HARD FEELINGS is the new collaborative project between Joe Goddard (Hot Chip) and Amy Douglas. For all intents and purposes, ‘HARD FEELINGS’, the self-titled debut album released on Domino Recordings, is “an opera of sad bangers.” Loosely conceptual without being a full concept album, the material is the ultimate immersive cinematic experience for your feet and ears, seated fluidly at the intersections of New Wave and Synthpop-inspired Pop Music and full on Dance majesty.

New York City’s Amy Douglas has made her reputation across the worlds of house and disco with her distinctive voice and stellar songwriting ability. She has worked with such artists as Luke Solomon, The Crooked Man and Horse Meat Disco, and she wrote ‘Something More’ for Roisin Murphy on her recent album ‘Roisin Machine’.

Joe Goddard is also synonymous with the electronic music world, widely-known in the front ranks of British producers, creating a sounds from across his panoramic musical life, from house, techno and disco to UK garage, R&B and electro-pop. Joe forms one fifth of the UK electronic-pop powerhouse Hot Chip whilst, alongside Raf Rundell, he is one half of The 2 Bears.

TRACK LISTING

Love Scenes
Dangerous
Running Out Of Time
You Always Know
Take You Down
About Us
Holding On Too Long
Sister Infinity

In contrast to Diviner, a record that very much favoured the inner world, Moondust For My Diamound sees Hayden Thorpe moving into a more natural visual and sonic palette, gazing outward on the world. Produced by Richard Formby and Nathan Jenkins (Bullion), Thorpe has made an album that is galvanising, reassuring, elegant, seductive: it oozes Big Cosmic Energy.

‘Down There’ is the debut solo album from Animal Collective member Avey Tare.

Recorded in 2010 at the Good House, an old church in upstate New York, with fellow Animal Collective band member Deakin.

‘Down There’ is a world of nine songs from Avey Tare. His first official solo full length carries you through a murky world of sound, an alien death world of soul grooves that is both honest and otherworldly.

Take a ride on this haunted boat and let yourself be guided through deep sloshy rhythms, waterlogged bass and moonlit breaks in the canopy that reveal a crisp crystalline pop buzz.

TRACK LISTING

Laughing Hieroglyphic
3 Umbrellas
Oliver Twist
Glass Bottom Boat
Ghost Of Books
Cemeteries
Heads Hammock
Heather In The Hospital
Lucky 1

The LP was produced by White and recorded between his beloved Kensington Avenue home studio (and album namesake) K Bay, Richmond’s Montrose Recording and his own local institution, Spacebomb Studio. K Bay finds the singer/songwriter, bandleader, and musical polymath expanding every facet of his creative process and harnessing the full power of his community, culminating in the best record of his career.

"For me, one of the most exciting production techniques from this record was this idea where I’d record the song twice,” explains White of K Bay and “Genuine Hesitation.” “First, in a more traditional, band-in-the-room, work out the parts and sounds, nail it, kind of way. Secondly, I would distill the concept of the song one way or another into an instrumental composition. I had a much larger band (based off of Miles Davis’s On The Corner bands) play this kind of new-music/improvisational piece at the same tempo as I had recorded the first, more ‘normal’ take. The goal was to be able to cut across between the two pieces, and/or layer them and have them fit together in wild ways. To a large degree it worked, which was pretty exciting for me. The intro to ‘Genuine Hesitation’ is an excerpt from the much longer improvisation based instrumental."

K Bay, White’s first solo album in six years, is the astounding record he has forever aspired to make. A bold reclamation of independence and identity, K Bay establishes White as one of his era’s most imaginative artists. These 11 pieces are retro-futurist magic tricks that feel instantly classic and contemporary, the product of a musical mind that has internalized the lessons of his idols and used them to build a brilliant world of his own.

After his solo introduction Big Inner became a surprise hit and his 2015 debut for Domino, Fresh Blood, ascended him to late night TV performances and further critical acclaim, career demands nearly overwhelmed White. His record label/studio Spacebomb, for instance, ballooned into a bevy of obligations and expectations. White followed Fresh Blood with 2017’s Gentlewoman, Ruby Man, a set of duets with Flo Morrissey, and continued to produce records for the likes of Natalie Prass, Bedouine, and more—doubtless privileges that sometimes crowded out his ability to work on his own music. So he began building K Bay, a home studio where he could sequester himself with his thoughts. Newly married and starting to talk about children as he inched toward 40, White funneled a lifetime of experiences, enthusiasms, and obsessions into these new songs.

More than love, romance, or self-reliance, this is the animating ideal of K Bay—that we can forever strive for something better, no matter how flawed or blessed we have already been. A decade ago, Matthew E. White made a classic beauty no one expected; on K Bay, he has made a masterpiece by harnessing what he’s learned from that community and life itself in entirely unexpected, electrifying, and reaffirming ways

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: K Bay is by far White's most texturally interesting and conceptually exciting outing yet, and sees White heading more towards the sort of neon-lit futuristic synthpop that his technically minded production sensibilities are perfect for. It's swimming in groove and constantly confounding expectation while remaining resolutely melodic and typically inventive.

TRACK LISTING

1. Genuine Hesitation
2. Electric
3. Nested
4. Take Your Time (And Find That Orange To Squeeze)
5. Let’s Ball
6. Fell Like An Ax
7. Only In America / When The Curtains Of The Night Are Peeled Back - Feat. Joseph “JoJo” Clarke
8. Never Had It Better
9. Judy
10. Shine A Light For Me
11. Hedged In Darkness

Where once was Superwolf, now roam Superwolves, the new album and demon spawn of Matt Sweeney and Bonnie ‘Prince’ Billy

The songs that make up Superwolves, the duo’s second album and first since 2005’s Superwolf, go boldly into undreamed-of places, and go deep, as Matt and Bonny take all the musics they know to make songs that penetrate. In classic Garcia-Hunter style, Sweeney and the ‘Prince’ first work separately, finding a path to each other in their solitary imaginings. Bonnie lyric sets delivered to Matt spark Sweeney’s guitar brain; chords and a melody are shaped, recorded fast and loose and sent back to the Prince, then the two parties meet up to sing, stitch, strengthen and finally perform them together in front of a small unsuspecting audience. Then new sets of lyrics are sent, animated and played in a high wire style until the shared songs and experiences are ready to commit to record. This is just the beginning of their fusion process, as words imply vocalizations to counter and support, and guitar lines suggest harmonic fields to subtly push into. In this process, a new creature grows out of the old one. In this name of this partnership, the guitar shares an open and fluid space with the vocals, the voices sing with the guitars—every moment in the life of Superwolves is an extravaganza, guided only by its need.

