This week’s guide is by CF Smith and contributors Arifur Rahman, Words By Shoaib, Benny Thomas, and Irfan Ayaan.
Each Friday, Between The Cracks steps into the shadows of the underground to spotlight six adventurous releases. This week new albums from Beth Orton, Martin Brugger, Test Card, Tahmela Six, Al Wootton & Irene Bianco, and Turn On The Sunlight. Each release pushing into distinct corners of folk, ambient, jazz, and experimental sound. As always, enjoy the music and support the artists and labels who keep the world interesting. Check out our latest picks on the site.
Albums
Al Wootton & Irene Bianco – Rope
I sometimes wonder if Al Wootton will ever make a record I don’t like; well, that day still hasn’t arrived. His new (collaborative) album only proves the point, pushing his sound further while keeping that unmistakable Wootton free-form style intact. He links up with site favourite experimental percussionist Irene Bianco for a fully improvised project that digs deep into dubby psychedelia. Wootton’s hardware processing of various sampling methods, plus guitar, bass guitar, and clarinet, provides a counterpoint to Bianco’s experimental treatments of the drum kit, bells, vibraphone, and other percussion instruments. Opening with the foggy, jazz‑inflected abstractions of ‘A/B’, the track eases you in before the pair veer into rougher, unruly terrain. From there, they navigate between gloom and grit, whether that’s the expansive cinematics in the ‘title track’ or the spaciousness of ‘Handle’. Meanwhile, ‘Spring’ drifts in like an extraterrestrial, anchored by a ringing, gong‑led meditation. The whole thing is soaked in ghostly reverbs and tape‑warped textures, giving it a distinctly psychedelic, alien feel. A special highlight for me is the gritty, psychedelic dub-drone experimentation of ‘Hara‘. Sparse, echoing stabs call out across a spacious soundscape before getting swallowed by swirling tape‑feedback and distortion. Overall, a really great and innovative project from two of the most interesting sonic explorers around. – CFS
Turn On The Sunlight – Iseo
With Iseo, Jesse Peterson‘s long-running Turn On The Sunlight project reaches a quietly transcendent new chapter. The album drifts through organic jazz, ambient textures and environmental recordings with remarkable patience, embracing atmosphere over destination. Recorded across Maui, Tokyo, London and beyond, these pieces feel less like compositions than carefully cultivated ecosystems where every instrument, field recording and collaborator occupies its own natural space. The title track, Iseo, sets the emotional tone with a tender lullaby sung by Luis Pérez Ixoneztli. Built around Peterson’s son’s middle name, it radiates warmth through delicate acoustic instrumentation and understated melodic grace. Cosmic Feathers, meanwhile, floats effortlessly between shimmering synths, breathy flutes, and gently pulsing percussion, capturing the album’s balance between movement and stillness. The centrepiece, Medianoche en la Calle Aurora, stretches across fifteen immersive minutes, rewarding attentive listening with slowly evolving textures rather than dramatic climaxes. Throughout Iseo, Peterson acts less as a bandleader than as a facilitator, allowing collaborators and environments to shape the music organically. The result is a deeply humane, beautifully porous record that invites listeners to inhabit its world rather than observe it. – WBS
Tahmela Six – Alight
Having already spun the new Tahmela Six album a fair few times, It’s an easy recommendation for anyone who enjoys Triple Blind, Organic Pulse Ensemble, Orio Pena and Isach Skeidsvoll. Their last album, Mount, was recorded indoors during Finland’s darkest week, but for Alight they decided to go outdoors for an all-day session at Palmutsaari farm. You can hear the birds chirping and the wind gently blowing as the six musicians improvised their way through four tracks. The open-air acts almost like extra players; ideas slowly bloom and recede across the four pieces. That sense of place makes the album easy to live with: for all its exploratory fire and shifting densities, Alight comes across as grounded, spacious and quietly luminous, the kind of record that to my ears deepens each time you return to it. The journey opens with ‘Endless Summer Sun‘, using spacious improvisations to evoke the stillness of midday heat. Next, ‘Time and Again‘ tightens the focus, driving the afternoon forward with dense, rhythmic horn harmonies. The energy peaks with ‘Ground VI‘, unleashing a raw, collective free-jazz surge over a rolling double-bass groove. They hit full flight on the title track, ‘Alight‘, which closes the session, blending instrumental swells with the raw, ambient hum of insects as night falls. Well worth checking out. – BT
