• Ash – Islands

    June 14, 2018 - By 

    Ash’s seventh studio album Islands lets you listen once again to the corny soundtrack to your summer love affair. Wheeler scrapes towards the very bottom of the barrel in one final bid to transform that washing machine shift at a Gaeltacht Céilí into the idealised romanticised summer of sun, beach and surfing. Islands features a myriad of sun-soaked riffs, images of crisp, white beaches for miles and just about everything else you’d expect from an Ash album. Only this time, the summer lovin’ fallacy just isn’t working its charm the way it used to as the album falls just short…

  • Islands – Taste

    May 18, 2016 - By 

    From the ashes of The Unicorns came Islands, one sonically eccentric band’s demise giving rise to a new vehicle for mainstay Nick Thorburn’s endless imagination for quirky melodies and wry lyricism. Taste marks the sixth album for the band, but what is most remarkable about this release is that it’s being released simultaneously with their seventh album, Should I Remain Here At Sea? – our review of which you can read here. So, two records, one release date; the former an exploration of synth-based electro pop, the latter an indie pop record more in keeping with Islands’ invigorating debut album from 2006. Drum machines, programming and…

  • Islands – Should I Remain Here at Sea?

    May 18, 2016 - By 

    It was a bittersweet thing when The Unicorns disbanded in 2004 after releasing one of the most fun records by anyone, ever. The trio’s paths diverged. Alden Penner trucked on as a solo artist before forming Clues a few years later, while Nicholas Thorburn and Jamie Thompson kept ‘er lit, forming two groups at once – the short-lived hip-hop outfit Th’ Corn Gangg, and Islands. One thing that was clear from Islands’ debut Return To The Sea and their subsequent run of records was that The Unicorns’ eccentricities, about-turns, and canny knack for an earworm were as much down to his colleagues – and Thorburn in…