“The chemistry comes from lives, lived separately, in which music is crucial sustenance. We listen with gratitude and awe, knowing that we belong in there. We construct our dream selves with the faith that these selves will have their chance at life. We know what we are capable of doing and just need each other’s support to bring the imagined languages to life.” — Will Oldham

“I love the challenge to write melodies for Will to sing. Struggle with that challenge too. Knowing that Will’s voice will elevate the melody makes me reach higher and dig deeper for the tune. Makes me want to match it with a guitar part that holds his voice like a chalice holds wine (or blood, or whatever is needed to live the best life). I also love singing harmonies and responses to this voice of his.” — Matt Sweeney

As far as this record, as in when and how it came together, the two man crew started working on it five years ago. The first actual session, however, went down about a year ago at Brooklyn’s Strange Weather and the next took place at the Butcher Shoppe in Nashville. Sweeney oversaw the mixing of the Brooklyn sessions with Oldham overseeing the Nashville mixes. On the album, Sweeney sings harmonies along, with, and around his favorite singer, and plays all electric, acoustic, and bass guitars, joined in places by David Ferguson on stand-up bass, Mike Coltun on electric bass, Mdou Moctar on electric lead, Ahmoudou Madassane on rhythm guitar, Souleyman Ibrahim, Ryan Sawyer and Peter Townsend on drums and Mike Rojas on keys. The Bonnie ‘Prince’ sings. Does he ever. And Superwolves rules over all.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: This is a perfect collaborative effort from Sweeney & Oldham here, offsetting BPB's sometimes saccharine vocal style with Sweeney's brilliantly dynamic guitar playing. There are moments of stunning minimalistic bliss ('Resist The Urge') or more psychedelic grooving force ('Hall Of Death') but this is a constantly confounding and rewarding listen.

TRACK LISTING

1. Make Worry For Me
2. Good To My Girls
3. God Is Waiting
4. Hall Of Death
5. Shorty’s Ark
6. I Am A Youth Inclined To Ramble
7. My Popsicle
8. Watch What Happens
9. Resist The Urge
10. There Must Be A Someone
11. My Blue Suit
12. My Body Is My Own
13. You Can Regret What You Have Done
14. Not Fooling

‘Feels’ is Animal Collective’s sixth studio album, originally released in 2008. The album features all four band members - Avey Tare, Deakin, Geologist and Panda Bear.

TRACK LISTING

Did You See The Words
Grass
Flesh Canoe
The Purple Bottle
Bees
Banshee Beat
Daffy Duck
Loch Raven
Turn Into Something

‘Sung Tongs’ is the band's fifth studio album. Originally released in 2005, the album features Avey Tare and Panda Bear.

TRACK LISTING

Leaf House
Who Could Win A Rabbit
The Softest Voice
Winters Love
Kids On Holiday
Sweet Road
Visiting Friends
College
We Tigers
Mouth Wooed Her
Good Lovin Outside
Whaddit I Done

EPs 1988-1991 And Rare Tracks compiles the group’s four EPs, wherein many of their devoted fans’ favourite music lies. You Made Me Realise and Feed Me With Your Kiss both preceded the band’s debut album in 1988 in quick succession. In the gap between Isn’t Anything and loveless, the band released two further EPs; Glider (1990) and Tremolo (1991).

TRACK LISTING

CD1
1. You Made Me Realise
2. Slow
3. Thorn
4. Cigarette In Your Bed
5. Drive It All Over Me
6. Feed Me With Your Kiss
7. I Believe
8. Emptiness Inside
9. I Need No Trust
10. Soon
11. Glider
12. Don’t Ask Why
13. Off Your Face

CD2
1. To Here Knows When
2. Swallow
3. Honey Power
4. Moon Song
5. Instrumental No. 2
6. Instrumental No. 1
7. Glider (full Length Version)
8. Sugar
9. Angel
10. Good For You
11. How Do You Do It

Finally re-emerging in 2013 after two full decades in relative hiding, their third album m b v is by turns their most experimental record but also their most melodic and immediate; proof real of their unerring desire for re-invention. Continuing to push boundaries of both music and genre, m b v is an album of astonishing music, some of which could lay claim to being of a type never been made before. Otherworldly, intimate and a visceral listen, m b v is a startling and beautiful metamorphosis of what was known of the my bloody valentine sound, pushing the boundaries of genre unlike any other band. The album’s closer, “Wonder 2” is an example of this, seeing Shields meld hypnotic guitar with drum’n’bass to astonishing result.

TRACK LISTING

1. She Found Now
2. Only Tomorrow
3. Who Sees You
4. Is This And Yes
5. If I Am
6. New You
7. In Another Way
8. Nothing Is
9. Wonder 2

With their debut album, Isn’t Anything (originally released in 1988), my bloody valentine revolutionised alternative music and heralded a new approach to guitar music for generations to come. The album birthed a sound which became a template for thousands of new subgenres, heralding a new approach to guitar music and studio production. Not only was it a new type of music, it paved the way for a new type of journalism; inciting comparisons to elemental phenomenon, tapping into how the music affected the psyche. Shields and Butcher frequently sang in a similar vocal range that allowed their voices to blend together. This had the effect of making their gender indistinguishable, to the point where their voices could be used as another melodic layer to complement the vertigo-inducing sounds made by Shields’ guitars.

TRACK LISTING

1. Soft As Snow (But Warm Inside)
2. Lose My Breath
3. Cupid Come
4. (When You Wake) You’re Still In A Dream
5. No More Sorry
6. All I Need
7. Feed Me With Your Kiss
8. Sueisfine
9. Several Girls Galore
10. You Never Should
11. Nothing Much To Lose
12. I Can See It (But I Can’t Feel It)

The second my bloody valentine album, loveless, was released in 1991. Musically, it took an unexpected leap forwards, standing ahead of anything released at the time. Shields and the band moved further towards a music of pure sensation, creating textures and tones that could be felt as much as heard; with loveless the band created an album that overwhelmed the senses. loveless is widely considered a flawless whole and rightly regarded as a masterpiece; a 1990s equivalent to Pet Sounds, In A Silent Way or Innervisions, a record constructed by exploring the edges of what a recording studio is capable of. It is a record best experienced as a whole, in one sitting - a listening experience like no other and unmatchable in its sonic brevity.

