Album Review: Frank Turner – Positive Songs For Negative People

Frank turner is a man who seems to have hardly slept since he began this solo venture of his back in 2006.  If he’s not writing he’s in the studio, and if he’s not in the studio he’s on the road. Positive Songs For Negative People is Frank’s sixth album and follows up 2013’s Tape […]
The Maccabees in my opinion have always been an underrated outfit. When you’ve got groups like Kasabian and Kaiser Chiefs pissing around the industry like headless chickens desperately trying to reinvent themselves, it’s nice to see a band come along with a positive correlation rather than a disjointed ‘progression’ in accordance with fashion trends in […]

ALBUM REVIEW: THE MACCABEES ‘MARKS TO PROVE IT’

ALBUM REVIEW: FLY GOLDEN EAGLE – QUARTZ BIJOU

ATO Records’ press release states that this album is “Nashville Psych-Rock for fans of Pond, King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard, T Rex, The Doors”. I would argue that they’re not really too much like any of those bands at all, but still, they’re right, if you like those bands you’ll probably like Fly Golden Eagle. They’re brash, bold, and […]
Omar Souleyman’s own promoters have labelled Bahdeni Nami as his “second proper studio effort”, but this does little to convey the man’s career. Performing since 1994, Souleyman has made over 500 recordings, the majority of which were released as cassettes of his performances at wedding ceremonies in his native Syria, the resale of which has […]

ALBUM REVIEW: OMAR SOULEYMAN – BAHDENI NAMI

Album Review: Sleaford Mods – Key Markets

“Wonderful Cunts. That is all.” That’s ideally what I’d like to have published however, due to the restrictions of word count and “professionalism” more of an explanation as to why I love this band is required. But hey it’s Sleaford fucking Mods so I couldn’t give a fuck! Key Markets sees the boys from Nottingham, Jason […]
Ezra Furman’s rise to prominence stems from some hyperbolic words from Michael Hann. His five star review of Day of the Dog, where he proclaimed the record a “genre classic…that never feels like an exercise, but a living breathing piece of self-expression”, gave the band the success they enjoy in the UK. And those words aren’t unfounded, […]

Album Review: Ezra Furman – Perpetual Motion People

Album Review: Jenny Hval – Apocalypse, girl

What is immediately striking about Jenny Hval’s third studio album Apocalypse, girl is the Norwegian’s fearlessness in exploiting speech and melody to convey her highly individual worldview. As a credited lyricist, writer and singer all rolled into one, her work demonstrates an artistic, experimental quality that incorporates familiar influences yet stretches out far beyond them. […]
Gengahr have trapped a little nugget of sunshine. A Dream Outside is music perfectly paired with a healthy dose of vitamin D. It percolates your inner ear and clouds your vision and poof: you’re at a sunny festival, on a grassy knoll overlooking satellite stage. It gives you that midway-through-my-fourth-warm-can buzz. Although there are plenty […]

Album Review: Gengahr – A Dream Outside

Album Review: Kathryn Williams – Hypoxia

The new album from Kathryn Williams owes its origin to a commission from New Writing North for the Durham Book Festival, when she was asked to write songs inspired by Sylvia Plath’s book The Bell Jar. It was a daunting prospect for the Liverpool-born singer-songwriter and after returning to the source text, the initial five […]
There is as much to treasure about Nozinja Lodge as a statement of where the music industry finds itself in 2015 as there is with the addictive music itself. Nozinja – aka Richard Mthethwa – hails from the poverty-stricken South African province of Limpopo, and has become the talisman for the burgeoning genre hybrid known […]

Album Review: Nozinja – Nozinja Lodge