Dream Nails - Doom Loop (Album Review)

Dream Nails are a band of intention, fearlessly tackling topics that many avoid as they don’t have the mettle — not to mention the musical chops — to turn an unacceptable socio-political reality into something captivating and joyful.

Written by: Laura Johnson | Date: Friday, 27 October 2023

Offset - Set It Off (Album Review)

The best word to describe Offset’s career to date is turbulent. On one hand there’s being part of one of trap's greatest groups, Migos, and forming a rap power-couple with Cardi B. On the other is scandal and tragedy, including the loss of his bandmate  Takeoff last year. Nothing has come easy, and so it is with his second solo album 'Set It Off'.

Written by: Jack Terry | Date: Wednesday, 25 October 2023

Sampha - Lahai (Album Review)

Sometimes life goes in circles. Sampha’s ‘Lahai’ is a long-awaited return that follows up a long-awaited debut, picking up where 2017’s ‘Process’ left off before journeying to a host of unexpected realms.

Written by: Tom Morgan | Date: Wednesday, 25 October 2023

††† (Crosses) - Goodnight, God Bless, I Love U, Delete. (Album Review)

Photo: Brian Ziff For the past few years ††† (Crosses), the synthwave project helmed by Deftones frontman Chino Moreno and Far guitarist Shaun Lopez, have been drip feeding new material to fans. The slow-burn has been building towards a full length follow up to 2014's self-titled debut, and it's been worth the wait.

Written by: Jack Terry | Date: Tuesday, 24 October 2023

Blink-182 - One More Time (Album Review)

Photo: Jack Bridgland There’s a new Blink-182 album featuring the unmistakable drawl of Tom DeLonge and puerile humour that drips from song titles such as Edging. The year is, somehow, 2023. Following Mark Hoppus’s recovery from cancer the pop-punk titans are back in the configuration that conquered the world two decades ago — with Travis Barker still behind the kit and DeLonge’s return meaning the exit of Alkaline Trio’s Matt Skiba — and ‘One More Time…’ is their chance to take one more stab at things.

Written by: Will Marshall | Date: Monday, 23 October 2023

The Streets - The Darker The Shadow The Brighter The Light (Album Review)

Mike Skinner, clipper lighter aficionado, DJ and the mind behind The Streets, has been slipping in and out of the zeitgeist for decades, soundtracking lost nights and reflective mornings. On ‘The Darker The Shadow The Brighter The Light’ he shows his words have lost none of their potency.

Written by: Jack McGill | Date: Friday, 20 October 2023

Creeper - Sanguivore (Album Review)

British punks Creeper arrive at their third studio album with a sweeping sense of gothic grandeur now a vital part of their sound. On ‘Sanguivore’ the band plays into every tongue-in-cheek spooky narrative and arterial fountain with total confidence and an unshakeable sense of self. 

Written by: Rebecca Llewellyn | Date: Wednesday, 18 October 2023

The Menzingers - Some Of It Was True (Album Review)

Photo: Danielle Dubois On the surface, heartland rock is a lot like buses. You wait years for a band to bring it back, and suddenly The Gaslight Anthem have reformed while Bruce Springsteen is on the road racking up stadium show after stadium show. In the background, though,  The Menzingers’ wheels never stopped spinning.

Written by: Jack Press | Date: Tuesday, 17 October 2023

Troye Sivan - Something To Give Each Other (Album Review)

Photo: Stuart Winecoff It has been a long five years since Troye Sivan released ‘Bloom’, an album that received praise for vulnerable, defiant tracks that honestly discussed his experiences of being a queer man, enabling Sivan to situate himself as one of pop’s most essential voices. Its follow up, ‘Something To Give Each Other’ adds further colours to his palette: it is a 10 track celebration of sex, community, queerness, love, and friendship. 

Written by: Katie Macbeth | Date: Tuesday, 17 October 2023

The Drums - Jonny (Album Review)

Photo: Qiao Meng Critical darlings during the early 2010s, The Drums have always exuded an effortless sort of charisma. Their plaintive and irresistibly catchy brand of indie-pop, which grafted a west coast vibe onto a krautrock backbone, was a welcome reprieve from much of the overwrought, overly serious music of the time. 

Written by: Craig Howieson | Date: Friday, 13 October 2023

Sufjan Stevens - Javelin (Album Review)

There are some things in life that feel almost too precious to experience. They offer moments of such clarity that you are tempted to shield yourself from their candour lest you break the spell in some way. ‘Javelin’, the latest record from Sufjan Stevens, is one of them.