TRACK LISTING

1. Only Shallow
2. Loomer
3. Touched
4. To Here Knows When
5. When You Sleep
6. I Only Said
7. Come In Alone
8. Sometimes
9. Blown A Wish
10. What You Want
11. Soon

Anna Calvi will release a 10-year Anniversary edition of her self-titled debut album via Domino. An astonishingly confident record; ‘Anna Calvi’ showcases the unique strengths of her songwriting, singing and virtuoso guitar-playing, all jumping out of the speaker together. Calvi drew on the ghosts of Nina Simone and Maria Callas for influence to create a stunningly modern sound.

To date, Anna Calvi has released three studio albums (‘Anna Calvi’, ‘One Breath’ and ‘Hunter’), a collaborative EP with David Byrne (‘Strange Weather’) and the most recent ‘Hunted’, a seven-track reworking of ‘Hunter’. Additionally, Calvi wrote and performed the score for Season 5 of BBC One’s Peaky Blinders and wrote the music for the opera The Sandman, directed by Robert Wilson.

Anna is the first solo artist to achieve three consecutive Mercury Prize nominations and has also received a Brit Award nomination. Throughout her career, Calvi has worked with Brian Eno, Marianne Faithfull, Charlotte Gainsbourg, Joe Talbot (IDLES), Dave Okumu (The Invisible), Johnny Flynn, Adrian Utley (Portishead) and Courtney Barnett.

The LP, which includes the likes of ‘Desire’, ‘Blackout’, ‘Rider To The Sea’ and ‘Suzanne And I’, is reissued for the first time, available to independent retailers on deluxe red vinyl. It also features brand new cover artwork and an 8-page booklet containing previously unseen photographs, plus digital download code.

TRACK LISTING

1. Rider To The Sea
2. No More Words
3. Desire
4. Suzanne And I
5. First We Kiss
6. The Devil
7. Blackout
9. I’ll Be Your Man
10. Morning Light
11. Love Won’t Be Leaving

Set in the desert of Crestone, Colorado over the course of eight days and set to an original score composed by Animal Collective's Geologist & Deakin. Crestone follows a group of SoundCloud rappers who live in solitude, growing weed and making music for the internet. When an old friend arrives to make a movie, reality and fiction begin to blur.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: It's a bit of a different vibe for Animal Collective this time round, with their notoriously clangy arty-indie replaced with brittle atmospherics and suitable filmic drones. It's a big step, but a perfectly fitting soundtrack and a testament to the continued skill of this Maryland crew.

‘Island’, the latest album from Oscar-nominated composer and songwriter Owen Pallett, released on Domino / Secret City Records (Canada).

Almost entirely acoustic, ‘Island’ begins with 13 darkened chords and was recorded live at Abbey Road Studios with the London Contemporary Orchestra. The introduction is the sound of waking up alone and on the shore of a strange land. What follows is a shimmering and luscious orchestral album that draws across the full breadth of Pallett’s discography, from ‘Heartland’’s Technicolor to the glittering, fingerpicked guitar that marked Pallett’s first records with their trio, Les Mouches.

In addition to Pallett’s Grammy Award-winning work with Arcade Fire, Pallett’s commissions have included string, brass and orchestral work for Last Shadow Puppets, The National, The Mountain Goats, Christine and arrangements for Frank Ocean, Caribou, R.E.M., Linkin Park, Sigur Rós, Taylor Swift and the Pet Shop Boys.

Since the release of ‘In Conflict’ (2014), Pallett has earned an Oscar nomination for their film scoring work on Spike Jonze’s ‘Her’ and an Emmy for Sølve Sundsbø’s ‘Fourteen Actors Acting’. Their score for Matt Wolf’s ‘Spaceship Earth’, a documentary about a crew who spent two years quarantined inside a replica of Earth’s ecosystem called BIOSPHERE 2, is out now.

TRACK LISTING

---> (i)
Transformer
Paragon Of Order
---> (ii)
The Sound Of The
Engines
Perseverance Of The
Saints
Polar Vortex
---> (iii)
A Bloody Morning
Fire-Mare
Lewis Gets Fucked Into
Space
---> (iv)
In Darkness
Paragon Of Order
(version)
Fire-Mare (version)

‘Banane Bleue’ (French for blue banana), the brand new album from Frànçois & The Atlas Mountains, is a nomadic and truly European record, hailing from rented workspaces in some of the continent’s key cities - Berlin, Athens and Paris - and recorded with instruments that were often borrowed from likeminded musicians.

Written solely by Frànçois Marry himself, close collaborator and Weird World artist Jaakko Eino Kalevi was enlisted for production duties whilst Renaud Letang (Feist, Gonzales, Connan Mockasin) mixed the album.

The title of the album is taken from the ‘blue banana’ concept, a geographical theory that groups together a corridor of Europe’s biggest cities, originally conceived in the 1980s. The theory states that the blurring of these cities’ boundaries has resulted in the formation of one massive, interconnected megalopolis.

Expanding on the theory, Frànçois poetised it, picturing a luminescent blue banana shape that you can see from space with vibrant, ethereal currents that surround and bind us. It explores common cultural and romantic ground, creating an album full of missed meetings and misunderstandings.

TRACK LISTING

The Foreigner
Coucou
Julie
Par Le Passé
Holly Golightly
Lee-Ann & Lucie
Tourne Autour
Revu
Gold & Lips
Dans Un Taxi

Animal Collective present the physical release for ‘Bridge To Quiet’, out on Domino.

The band took some of their unreleased improvisations, remixed them, collaged them and built them into fully formed songs, finding their way to ‘Bridge To Quiet’.

Animal Collective consists of musicians Avey Tare (David Portner), Panda Bear (Noah Lennox), Deakin (Josh Dibb) and Geologist (Brian Weitz), who play in various configurations on each album. Their expansive catalogue spans the entirety of the 2000s, including ‘Strawberry Jam’, ‘Feels’ and ‘Sung Tongs’. With the release of ‘Merriweather Post Pavilion’, named after the Baltimore venue, they established themselves as one of the most acclaimed acts of the 21st Century.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Bridge To Quiet shows the Animal Collective in a more expansive, avant-ambient mood, with these stunning shadowy vocals and electronic artifacts mixed with glitched synths and off-kilter snappy percussion.

TRACK LISTING

Rain In Cups
Piggy Knows
Sux-Bier Passage
Bridge To Quiet

The album came to be after the blossoming of a long-term friendship between James Yorkston and Karl-Jonas Winqvist, the Swedish music producer, leader and conductor of The Second Hand Orchestra.

