An unapparent but striking appearance in the way that only the most intimate things can, Vivienne emerged just as the globalization of the pandemic was snapping to quietly be celebrated as one of that year’s happenings in various publications and hearts. And with the calmness that an album of this nature asks for. The debut album of this Australian artist living in London, Vivienne felt the pulse of this city in a way that is as personal in its delivery as it is universal in its empathy, resonating with DIY resources a series of strains that in a dream can be pop as well as chamber music, spiritual jazz or narcotic beat. And if the “poverty” of means of Vivienne, made of little or nothing more than piano, voice and effects could refer to electro-acoustic landscaping, by projecting Sakini into the chemtrails of shoegaze, where the suspension of Slowdive’s Trellisaze is felt in Grouper, we escape the post-covid buzzword that ambient has become. That is, as indoor music and ripped functionalism from wallpaper, this one comes loaded with experiences made memory, of songs stripped down to their most vital and intimate elements. Already this year, the vinyl reissue of Into the Traffic, Under the Moonlight – imagined as an encore to Vivienne – and Blip in the Bungalow sort of open the window to let in the surroundings, expanding the arsenal to cello, winds, more sampler and beat, stomping the streets in that state of lysergic hypnosis that has made trip hop sometimes interesting and that has resurfaced with urgency recently through the likes of Jonine (HTRK), much in keeping with this last year and a half. Sakini entry in Boomkat’s Documenting Sound series – Strada – is a reflection of this, touching like few others on the emotional core that hides under the curtain of uncertainty of these times. BS

Maria Reis (Pega Monstro, Cafetra) and Rudi Brito (Yong Yong, Luar Domatrix) got together for the first time in 2019 for a performance at Rudi’s painting exhibition Voice of Lime, at Spirit Shop in Lisbon. Now, two years later, the two friends and new neighbors show the result of afternoon meetings in the presence of the cat, the sound of mystery, in the beauty of time passing. A natural union of brotherly ears, the important experience of contemplation.