ALBUM ROUNDUP WEEK ENDING 4 AUGUST 2023

Here is a chance to browse through the Silent Radio rack of this week’s album releases, an intriguing array of generally newer artists to discover. Oiro Pena            Puna      Finnish jazz collective creating a mix of lo-fi spiritual jazz, experimental, and avant-garde music forms. It includes four vocal tracks recorded with Merikukka Kiviharju, which feature both […]
At a Tarot reading during the pandemic, Ryan Fuson of Holy Wave was struck by the Five of Cups card which signifies loss and grief. A cloaked figure with a bowed head looming over three spilled chalices while ignoring the two full vessels, it is seen as symbolising dwelling in a negative past rather than […]

ALBUM REVIEW – HOLY WAVE: FIVE OF CUPS

ALBUM REVIEW – THE CLIENTELE: I AM NOT THERE ANYMORE

The Clientele has been described as a band who rather than merely creating their own individual sound have gone a step further to create their own world during their 32-year career. It is characterised by a hazy, shimmering, understated guitar pop married to an evocative lyricism. Their first release since 2017’s ‘Music for the Age […]
There is a healthy selection of new releases this week, including a few covered in greater depth elsewhere on this section. Here is our brief roundup. Dexys    The Feminine Desire      Their first album in over a decade sees Kevin Rowland reevaluating the whole concept of masculinity that he grew up with. Dot Allison         Consciousology Former […]

ALBUM ROUNDUP WEEK ENDING 28 JULY 2023

ALBUM REVIEW – DOT ALLISON: CONSCIOUSOLOGY

Concept albums were scorned and derided for a long time. Recently, the pendulum has flipped and significant numbers of long players, if not advertising themselves as concept albums, have an underlying theme that links the songs. This could be a response to streaming and the need to make long-playing records relevant as entities rather than […]
Blur are back with their ninth album, a whole 20 years since 2003’s ‘Think Tank’ and eight years since 2015’s ‘The Magic Whip’. At this point, you’re probably questioning what is happening. Is there finally a resurrection of our classic, beloved Britpop? Or have we just harped on enough to get another album? Either way, […]

ALBUM REVIEW – BLUR: THE BALLAD OF DARREN

ALBUM ROUNDUP WEEK ENDING 21 JULY 2023

A busy week of releases with plenty to grab the attention. Here is our weekly roundup. Wren Hinds        Don’t Die in the Bundu  A gleaming set of gently dappled and poetic songs about fatherhood and fortitude from Cape Town based singer-songwriter. Mull Historical Society   In My Mind There’s A Room        A concept album in which […]
Few bands can compete with the legacy Dexys Midnight Runners created in the early 1980s. Both the donkey jacketed, amphetamine surge soul gang of ‘Searching For The Young Soul Rebels’ and the dungaree clad Celtic soul barrage of ‘Too Rye Aye’ burst with incomparable euphoric energy and intensity. Unlike the records of many of their […]

ALBUM REVIEW – DEXYS: THE FEMININE DIVINE

ALBUM REVIEW: WEST COAST POP ART EXPERIMENTAL BAND – A DOOR INSIDE YOUR MIND, THE COMPLETE REPRISE RECORDINGS 1966-1968

The West Coast Pop Art Experimental Band were part of the 60’s psych explosion emerging from California, who melded brilliant harmonies with folk rock riffs. The three albums the band recorded for Reprise Records, ‘Part One’, ‘Vol 2’ and ‘A Child’s Guide To Good And Evil’ are contained within this box set, as well as […]
The first sign of the summer lull with a comparatively quiet week but still a few releases to contemplate. Current Affairs                  Off The Tongue Current Affairs’ music straddles new-wave pop and gothic post-punk in the way that you should expect a Glasgow-Berlin band to do so: with grit and panache. Peace Flag Ensemble     Astral […]

ALBUM ROUNDUP WEEK ENDING 14 JULY 2023