Yorkston says of recording “Struggle” with TSHO: “The band were sat by in the studio by themselves, looping the verses over and over. I was in the control room, drinking sweet tea. I just had to wait for the right moment and jump on board, like when I’m pushing my kids round on a roundabout in the local park. I love that everyone was singing along so freely when we recorded this. There were vocal mics for everyone, and people would just lean in with a harmony, every now and then. It gives it a very communal feeling.”

That communal feeling is apparent across the entire album. Recorded and mixed in Sweden over the course of three days with a selection of musicians Winqvist had brought together, including Peter Morén (Peter, Bjorn & John), Cecilia Österholm (one of Sweden’s best-known nyckelharpa players), Emma Nordenstam (piano & cello) and Ulrika Gyllenberg (violin). The studio approach with The Second Hand Orchestra was entirely improvised around Yorkston’s songs, and the only song they heard in advance was “Ella Mary Leather”; Yorkston didn’t want to direct anyone too much but instead, allowed for a welcoming, instinctive, free-spirited and joyful atmosphere. The Wide, Wide River is a soothing, warm and sublime listen, whilst also highlighting Yorkston’s skills for songwriting, collaboration and as a musical conductor. The record takes in past loves, advancing age and friends, now gone, whilst also containing some of the most sanguine songs Yorkston has ever made.

The Wide, Wide River is James’ tenth album for Domino, not to mention his three albums as part of Yorkston/Thorne/Khan and his two books. A prolific writer, Yorkston has worked with a wealth of talent over his two-decade career including Four Tet, Alexis Taylor, KT Tunstall, Rustin Man, Simon Raymonde, Norma and Mike Waterson, Martin Carthy, Max Cooper, David Wrench and many others.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: James Yorkston makes some of the most endearing melodic indie-folk you're likely to hear and teaming up hear with the Second Hand Orchestra ends up sounding like a joyful, clattering distillation of trad folk and wild exhuberant art-rock. Exactly what we need right now.

TRACK LISTING

Ella Mary Leather
To Soothe Her Wee Bit Sorrows
Choices, Like Wild Rivers
Struggle
There Is No Upside
A Droplet Forms
A Very Old-Fashioned Blues
We Test The Beams

Georgia’s new album, ‘Seeking Thrills’, is a musically daring story of hedonism, self-discovery and, above all, the transcendental power of the dancefloor.

The North West Londoner has been on a long, dazzling journey since the release of her critically acclaimed debut album in 2015. Her first self-titled collection of percussive, punk-inflected pop songs was lauded by The Guardian, Vice, The FADER and others - but nobody predicted the about turn she would make when she returned with two rough-hewn diamonds of house music in 2019.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: I was a huge fan of the superb album from Georgia a few years ago, and if anything, the crystal clear production and effortless absorption of dancefloor influence and soulful 80s groove in 'Seeking Thrills' is even more satisfying. Ram-packed with day-long earworms.

TRACK LISTING

Started Out
About Work The Dancefloor
Never Let You Go
24 Hours *
Mellow (ft Shygirl)
Til I Own It
I Can’t Wait
Feel It
Ultimate Sailor
Ray Guns
The Thrill (ft Maurice)
Honey Dripping Sky

* = CD / LP Digital download Card Only

The Kills have compiled an extraordinary career spanning b-sides and rarities album titled, appropriately, Little Bastards. The songs date back from the band’s first 7-inch singles in 2002 through to 2009. All of the material has been newly remastered for release on 2 x LP, CD & Digital and marks the first ever vinyl pressing for some of these tracks.

The compilation includes the unreleased and never-before-heard demo “Raise Me” from the 2008-2009 Midnight Boom era. Other highlights include “I Call It Art” from the Monsieur Gainsbourg Revisited covers compilation, the brilliant Midnight Boom digital bonus track “Night Train,” a blistering performance of “Love Is A Deserter” from an XFM radio session and a handful of classic American roots songs performed with the kind of bruising delivery they’re famous for: Howlin’ Wolfs’ “Forty Four,” Screamin’ Jay Hawkins’ “I Put A Spell on You” and Dock Boggs’ “Sugar Baby.”

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: It always amazes me when a band releases a b-sides album that could easily have held an album’s worth of material. In the case of the new Kills retrospective, ‘Little Bastards’ (named after a presumably disobedient Roland 880 sampler) it could easily have been two albums worth.

TRACK LISTING

1. SUPERPOWERLESS / Last Day Of Magic 7” - 2008
2. PASSION IS ACCURATE / Love Is A Deserter CD Single - 2005
3. KISS THE WRONG SIDE / Cheap And Cheerful 7” - 2008
4. RAISE ME / Unreleased Demo 2009
5. NIGHT TRAIN / Midnight Boom Digital Bonus Track 2008
6. HALF OF US / No Wow 7” - 2005
7. LONDON HATES YOU / Tape Song 7” - 2008
8. I CALL IT ART / Monsieur Gainsbourg Revisited Compilation - 2006
9. FORTY FOUR / Black Balloon 7” - 2009
10. LOVE IS A DESERTER / Recorded For XFM - 2005
11. THE SEARCH FOR CHERRY RED / Pull A U 7” Single - 2003
12. MAGAZINE / Love Is A Deserter 7” - 2005
13. BLUE MOON / Future Starts Slow 7” Single - 2011
14. JEWEL THIEF / Fried My Little Brains 7” Single - 2003
15. BABY’S EYES / The Good Ones 7” Single - 2003
16. I PUT A SPELL ON YOU / Screamin’ Jay Hawkins Cover - 2009
17. RUN HOME SLOW / The Good Ones CD Single - 2005
18. WEED KILLER / Black Balloon 10” - 2009
19. THE VOID / No Wow Expanded Edition CD - 2005 

Recorded at the start of the band’s ‘Tranquility Base Hotel + Casino’ tour, ‘Arctic Monkeys - Live At The Royal Albert Hall’, features 20 of the band’s finest moments to date.  All proceeds from the album will go to War Child to help fill the £2 million deficit they are facing in 2021 caused by the devastating impact of Covid-19 on their fundraising. These funds are urgently needed to support those who are worst hit by the virus.

