Erased Tapes Vinyl & CDs

Review: After a year of creative stagnation, Ryan Lee West returns with music that pulses with renewed spirit and emotional clarity. Rather than retreat to well-worn methods, he ventured outside his Hackney studio, crafting this album from a collection of salvaged fragments and half-formed sketches. The result is a record that constantly shifts between introspective ambient passages and vibrant electronic bursts, always grounded by West's keen sensitivity to emotion and movement. There's a tactile, almost handmade quality throughout. Tracks like 'Catherine' unfold with disarming simplicity, just a bare melody and shifting drums, yet feel deeply alive. 'Known Shape' straddles the boundary between club and dreamstate, while 'In a Trance' bounces with uncanny charm, pieced together from disjointed rhythms and airy textures. '2 Forms' distorts synths into something raw and turbulent, and 'Nocturne' quietly explores shadowy spaces with ghostlike piano and reverb. West's background as a guitarist subtly informs the record's structure, and he often treats electronic elements with a sense of physicality. Acoustic guitar loops thread through 'In Reverse' and 'Gaivotas', blending digital and organic worlds with ease. Details like muffled percussion on 'Coda' or room ambience on 'Tape Loop' give the album a feeling of lived-in warmth. Landscape from Memory plays like a sonic diary, full of fragile reflections and sudden clarity. It's a rich, nuanced journey shaped by West's rekindled connection to creativity, and his gift for making the inanimate feel human.

Review: London-based Erased Tapes stalwart Rival Consoles crafts electronic music with an emotional core, bridging the human and the synthetic in a way few can. His ninth album channels a renewed creative energy, emerging from a period of detachment to produce some of his most immediate and affecting work. 'Catherine' flickers with a stripped-back intimacy, its exposed melody riding skittish drums, while 'Known Shape' lunges into unfamiliar rhythmic terrain. The title track, a euphoric closer, marks the point where hesitation turns into catharsis. Elsewhere, '2 Forms' bends and fractures under its own weight, and 'In a Trance' locks into an off-kilter, hypnotic pulse. Field recordings and unconventional techniquesidrums dampened on a sofa, tape loops capturing shifting room acousticsilend a tactile quality to the album, reinforcing its sense of place. Each piece feels like a snapshot, an artefact from a restless journey, where nostalgia and forward momentum collide in vivid bursts of colour.