Tracklisting:

Mike Pace and the Child Actors – Everyone Out of the Car
Miranda Winters – The Futuristic District
Exam Season – Strawberry Milk
Saccharine – Pumpkin Guts
Tuvaband – Wolfpack
Devon Welsh – Dreams Have Pushed You Around
Mending – Alan after the Fire
Reddening West – Even If
Valley Maker – Light on the Ground
The Washboard Abs – Return to You
Manatree – Brushfire
Miserable Chillers – Horse Opera
Saint Charles – She Don’t Wanna Know
new casino – going for a walk*
Frankie Valet – Why Blue
Goodbye Max – Old Photos
Adeline Hotel – Habits
Joe Kaplow – I Said I Was Going and I Went
Pecas – Tuesdays
Sun Kin – Neglect
Baby Cages – flowers
Crooked Spine – Skinned Knees
Lauren O’Connell – Out of Focus
Mount Goldie – Summer
Harvey Trisdale – Baby
american poetry club – the sum of your parts
Babehoven – Out of the Country
Adam Arcuragi – Low Parade Rain
Jason Bemis Lawrence – Southern Midwest
Campdogzz – Sorceress
Barfoot – A Thin Place Between Worlds

* not on Playmoss

The post August 2018 Roundup appeared first on Various Small Flames.

After Dark, the latest release from Brooklyn duo Pecas, certainly falls into the latter category. The project of Sandy Davis and Johnny Dynamite, Pecas make a sultry brand of dream pop that feels not so much suited to night but crafted from it, After Dark collecting six soundscapes woven from thick dark air and neon threads.

Opener ‘Tuesdays’ sets the tone, the tempo sluggish and speckled with synths, lending a doped viscosity to the atmosphere where experience is softened and heightened all at once. The vocals of Davis emerge to flit and flutter within this haze, a near whisper as ethereal as the mood itself, all the while the track rising toward something of a crescendo. Once reached however, the moment of crystalline clarity lasts for all but a moment, lucidity slinking back beneath the fog to dissipate once more.

Davis’s vocals on ‘Girl Wonder (One More Chance)’ are breathy and sensual, sighing in the spaces between languid beats and shiny synths, while the breathy ‘French Kiss’ has an unstable edge, as though threatening to escalate or unravel at any moment. ‘Matchstick’ is far sleeker, part funky pop song, part humid and sticky soul, the smooth sax bringing an air of opulent 80s cool as the vocals condense like hot breath on your cheek. As the title suggests ‘Te Olvidaras’ is minimal downbeat disco delivered in Spanish, before closer ‘This is Why (We Can’t)’ paints the shadowy atmosphere with luminous synths and gentle slo-mo firecracker beats.

With After Dark, Pecas deliver an album for the nameless hours of night, where time and even life itself is suspended and experience takes on a strange, otherworldly shimmer. The feeling might seem foreign the next morning, inimitable even, and that is half the charm. The sensation is unique and transient, a chance escape from the banalities of everyday life, so enjoy it while you can.

We’re excited to be able to share the album in its entirety a few days before release, so grab your headphones and turn out the lights.

The post Album Premiere: Pecas – After Dark appeared first on Various Small Flames.