• Mount Kimbie – Cold Spring Fault Less Youth

    June 1, 2013 - By 

    It’s a familiar trajectory – new outfit releases a series of head-turning EPs on a niche electronic label, graduates quickly to a full-length album and then gets snapped up by a much larger concern for a full assault on hearts and minds. That path has now more or less been trodden by three leading lights of the dubstep diaspora: James Blake, Darkstar and now Dom Maker and Kai Campos of Mount Kimbie. While Blake has sought to weld his background in dubstep production to a new role as a writer and singer of delicate soul, Darkstar and Mount Kimbie have…

  • Koreless – Yugen EP

    May 31, 2013 - By 

    Welsh producer Lewis Roberts places great emphasis on the synthetic. His debut EP as Koreless is for the most part beatless; whilst the hypnotic  (and at times vaguely unsettling ) sounds which pervade on Yugen are derived from Roberts’ fondness for sci-fi; with the novels of JG Ballard having been a particularly prominent influence during the recording of the EP. Indeed the Welshman was quoted in a recent interview with Pitchfork as having said, “I don’t ever want my music to be real— I don’t want any acoustic or human elements. I want it to be completely artificial and sci-fi”. There is…

  • John Grant – Pale Green Ghosts

    May 29, 2013 - By 

    What happens to the elephant in the room when somebody talks about it? Contrary to popular opinion, it does not vanish in a puff of grey smoke. Rather, everyone is abruptly made aware of said elephant as it crushes their toes, pokes them with its tusks and snuffles about in their pockets for polo mints. And nobody appreciates the impact of proverbial elephants more intimately than John Grant, once of The Czars and Midlake, whose penchant for revealing his most secret desires and guiltiest pleasures knows no bounds. Infamously, at last year’s Meltdown Festival he announced onstage that he had…

  • Bibio – Silver Wilkinson

    May 27, 2013 - By 

    Ambient, electronica, folk, Boards of Canada and a couple of kitchen sinks are the constituent elements of  Bibio‘s (aka Steve Wilkinson) seventh album, Silver Wilkinson. The British producer has been toying with his distinct sound for the last ten years; a sort of folktronica. For this album he has attempted to expand on his previous effort’s more funk-driven style, leading to a conflict that divides the album into two distinct halves; the downtempo, Air– like first half and the funkier, more dance -based feel of the second half. Silver Wilkinson is an album to listen to during a late night chill-out session. The first section of the album is draped with shades of Eno‘s Ambient series and Zero 7‘s earlier releases.…

  • Vampire Weekend – Modern Vampires Of The City

    May 27, 2013 - By 

    Ever since Vampire Weekend poked their heads above the sub-Libertines dross of late-noughties indie they have always seemed several steps ahead of their peers. The self-titled debut’s hyperactive afro-pop and the genre-bending follow-up Contra established the New York quartet as the thinking fan’s hipsters of choice; their star continuing to ascend even as, one by one, those contemporaries deservedly crashed and burned. Despite this, it would be fair to say that they weren’t universally admired. What was perhaps missing for some amidst all this clever-clever meta-pop mashing of styles was heart: Vampire Weekend were perfectly capable of connecting with the…

  • The National – Trouble Will Find Me

    May 27, 2013 - By 

    There’s a famous Edward Hopper painting, simply entitled ‘Gas’, in which a solitary, dapper figure stands in the centre of the canvas, almost obscured by a cherry red petrol pump. On first glance its meaning is immediately apparent: it’s either a character study or an elegy to those charming locations found off the beaten track. However, this simplicity is deceptive – as simplicity often is. Look to the right of the frame, where a particularly vicious darkness is bleeding from an obscured road into the forest. One wonders where this path leads and what is to be found there. The…

  • The Dillinger Escape Plan – One Of Us Is The Killer

    May 23, 2013 - By 

    From opening track and mission statement ‘Prancer’ – resplendent with what are now Dillinger Escape Plan’s signature complex, syncopated guitar riffs, utterly frantic drumming and vocal intensity -their fifth full length album ‘One Of Us Is The Killer‘ rages to life with the chaotic measure of a broken photocopier. The second album to be released on their Party Smasher Inc label, One Of Us… is perhaps not quite the Dillinger of their seminal and still stunning breakthrough album Calculating Infinity – but is very much the Dillinger of today and tomorrow. Often referred to as ‘mathcore’, their music has been,…

  • Robyn G Shiels – Underneath The Night of Stars EP

    May 21, 2013 - By 

    Almost locally renown for “taking his time” between releases, Belfast-based singer-songwriter Robyn G Shiels is equally – ever increasingly – justified in biding his time as a consummate, altogether important artist. As the very best wine cannot possibly stem from a rushed harvest, similarly Shiels possesses an instinctive knack for seeing the brilliant fruits of his labour (experience, regret and alleviation) arrive in their destined condition at the most appropriate time. Little over a quarter of an hour in length, his new EP, Underneath The Night of Stars, is Shiels’ present-day distillation of this fact. Emerging quietly via a slowly…

  • The Dudley Corporation – Everyone Does Everything Wrong

    May 22, 2013 - By 

    It’s been five long years since the Dudleys caressed our lugholes with the slow-burning menace of Year Of The Husband. As supercharged opener ‘DLQ’ cranks this fourth LP into life, it’s apparent that much has changed in the Dubliners’ camp. Gone are the tension-building epics of old, replaced with thirteen sub-three minute nuggets of alt-rock gold. That’s not to say the trio have gone down the commercial route – anything but: the guitar sound is scathing, the vocals sneer and howl misanthropically and the rhythm section pummel and clatter more intensely than ever. Highlights of this newly-streamlined, energetic approach include…

  • Styles P – Float

    May 21, 2013 - By 

    The nineties resurgence sweeping New York hip-hop has primarily been forged by artists born right in the middle of the decade, but with boom-bap beats fashionable again it was only a matter of time before some older statesmen made a fresh run for relevance. Yonkers rapper Styles P has seemingly been around forever as both a solo artist and member of The LOX. But while Styles goes back far enough to have shared a label with Biggie, he’s always been playing catch up in a career full of missed opportunities and false starts. The LOX never really got going on…