I just got into Swans. Their albums “To be kind” or “Glowing man” are great, and it reminded me of “20 Jazz Junk Greats” by Throbbing Gristle. I wonder how many great experimental albums are there?
Heh, not to disappoint you, but that’s some of Swans’ newest music. Their discography goes back to '83. Killing for Company off of The Great Annihilator (1995) is my favorite song of theirs. Then again, I haven’t listened to To Be Kind & Glowing Man, so I’ll have to check those out.
To get this one out of the way, The Caretaker - Everywhere At The End Of Time.
My personal recommendation would be Kayo Dot. Here’s their album Dowsing Anemone With Copper Tongue.
Dowsing Anemone is great, I’ll dig some more Kayo Dot now! Thanks for sharing.
Yeah, you’re right. I checked their bandcamp page and assumed these albums were earliest. I’ll edit it now.
Black Midi is pretty experimental.
Here’s a few of my favourite “weirder” albums:
Death Grips - The Money Store (Aggressive alternative hip hop/industrial)
Animal Collective - Merriweather Post Pavillion (Psychedelic folk/pop)
Clipping - CLPPNG (Alternative hip hop)
Daniel Johnston - Hi, How Are You? (Lofi pop/indie)
Charles Mingus - The Black Saint and the Sinner Lady (Jazz)
Miles Davis - Bitches Brew (Jazz)
Meshuggah - Catch 33 (Djent/Prog Metal/Extreme Metal)
John Frusciante - Niandra LaDes and Usually Just a T-Shirt (Experiential folk)
Black Country New Road - For the First Time (Prog rock/Post rock/sort of “Jazz” IDK)
Hope you find something you like!
Great suggestions!
I was wondering what experimental meant so looked up Swans. The only band i know of thats super weird is called Clowncore, i dont listen to them but maybe someone likes it
The drummer in Clowncore is widely believed to be Louis Cole. His band Knower is very cool.
Knower have very recently released a brand new album, only available on bandcamp for now as they are independent and trying to earn some money and Spotify pays very little. Will release on Spotify in a while though.
No shit!!! That’s wild
I’ll be honest, I don’t really know what counts as “experimental,” but I’ve been really liking music in this genre that I guess is called “Baroque Metal” or something like that. Igorrr and Keygen Church have been a couple favorites.
More on the jazzy side, I listened to Sungazer’s album Perihelion on repeat for like two straight weeks, it’s really good
I love Igorrr. It has been interesting seeing the project progress to having lots of musicinas rather than just sampling. I love the older stuff with the samples, but I imagine the new stuff would be fun to see live.
Igorrr is wild. Shout out to Patrick the chicken 🐔
Keygen Church is SO GOOD. I really dig this fusion of metal, glitch (I guess? I don’t really know a good term for it lol) and baroque music. I’ll check Igorrr out, I’ve been craving something in that vein for the longest time!
I actually found Igorrr first, and had no idea what I was in for (I was unaware of this genre before I found them). They’re fantastic, I hope you enjoy!
I really enjoyed Igorrr! I think it has more middle-eastern influences, which I really dig! Thanks for the recommendations! :D
Have you listened to Master Boot Record? It is the same guy as Keygen Church. A few years back he set up some really fun internet scavenger hunts with some fun puzzles, ciphers, etc using old protocols, which eventually led to unreleased tracks and an actual BBS.
I haven’t! I’ll check it out, I love his work on Keygen Church!
The Caretaker’s An Empty Bliss Beyond This World (2011)
maudlin of the Well and Kayo Dot! My two favorite bands. Both avant-garde metal bands led by Toby Driver. motW’s Bath / Leaving Your Body Map are sister albums and an amazing listen back to back, start to finish. Kayo Dot’s Choirs of the Eye is one of the best albums of all time, another amazing full listen.
I don’t know how experimental they were per se, solidly jazz fusion, but anything by the Mahavishnu Orchestra tends to be a journey.
Probably not to your taste, but Veilburner makes some really unique and good Death/Black Metal
The Red Crayola with The Familiar Ugly album, The Parable Of Arable Land is an amazing listen. It’s psychedelic rock experimental style. Coil made the album Musick to Play in the Dark. It’s an electronic, darkly ambient, spoken word piece of music. Colin Locker Kid made the album Empathica, and it’s very hard to label. It has elements of hip-hop and spoken word, but it’s an abstract, collage of an experimental album. No idea if any of them sound interesting? They were the first three to spring to mind.
Some stuff I’ve been listening to lately they you might be into -
https://mands.bandcamp.com/album/15-6-2014
https://iecrazy.bandcamp.com/album/non-compos-mentis
https://gillaband.bandcamp.com/album/the-early-years
https://open.spotify.com/album/3F5g47LLRqNP9NwYMtv5fH?si=_Re4_8WYTt6gV4DyD8Qdrg&context=spotify%3Aalbum%3A3F5g47LLRqNP9NwYMtv5fH (can’t find their Bandcamp)
Captain Beefheart - Trout Mask Replica
The Caretaker - Everywhere At The End Of Time
Flux Of Pink Indians - The Fucking Cunts TreatUs Like Pricks
Crass - Yes Sir, I Will
Velvet Underground - White Light/ White Heat
Black Midi - Cavalcade
Earth - Earth 2
Swans - Soundtrack For The Blind
Godspeed! You Black Emporer - Raise Your Skinny Fists
Sunn O)) - Pyroclasts
That Caretaker piece is a hard listen. Absolutely beautiful though.
It’s hard because of the subject matter but also the length. It takes about 6 hours and to really appreciate it you need to listen to it in one sitting.
Awesome stuff! That Flux album is new to me, really gonna listen to it later based off the others on this list.
It’s quite similar to Yes Sir, I Will but more angry and noisy if possible. I think it came about after the sexual assault of a friend and the lyrics are heavily based on that experience.
This is gonna be a disturbing workday in the best way
How experimental do you want? Einstuerzende Neubauten made some interesting records in the eighties (and later as well). I enjoy Five on the open-ended Richter Scale.
All Bitches Die by Lingua Ignota is absolutely terrifying, in a good way (if you enjoy unhinged screaming and beautiful melody, and who doesn’t?). It’s not a crappy hip hop album, but deals with artist’s experience of abuse and with revenge, hence the title.
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Probably not as experimental as some others here, but Flume - Hi This is Flume (especially with the visualizer on YouTube)
