Discover Blogly: Listen to new music from Rich Hinman, inuha, Aunt Katrina, and more

Though it might often be used to channel twangy flavor and old-time feeling, the steel guitar can be a deceptively futuristic instrument in the right hands, closer to the theremin or talkbox than a traditional stringed instrument. Pedal steel in particular is almost like the original synthesizer, a machine for stretching sound beyond the confines of a single note. It’s also an instrument that encourages constant tinkering and practically requires you to be a gearhead, which tends to attract musicians who are experimentally-minded and willing to bend the accepted limits; there’s a reason why even Daft Punk included a little pedal steel on Random Access Memories. The steel guitar almost naturally lends itself to the layered distortion of post-rock and shoegaze — look at the reverb-heavy steel of Wednesday, or the viral success of “Pedal Steel Noah,” a young Texan musician who records pedal steel covers of dream pop and alt-rock classics from bands like The Cure, The Jesus and Mary Chain, and Joy Division.

Classic country steel might have always had a futuristic bent, but a new wave of adventurous steel players are pushing the instrument to a downright cosmic dimension. Rich Hinman cut his teeth playing pedal steel for a spectrum of adult-contemporary and indie-pop artists from St. Vincent to Sara Bareilles, but his new album Memorial is on a more out-there wavelength. Rather than a pure solo showcase, Hinman elegantly weaves his pedal steel into the tapestry of an instrumental ensemble that approaches something between ambient glitch and hillbilly jazz. On “Sky Lounge,” the steel guitar plays lead chair in a trip-hop orchestra, encircling with a tender saxophone and rumbling drums like beams of light intertwining on the horizon. In other moments, the atmosphere skews more traditional, like the Celtic-flavored accordion duet “Buddy,” a tribute to legendary steel player and Nashville session musician Buddy Emmons — his 1963 album Steel Guitar Jazz is a clear ancestor to the sonic frontiers traversed on Memorial. Rich Hinman demonstrates what’s so singular about the pedal steel: it’s an instrument that can evoke potent memories of the past while still stretching toward the future. — Nadine Smith

It was only weeks after Philadelphia fuzz-rockers feeble little horse released their great sophomore album, Girl With Fish, that they abruptly announced the cancellation of their summer headline tour. No reason was given, and their statement was kept vague, simply iterating that the horse needed to “get a good night’s sleep.” The response from fans was a balancing act of empathy and polite disappointment, commending the band for prioritizing their mental and physical health while still lamenting the potentially permanent loss of a great new indie rock force. This month, however, one of the band’s stallions has set out with their own solo project: feeble little horse guitarist Ryan Walchonski’s Aunt Katrina is a collection of scuzzy, hooky, anarchic noise-pop songs that pick up where feeble little horse left off — and more. Walchonski takes primary vocal duty on Aunt Katrina, where his hazy verses meld with discordant guitars and crunchy distortion that is lawless as it is joyful. Lo-fi bedroom pop and eclectic, synthy electro-rock join forces here, juxtaposed by the nihilism of Walchonski’s lyrics: “I’ve changed, and not for the best / Same shit, throw out the rest,” he mutters on “Obsessed.” On album highlight “Get Me Out of Bed,” Walchonski makes an anthem of everyday disillusionment: “I want something new to get me out of bed.” And perhaps he found it, as feeble little horse have just been announced to play Coachella this year. — Cady Siregar

The shoegaze revival was one of independent music’s defining stories in 2023. Veterans like Slowdive saw their sales rise exponentially thanks to TikTok while a new wave — led by artists like Jane Remover, Wednesday, yeule, and Hotline TNT — pulled inspiration from the genre freely without leaning too hard on what came before. 陽​の​か​け​ら (translated: Fragment of Sunshine), a new EP from the japanese “post-shoegaze” act inuha, falls into the latter camp in its embrace of the digital in the creation of its soaring sound. The lead vocals are sung by a Vocaloid, and the frayed edges of its nearly-human phrasings are audible from its first notes in the opening track “出発の朝,” a song which introduces the EP’s cloudy, Sigur Rós-inspired fantasy and ends with the sound of bitcrushed wind, crunching leaves, and a few lonely guitar notes. This affection for the natural world can be heard on “病気の子どもたち,” where soft wind chimes introduce a song with the structure of a massive, gently evolving loop, like its own seasonal shift. The deft confluence of the plainly artificial and deeply ineffable help make 陽​の​か​け​ら a standout amid a glut of shoegaze-indebted releases. — Jordan Darville

U.K. drill has been on a wild ride since emerging in the early 2010s, simultaneously influencing rap scenes across the globe while being used at home to monitor supposed criminal activity and punish creativity. Unknown T has been a significant figure in the latter half of the decade after making his sub-zero vocals heard on 2018's "Homerton B." In the subsequent years, he has balanced his output between heavy-hitting rap tracks and boundary-pushing collaborations with FKA twigs and Afrobeats group NSG. Earlier this month he dropped Blood Diamond, his long-awaited studio debut. Blood Diamond is Unknown T at the height of his powers, honing everything he has learned so far and delivering his most confident and accomplished work so far. The early stand-outs are the richly melodic "PASSA" and hard as nails posse cut "AVEN9ERS ASSEM8LE." The lyrics reflect Unknown T's rise, with mentions of bottle service and supercars balanced by memories of selling drugs at 14 ("Adolescence") and the trauma of a murder case that threatened to derail his career just as it was taking off. The throughline on all 17 tracks here is T's booming vocals, a delivery deeper than the Krubera Cave. He knows it, too, rapping "Who would've thought that this voice would've spread this far?" on Bon Appètit. The exciting thing about Blood Diamond is how it feels like the start of something new. — David Renshaw