Aquarium Drunkard

Juni Habel :: Evergreen In Your Mind

Justin Gage — Fri, 22 May 2026 12:30:00 +0000

Norwegian songwriter Juni Habel drifts through haunted folk terrain on Evergreen In Your Mind, her third album and perhaps her most transportive yet. Built from trembling vocals, sparse guitar, room tone, and gently destabilized atmospherics, the record moves with a hushed intensity — intimate songs suspended somewhere between pastoral melancholy and dream-state solitude. Evoking the stark emotional clarity of Sybille Baier and the fragile chamber-folk textures of Department of Eagles, Habel creates music that lingers like fog rolling in off a dark coastline.

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Ed Askew :: For The World

Jason Woodbury — Fri, 22 May 2026 12:00:00 +0000

Jerry David DeCicca looks back on the making of Ed Askew’s 2013 late-period masterpiece For the World — a record assembled through borrowed rooms, broke musicians, chance encounters, and the quiet force of Askew’s songs themselves. What began in a sweltering West Harlem warehouse with Jay Pluck, Tyler Evans, and engineer Keith Hanlon gradually expanded through contributions from Mary Lattimore, Sharon Van Etten, and Marc Ribot, all orbiting Askew’s singular presence. DeCicca’s recollection captures an artist who had moved far beyond the “psych-folk” tag attached to his ESP-Disk years.

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Jeff Parker ETA IVtet :: Happy Today

Justin Gage — Thu, 21 May 2026 14:00:00 +0000

If The Way Out of Easy marked the emergence of the ETA IVtet as an entity separate from the site of the band's origins, Happy Today serves as another milestone: It's the first ETA IVtet record taped somewhere other than Enfield Tennis Academy. Capturing a 2025 set at the much-larger Lodge Room, the third album from guitarist Jeff Parker, saxophonist Josh Johnson, bassist Anna Butterss and drummer Jay Bellerose shows a band with more room to move and more space to listen. Over two meditative, grooving and restless long improvisations, Parker and the ETA IVtet hone their connection, deepen their focus, loose their restraints and continue their determined yet serendipitous transformation.

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Stix Hooper :: The Aquarium Drunkard Interview

Jason Woodbury — Thu, 21 May 2026 13:30:00 +0000

As a member of The Crusaders, drummer Nesbert "Stix" Hooper's life in music is a testament to the power of the groove. With his rhythms at the foundation, the band blended R&B, jazz, rock, funk, and eventually fusion, and his playing would go onto provide crucial samples for beats utilized by artists like J Dilla, Madlib, Three Six Mafia, and many more, making him, according to his label, "arguably the most sampled drummer of all-time." He joins Aquarium Drunkard to discuss his new album and storied history—and one necessary ingredient that should be in every pot of gumbo.

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Luiz Bonfá :: Introspection (1972)

Justin Gage — Thu, 21 May 2026 12:00:00 +0000

Long framed abroad as a translator of Brazilian music for international audiences, Luiz Bonfá reveals a far stranger and more intimate dimension on Introspection (1972), a hushed solo-acoustic meditation built from layered guitar lines, drifting counterpoint, and weightless melodic fragments. Tracing Bonfá’s unlikely path from Black Orpheus and CTI Records to hip-hop sampling and accidental pop immortality, this set repositions him not as an ambassador, but as a singular architect of suspended, dreamlike atmosphere.

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Beefheart & McGuinn :: Midtown Downtime

Justin Gage — Wed, 20 May 2026 19:15:51 +0000

The new collaboration between UK/Melbourne musicians William Murray and Winter McGuinn, Midtown Downtime is a warmly worn folk-rock set built on intoxicating harmonies and beautifully crisp production. Bound together by a shared lineage of touchstones, the duo channel a loose, rootsy sway that occasionally recalls the unhurried ease of J.J. Cale. Arriving at the onset of summer, Midtown Downtime carries an understated breeze that feels equally suited to late afternoons, long drives, or slow evenings with the windows open.

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Lee Shook on the Sun Ra Day Festival :: 2026

Jason Woodbury — Wed, 20 May 2026 17:30:00 +0000

Everyone knows he came from Saturn. But his earthly form, that of a young jazz prodigy Sonny Blount, was born on May 22, 1914, in Birmingham, Alabama. And Birmingham is where the the Sun Ra Day Festival, a multi-day, multi-city event—with outposts in London and Nashville—is rooted. Commemorating the 112th anniversary of his earthy arrival, the festival's aim is to explore and expand the cosmic legacy of Ra with film screenings, talks, and a performance by his Arkestra, under the leadership of the 102-year-old saxophonist Marshall Allen, who studied directly with Ra for decades. Organizer Lee Shook joins us to discuss.

