Music I Like – Post-Everything

I don’t know why, maybe it’s the echo-filled production, the sparkly guitars, meandering song forms or emphasis on atmosphere, but if the genre tag has a “post-” in it, I’m probably going to like it, whatever comes after the hyphen.

Driving Slow Motion

The biggest complaint about post-rock is that it all sounds the same. Humans are so attuned to human voices, that it’s much harder to differentiate instrumental bands. But aside from that, there’s some truth to the complaint. Post-rock bands almost all use the same effects, play in the same tempo range, and write lengthy, meandering, cinematic songs. I often have a hard time telling post-rock bands apart, myself. I still like them even when I can’t tell who it is. It doesn’t matter if they sound the same, when the sound is so good. If you don’t know what I mean, give a listen to Arda by Driving Slow Motion.

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MOLLY

The Austrian duo MOLLY claims to be inspired by the sharp cliffs and dramatic weather changes of their mountain home, but the sound on All That Ever Could Have Been is decidedly Sigur Rosy. I love that sound.

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Appleseed Cast

How could I resist checking out a band that shares the name of a classic anime? Even if it’s one that I missed out on, that’s a hook for me. Whether the anime connection is intentional or not, the music will keep me coming back for more. The Fleeting Light of Impermanence (a delightfully poetic, overlong post-rock title if ever I heard one) has the crashing cymbals of percussion-forward post-rock. But it’s also got the jangly guitars I love from indie rock that remind you modern strings are made of metal. Add in some tenor vocals and brisk pacing and you’ve got the best elements of post-pop, too. If that’s a thing.

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Alcest

I always feel a little silly when I include really important and well-known bands on my blog. But I’m not pretending that anything here is my “discovery.” And even huge bands may be new to some people (the other day my daughter butted in to a grownup conversation to say, “Who’s Tom Petty?”)

Last year I met an artist in Bergen who drew ironic black-metal art (I bought my husband a card with a corpse-painted beardo saying “Hold me”). She told me she liked to use the hashtag #trvenorwegianblackmetal ironically, and enjoyed all the hipster black metal that bunches the panties of the cvlt. But she had never heard of Alcest.

So that’s a really long introduction for a band that needs no introductions. On the off chance that anyone here has not already heard their latest, Spiritual Instinct is as beautiful as Alcest ever is.

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Hugar

Hugar is tagged on Bandcamp as post-rock and also neoclassical (which, I guess, is the same as post-classical). On their self titled album the Icelandic duo are joined by numerous other artists, including Ólafur Arnalds, who is known for his neoclassical piano compositions. But he got his start as a punk drummer, and her plays neoclassical drums. Or is it post-rock? Hugar might be post-genre, but it is not post-narrative. A sense of storytelling in instrumental music repeatedly draws me to Icelandic musicians and to post-rock. Every song on this Icelandic post- project feels like it’s telling a story. I don’t always know what the story is, but it’s always powerful.

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