“On June 7, 2018 we played a very special show at London’s Royal Albert Hall. All the proceeds from that memorable night were donated to War Child in support of the vital work they do protecting, educating, and rehabilitating children who have experienced the trauma of conflict and the horror of war. The situation that was bad in 2018 is now desperate and those children and their families need our help more than ever. To enable War Child to reduce their funding deficit and continue their valuable work, we are happy to be able to release a live album, recorded that evening at The Royal Albert Hall. All proceeds will go direct to the charity. We thank all our fans in advance for their support of this release and in turn for their support of War Child” - Arctic Monkeys.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: A completely essential document of the Arctic Monkeys incendiary live show here, on top form and all for a good cause. The set-list is everything you'd expect from a Monkeys best-of gig and all from the comfort of your own home! What more could you want.

TRACK LISTING

1. Four Out Of Five
2. Brianstorm
3. Crying Lightning
4. Do I Wanna Know?
5. Why'd You Only Call Me When You're High?
6. 505
7. One Point Perspective
8. Do Me A Favour
9. Cornerstone
10. Knee Socks
11. Arabella
12. Tranquility Base Hotel & Casino
13. She Looks Like Fun
14. From The Ritz To The Rubble
15. Pretty Visitors
16. Don't Sit Down 'Cause I've Moved Your Chair
17. I Bet You Look Good On The Dancefloor
18. Star Treatment
19. The View From The Afternoon
20. R U Mine?

As the These New Puritans canon has grown through the years, Hidden has always stood as the great indicator of the group's detail, precision and ambition. Originally released in 2010, when both Jack and George Barnett were just 22 years old, Hidden was the second album the twins released as These New Puritans.

The album itself was produced by TNP's Jack Barnett and Graham Sutton (Bark Psychosis, Boymerang) and mixed by Dave Cooley (J Dilla, MF DOOM), it draws on both the rhythmic lexicons of dancehall and 20th century post-minimalism, the recording features 6ft Japanese Taiko drums, a thirteen piece brass and woodwind ensemble, sub-heavy beats, prepared piano & a children's choir. The result is equal parts brutal and melancholy, standing the test of time, sounding as pioneering and bold a decade on.

Hidden is a record that crushes together menace and beauty: after the prelude of woodwind that is “Time Xone”, “We Want War” remains one of the most startling tracks to be released as a single in this millennium - a sound like swarms of invading, metallic wasps, robotic voices intoning, the martial rattle of layers of drums, Jack Barnett’s vocals an incantation. The militant funk of “Three Thousand”, strange skittish jazz in “Hologram”, and “Drum Courts - Where Corals Lie” feels like an ancient, elegiac folk song carried forth on a storm. A record of intense variety, soul and depth, Hidden is remarkable by anyone’s standards, let alone one made by a group of people barely out of their teens.

Through the extremes of recording, These New Puritans had a critical hit. It was rightly lauded for its singularity and adventure at the time and found the group a legion of loyal fans and was given NME’s prestigious Album of the Year 2010 accolade. Further to the record, it spawned the Hidden Live tour, featuring a large ensemble, conductor Andre De Ridder, and a kids choir. 

TRACK LISTING

Disc 1
1. Time Xone
2. We Want War
3. Three Thousand
4. Hologram
5. Attack Music
6. Fire–Power
7. Orion
8. Canticle
9. Drum Courts–Where Corals Lie
10. White Chords
11. 5

Disc 2
12. Hologram Pianos
13. We Want War Brass & Woodwind
14. 5 Mallets
15. Hologram Chamber Mix
16. Drum Courts Hidden Live Paris
17. Irreversible¬¬–En Papier Hidden Live Berlin

Dirty Projectors’ 2020 five four-song EPs, each strikingly different from the next, all come together in a 20-song anthology titled ‘5EPs’.

Each EP features lead vocals by a different band member: Maia Friedman, Felicia Douglass, Kristin Slipp and Dave Longstreth, who all trade verses on the series closer.

Maia’s ‘Windows Open’ is acoustic and folky, Felicia’s ‘Flight Tower’ is both soulful and electronic, Dave’s ‘Super João’ is a four-track bossa nova homage to João Gilberto, Kirstin’s ‘Earth Crisis’ is a cut-up orchestral collage in the mode of through-composed art song, whereas the final EP ‘Ring Road’ weaves together the emotional, stylistic, and lyrical threads explored in the prior four EPs.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: I was just listening to Dirty Projectors' song with David Byrne for the 'Dark Was The Night' compilation just the other day, which led me to wishing for a collection of some of the more unheard of tracks from their canon. Lo and behold, stone the crows etc. Here it is. You'll have heard some of these tracks before, but it's a brilliant document to have them all together like this.

TRACK LISTING

On The Breeze
Overlord
Search For Life
Guarding The Baby
Inner World
Lose Your Love
Self Design
Empty Vessel
Holy Mackerel
I Get Carried Away
You Create Yourself
Moon, If Ever
Eyes On The Road
There I Said It
Bird’s Eye
Now I Know
Por Qué No
Searching Spirit
No Studying
My Possession

‘A Bag Of Eyes’ is Fogarty’s third album - a wholly different sonic prospect to 2017’s much-lauded ‘The Curious Hand’. Weary of the guitar, and seeking something darker than its predecessor, he chose to lean more heavily on synths and drum machines and, additionally, to self-produce. “It was about creating and exploring new sound worlds,” Fogarty says. “Experimenting with new ways of incorporating electronics into the songwriting process, and in some cases dispensing with conventional songwriting processes altogether.”

On ‘A Bag OF Eyes’ there is industrial judder, slacker-fuzz guitar, a cacophony of saxophones. On one track, ring-modulated drums kick in with oscillating fury. Another moves from 90s shit-hole grunge venue to sleazy jazz joint in four minutes. Whilst on a third a synth is deployed, with the express purpose of sawing the listener’s ears in half, Fogarty attests. However, beneath them all lie fragments of melody, image, drone; a flicker of banjo, an electronic pulse. “I like to purposely make music that clashes with the more traditional stuff that I do,” he says.

Fogarty’s celebrated storytelling is at home in this new sound world, rambling between the fantastical and the mundane: nuns playing volleyball, horses on clifftops, lives glimpsed through rear windows. There are echoes of his own past, the loss of dear friends. Ireland, London and two views of San Francisco, 15 years apart. It is bus stops, house fires and Jimmy Stewart. ‘A Bag Of Eyes’ was recorded across London, Kent and East Sussex and features Fogarty’s partner Emma Smith, Meilyr Jones, long-time collaborators Leo Abrahams, Aram Zarikian and John Fogarty, as well as someone slightly more unexpected, an audience member recorded live at one of Seamus’ gigs in Dublin. If there is a restlessness to these songs it is there not only in their geographical sweep, their mingling of memory and nostalgia, but also in their sense of invention: audience anecdotes, a trad ballad cover, electronic fury, dirty guitar solos, all pressed fiercely together into something that feels startling and new and explorative. 

