Suggestions
Suggestions
In the 1970s the name space rock went to Pink Floyd, Hawkwind and bands like them. It later moved to a generation of alternative and indie bands working from ambient music, psychedelic rock and experimental ideas, and Britain’s Spacemen 3 came first, drone-heavy and minimal. When they split in 1991, Spiritualized grew the sound into lush orchestrated pieces. The music moves slowly and repeats until it feels weightless: guitars swim in reverb, drums stay sparse, the singing is soft and sometimes sits below the instruments, and tracks stretch out with little use of verse and chorus.
Italy’s Ufomammut put out the “Crookhead” EP on their own Supernatural Cat Records ahead of their 25th anniversary, still pairing huge riffs with psychedelia. Los Angeles band Vast Asteroid, with former Warlocks bassist Mimi Star, call their mix of shoegaze, space rock, desert rock, art grunge and britpop “spacegaze”. Seattle’s Critté wrote “Spaced Out” as a heavy song inspired by David Bowie, with guitar riffs, playful synthesizers and a sci-fi animated video. Grails came back from a five-year break with “Anches En Maat”, a single LP after sprawling double albums, unfolding its layers with eerie patience, and London’s Wildernesses, started in 2022 as a way to “play sad songs loudly in a practice room”, put out “Four Hour Drive” as their first single.