Scour - Scour EP (Album Review)

Let’s start where we need to start. Philip H. Anselmo’s actions last winter, when he yelled “white power” from the stage at Dimebash, were wrong. This EP, by the black metal supergroup Scour, is the former Pantera vocalist’s first musical statement since that day. For now, we’re here to judge the music. That’s why you’re here too, right? Because you live, breathe, eat and shit heavy metal.

Written by: Alec Chillingworth | Date: Wednesday, 20 July 2016

Steven Tyler - We're All Somebody From Somewhere (Album Review)

Country carpetbagger. It’s a pejorative phrase used to slight musicians who relocate to Nashville, hell-bent on exploiting country music’s commercial pulling power. Aerosmith’s Steven Tyler is the latest artist to walk that way, but while the singer’s rock fans may have dreaded the prospect his debut solo release would have been much better if he’d actually made a flat out country album, rather than this unfocused, messy effort.

Written by: Simon Ramsay | Date: Wednesday, 20 July 2016

The Avalanches - Wildflower (Album Review)

The wait for the Avalanches’ second album was so long that it became an in-joke; a white whale for those who spent the turn of the millennium hunting through the mountain of samples from which they sculpted their debut, ‘Since I Left You’. It’s been almost 16 years, but ‘Wildflower’ is finally here and it demonstrates that they have lost none of their compositional guile, nor misplaced their appetite for flights of fancy.

Written by: Huw Baines | Date: Tuesday, 19 July 2016

Cane Hill - Smile (Album Review)

Nostalgia can be great, but you only need a passing glance at the latest swathe of sub-par Led Zeppelin worshippers to know that it can also be dreadful. New Orleans’ Cane Hill pay tribute to the nu metal era without sounding like they’re straight out of ’99, with baggy trousers, backwards caps and all that might entail. This isn’t ‘Chocolate Starfish’.

Written by: Alec Chillingworth | Date: Monday, 18 July 2016

Martha - Blisters In The Pit of My Heart (Album Review)

Bubbling just below the surface, there’s a group of UK bands keen to redress the unfair assumption that pop songs are music’s emptiest vessels. Among them you have Trust Fund, Alimony Hustle and Happy Accidents, but at the front of the line, and with their second LP, ‘Blisters in the Pit of My Heart’ tucked under their arms, are Martha, a power-pop quartet from Pity Me, Durham who grew up punk and now spend their spare moments cramming as many hooks into three minute songs as they can.

Written by: Huw Baines | Date: Thursday, 14 July 2016

The Julie Ruin - Hit Reset (Album Review)

Three years on from the release of ‘Run Fast’, ‘Hit Reset’ finds the Julie Ruin deploying the same relentless energy they started out with, just like a child picked up mid tantrum with legs still flailing. Kathleen Hanna, who first used the band’s name back in the late ‘90s before forming Le Tigre, has still got the pipes and an acid tongue, while Kathi Wilcox, Kenny Mellman, Carmine Covelli and Sara Landeau paint a dance-worthy, synth-filled backdrop throughout.

Written by: Laura Johnson | Date: Thursday, 14 July 2016

Joey Purp - iiiDrops (Album Review)

The lines between hip hop albums and mixtapes have become increasingly blurred over the years, to the point that some critics are prepared to deny that there are any.

Written by: Jonathan Rimmer | Date: Tuesday, 12 July 2016

Blink-182 - California (Album Review)

There are a few ways to view Blink-182. To some, they are that band from the late ‘90s who got naked a lot. To others, they were a gateway into punk rock and the soundtrack to, you guessed it, growing up. But since the heady days of ‘Enema of the State’ and ‘Take Off Your Pants and Jacket’, their road has sometimes been a rocky one. They split for a while, following the release of their 2003 self-titled album, and reconvened for the disappointing ‘Neighborhoods’ five years ago. Now, they're back with a new line up. For a band that released a live record called ‘The Mark, Tom and Travis Show' at their peak, this is a big deal.

Written by: Huw Baines | Date: Monday, 11 July 2016

Cradle of Filth - Dusk…And Her Embrace: The Original Sin (Album Review)

For nearly two decades, any attempts to force new Cradle of Filth releases upon non-believers have been futile. Many ‘trVe’ fans clocked out just before the turn of the century. But the band never went away. In fact, recent years have found them sifting through their past and uncovering nuggets of gold. Two years ago we got a reissue of the raw ‘Total Fucking Darkness’ demo collection and now, 21 years on from their recording, we have in our hands the original, scrapped tapes once intended for the band’s immaculate second record, ‘Dusk… And Her Embrace’.