TRACK LISTING

Shapes
Old Suit
Jimmy Stewart
Wake Up Felix
Bus Shelter Blues
Nuns
Ghosts
Horse
Interlude
Johnny K
San Francisco
My Boy Willie

Performed, produced and recorded entirely by herself, acts of rebellion is a complex manifesto on simplicity, a call to fight, to live, to be present. It’s a collection about the personal as political and embracing the beauty of tiny acts of revolution in our everyday lives. This ethos is clear in the dreamy, pulsing new single/video, “el cielo no es de nadie,” “an ode to little, constant, every day acts of love” sung in Ela’s native Spanish.

Following “they told us it was hard, but they were wrong” and “megapunk,” “el cielo no es de nadie” defies the idea that one grandiose act means more than little ones. The video, co-directed by Ela and Pepi Ginsberg, presents striking images of Ela’s machines and her moving throughout the stage and hallways of a club. It gives a feel of Ela’s visceral, intimate world and urges finding a deeper connection to those around you. “‘el cielo no es de nadie’ is about all the love I see in small, everyday acts. It’s an invitation to appreciate unheroic, but constant and meaningful actions,” says Ela. “The song’s title, ‘el cielo no es de nadie,’ refers to the phrase ‘I’ll give you the sky,’ a common expression used in Spanish when in love. In the song, I defy it: 'you can't give me the sky' / it isn’t yours to give.”

Before forging her path as a solo electronic artist, Ela was a drummer in a teenage hardcore band. She joined the band when she was just 12, performing with them for almost a decade. Ela then moved to the United States to attend Berklee College of Music, where she double-majored in jazz drumming and synthesizer design. This roving background instilled in her a belief that we all have the power to change things, and as she delved deeper into her work with synthesizers, she saw a clear connection between the freedom of the DIY scene she grew up in and club culture. “I deeply identify with club culture, and want to make music to dance to,” she says. “I also want to make songs in the more traditional sense, with melodies, lyrics, and singing. I want to make songs that stay with people through the years.”

Using only hardware to perform, write and record, Ela creates complex, technical electronic music that exudes a warm vibrancy, along with a darker, almost celebratory understanding that our breaths aren’t infinite. Her sharp, coiled words are cathartic—due in part to her approach to writing them. “I always start writing by improvising alone,” she says. “Once I have some instrumentals I’m happy with, I intuitively grab the mic and sing a phrase with a melody in it. I always keep that initial phrase.” On acts of rebellion, you sense the stories hidden in everyday things. You feel Ela’s personality and viewpoint; you sense her presence. The cover features a photo of her, most of her face obscured, but her eyes sharply focused.

On acts of rebellion, she’s asking us to make contact not just with her, but also the people that inhabit our lives. She’s suggesting we leave our gadgets behind in favor of flesh-and-blood communities. She’s asking us to think, dance, and love, while she coaxes humanity from her hardware—machines that rattle and whirr alongside her and, in turn, make us feel more alive.

TRACK LISTING

1.N19 5NF
2. They Told Us It Was Hard, But They Were Wrong.
3. El Cielo No Es De Nadie
4. Megapunk
5. Pocket Piano
6. Dominique
7. Let Them Have The Internet
8. Tony
9. Do Whatever You Want, All The Time.
10. Close (ft. Helado Negro)

The singular Robert Wyatt releases ‘His Greatest Misses’ - a compilation spanning his decades-long career - on vinyl for the first time ever. Also back in stock on CD.

In its title, ‘His Greatest Misses’ acknowledges that Wyatt’s career has taken place outside the limited space and definition of commercial pop success but simultaneously recognises that Wyatt’s non-careerist career has nevertheless proven both productive and rigorous. The collection, originally released as a Japanese edition, includes selections dating from ‘Rock Bottom’ (1974) to ‘Cuckooland’ (2003), although its running order is non-chronological. This makes the subtle point that Wyatt’s recordings are best considered as a nonlinear catalogue; this is a world through which the listener can move at any pace in any direction.

Born in Bristol in 1945, Wyatt was a founding member of the bands Soft Machine and Matching Mole, before embarking on a solo career. His discography is one that flows with the force and intensity of a river in full spate. Each recording on ‘His Greatest Misses’ is a benchmark in the life and work of a steadfast and true original and provides the opportunity for the listener to enjoy some wild swimming through this powerful, idiosyncratic and unclassifiable catalogue.

The release of ‘His Greatest Misses’ coincides with the release of ‘Side by Side’, a book by Robert Wyatt and his wife Alfie Benge: visual artist, songwriter and the person who has nurtured and overseen Wyatt’s career for the past forty-six years.

TRACK LISTING

1. P.L.A.
2. Worship
3. Heaps Of Sheeps
4. Free Will And Testament
5. I’m A Believer
6. Sea Song
7. Little Red Robin Hood Hit
8. The Road
9. Solar Flares
10. At Last I Am Free
11. Arauco
12. The Age Of Self
13. Alien
14. Shipbuilding
15. Memories Of You
16. Muddy Mouse (b)
17. Mister E
18. Foreign Accents

Heart’s Ease follows 2016’s Lodestar; which on its arrival, seemed like a musical miracle - an enthralling new LP from a woman who is widely acknowledged as England’s greatest female folk singer, but who had not recorded an album for 38 years.

With Heart’s Ease, Shirley delivers a record even stronger than Lodestar having completely regained her confidence, and singing so well that you can’t believe she was away for so long. As Shirley put it, “Lodestar wasn’t too bad, was it? But when I listen to it, it does sometimes sound rather tentative. I had to record it at home because I was just too nervous to sing in front of somebody I didn’t know. This time I was far more relaxed – even though I went into a studio.” Recorded at Metway in Brighton, Heart’s Ease is as compelling and original as Shirley’s great albums from the Sixties and Seventies. There are traditional songs, of course, from England and the USA, but there are also more new songs than in the past (four non-traditional tracks) and there’s even a burst of experimentation that hints at possible new directions to come.

In the years between For As Many As Will (1978) and the release of Lodestar, Shirley suffered from a form of dysphonia, had lost her singing voice, and was never expected to sing again – certainly not in public. Lodestar was a delightful surprise to all her fans and the folk community, and once Shirley had started to sing again, she was not going to stop. “I’m absolutely consumed by this music,” she said. “I have always loved it so much. I’m still learning songs and just want to keep learning them. I thought ‘somebody has got to sing these songs, so it might as well be me!”

