Post-rock is a gene pool of musicians who have become notorious for their vehement insistence on anonymity. Apart from a handful of the most popular bands in the scene, you cannot find much info about the artists – very often, nothing. NEONWAVE is one of these acts. Here’s all I could gather from various online sources: it is an instrumental outfit comprised of just one musician, hailing from China. To make matters even more confusing, there is a verified solo artist by the same name on Spotify, but you’ll soon realize I’m not talking about that one here. If you wish to find the correct one, you’ll have to type the name of the band stylized as NeonWave in the search bar. It appears that this artist has released six albums already this year, which could suggest either AI-generated stuff or that the guy behind this artistic alias has been busy cleaning out his archives. His debut, the first installment in the “Echoes of Emptiness” album series, came out in November 2025, and he’s got twelve albums already under his belt, so it could be either way. The production is quite polished, so I guess it could be AI for all I know, but the songwriting does not have that generic stench of AI-slop about it – unless, of course, you happen to be one of those devout post-rock haters. Either way, the music certainly fits the description on the band’s profile pages on both Postrocknation and Bandcamp: “NeonWave creates instrumental soundscapes for those who travel alone across cities, memories, and sleepless nights.” Out of all these six most recent releases, I have found the one entitled “A Quiet Place to Exist,” released independently on January 26th, 2026, to be particularly good for taking the edge off after a hard day in this late-stage Capitalist dystopia. So, that’s the one I’m going to dissect here. It’s missing from Bandcamp, but as luck would have it, you can find it on those other two platforms.
The album is comprised of 19 instrumentals that are relatively short for post-rock compositions – I mean, there is not one single epic clocking in around the 10-minute mark as the gold standard of the genre would dictate. The shortest track, “Stillness Beneath Moving Wind,” clocks in at 2:40, and the longest track, “Letting Go in 2027,” is just a little bit over 7 minutes long – that’s like the post-rock equivalent of a “radio-friendly single length.” This short-form approach certainly factors into the album’s overarching feel of cohesiveness. Another thing that goes slightly against the grain, given the conventions of the genre, is that the modus operandi is less about the somewhat clichéd “From whisper to a scream” dynamics and more about exploring different shades of melancholy through modal guitar melodies and riffs. On occasion, the songs are reminiscent of other post-rock bands, such as GOD IS AN ASTRONAUT and JAKOB, and then, some guitar lines echo the style of Buckethead or Plini, in passing.
Right off the bat, “Slow Breathing Light” even features some trumpet, which is not exactly the most common instrument to come across on a post-rock album. It’s hard to say whether the brass lines are organic or VST – they sound almost a bit too convincing, in terms of tone and phrasing, to be programmed, but I know that the latest, state-of-the-art VST’s are pretty damn good. Plus, it helps that the melodic lines are written as though meant to be played by a human. So, even if it turned out that NeonWave has been using the latest VST’s or even AI-tools available, the dude would surely need to have some explicable talent to pull something like this off. While the album isn’t a showdown of pyrotechnical guitar prowess (post-rock typically isn’t about anything like that, by default), the songcraft, pacing, and overall arrangement speak for a musical vision worth paying some attention to.
Like always, post-rock endeavors such as this work best when you listen to them from start to finish in one go. There are a couple of standout tracks, however. One of the longer tracks, “Soft Reflections in the Fog,” is driven by a delicious delay motif, which might trigger Buckethead flashbacks. Then, “Above the World, Calm and Still,” in turn, recalls some softer bangers in Plini‘s back catalog. Obviously, I cannot resist the charm of the longest banger, either, because it throws in all of NeonWave‘s fortes in the same bowl – tight riffs, haunting melodies, delay motifs, atmospherics, and some more trumpet! For the past 20-something years, my album-of-choice for traveling alone has been a Finnish jazz rarity from the 1990s, “Garden of Time” by PERKO-PYYSALO POPPOO, but now I think it’s time to finally archive that one and start listening to NeonWave. His music is just perfect for watching the blurry reflections in the black mirror of a night train’s window.
Written by Jani Lehtinen
Tracklist
- Slow Breathing Light
- Deep Inner Space
- Where Light Slowly Disappears
- Walking Toward the Vanishing Line
- When Distance Becomes Silence
- Soft Reflections in the Fog
- Lingering Through the Clouds
- Above the World, Calm and Still
- Floating Over Quiet Valleys
- Following the Misty Path in Silence
- Letting Go in 2027
- Wind Between the Stones
- Echoes Across Empty Air
- The Mountain’s Quiet Answer
- First Breath of the Summit
- Light Swaying in the Night Air
- Stillness Beneath Moving Wind
- Cold Air, Slow Heartbeat
- Fading Warmth in Silent Snow
Lineup
NeonWave – everything
Label
Independent
