Diana - Familiar Touch (2016) FLAC

Toronto's breezy synth-pop outfit DIANA began as a collaboration between drummer Kieran Adams and saxophonist Joseph Shabason, fixtures of the city's music scene who met while studying jazz at the University of Toronto (later, they played with acts including Warm Myth and Destroyer, respectively). Having written an album's worth of demos during a working holiday in the Canadian countryside, the pair recruited singer Carmen Elle, formerly of Spiral Beach and Army Girls, to lend some sweeter vocals to the project. The group finished recording in July 2012, and after posting some songs to SoundCloud, signed to Jagjaguwar Records. DIANA added another of Adams and Shabason's U of T classmates (and Hidden Cameras alumnus), Paul Mathew, to the fold before their debut, Perpetual Surrender, arrived in August 2013. Three years later, the group (minus Mathew) returned with second album Familiar Touch, which included singles "Confession" and "Slipping Away." ~ Heather Phares