Collins followed Lodestar with a remarkable blitz of activity for a lady in her eighties. There was a film, and soundtrack album, The Ballad of Shirley Collins. There was a new autobiography, All in the Downs, which won the Penderyn Music Book Prize (beating the Beastie Boys). And there were high-profile come-back concerts, including a memorable appearance at London’s Barbican, at which she was backed by an exceptional group of friends and musicians, the Lodestar Band. She may have felt nervous being back on stage, “but I feel so supported by that band. And every song I sing I love anyway – it’s not a hardship to sing the songs!”.

All of which is reflected in her second come-back album, Heart’s Ease. Collins’ intriguing choice of songs on Heart’s Ease includes two with lyrics by her first husband Austin John Marshall, a graphic artist and poet who produced several of her albums and had the inspired idea of getting Shirley to work with blues/jazz/world music guitarist Davy Graham on that extraordinary album Folk Roots, New Routes in 1964. There are more family memories with “Locked In Ice”, written by Dolly’s son the late Buz Collins and the most startling new piece is the finale, “Crowlink”, named after a pathway on the South Downs overlooking the English Channel “where I love to be,” in which Shirley sings against a moody, atmospheric fusion of Ossian Brown’s hurdy-gurdy, and electronica and field recordings of waves and sea birds from Matthew Shaw.

Heart’s Ease is a glorious reminder that Shirley Collins is still in a class of her own, both as a folk singer with a distinctive no-nonsense style that is all her own, and as an innovator. And she certainly doesn’t intend this album to be her last. “I have such a huge memory of songs, so many of which I still want to sing. And I wasted all those years not singing, so now I’ve got to catch up a bit!”

TRACK LISTING

The Merry Golden Tree
Rolling In The Dew
The Christmas Song
Locked In Ice
Wondrous Love
Barbara Allen
Canadee-i-o
Sweet Greens And Blues
Tell Me True
Whitsun Dance
Orange In Bloom
Crowlink

Following the release of Relatives In Descent, the band’s critically acclaimed headlong dive into the morass of American life in 2017 (featured on myriad “best of” lists, including The New York Times, Esquire, Newsweek, Loud & Quiet and more), Ultimate Success Today continues to further expand the possibilities of what a Protomartyr album can sound like. 

“There is darkness in the poetry of Ultimate Success Today,” says punk legend, founding member of The Raincoats, and friend of the band Ana da Silva. “The theme of things ending, above all human existence, is present and reminiscent of Cormac McCarthy’s The Road. Our world has reached a point that makes us afraid: fires, floods, earthquakes, hunger, war, intolerance…There are cries of despair. Is there hope? Greed is the sickness that puts life in danger.”

"The re-release of our first album had me thinking about the passage of time and its ultimate conclusion,” says singer Joe Casey of Ultimate Success Today. “Listening to No Passion All Technique again, I could hear myself hoping for an introduction and a long future, but also being cognizant that it could be ‘one and done’ for us. So, when it came time to write Ultimate Success Today, I was reminded of that first urgency and how it was an inverse of my current grapple with how terribly ill I’ve been feeling lately. Was that sick feeling colouring how I felt about the state of the world or was it the other way around?”

“This panic was freeing in a way. It allowed me to see our fifth album as a possible valediction of some confusingly loud five-act play. In the same light I see it as an interesting mile marker of our first decade of being a band - a crest of the hill along a long highway. Although just to cover my bases, I made sure to get my last words in while I still had the breath to say them.”

“There are exquisite, subtle gifts from other instruments that always heighten the guitar, instead of fighting with it,” explains da Silva. “They help to create a harmonious wall of sound all of its own. This was intentional. Greg Ahee wanted to use different textures other than pedals, and the drone quality of some of those instruments colours the guitar and the whole sound with a warm, rich in reverb, yet all-consuming landscape for Joe Casey’s voice.”

Protomartyr is Joe Casey (vocals), Greg Ahee (guitars), Alex Leonard (drums), and Scott Davidson (bass guitar). Ultimate Success Today was recorded at Dreamland Recording Studios, a late 19th century church, in upstate New York and co-produced by the band and David Tolomei (Dirty Projectors, Beach House) with mixing by Tolomei. Featured guest musicians on the album include Nandi Rose (vocals) a.k.a. Half Waif, jazz legend Jemeel Moondoc (alto sax), Izaak Mills (bass clarinet, sax, flute), and Fred Lonberg-Holm (cello).

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: 'Ultimate Success Today' is a superb, burning fire of an LP from start to finish. Dark and foreboding while somehow managing to elicit a headnod from even the most stationary of listeners, this is Protomartyr's finest moment yet.

TRACK LISTING

Day Without End
Processed By The Boys
I Am You Now
The Aphorist
June 21
Michigan Hammers
Tranquilizer
Modern Business Hymns
Bridge & Crown
Worm In Heaven

GENE arrives five years after the iconoclast variously known as Sam Eastgate, Sam Dust and LA Priest thrilled the world with the cosmic pop of his debut album Inji, his first LP for Domino and his first solo output following the disbanding of former outfit, Late Of The Pier. GENE also follows the 2016 project Soft Hair in which Sam teamed up with Connan Mockasin for an instant cult-classic album.

GENE, the album, is named after a brand-new analogue drum machine Sam dreamt up and built alone. Working in isolation for more than two years in California, Wales and England’s south coast, soldering iron in hand, Sam developed the inners of GENE using dozens of electrical circuits he made up himself. The creation came after a search for an alternative to the structure and rigor of standard drum machines. Its unique rhythmic patterns are the focal point for the album, which is coloured by lush, pastoral tones, paired with the influence of his environmental changes.

The product of clear-eyed focus, the record offers a one-way ticket into a dimension entirely of Sam’s own making.

GENE is the most complete realisation of his vision yet. These songs are on a quest for meaning, exploring the limits of their maker’s abilities.

Coaxed into life with the juicy groove of “Beginning”, the record struts and sparkles through “Rubber Sky” and “What Moves” towards the melancholic interlude of “Sudden Thing” and the gigantic noise of centerpiece “Monochrome”, taking a sharp turn in the final third towards something darker and more mystical.

GENE was produced alongside London based artist, producer, DJ and founder of Phantasy records, Erol Alkan.