Martin Brugger – The Shell
Martin Brugger‘s The Shell is a quietly absorbing album that finds beauty in restraint. Blending ambient textures, lo-fi folk guitars, field recordings, and hazy electronics, the Munich-based producer creates a reflective soundscape that feels intimate without becoming insular. Every piece unfolds patiently, inviting listeners into a world shaped by subtle details rather than dramatic gestures. ‘Downward Curving’ opens the record with an ambient drone that is set against melancholic, drifting guitar lines. The lead single, ‘Knees, Hands, Shoulders, Teeth’, introduces Brugger’s understated approach with delicate guitar motifs, soft electronic washes, and an understated emotional pull. ‘Wounded Dove’, another early preview, expands the atmosphere through drifting melodies, children’s voices and textured production, balancing melancholy with quiet warmth while revealing the record’s cinematic sense of space. Two short and sweet pieces follow; ‘ The Brilliant Light Between The Ropes‘ offers gentle, drifting acoustic refrains. While the gorgeous ‘Thick of the Fray‘ features the tune of an ice cream truck with a friend humming along and nylon-string guitar plucks. The remaining compositions maintain this contemplative mood, moving effortlessly between ambient passages, dream-pop hues, and organic field recordings. Brugger allows silence and texture to play equal roles, making each track feel carefully sculpted without losing its natural flow. The Shell succeeds through patience and emotional clarity rather than grand statements. It is an elegant, immersive listen that rewards close attention, confirming Brugger’s gift for transforming minimal sounds into deeply affecting musical landscapes. – WBS
Beth Orton – The Ground Above
The Ground Above is framed around survival and renewal, motherhood and identity, and quiet political unease. The title track opens the album with a long, immersive dreamscape. Beth Orton’s voice moves through lush harmonies and steady drums that feel both fragile and resilient. Before I Knew narrows the lens. It circles early awareness and hindsight over a slow, pulsing arrangement. Cigarette Curls drifts in on smoky imagery and soft repetition. It feels like memory looping on itself. Waiting has already emerged as a focal point. Guitars, keys, and rhythm hang back while the lyric turns the act of waiting into something charged and active. Celestial Light lifts the mood gently and hints at grace without denying the weight of the world. In the final stretch, I’ll Miss You, Love You Right, and Otherside return to the core themes. They ask what it means to stay in love, in art, and in the world, even when it hurts. – IA
Test Card – 73 & Good Luck
73 & Good Luck unfolds like a distant transmission, slowly revealing its atmosphere and emotion. Taking its title from the amateur-radio sign-off “73,” the album feels like a farewell that never quite closes the door – a transmission fading into the distance while another signal begins to emerge. Test Card, the project of Lee Nicholson, builds that feeling beautifully through spacious electronics, analogue synth textures, understated rhythms and slowly unfolding atmospheres. The album does not rush to impress. Instead, it draws you in gradually, allowing each sound to settle before introducing another layer. ‘Telnet to Telex‘, the second track, is an immediate highlight, balancing its electronic pulse with an almost nostalgic sense of movement. It feels like travelling through an unfamiliar city at night, watching distant lights pass through a train window. Then comes ‘Bravo uniform station‘, where the album further stretches its cinematic character. The arrangement has an impressive sense of patience, with the rhythmic structure keeping the piece alive while the surrounding textures continue to evolve. Nothing feels unnecessarily crowded; every element has room to breathe. ‘Five and eight is the report‘, is another particularly memorable moment. Its atmosphere feels expansive and strangely intimate at the same time – a fitting late-album statement before the closing track. What makes Test Card especially compelling is his ability to turn electronic music into a sense of place. There is craftsmanship in the restraint, imagination in the textures, and a genuine warmth beneath the machinery. He does not simply create sounds; he creates environments for the listener to inhabit. 73 & Good Luck is a strong reminder that electronic music can be both futuristic and deeply human. – AR
