ALBUM REVIEW: BLOC PARTY – HYMNS

Remember last year when Bloc Party lost some of its original members, Gordon Moakes and Matt Tong? Well, according to lead singer Kele Okereke you can blame that on ‘someone doing cocaine and someone not being into it’.  But it doesn’t seem as though the 4- piece band are losing out with the new, yet […]
Tindersticks has been a reassuring presence on the British music scene for over two decades, exploring the landscape of human emotions in their own unique classically restrained chamber-pop style. The band led by the sophisticated rich baritone of Stuart Staples, now has a settled line-up after a number of personnel changes following the dissolution of the […]

Album Review: Tindersticks – The Waiting Room

Album Review: Beans on Toast – Rolling up the Hill

December is a time of year when long-standing traditions are celebrated. A less heralded one, but a ritual that should be, is the annual release from Beans on Toast. The seventh album, Rolling Up the Hill, has continued the pattern of the first day of the month seeing a new album emerge. The significance of […]
Wrong Way is a new independent record label specialising in psychedelia, shoegaze, spacerock, leftfield and krautrock emerging from the depths of Cornwall. This will be the labels first release and emerges into the world on 5th February 2016. Founded in 2003, Norway’s Rancho Relaxo are known for their talent to create compelling, absorbing sound that […]

ALBUM REVIEW: RANCHO RELAXO – WHITE LIGHT FEVER

Album Review: Lanterns on the Lake – Beings

The first time I picked up Lanterns on the Lake’s début full-lengther Gracious Tide, Take Me Home it was for embarrassingly superficial reasons – the band’s unusual, starry-eyed name, a cover designed like a battered old book – it all seemed to give off an independent, DIY impression I hoped would reflect in their sound. Thankfully […]
Fuzz Club’s exploration of the psychedelic underground has yielded another stellar discovery in Italian coldwave duo Throw Down Bones. With live performances at Liverpool Psych Fest and the Fuzz Club Festival both being treated with great accolades, the debut album is eight tracks of instrumental electronica born from experimentation, and is the most played album […]

ALBUM REVIEW: Throw Down Bones – Throw Down Bones

Album Review: EL VY – Return to the Moon

When the formation of EL VY was announced, I was particularly excited. A duo combining the giddy electronica of Menomena with the refined introspection of the national, seemed like something only dreams could be made of. When the lead single and the album’s opening track ‘Return to the moon’ hit the blogosphere, it was anything […]
Prior to the album release, Bradford Cox revealed Concept Map listing the influences of the album, which seems to have acted as a handy companion to any press release. Most reviews already posted seem to pick a circle of the map and use that as the premise for their review (see Ian Cohen of Pitchfork’s focus on […]

Album Review: Deerhunter – Fading Frontier

Album Review: Pretend – Tapestry’d Life

Tapestry’d Life is the brand new album from post-rock American quartet Pretend, released on October 9th. The group have been playing and writing together since 2004, and the time taken to mould their experimental sound and approach to music certainly shows, creating one of the most exciting albums I’ve listened to this year. A musical […]
Dodge and Burn is Nashville supergroup The Dead Weather’s 3rd album, through Jack White’s own Third Man Records. The band are an amalgamation of Raconteurs, with bassist Jack Lawrence and Queens of The Stone Age guitarist Dean Fertita joining Jack on Drums and The Kills Alison Mosshart on vocals. Any project of Jack’s is guaranteed top billing, and this […]

ALBUM REVIEW: THE DEAD WEATHER – DODGE AND BURN