The Besnard Lakes – A Coliseum Complex Museum

If you like giant orbs, the great outdoors, hanging out in museums and being told creepy, candle-lit stories of strange beasts and ghostly happenings, you’ll fit right in with The Besnard Lakes. The twelve-handed band from Montreal take their name from a collection of waters in rural Saskatchewan, and make no secret of their interest in mammoth, expansive landscapes – both sonic and geographical. 

Fifth album A Coliseum Complex Museum truly is colossal, and certainly complicated, but in such an un-rushed, all-encompassing way that – like with awe-inspiring natural phenomena – you feel no pressure to take it all in on the first go.

Mystical and psychedelic, with a real knack for texture and detail in the midst of a big, blown-out prog adventure, this is an album best served whole. Turn off those pesky shuffle features, draw the curtains and settle in for a luxurious full-length listen. It’s just what these all too long, too dark evenings require. [Katie Hawthorne]