• Yo La Tengo – Stuff Like That There

    September 8, 2015 - By 

    There’s something inherently calming about Yo La Tengo. They’re a fundamentally solid band, the kind who, at worst, release records that you don’t like rather than outright bad ones. They’re these reliable old workhorses whose every album is going to give you a least one thoroughly pleasant gift. They don’t make records that you eagerly watch the calendar for, but rather ones that provide a humble, unassuming announcement of their presence and let you discover them for yourself. Everything about them is decidedly pleasant, which leads us to their latest LP, Stuff Like That There. Stuff is a cover album…

  • Call Super – Migrant

    September 3, 2015 - By 

    Call Super’s bios on Twitter and Tumblr read “confuse, construct”. It’s important to bear in mind when navigating his ever-growing catalogue — just when one thinks he’s settled on a style or direction, he upends expectations and jumps into something either head-bangingly intense or daringly mellifluous. Following the impeccably layered and textured Suzi Ecto full-length for Houndstooth last year his next release was the two-track Fluenka Mitsu EP for Greek label Nous Disques, the first of which sounded nothing like anything he’d released before. Rolling, rumbling melodies run unchecked for 10 solid minutes on ‘Fluenka’s Shelf’, while thunderous echoes abound overhead…

  • The Weeknd – Beauty Behind the Madness

    September 2, 2015 - By 

    Hailing from Toronto and one of Canada’s hottest talents right now alongside Drake, R&B singer The Weeknd drops his newest record Beauty Behind The Madness. With a number of hit singles before the release, something huge is expected from vocalist Abel Tesfaye for his sophomore album. The lyrical content of previous work often contained stories of sex, drugs and drink, and although there are a few songs with strong such references, the lyrical theme has been diluted on the record, and involves more of a sombre tone of hurt and relationships. Abel expresses the stories with a soulful voice that…

  • Explosive Decoy Humans – Transient

    August 20, 2015 - By 

    Transient is the first EP from unashamedly nerdy tech-metallers Explosive Decoy Humans, dispersed across three continents yet unencumbered by the oceanic expanses. Featuring members of Cyclamen, Subterranean Fishermen, and Dead on Both Shoulders, the qualifications of EDH are without question, and Transient arrives not a moment too soon for this creative contingent. The sonorous, sometimes somnolent croonings of vocalist Lindsay Templeton evoke Orchid-era Mikael Akerfeldt amidst a whirlwind of seething meters. A field recording of a lagoon punctuates the opener’s onslaught, grounding it in an evocative, intimate serenity. True to its name, ‘Chaos’ flits and flutters, its flight enigmatically sating the attention,…

  • Chelsea Wolfe – Abyss

    August 19, 2015 - By 

    Treacle-thick tones and monolithic riffing set the tone immediately for Chelsea Wolfe’s latest excursion, Abyss. Long a much-fancied purveyor of doomy, layered heaviness, the record’s title is apt to say the least. ‘Carrion Flowers’ trudges along, industrial tinges emerging here and there in clatterslap percussion as Wolfe’s sultry voice blushes the whole thing with a beautiful fatalism, her range equally as enviable as her depth and strength as an artist. The mechanics of the record maintain consistency throughout, alternating between gentle, damned balladry, and guttural sludge in the likes of ‘Iron Moon’. ‘Dragged Out’s’ looping, keening highnotes invest a detached,…

  • Cruising – Cruising

    August 14, 2015 - By 

    Sometimes a band name can elucidate the direction in which its songs will travel.  Cruising are a case in point, named after a book/film delving into the dark underworld of a serial killer who picks up homosexual men from the New York S&M scene to murder.  EP cover emblazoned with a black leather biker jacket, band name studded across the shoulders, and PVC leather hat a la Jesse “Boots Electric” Hughes, worn in promo photos runs with the theme. There’s more than a whisper of iconic female rockers like Joan Jett, Siouxsie Sioux and Poly Styrene.  Understandably so, given that…

  • The Host – Esalen Lectures

    August 13, 2015 - By 

    Pulling absolutely no punches when it comes to leaving his imprint on the electronica scene, Belfast’s Barry Lynn (Boxcutter) – The Host for his latest release – has compounded a long track record of compelling, experimental arrangements with his new record, the Esalen Lectures LP. Given Lynn’s seemingly savage pursuit of originality though, this probably wasn’t the most difficult of tasks with a back catalogue as remarkable as his – various remix credits for heavyweights like Amon Tobin or our own Space Dimension Controller, all whilst his tenure for Planet Mu garners more notches than a backroad motel bed-frame. The…

  • Roslyn Steer – Still Moving

    August 6, 2015 - By 

    Roslyn Steer is a member of Morning Veils, who specialise in “forgotten folk”. She is also a PhD student at NUI Maynooth, writing a thesis on screaming at the department of music. These two interests come together on her solo release Still Moving, a tape for her own label KantCope (a delightful play on words). Side One is taken up fully by the title track, a half-hour meandering body of work that shifts between chilling spoken word, drawn-out, lilting harmonica and twisted church bells that meet rugged guitar distortion. A huge entity, its breadth and ambition is matched by its…

  • Albert Hammond Jr. – Momentary Masters

    August 4, 2015 - By 

    Albert Hammond Jr. is a man whose solo work is put under severe levels of scrutiny because of his musical pedigree: son and namesake of a highly distinguished and decorated musician, and a key figure in the success of one of the most influential bands of a generation – in one sense it’s a badge of honour; in another, an encumbering lineage. It’s fair to say that previous albums, although competent, haven’t quite lived up to those somewhat daunting standards. The album’s first single, ‘Born Slippy’, opens proceedings, and is very different to the now 20-year-old track from Underworld, forever synonymous with Trainspotting.  Evocative of the intro to ‘Macho Picchu’ from The Strokes’ 2011 album Angles, it’s a nod to seminal New York insouciant…

  • Lianne La Havas – Blood

    August 3, 2015 - By 

    For her second album, Lianne La Havas has traded the acoustic settings of her 2012 debut, Is Your Love Big Enough?, for a lusher, summery sound. Inspired, La Havas says, by her Jamaican and Greek heritage, the album fairly shimmers with plush, melodic soul numbers, usually of the most laid-back variety. At the same time, there’s a refined musical intelligence at work across the album that keeps the attention throughout – not least in La Havas’ expertly judged vocal delivery. While co-producers Di Genius (son of veteran reggae artist Freddie McGregor), Paul Epworth and Jamie Lidell all put in top-drawer…