Copper Lung, 2009

The debut full-length from Illinois’ aptly-named Oceans is an hour of post-rock of the joyful and dreamy kind, its gentle melodies climbing towards appropriately grand climaxes. Their deft grasp of said intensity-building structures and atmospherics, and some carefully placed group vocals, make this a very solid start.

Smalltown America, 2009

Just when you thought it was safe to shoegaze, this impressive Belfast quartet’s debut shows up and injects instrumental post-rock with a welcome shot of energetic immediacy. Playful, technical, and massively noisy when it wants to drive a point home.