It Was All A Dream

What a few weeks. Time for some nature inspired & infused folk, a cultured ambient project that you’d actually like to see live & a beguiling collision of past & present, (Middle) East meets West

I know I said I was going to focus on the music, but as I’ve missed a newsletter, the paid subscribers at least deserve an explanation, and what a few weeks it’s been. Just as I thought the drama was over, it appears that the calm was just a dream sequence in 2026’s soap opera.

Shortly after the last newsletter, my landlord, who resided at a second property on the land at my country abode, had a bit of a meltdown. His issues weren’t hinted at in our initial meetings, but became apparent once I’d settled in - something I decided to brush over. Long story, but with the writing on the wall and despite us agreeing a three-month notice period, for my peace of mind I busted a gut looking for a new home and, having experimented with alternative rural living options for nine months since splitting up with my partner, I decided it was time to prioritise security over an idyllic, healthier outdoor lifestyle for my daughter and me.

So I said goodbye to my flourishing, soon to be abundant, vegetable patch - you should have tasted the beans, carrots, spinach and strawberries - all delicious and surprisingly easy to grow, and found an apartment in the small city I had departed last September; sealed the deal and moved into an unfurnished apartment that I’m now trying to furnish on a shoestring.

There was a stage when I thought my head would explode, but luckily I’ve got a thick skull which contained the blast. The stress was real though - a third property search/move in ten months was a lot, but the light-headed spells have finally abated in the last few days, as I settle in and start to scratch the surface of the music backlog.

I have to admit it feels pretty good, and as much as I still hanker after rural living, I now know exactly how I want to do it, have a clearer idea of where I want to go, and what to expect - it’s been an invaluable experience. And I can’t lie, living a minute’s walk from a great bakery and supermarket, five minutes on the bike to the nearest beach and a great eco-park, and being closer to the bus and trains station, are certainly going to make my carless parental life a hell of a lot easier.

OK, on to the music. There were originally nine releases pencilled in, but as my daughter has just arrived for a stay, if I don’t hit send now (before she wakes up!) it will be another week at least before the next newsletter, so there’s, ummm, three recommendations. Sorry about that, I’ll make it up to you, promise.

First though, in music industry news, it was great to see Tidal outline their AI music policy recently:

Starting today, AI-generated music will not be monetizable. We are only in the beginning of the era of AI-generated music. We acknowledge the ongoing debate regarding whether certain AI-generated music (e.g. AI-generated music developed from fairly and properly licensed models) should be entitled to earn royalties. This debate will continue as the technology advances and rightsholders and AI music platforms develop licensing models. Tidal’s priority is ensuring royalties go to original works directly produced, written, and performed by people. We will therefore not knowingly attribute royalties to music we identify as wholly AI-generated.

If you weren’t aware AI music has swept through the streaming services in the last couple of years, further obscuring and diverting money away from genuine artists, not to mention making curation more difficult - it’s a serious issue. So it’s good to see the streaming services start to react, well at least Deezer and now Tidal, whilst the two major players - Spotify, and Apple Music (who at least enforce AI tagging), are still sitting on the fence. Expect governments to step in sometime in the 2030s if their tech passivity, and long overdue social media crackdown are anything to go by.

Driftwood - Maps (Room40)

I’m glad that labels like Room40 exist, even if a lot of their releases are somewhat challenging, but due to Lawrence English’s curatorial quality control, I keep an ear on them and leap on the label’s mellower, more melodic moments with glee. And this Driftwood album is a serious winner.

Driftwood comprises Nick Ashwood and Aviva Endean, who appear to have bonded over a love of microtonally re-tuned pump organs and electronic music, with Ashwood also playing guitar, and Endean the clarinet. Their debut album was similarly improvised, although more of a project sketch I’d suggest, that sat somewhere around the sparsely populated folk and jazz-infused ambient intersection, but they’ve obviously been giving the project some thought since, and they’ve just made quite the evolutionary leap.

This time round, they’ve brought in a guitar, effects pedals and contact mics to the studio, and as well as recording their live instrument juggling - which perhaps they’ll kindly capture on camera for the next installment, they post-produced the recordings, processing some of the sounds and injecting some new frequencies to fine effect. The result is a live instrument-rich, electroacoustic ambient pleasure. Tracks variously spiral off into cosmic realms - just check “Restless Earth”, Eastern lands are evoked and spiritual paths suggested; minimal, mantric repetition abounds, minimal guitar mediations made public and clarinet improvised over spiritual drones. The progression from the debut is real and fingers crossed, the project will run and run, it could just be one of those rare beasts - a cultured ambient project that you’d actually like to see live.

Cinna Peyghamy - Music For Tombak & Synth (Other People)

It’s always worth keeping an eye on Nicholas Jaar’s Other People label, the scope is global and driven by curiosity rather than commerce. I probably would never have discovered the synth-loving, tombak playing Cinna Peyghamy any other way.

With a relatively short but impressive, more electronic music-focussed discogrophy, albeit with a polyrhythmic approach, he’s gone full on electroacoustic with this latest offering by putting his ancient Persian drum front and centre, whilst also introducing the evocative strings of the setar, some great clarinet courtesy of Quelque Bourdon, and not to mention some well-read Persian poetry by his father.

The album is a beguiling collision of past and present, (Middle) East meets West, and the first time Peyghamy has deeply explored rather than hinted at his heritage. The album starts with the sharper end of the drum’s palette, the slow minimal rhythm easing us into the LP nicely; well, until the tempo increases dramatically and is then consumed by the surrounding machines and ends up resembling more of a skittering, weekend-primed, minimal techno track. The deeper, warmer sound of the drum’s center are given a proper workout next, aided by similarly resonating machine frequencies as Peyghamy showcases his percussive dexterity and love of modular sound twisting; opening up a brave new world of rave possibility and a fresh branch on the drum and bass continuum. And so the album winds through thick and thin, frenetic and thoughtful, along a culture-clashing, but ultimately uniting course.

REA - Crop Circles (Self Release)

The thing that gets me out of bed every day, often far too early, is the excitement of stumbling across new, especially young, talented and upcoming artists. Although I can’t give them much of a leg up -- one day I’ll have a hundred thousand engaged followers who can catapult artists to the next level, but I can at least give them a few new listeners or fans, some blogosphere encouragement, SEO advantage and something to show potential bookers.

Although a lot of the coverage is for great singles that signal promise and happens via the blog, I was very taken by this nature-inspired, sweet and soothing singer-songwriter Rachel Adderley aka REA. Styling her music as, “alt-folk music from quiet outdoor spaces and deeply rooted in the natural world”, she’s not faking the funk - recording this sophomore EP with her band sitting around a crackling campfire in a secluded woodland plot in a national park.

The band certainly do their bit not to disturb the surrounding flora and fauna - their acoustic instruments and softly spun tunes the perfect foil for Adderley’s own acoustic strumming and charming voice, the ambient noise from the setting hinting at her field recording hobby, and providing pleasing sonic depth.

If well-crafted, good-natured folk is your cup of tea then head over to Bandcamp - the only place you can hear this particular releases, and make you check last year’s, more widely available, debut whilst you’re at it. And if you want a peek behind the scenes, then check out her Substack.

Don’t Forget TSMM’s Playlists and Podcast.

From ambient sound baths and wellness imbuing new age vibes to underground house via jazz, neoclassical, folk, dub and more, the twenty one TSMM playlists and podcast cover a lot of ground, and are updated regularly.

They’re available on Tidal, Apple Music, Amazon, Youtube Music, Youtube, Deezer, Soundcloud and Spotify (if you don’t worry about them not paying most of the artists on the playlists).