• 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…

  • The Flag – Heat Waves

    July 28, 2015 - By 

    One-man racket-making specialist Ted McGrath has hit on to a nice niche here. With The Flag’s Heat Waves, he’s happened onto this strange electronic hybrid. Swathes of eclectic influences, styles and instrumentation all come together in this intriguing amalgamation. Sensations of Girl Band, The KLF and Young Fathers all come to mind as the album takes you on its rather spritely journey. It’s sharp, absorbing and more often than not quite compelling. There are issues with its layout and construction, however, that hurt the experience overall. The proceedings start well with the titular ‘Heat Waves’, this brooding creeping creature which…

  • Wilco – Star Wars

    July 17, 2015 - By 

    “Why release an album this way and why make it free? Well, the biggest reason, and I’m not sure we even need any others, is that it felt like it would be fun. What’s more fun than a surprise?” So posited the ever quizzical Jeff Tweedy on Wilco’s Facebook page earlier tonight, just when pretty much every Wilco aficionado (especially those of us brushing our teeth before bed) was positively not expecting Wilco’s first studio album in four years to be let loose onto the internet for free. Now, rather than answer his concluding rhetorical question (let’s face it, there’s plenty…

  • Refused – Freedom

    July 17, 2015 - By 

    Refused are fucking alive. Or so we’re told. One of the most powerful, vital and cathartic hardcore bands of the nineties, the Swedish four-piece created an unmatched legacy by blazing a trail of fearless musical fusion, incandescendent agitprop and a vast palette of cultural influences and reference points, from fine art to the New Romantics, as best encapsulated in seminal album ‘The Shape of Punk to Come’. Then, at the height of their potency and white-hot rage, they disbanded in a storm of shit and failure, and instructed press outlets to delete reviews, promo pics on file, etc. It was…

  • Ken Camden – Dream Memory

    July 9, 2015 - By 

    You know, Ken Camden, from Lahndan Tahn? Bit of a spiv, sells knockoff jeans and bootleg t-shirts. Once did CDs n’all, but no one cares ‘bout them no more. No wait, that’s Camden Ken. Better instead to concentrate on the name of the album. Dream Memory as a title, along with the striking artwork, does a much better job of setting the scene for what can be heard inside. However, positioning his listener in a suggestible other-worldly location with a couple of words and a picture only partially paves the way for just how exquisite the next 45 minutes of their life might…

  • Desaparecidos – Payola

    July 8, 2015 - By 

    Bright Eyes, and by extension their central member Conor Oberst, are the sort of group who elicit a strong reaction from people. There are those who think him a Dylanesque wunderkind whose every word perfectly summarises all the emotion that their teenage selves never could, others see him as an obnoxious, overgrown perpetual adolescent who needs to get over himself rather swiftly. There is also a decently sized camp who are indifferent until he lets his frustration loose in the rawest manner. Of the three groups, the one who’ll be most satisfied by the man’s latest venture, the long awaited…

  • Sleaford Mods – Key Markets

    July 7, 2015 - By 

    Fresh from well received performances on the festival circuit, particularly the BBC-broadcast Glastonbury, Sleaford Mods have been exposed to a wider audience and remain masters of polarisation. They have become poster boys for the disenfranchised: they’re proud of their roots but they don’t want the music to be undermined or people to misconstrue their working-class stance as validation of lout culture. They are quick to disassociate themselves from the hooligan element, or as vocalist Jason Williamson put it: “If you’re expecting some kind of cross between This Is England and Twycross Zoo mixed in with The Firm then please do…