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All One Song :: Jerry David DeCicca on “From Hank To Hendrix”

Jason Woodbury — Wed, 20 May 2026 12:00:00 +0000

Here to plumb the depths of “From Hank To Hendrix” today is Texas-based singer-songwriter Jerry David DeCicca. Like Neil Young, Jerry’s songs are often made out of seemingly simple materials, but the more you listen to them, the deeper they become, simplicity transforming into something wonderfully complex. For example, one of his best songs deals with the cosmic pleasure of watermelons.

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What’s There That Isn’t There: Avey Tare & Geologist on “Croz Boyce”

Justin Gage — Tue, 19 May 2026 13:00:00 +0000

Dave Portner and Brian Weitz are finally getting back to basics. After nearly three decades of pushing the concept of “rock music” to its absolute limit in Animal Collective, the duo better known as Avey Tare and Geologist recently dropped their debut collaborative release, Croz Boyce. A breezy, bountiful collection of instrumental jams, the record recalls Campfire Songs-era AnCo while simultaneously striking out in playful, surprising directions that almost verge on pop.

Recently, we sat down with Portner and Weitz to unpack where Croz Boyce came from, who Janis is, how Animal Collective was never even supposed to be a band, and much more.

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The DIY Multiverse of Charles Joseph Smith

Justin Gage — Tue, 19 May 2026 12:00:00 +0000

A classically trained pianist, electronic composer, uninhibited dancer, avant-garde experimentalist and Chicago underground scene fixture, Dr. Charles Joseph Smith lives and works in many worlds. A three-disc set containing just a smidgen of his voluminous DIY output gives a panoramic look at the variety and scale of his work while hinting at the vast expanses waiting to be discovered.

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Road to Ruin: A Decade of John Martyn – Bless the Weather

Justin Gage — Mon, 18 May 2026 13:06:09 +0000

... coming from the highly organized LP prior to this point, with its sincere arrangements, sultry takes, and soft edges, “Glistening Glyndebourne” takes moment to reveal its intent. What seems chaotic upon first listen slowly reveals a purpose. The experiment is embellished in supposed chaos, but close listening finds that Martyn is in control the entire time—the ever-looping echoplex serving as anchor.

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The Lagniappe Sessions :: Resavoir & Matt Gold

Justin Gage — Mon, 18 May 2026 12:00:00 +0000

Trumpeter/composer/producer Will Miller (AKA Resavoir) and guitarist Matt Gold released the collab LP Horizon almost exactly a year ago. The album was an expertly rendered love letter to the música popular brasileira world, its 10 tracks breezy, beautiful and deep. Horizon is lush without feeling overdone, intricate but never fussy, favoring groove and melody above all else. These two musicians may call Chicago home, but the sounds they make transport the listener directly to a Brazilian beach. Now, Miller and Gold are offering up a pair of bonus tracks for their debut Lagniappe Session together — gorgeous covers of MPB icons Mario Adnet and Caetano Veloso.

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Radio Free Aquarium Drunkard :: May 2026

Justin Gage — Sun, 17 May 2026 18:00:00 +0000

Freeform transmissions from Radio Free Aquarium Drunkard on dublab. Airing every third Sunday of the month, RFAD on dublab features the pairing of Tyler Wilcox’s Doom and Gloom from the Tomb and Chad DePasquale’s New Happy Gathering. This month, Tyler leads things off with some interstellar jazz/psych/etc instrumentals, equal parts breezy, funky and crunchy. Chad follows up with an hour's worth of hallucinogenic psych & weirdo freakbeat-pop. Sunday, 4-6pm PT.

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Kevin Morby :: Little Wide Open

Jason Woodbury — Fri, 15 May 2026 12:00:00 +0000

Kevin Morby’s Little Wide Open trades restless drift for hard-earned steadiness, mapping middle-American domesticity, memory, and partnership into widescreen soft-rock forms that feel less revivalist than quietly lived-in. Aaron Dessner’s production keeps the frame clean and open, letting the songs arrive with the unforced inevitability of classic Petty or heartland-era FM transmission.

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“Who the Fuck Is That?” :: Kathleen Edwards Reconsiders Failer

Justin Gage — Thu, 14 May 2026 17:36:43 +0000

27 years after her debut, Kathleen Edwards revisits Failer and early songs she barely recognizes, tracing the strange path back through musician-producers, a covers project born of the algorithm, and relearning how to believe what you sing.

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