Written by: Alec Chillingworth | Date: Thursday, 07 July 2016

Metronomy - Summer 08 (Album Review)

Can the decision not to tour a record improve its quality? It worked a treat for the Beatles in the late ‘60s but, of course, Metronomy aren’t the Beatles. Still, ‘Summer 08’ is the most carefree Joseph Mount has sounded in quite some time.

Written by: Liam Turner | Date: Wednesday, 06 July 2016

Bat For Lashes - The Bride (Album Review)

Natasha Khan has never embodied a character or concept as completely as she does on ‘The Bride’, her fourth album as Bat For Lashes.

Written by: Laura Johnson | Date: Monday, 04 July 2016

Nice As Fuck - Nice As Fuck (Album Review)

There are two sides to every coin, but it would have been a brave soul who bet that the flip to Jenny Lewis’s ‘The Voyager’ would look like this.

Written by: Huw Baines | Date: Monday, 04 July 2016

case/lang/veirs - case/lang/veirs (Album Review)

Collaborations of this sort are a complex, often confounding proposition. The assorted mechanics of established writing careers must be integrated, along with clashing schedules and, often, egos. Then there's the dreaded supergroup tag and the expectation that, somehow, the meeting must amount to something greater than its constituent parts in order to qualify as a success.

Written by: Huw Baines | Date: Wednesday, 29 June 2016

Walter Trout - Alive In Amsterdam (Album Review)

“This is a song with a message,” cries Walter Trout as he steams into a pulsating rendition of Luther Allison’s I’m Back during this electrifying, and fittingly titled, live record. The subtext isn’t complicated, it merely signifies what the Dutch crowd, and all those who attended his 2015 comeback concerts, witnessed first hand: Trout’s resurrection from seemingly doomed rock ‘n’ roll casualty to roaring, blues-rock powerhouse is complete.

Written by: Simon Ramsay | Date: Tuesday, 28 June 2016

Swans - The Glowing Man (Album Review)

Swans have never shied away from the fact that their songs are punishing. Many of them last as long as your average punk LP, and very few offer straightforward sonic hits. But tedious and tiresome they are not. Investing in Swans’ music requires patience, but the process is rewarding.

Written by: Liam Turner | Date: Monday, 27 June 2016

Weaves - Weaves (Album Review)

Two years ago, following the release of Weaves’ debut EP, Jasmyn Burke told Rolling Stone: "We don't want to necessarily identify with a scene, and I think our music holds true to that. It's a bit out there, no matter what kind of music you like."

Written by: Laura Johnson | Date: Friday, 24 June 2016

Mitski - Puberty 2 (Album Review)

Photo: Ebru Yildiz On ‘Puberty 2’, Mitski spends much of her time wrestling with her significance in the grand scheme of things.

Written by: Jonathan Rimmer | Date: Thursday, 23 June 2016

Jake Bugg - On My One (Album Review)

'On My One', Jake Bugg’s third full-length release is, at least on the surface, aptly titled. For the first time the Nottingham native has eschewed contributions from outside songwriters and also produced much of the record solo, but the one thing that challenges this solitudinous sentiment is the scale of the thing: this is the biggest sounding Bugg album yet.

Written by: Liam Turner | Date: Wednesday, 22 June 2016

Red Hot Chili Peppers - The Getaway (Album Review)

Red Hot Chili Peppers rarely seem to live a dull moment. Lately, singer Anthony Kiedis has resuscitated a baby, wrestled with James Corden and found himself admitted to hospital with complications from intestinal flu. Bassist Flea, meanwhile, broke his arm while snowboarding and faced a long period of rehab. Amid all this we have ‘The Getaway’, their 11th album and the follow up to 2011’s ‘I’m With You’.

Written by: Graeme Marsh | Date: Tuesday, 21 June 2016

Band of Horses - Why Are You OK (Album Review)

Photo: Andrew Stuart It’s now a decade since Band of Horses’ debut, ‘Everything All The Time’, arrived to much acclaim. With every release since then, though, Ben Bridwell and his band have seemed to slip further and further away from the folky roots that initially drew their fans in.

Written by: Graeme Marsh | Date: Monday, 20 June 2016