Soundscape is a weekly look at local and international releases making an impression on our musical radar. The list offers a cross-section of EPs and albums arriving at the station.

We have been busily scouring the Soundscape! Check out some of our favourite finds for this week 6 July 2020

Bananagun - The True Story of Bananagun (Anti-Fade)**Album of the Week

The debut full-length from the Melbourne group translates the energy and invention of their renowned live sets, fusing tropicalia, Afro-beat, psychedelia, garage and pop traditions. Reflected in all of their songs is the band's deep love of nature, including samples of kookaburra and parrot calls recorded in the region surrounding the home of band-founder Nik Van Bakel.

Poppongene - Futures Unsure (Out Golden Friend)

The Melbourne multidisciplinary artist Sophie Treloar has described her debut Poppongene EP as marking “the closing of a personal time in my life and everything that followed throughout.” With themes of love and loss, both in an exterior and interior context, Treloar has created 8 complex tracks in her glistening, sun drenched style as the perfect vehicle for her story.

Various Artists - Midnight Meditations (Chapter Music)

Supported by the City of Melbourne COVID-19 Arts Grants, midnight meditations is fourteen unreleased tracks from Australian-based artists “designed to help listeners through long dark nights of the soul.” The music represented is contemplative and ambient, designed for the late night, with tracks spanning from the 80s to the present day. Represented here are cuts from the likes of Sarah Mary Chadwick, Yiranda, Fia Fiell, Gallery B and many more.

박혜진 Park Hye Jin - How can I (Ninjatune Records/Inertia)

The much anticipated second release from the LA based South Korean producer comes after an ascendent and acclaimed run of dates through the biggest clubs and festivals in Europe, the US and Australia. On How can I, Park expands on the dreamy electronica of her debut to harvest more muscular sounds from juke, trap, and techno into her own sonic wheelhouse.

Ego Ella May - Honey For Wounds (UPPERROOM RECORDS)

Nearly a decade after first gracing stages, the South London future soul artist releases her long awaited debut with Honey for Wounds. Described as “music to heal to”, the album is centered around May’s gorgeous, dreamy, golden vocals, cradled by delicately produced instrumentation featuring many high profile contemporary jazz and soul instrumentalists from the US and UK.

Whirlywirld - Complete Discography 1978 - '80 (Sorcerer Records)

Whirlywirld was the first musical collaboration between the Australian Post-Punk trailblazers; vocalist Ollie Olsen (Reals, Young Charlatans) and drummer John Murphy (News). Inspired by international acts, the band formed in 1978 with the objective of exploring the sonic possibilities of electronic music within the post-punk ethos. This release collates their short but influential discography from 1978 - 1980.

Setwun - Our World (Mandarin Dreams)

Setwun is the project of composer, producer and multi-instrumentalist Josh Panakera-Moloney. His latest EP ‘Our World’ acts as a worship record to the power, healing and uniting capacity of music. With sincere connection to his roots and influences, Setwun creates a melting pot of styles, sounds and inflections which become uniquely his own within the flourishing Australian soul landscape.

Mulatu Astatke & The Black Jesus Experience - To Know Without Knowing (Agogo Records)

The legendary vibraphonist and “Father of Ethio-jazz” Mulatu Astatke continues his collaboration with the Melbourne collective Black Jesus Experience on To Know Without Knowing. Recorded between Addis Ababa and Melbourne, the record builds on the creative output of their unlikely partnership, combining original compositions of Ethipian melodies and hip-hop infused jazz and funk grooves, with reworkings of Ethio-jazz classics.

The Koreatown Oddity - Little Dominiques Nosebleed (Stones Throw)

The LA based underground rapper and producer turns to the autobiographical on his fourth solo LP. Taking his childhood neighbourhood of Koreatown, Los Angeles as the backdrop to his story, he tells the story of it’s shifting ethnic demographics, gentrification, conflict and people with warmth and love.

Haim - Women In Music Pt.III (Columbia)

The third album from the LA trio is their most complex and wide-screen album yet. The three sisters have each discussed in interviews that they arrived at the studio to record their newest album with their own personal traumas, mental and physical health struggles. These traumas form the thematic heart of the album, which is their most vulnerable and times at dark songwriting in their catalogue. Musicall, the album ventures beyond the sun-drenched sounds of California, with moments indebted to East Coast jazz and even UK garage.