Nodding both in name and spirit to influential British BBC Radio 1 DJ John Peel, New York's Peel Dream Magazine offers up a low-key but endearingly insistent debut that recalls the dazed, psych-inspired minimalism of early-'90s indie pop. The project of New York musician Joe Stevens, Peel Dream Magazine takes many of its cues from the mesmerizing sonic environment of classic Stereolab albums, utilizing a mix of burbling analog synths and organs along with fuzzed-out guitars and hushed, hypnotic vocals. Written and recorded by Stevens during a four-week period in late 2017, Modern Meta Physic has the homespun appeal of a classic period of D.I.Y. indie music that existed in the early '90s before the garage revival steered home recording back into a more primal and decidedly ramshackle territory. The album's grainy fidelity and motoric two-chord grooves contain a certain amount of elegance and finesse, whispering of obscure Krautrock, psych, and French pop releases from earlier decades while emitting its own pirate radio signals faintly in the background. Take "Shenandoah," for example, a lovely sleeper of a track whose repetitive sequence snakes gently along like its namesake river, then fades out mid-chorus, suggesting some infinite loop. "Deetjen's" takes a similar tack, chugging along in a stylish mod fug of easy guitar jangle and buried vocals before also fading out into some unseen terminus. The spacy "Wood Paneling" offers up its library of vintage radio and television announcements in a soporific loungey collage, while "Anorak" takes a more sprightly if wobbly approach to narcotic indie pop. Overall, Modern Meta Physic is deeply reminiscent of a certain era of indie pop, but Stevens has such a strong command of the tonal language and obvious fondness for its sounds that he manages to convey a character of tenderness and appreciation rather than one of imitation.