession of compatible sub-genres: witch house, ambient, noise pop, etc. The latest to fly the flag is Twigs, an R&B chanteuse of unknown origin who is releasing her second single without bothering to establish a public identity to underline her first.

The Raveonettes: "She Owns the Streets"

Of all the current bands that could be considered reasonably young, The Raveonettes have been doing the hazy, surf pop thing for about as long as anyone. Listening to "She Owns the Streets" it seems straight up retarded that they aren't played on every Top 40 station in the country. Even to the bottom feeding American Idol generation this shit just isn't that difficult.

[EDIT 7/23/12: added music video]:

Weird Dreams: "House of Secrets"

London's Weird Dreams walk an accessible line between dream pop and shoegaze, at least from the couple of singles we've heard from them so far: "Little Girls" and now "House of Secrets", a slow burn track that emphasizes easily made out vocals and chiming hooks. "House of Secrets" will be Weird Dreams' side of a split 7" with Girls Names, out June 25 on Slumberland.
(via Stereogum):

Sleep ∞ Over: "Romantic Streams" [CFCF Remix]

In between covering bands from Portland and Brooklyn to the point of near exclusivity, I sometimes like to squeeze one in from some homegrown Austin bands... what with being the Live Music Capital of the World, which to many just means we get a crap ton of touring acts and to some is just straight up bullshit one way or the other. "Romantic Streams" isn't exactly new, but since there's no such thing as an album cycle anymore Montreal's CFCF is just now getting around to remixing it. Anyway they're called Sleep ∞ Over because they make drowsy, somnolent music that's kind of like a lullaby... get it? Yeah they could afford to be a little more obtuse... agreed. I'd tell them myself except their website is damn near unnavigable.

2:54: "Creeping"

If 4:20 is when you smoke a joint does that make 2:54 when you pop an Ambien?

[UPDATE 5/29/12: adding music video]

Zambri: "Hundred Hearts"

That synth line sounds like Martin Rev from Suicide covering "Take My Breath Away". Zambri have gotten a lot more polished since their 2011 EP, Glossolalia, but they've countered that trade off with a remarkably keen uptick in songwriting process. "Hundred Hearts" may be the best song on this year's House of Baasa, but it's not the only one that's good, even stellar.

Indians: "Magic Kids"

Really getting tired of all these single word, pluralized band names these days, but what are you gonna do? Especially when the band in question is as good as Indians. "Magic Kids" is kind of a deluxe version of chillwave, with orchestral synths bubbling up from an ethereal pool of percolating sounds and crystal clear lyrics breaking occasionally breaking the tranquility. As near as I can tell this is one guy from Copenhagen, and I'll be damned if I can find anything other than this one song by him. Stay tuned.

Violens: "Der Microarc"

The title "Der Microarc" may bring to mind steely Teutonic iciness - a rational tyranny of imperative emotionlessness - but that wouldn't be Violens' style. This is warm, nostalgic bliss of timeless melancholy, 60s AM haze and modern dream pop all wrapped into a concise, well executed package. Bonus points for recreating the famous "Subterranean Homesick Blues" cue card sequence using Rorschach-ian free associative imagery.

True is out May 15 on Slumberland Records.

Violens - Der Microarc from Slumberland Records on Vimeo.

Married in Berdichev: "Light Comes"

In the same manner that you can instantly identify anything recorded in the 80's by its compressed dynamics and dry, in your face percussion, I think one of the hallmarks of today's production considered decades from now will be the ubiquitous use of cavernous, almost cathedral-like space that modern recording equipment affords this generation's artists.

In the same way that 80's artists were merely taking advantage of new-at-the-time technology to achieve a crystal clean clarity that wasn't possible in the analog era, it's unlikely that modern artists are intentionally trying to all produce minor variations on dream pop ambiance so much as just trying to get the most out of the cutting edge technology available in 2012. Either way there's a lot of somnolent, lush avant pop bubbling up from the underground these days.