Turin isn’t the first city you associate with shadowy, slow-burning heavy rock, but Dune Aurora have been sharpening their sound there for a while. Ginny, Roberta, and Serena first surfaced with a few singles and the 2022 Lonely Town EP, and even then it was clear they weren’t following anyone’s playbook. Their music felt like they were dusting off the remnants of some forgotten desert ritual rather than echoing whatever was getting traction online.
Ice Age Desert, their first full-length, leans into that blend of fuzzed-out psych, doom heat, and occult-tinted atmosphere. The riffs move with a kind of slow confidence – thick, patient, and worn in – like they’ve been hammered into shape over months in a cramped rehearsal space. Ginny’s vocals drift between smoky and otherworldly, slipping in and out of the guitar haze without losing their bite. The rhythm section keeps everything grounded (and quite catchy), steady enough to hold the tension but loose enough for the songs to stretch.
What gives the album its pull is the way the tracks bleed into one another with a hazy, late-night logic. Tiny details stand out: a bass line that clings to a note longer than expected, a drum fill that edges toward collapse before clicking into place. Those small imperfections make the record feel lived-in rather than engineered. Psychedelic touches appear like heat shimmer – nothing flashy, just a quiet distortion around the edges.
James Plotkin’s mastering keeps the whole thing rough around the edges. You can practically feel the amps humming, slightly overdriven, slightly unstable. Nothing here has been sanded down.
Dune Aurora don’t try to bowl you over. They let the sound pull you in gradually, and by the end you realize you’ve been caught in their dust storm without noticing when it started. Heavy, hypnotic, and quietly luminous, Ice Age Desert feels like the band finally uncovering the core of what they’ve been circling from the beginning – something brooding, warm, and unmistakably their own.
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Released by Octopus Rising on November 21, 2025
Music source for review – Grand Sounds PR
