Berlin, a city well known for its love of minimal techno and dark electronica, is where Niklas Kramer chose to make the home of his warm dream pop project Still Parade. Despite his music being a far cry from the hyper-cool club culture of Berlin it’s possible that the city’s affinity for electronic music had an impact on him. Kramer’s previous band Deep Sea Diver, which included a cello as well as him on acoustic guitar, operated within the realm of acoustic chamber pop. Deep Sea Diver was based in the German town of Gottingen, a city with a rich history of academia, aptly nicknamed ‘the city of science.’ The restrained sound of his former band compared to the lo-fi haze of Still Parade begins to make sense when considering the undeniable differences in a city of science and one of foggy warehouse clubs that stay open for days at a time. This is not to say that Concrete Vision sounds like something that could ever be played over the sweaty floors of Berghain, this blissed out debut album is meant to be enjoyed out in the open under a deep blue sky.

Concrete Vision is, however, rich with vibrant synths and well-layered 808 drumbeats, key staples of Berlin’s music scene, yet this is where the city’s seeming influence ends. Kramer’s sound comes to fall more in line with the wistful bedroom producer sound that came to define the lo-fi inclined chillwave movement of the late aughts. The percussion is relaxed, the melodies are comprised of bright catchy chords, and his vocals/guitar often exist shrouded in that style’s signature hazy reverb. With only one EP behind him, Kramer’s debut has a fully realized sound that most first LPs don’t. The album’s overall sound is cohesive; nothing sounds out of place because he’s chosen a style that works well with his abilities as a producer and singer. And yet, his devotion to this particular style of what he describes as “Dream Funk/Psych Pop” is that the songs tend to bleed into one another when not listened to carefully.

Fortunately, Concrete Vision is bookended by two very strong songs that are hard to forget. The first, “Seasons,” invokes loneliness while simultaneously managing to create a sense of hope as a steady bass line, chirpy synths, drum claps, and a guitar line all come together to create something that at only 2:04 leaves one craving more. The ninth and final song on the album “True Love” sounds like something Twin Peaks’ Angelo Badalamenti might have produced had he access to a midi keyboard, a MacBook, and a time machine back in 1989. In between these two sturdy songs is roughly 27 enjoyable minutes worth of music that hint at exciting things to come from Niklas Kramer as he continues the development of his sound.

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Jessy Lanza’s Pull My Hair is an exceptional debut release that helped demonstrate her ability to write, sing, produce, and collaborate. She and production partner Jeremy Greenspan of the Junior Boys once again manage to find that emotional space between lavish exaltations and intimate disappointments on Oh No. There is, however, a fundamental difference in both albums. Whereas Pull My Hair can be thought of as a sexually confident late night dial, the aptly named Oh No should be considered the clever but hesitant early morning explanation text following an unanswered phone call.

Although Oh No is not as sonically inviting as Pull My Hair, the majority of latter’s sultry slow building waves of synthesizers are replaced with sounds that operate under a frosty yet danceable urgency of minimal precision. In the nearly three years since her first release it is evident that touring has influenced the design of Lanza’s sound. These upbeat and sometimes unpredictable tracks have sound tailor-made for live performance. Over the years she has also gained outlook and learned when it’s appropriate to slow down, strictly in the romantic sense. Early in the bubbling spacey R&B track “vivica” she claims to want to take her time, and later with the line “not trying to pressure you baby” the listener gets the sense that seemingly youthful infatuation is now reflected on from a more mature and equally vulnerable place.

At the heart of everything is Jessy Lanza and her sense of concern regarding missed opportunities. Her adaptable voice seems to lead the production on every track, no matter how delicate and light it becomes the vocals never manage to be forgotten or overtaken by lush studio work. Her sharp lyrics of unrequited love and unsatisfying relationships cut through to the surface of almost every track. On “vv violence” she irreverently claims “I’m working all day long / For the love I never see / Yeah I say it to your face, but it doesn’t mean a thing, no!” Phone calls go unanswered, but luckily for the listener the love she doesn’t get to see is strongly felt.

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The opening instrumental track of Xavier Wulf’s, The Local Man, sounds like something a trap oriented producer might put together late one night during their stay at a New Age retreat, where “feeling” things is key.  And The Local Man’s production is easily felt. The opener, “Sleet & Hail,” places the listener in a sunny field of warm synths during a mild storm of transcendental 808s.

The album carries on with a hypnotic progression that evokes both 90’s era Three 6 Mafia, and Bone Thugs. A Raider Klan graduate, Wulf ‘s style of lyricism is often compared to both groups, and for good reason; the influence of their music on his overall sound is unmistakable. Still, when listening to The Local Man, it becomes obvious that Wulf is indeed his own man. Having left the Raider Klan to expand upon this sound, he uses frequent shifts in volume and speed to keep his voice from being lost in cloud rap purgatory. The atmosphere in which the music exists is not one of mindless reverb and weed smoke. The production on tracks like “The Hazard,” featuring Eddy Baker, is reminiscent of the delicate precision of Brian Eno’s Ambient 1: Music for Airports.

One of the standout tracks is “Last Step In The 1st Place,” which features frequent collaborator Bones. Anyone familiar with Cartoon Network’s Adult Swim programming will immediately recognize the “absolutely” sound bite from Tim Heidecker and Eric Wareheim’s Abso Lutely Productions, with which it opens. (From a cursory browsing of his Instagram account, one can see his interests in other stoner vices such as anime, Adventure Time, and Canadian cult classic Trailer Park Boys.) His voice is both cool and fragile, when he raps reflectively with “I don’t know what you want/and I don’t know what I want,” the thoroughly depressing piano progression that loops throughout “Last Step In The 1st Place” is satisfying in the way a good cry during a tragic foreign film is.

But the album isn’t all subdued doom and wavy gloom. On “Beyond The Clouds” his playful side comes out with lines like, “She say ‘JK’/She so silly” and “They think I’m Tom Hanks/ I cast away when I hit the spliff/ Jack Wulf Sparrow/ That’s my name when I hit the ship” Smoking is important to Wulf, and at times this subject matter, along with the smoky production can begin to feel a bit repetitive. But this isn’t a long album; all of the ten tracks come in under three minutes, and because of this The Local Man doesn’t overstay its welcome at the aforementioned New Age retreat. In an interview with the Memphis Flyer, Wulf stated that he’s “never recorded a song sober.” Everyone comes down from the clouds eventually, and this album encourages you to do it peacefully

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