André 3000 didn’t enter the studio intending to make an ‘Alice Coltrane’ or ‘Jon Hassell’ album, he simply followed his muse. If only more high profile artists did this.

Mia Garcia and Hailey Niswanger of OHMA made a pure chilled vibe record with ‘Between All Things,’ arguably the best such record of 2022.

Carl Weingarten and Delay Tactics offer more tempered prog that’s still filled, thankfully, with a very earthy groove.

The ambient, computer-generated drones of ‘New Primes’ produced by Greg Davis is a deep harmonic bath that uses your ears to transport your mind.

Recent albums from Steffie Moonlady and Dennis Haklar, and Hans Joachim Rodelius and Dallas Acid demonstrate the incredible variety of ambient music.

With a prepared piano, Satoko Fujii once again makes “music that no one has ever heard before.”

Those who seek to pigeonhole music – this is jazz, that is pop, this is hip hop – have their work cut out with Chase Ceglie’s ‘Fear and Love, Together.’

While classical purists may be aghast, Avawaves’ ambient varient is enjoyable for those with open ears.

Jon Dawson of Third of Never and Electric Forgiveness fame has crafted a solo album that’s quite different from the rocking power pop he is known for.

Samuele Strufaldi and Tommaso Rosati’s ‘1.15 K’ is fascinating not just because of the colliding of two musical worlds, but the creativity that went into it.