Kelela - Take Me Apart (Album Review)

Kelela’s 2013 mixtape, ‘Cut 4 Me’, introduced her to audiences through a blend of sexy future R&B and nu-soul minimalism. Her first album, ‘Take Me Apart’, builds on those foundations with a selection of sultry, lo-fi electronica, recorded with producers from the worlds of pop and avant-garde: Arca to Ariel Rechtshaid and key collaborator, Jam City.

Written by: Jacob Brookman | Date: Wednesday, 11 October 2017

Wolf Parade - Cry Cry Cry (Album Review)

Wolf Parade have returned to sum up our feelings about the last 18 months. And they want to make us put on our red shoes and dance away the blues. ‘Cry Cry Cry’, is the first album from the Canadian band since they entered an indefinite hiatus in 2011, and they have never sounded better.

Written by: Jennifer Geddes | Date: Tuesday, 10 October 2017

Liam Gallagher - As You Were (Album Review)

It’s been said before, but it’s worth reiterating: as long as he keeps chatting shit in interviews Liam Gallagher can release a solo album a month for the rest of time. The build up to his first outing shorn of a band - Beady Eye, his post-Oasis outfit, fizzled in 2014 - has been accompanied by a press blitz as deliriously entertaining as the record itself is beige.

Written by: Huw Baines | Date: Tuesday, 10 October 2017

The Weather Station - The Weather Station (Album Review)

The Weather Station are a Torontonian folk band led by actor and musician Tamara Lindeman. Their eponymous fourth album is a collection of meticulously arranged tracks that demonstrate Lindeman’s deft understanding of vocal blend, melody and tonal cohesion. It is a wonderful work of confident poise, with storytelling front and centre.

Written by: Jacob Brookman | Date: Monday, 09 October 2017

Marilyn Manson - Heaven Upside Down (Album Review)

Despite not doing anything truly culturally noteworthy in an awfully long time, Marilyn Manson remains a pop culture boogeyman, a haunting reminder to any mums and dads who lived through the '90s. Nothing can bury this man. He is here to stay, the God of Fuck looming large in an ill-fitting corset.

Written by: Alec Chillingworth | Date: Monday, 09 October 2017

Torres - Three Futures (Album Review)

“Lay off me would ya…I’m just tryin to take this new skin for a spin,” Mackenzie Scott sang on her second LP as Torres, ‘Sprinter’. The record was a leap forward from the bare-bones intensity of her self-titled bow and almost exclusively inhabited harsh, distorted rock shapes. Its new skin was a perfect fit.

Written by: Huw Baines | Date: Friday, 06 October 2017

Miley Cyrus - Younger Now (Album Review)

A few years back, country star Miley Cyrus reinvented herself as a chieftain of teen rebellion with the release of her fourth album, ‘Bangerz’. Miley 2.0 was a figurehead of neon vulgarity, a kind of Boudicca of sleaze-punk-pop.

Written by: Jacob Brookman | Date: Friday, 06 October 2017

Protomartyr - Relatives in Descent (Album Review)

Photo: Doug Coombe Protomartyr won a lot of plaudits in 2015 for their record ‘The Agent Intellect’ and with good reason. Except for perhaps the-band-formerly-known-as-Viet-Cong, no post-punk act that year managed to make something with such sonic depth and rhetorical power.

Written by: Jonathan Rimmer | Date: Friday, 06 October 2017

Wolf Alice - Visions of a Life (Album Review)

By the time their debut, ‘My Love is Cool’, picked up a nomination for the Mercury Prize, Wolf Alice had already displayed their aptitude in a plethora of styles and variations on their sound. Sophomore effort ‘Visions of a Life’ continues to do so, but this time their eclecticism spreads even further.

Written by: Graeme Marsh | Date: Thursday, 05 October 2017

Hurts - Desire (Album Review)

Photo: Bryan Adams ‘Desire’ is Hurts’ fourth album in seven years and sees the Mancunian synth-pop duo moving confidently into new areas such as gospel, light jazz and funk. It’s a satisfying creative direction for a band who were unveiled with major label fanfare in 2011, but who have since retreated to become a bit of a left-field concern.