Written by: Craig Howieson | Date: Wednesday, 11 October 2023

Drake - For All The Dogs (Album Review)

Photo: UMG As if his book of poetry Titles Ruin Everything — 160 pages of pettiness and misogyny — wasn’t enough for 2023, Drake’s accompanying album ‘For All The Dogs’ is the cherry on top of a cake liberally flavoured by toxic masculinity.

Written by: Jack Press | Date: Tuesday, 10 October 2023

Slow Pulp - Yard (Album Review)

Releasing their first album, ‘Moveys’, during the pandemic didn’t seem to hinder Slow Pulp’s rise all that much, with critical acclaim settling on a record that felt fitting for gloomy autumn nights. Now, with the release of their second LP, ‘Yard’, the Wisconsin indie-rockers delve further into a sense of isolation in order to deal with the subsequent feelings of re-learning to trust and love others.

Written by: Katie Macbeth | Date: Monday, 09 October 2023

Armand Hammer - We Buy Diabetic Test Strips (Album Review)

Billy Woods is on fire. His stellar solo releases, output as the head of Backwoodz Studioz and as one half of Armand Hammer prove that he is the most vital experimental rapper in the world right now.

Written by: Tom Morgan | Date: Friday, 06 October 2023

Code Orange - The Above (Album Review)

Photo: Tim Saccenti If any one feeling defined Code Orange’s landmark 2020 album ‘Underneath’, it was a sense of impending doom. Landing just as the world began to shut down thanks to COVID-19, its ugly industrial discordance and hulking dread-laced noise made it a fitting soundtrack for a terrifying time.

Written by: Emma Wilkes | Date: Thursday, 05 October 2023

Ed Sheeran - Autumn Variations (Album Review)

Photo: Annie Leibovitz ‘Autumn Variations’ teased a return to the quirkily charming (albeit still reasonably irritating to many) pop-folk of Ed Sheeran’s emergence – the cover resembles his debut EP, ‘You Need Me’, and Aaron Dessner of The National, though a prior collaborator who failed to make ‘Subtract’ a likeable record, is a quality producer. Furthermore, signalling the completion of the increasingly gimmicky mathematical symbol album series can only be a plus (which is also, by far, the best album of that run). 

Written by: Jo Higgs | Date: Wednesday, 04 October 2023

Teenage Fanclub - Nothing Lasts Forever (Album Review)

Photo: Donald Milne We all love a bit of Teenage Fanclub, don’t we? Having given listeners so many wonderful moments throughout their decades-long, wildly influential career, the thirst for more will always be there. With that, though, comes expectation. Expectation that ‘Nothing Lasts Forever’ struggles to match.

Written by: Graeme Marsh | Date: Tuesday, 03 October 2023

Wilco - Cousin (Album Review)

Photo: Peter Crosby Wilco’s ‘Cousin’ documents a particular feeling: the sensation of being an outlier while also maintaining a connection. For Jeff Tweedy, being a “cousin to the world” is about forming part of a family while knowing that you’re far from central to the group. 

Written by: Jo Higgs | Date: Monday, 02 October 2023

Slaughter Beach, Dog - Crying, Laughing, Waving, Smiling (Album Review)

Photo: Ashley Gellman Around the time of 2019’s ‘Safe and Also No Fear’ Slaughter Beach, Dog’s Jake Ewald talked at length about his new found love of Wilco. And while that new fandom did not particularly influence its self-recorded pandemic record follow up — 2020’s stunning ‘At the Moonbase’ — it is certainly noticeable in the considered nuances and sumptuous execution of ‘Crying, Laughing, Waving, Smiling’.

Written by: Craig Howieson | Date: Thursday, 28 September 2023

Will Butler + Sister Squares - Will Butler + Sister Squares (Album Review)

Photo: Alexa Viscius When Will Butler left Arcade Fire after recording ‘We’, he said it was “time for new things.”  Given that he was already three solo records deep at that stage, the statement suggested a possible handbrake turn in his near future. But the fuzzy synths, feel-good melodies, and frenetic pacing of 2020’s ‘Generations’ are all present ‘Will Butler + Sister Squares’, and so is the nagging feeling that we’re listening to Arcade Fire from another dimension, rather than anything new.

Written by: Jack Press | Date: Thursday, 28 September 2023