Swell Maps Essentials

Haphazardly bisecting the Venn diagram of punk and New Wave, West Midlands boys Swell Maps combined Krautrock rhythms with helter-skelter experimental noise rock, layering skittish jams with intoxicating harmonies to form a woozy, phantasmic whole. Notoriously freewheeling when it came to rehearsing, the band wrote prolifically but recorded little, making their two lone albums—and celebrated standing as one of Britain's greatest post-punk bands—even more extraordinary.