Written by: Jacob Brookman | Date: Thursday, 05 October 2017

The World Is A Beautiful Place And I Am No Longer Afraid To Die - Always Foreign (Album Review)

Photo: Shervin Lainez The World Is A Beautiful Place And I Am No Longer Afraid To Die really bring home emo’s ethos that the personal is political on their third album, ‘Always Foreign’.

Written by: Jennifer Geddes | Date: Wednesday, 04 October 2017

Shania Twain - Now (Album Review)

To the under-25s, Shania Twain might require a bit of explaining. In her ‘90s heyday, the Canadian singer-songwriter’s country crossover albums ‘Come on Over’ and ‘The Woman in Me’ were absolutely ubiquitous, and formed the essential soundtrack for Texan truck stops and Sussex school discos alike. To date, she’s sold roughly 100 million albums over a 25-year career that also provided the blueprint for Taylor Swift, among many others.

Written by: Jacob Brookman | Date: Wednesday, 04 October 2017

Cradle of Filth - Cryptoriana – The Seductiveness of Decay (Album Review)

Another few years, another Cradle of Filth album. Grist for the Satanic mill, as frontman Dani Filth might put it. But the thing the band’s detractors fail to acknowledge, the thing that makes Suffolk’s spookiest outfit so damn idiosyncratic, is that they never release the same record twice.

Written by: Alec Chillingworth | Date: Tuesday, 03 October 2017

Wand - Plum (Album Review)

‘Plum’ is the fourth LP from Los Angeles band Wand, following up the quickfire trio of ‘Ganglion Reef’, ‘Golem’ and ‘1000 Days’, which were released in little over a year between 2014 and 2015. It marks a departure from the psych-garage-rock pigeonhole the band found themselves slung into and finds them standing out in a burgeoning crowd of peers.

Written by: Graeme Marsh | Date: Tuesday, 03 October 2017

Mastodon - Cold Dark Place (Album Review)

Mastodon did something special earlier this year. ‘Emperor of Sand’, the Atlanta metallers’ seventh full-length, branded 2017’s haunches with a ferocious stamp of quality. It had spleen-splitting riffs, it had heartfelt melodies. There were progressive passages to sate the strokiest of beards. It was wonderful.

Written by: Alec Chillingworth | Date: Monday, 02 October 2017

Phoebe Bridgers - Stranger In The Alps (Album Review)

Phoebe Bridgers might be in her early 20s, and ‘Stranger in the Alps’ might be her first LP, but it sounds like the product of a wealth of experience.

Written by: Helen Payne | Date: Friday, 29 September 2017

Chelsea Wolfe - Hiss Spun (Album Review)

Photo: Bill Crisafi Chelsea Wolfe’s name has become synonymous with a sense of melancholy. On ‘Abyss’ she lamented her tempestuous psyche, but on its follow up, ‘Hiss Spun’, she delves further in an attempt to find the beauty hidden within the pain and purge it in the process. This time round she is embracing her emotions as a means of control.

Written by: Laura Johnson | Date: Friday, 29 September 2017

Macklemore - Gemini (Album Review)

Seattle rapper Macklemore has carved out a niche through a combination of fun, bouncy pop tracks and an identity as hip hop’s most woke whiteboy wordsmith.

Written by: Jacob Brookman | Date: Thursday, 28 September 2017

The Horrors - V (Album Review)

Since the release of their debut LP, ‘Strange House’, in 2007, the Horrors have been in a state of constant evolution. Its critically acclaimed follow up, ‘Primary Colours’, took their goth-garage-punk sound and gave it an injection of psychedelics, while 2014’s ‘Luminous’ saw them dabble with a more danceable core.

Written by: Graeme Marsh | Date: Thursday, 28 September 2017

Tricky - Ununiform (Album Review)

It’s a little surprising to learn that ‘Ununiform’ is Tricky’s 13th studio album. Hugely prolific in the years following the release of 1995’s ‘Maxinquaye’ - a top five album in the UK - things had begun to tail off by the time 2001’s ‘Blowback’ came around.

Written by: Ben Gallivan | Date: Thursday, 28 September 2017