15 Albums For Bandcamp Friday

From breezy Lebanese Pop to sinister digital noise to dreamy indie rock, here are 15 albums worth your time and money this Bandcamp Friday.

The last Bandcamp Friday of 2023 is upon us; possibly the last one ever. As usual, there’s a ridiculous wealth of incredible, inspiring new sounds to get lost in this month. We’ve heard so many amazing records we just had to return with our Bandcamp Friday shopping guide.

There’s a little bit of a lot of different kinds of things on this month’s list. There’s a new repress of Sublime Frequencies’  Ishq Ke Maare: Sufi Songs from Sindh and Punjab, Pakistan for those looking to drop the needle on some Sufi music and Pakistani folk. Habibi Funk’s East Of Any Place from Lebanese folky Rogér Fakhr is a welcome breath of warm air for cold days (in the Northern Hemisphere). Dave Clarkson’s Ghosts of Christmas Past is one of the most hauntological things we’ve heard in a minute - like the Sorcerer’s Apprentice bringing all of the clockwork toys from the 1850s to the 1980s to uncanny life. So is Kid Acne’s Hauntological Codes, a retrodelic hip-hop joint that’s also just tons of fun. Portland’s Heterodox Records closes out a strong year with a new collaborative project called Aeon Angeles, to make all of your cyberpunk dreams come true.

This Bandcamp Friday is a strong close to a strong year in music. To commemorate the occasion, here are 15 of our top picks for this month’s Bandcamp Friday!

We’ve compiled all of our picks into a list on BuyMusic.Club, as well, for easy browsing and batch purchasing.

15 Albums for Bandcamp Friday; December 2023 Edition

Aeon Angeles - Udon Noodles

BIGMORTALCOIL - The Drone Engine

Two lengthy tracks of ferocious industrial drone from BIGMOTORCOIL, a new project from the Dirty Knobs' Zac Bentz. Like an engine firing up to open a wormhole to hell.

Dave Clarkson - Ghosts of Christmas Past

A symphony of existential speak 'n spells and robotic glockenspiels, antique clocks and ancient music boxes, all wrapped in an unheimlich aura of delirious reverbs and a sea of glistening analog noise. Like the ghosts of Christmas Morning circa 1850 - 1980 brought to mechanical uncanny life, like the Sorcerer's Apprentice bringing all the wind-up toys and primitive circuitry to clockwork life.

Darksoft - Grayscale 

Portland, Maine's Darksoft returns with his best album to date, delivering 10 brand new tracks of his distinctive blend of guitar-oriented indie rock and dream pop. It's full of dreamy ambient textures and moving, emotional vocals and layers of gorgeous guitars. Most of all, it's full of actual songs, the kind you want to drop onto mixtapes and listen to over and over.

Rogér Fakhr - East Of Any Place

Rare archival recordings unearthed from Habibi Funk while releasing Fakhr's 2021 album Fine Anyway. Recorded in the late '70s, East Of Any Place is seven tracks of laidback Lebanese folk pop with slight psychedelic flourishes.

Hawksmoor - Dracula (1897)

Library of the Occult's sprawling, never-ending alternate soundtrack for Bram Stoker's Dracula continues with two tracks of swirling analog electronics, with Hawksmoor's organs hanging like funereal fog over the Borgo Pass.

Headhunter - Live 10.7.23

Nice album of elliptical poetry, interspersed with jewels of Eastern Mysticism and philosophical musings, and sparking atonal ambient noise from poet Carrie Hunter and Headboggle's Derek Gedalecia. 

Hemadaxis - Hemadaxis 

Debut album from Portland modular synthesis is a bristling, glistening  mishmash of  dnb, digital glitch, industrial percussion, and the occasional electro epiphany. Has more ideas than Bertrand Russell on an espresso jag which, miraculously, all manage to sound cohesive and coherent. A true trip, one that you'll want to take again and again.

Kid Acne - Hauntology Codes

Sheffield's Kid Acne turns in 10 tracks of hauntological hip-hop, overflowing with decades of sci-fi pop culture nestled into a setting of boom-bap beats, '90s turntablism and gloopy layered infomercials. Like having multiple tabs open playing audio simultaneously.

Kemper Norton - Libraries

A collection of early demos and out-takes finds Kemper Norton developing his signature dreamy folk magic. Droning loops, mesmerizing chimes, backwards echoes, distant voices, Libraries is a fever dream of some lost Village Green marching band 

Milieu - April's Blissed Communion

A new 3xC-r edition of sprawling drones from Brian Grainger's Milieu project, summoned out of a R-EW Audioholistics modular system. Droney and dreamy, soothing and just a touch unsettling April's Blissed Communion is four hours of gossamer, diaphonous drones, drifting on a gentle breeze. Tranquil and hypnotic, transportive and mesmerizing, April's Blissed Communion will take you places.

Dorothy Moskowitz & Retep Folo - The Afterlife E.P.

Collaboration between legendary psych musician Dorothy Moskowitz and Retep Folo, a.k.a. Peter Olof Fransson of The Owl Report finds the pair exchanging visionary radiophonic poetry and rickey, ramshackle bootsale electronics for an album of cozy, evocative stereophonic musings. The lathe cuts are already long gone, but The Afterlife E.P is well worth a listen in whatever medium you can get your hands on.

Lida Pawliuk - Eight Exits

Eight tracks of moody, mysterious beatless ambient from Lida Pawliuk on Los Angeles' Jungle Gym Records.

Semiotic Ghosts - No. 5

LA's Semiotic Ghosts return with an absolute barn-burner, four tracks of excoriating, disorienting digital noise. Like dissolving in the guts of AM.

Various Artists - Ishq Ke Maare: Sufi Songs from Sindh and Punjab, Pakistan

Vinyl reissue of a sublime collection of Pakistani folk and Sufi music from Sublime Frequencies. Sometimes breezy and driving, other times mournful and meditative, here's a chance to hear a selection of a good cross-section of tastefully curated Pakistani folk, offering a taste of the many different types of wonderful Pakistani music.  

What’re y’all listening to, picking up, and obsessing over this Bandcamp Friday?

Many publications might be slowing down for the New Year, as we grind into the usual End Of Year madness, but not us! Stay tuned for more hauntological ruminations as we close down the wheel of the calendar year. Likes, comments, subscriptions and shares are much appreciated, as well!