TRACK LISTING

Beginning
Rubber Sky
What Moves
Peace Lily
Open My Eyes
Sudden Thing
Monochrome
What Do You See
Kissing Of The Weeds
Black Smoke
Ain’t No Love Affair

Hot on the heels of her recent critically acclaimed album ‘Seeking Thrills’, Georgia is releasing the 12’’ of her hit single ‘Never Let You Go’ with an additional remix by legendary UK DJ and producer Skream. Heavily inspired by Chicago house and Detroit techno of the early 80s, ‘Never Let You Go’ fuses analogue club sounds with solid pop songwriting and showcases Georgia’s lifelong love affair with the drums, whereas Skream delivers a driving Kraut-inspired workout of this track.

TRACK LISTING

Never Let You Go
Never Let You Go (Skream Remix)

Being in a toxic relationship can sometimes feel like being lost in a maze. Every attempt to turn a corner lands you back where you started. Austra aka Katie Austra Stelmanis’ fourth album, HiRUDiN is both a bold acknowledgement of such patterns of behaviour and a testament to the power of breaking them.

Katie Austra Stelmanis has been better known by her middle name for three albums, ten years, and countless tours. She wrote, produced, and performed all her own records, occasionally sharing the spotlight with a band to tour live. From the outside, things were going really well for a while: she built a devoted fan base and sold out shows all around the world. However, on the inside, Stelmanis was beginning to feel stagnant and uninspired. “I was losing faith in my own ideas,” she explains. Without realising it, she’d got caught up in a toxic relationship that was tearing her apart.

It wasn’t until Stelmanis was ready to face her insecurities that she was able to see a way forward: “My creative and personal relationships were heavily intertwined, and I knew the only answer was to part ways with all of the people and comforts that I’d known for the better part of a decade and start again.” Alongside making changes in her personal life, HiRUDiN saw Austra taking an entirely different, free-spirited approach to making a record. Seeking out all new collaborators, she booked three days of sessions in Toronto with improv musicians she’d never met before. They included two thirds of contemporary classical improv group c_RL, the cellist and kamanche duo Kamancello, kulintang ensemble Pantayo, and a children’s choir.

Accumulating a vast and vibrant mass of source material, Austra then holed up in a studio in the Spanish countryside and took a collage approach to sampling, arranging, writing and producing to reveal the songs that would form the album.

HiRUDiN traces a deeply personal journey towards regeneration, dealing with the fallout of toxic relationships, queer shame, and insecurity along the way.

TRACK LISTING

1. Anywayz
2. All I Wanted
3. How Did You Know?
4. Your Family
5. Risk It
6. Interlude I
7. It’s Amazing
8. Mountain Baby Feat. Cecile Believe
9. I Am Not Waiting
10. Interlude Ii
11. Messiah

Animal Collective’s live album ‘Ballet Slippers’, set for release via Domino, is an homage to the 10- Year Anniversary of their modern classic, ‘Merriweather Post Pavilion’. Recorded in the midst of the band’s extensive and acclaimed nine-month tour in 2009, the album features ‘Merriweather Post Pavilion’’s greatest hits alongside favourites from ‘Strawberry Jam’, ‘Sung Tongs’, ‘Feels’ and ‘Danse Manatee’. Mixed by Ajay Saggar and edited by Noah Lennox (Panda Bear), the release is culled from several shows from that album’s North American tour and sequenced to reflect a full concert experience, complete with song transitions and interludes, creating a captivating document of the genre- defying group

TRACK LISTING

In The Flowers (Live June 2, 2009 Boulder, CO)
Who Could Win A Rabbit (Live June 9, 2009 Ft. Lauderdale, FL)
Summertime Clothes (Live June 9, 2009 Ft. Lauderdale, FL)
Bleed (Live May 30, 2009 Las Vegas, NV)
Guys Eyes (Live June 9, 2009 Ft. Lauderdale, FL)
My Girls (Live May 30, 2009 Las Vegas, NV)
Banshee Beat (Live June 2, 2009 Boulder, CO)
Lion In A Coma (Live June 9, 2009 Ft. Lauderdale, FL)
No More Runnin’ (Live May 29, 2009 Los Angeles, CA)
Lablakely Dress/Fireworks (Live June 9, 2009 Ft. Lauderdale, FL)
Daily Routine (Live May 30, 2009 Las Vegas, NV)
Brothersport (Live June 2, 2009 Boulder, CO)

Songwriter, composer, director and visual artist Dev Hynes - best known under his moniker Blood Orange - releases the original motion picture score for the highly accoladed ‘Queen & Slim. ‘Queen & Slim’ is a 2019 American romantic crime drama film that follows two African-Americans on the run after killing a police officer in self-defence during a traffic stop. Directed by Melina Matsoukas (Beyonce’s Formation) and written by Lena Waithe (Master of None and Ready Player One), the film stars Daniel Kaluuya (Get Out), Jodie Turner- Smith, Bokeem Woodbine, Chloë Sevigny, Flea, Sturgill Simpson and Indya Moore.

The release of the ‘Queen & Slim’ score marks an incredible couple of years for Hynes, who recently wrapped up a tour opening for Tyler, The Creator in arenas across America. As Blood Orange, he released the mixtape Angel’s Pulse this past summer, in addition to directing a video for Beck, writing a collection of classical music with Third Coast Percussion, directing and releasing a series of his own videos and being called one of the Fast Company’s 100 Most Creative People For 2019

TRACK LISTING

Kids
Hair
Slim Lets Go
Opening
This Is A Safe Place
Bed
A Couple Deer
Slim’s Haircut
What’s Next
Love Theme (Dance)
Slim’s Horse
Slim Calls Home
Uncle’s House
Love Theme
(Photograph)
Get Upstairs
The Sheriff
Start The Car
Sneak Out
Arrival
Kissed All Your Scars

Together with co-producer James Dring (Gorillaz, Jamie T, Nilüfer Yanya), best friends Lorenz and Louis O’Bryen have woven 925 like a dreamscape in which idyllic and hellish scenes intermingle, forcing the question of what is real and what is make believe. Inspired by everything from Hermann Hesse to Aphex Twin and old-school crooner Tony Bennett, their experimental and holistic approach marks them out as a thoroughly 21st century band; from their open-minded approach to genre to their creativity allowing them to self-produce the music and direct accompanying videos.

Joined by drummer Lincoln Barrett and Campbell Baum on bass, Sorry emerged from a thriving scene of bands in London, and though 925 is their debut album, it is by no means their first statement. It follows a series of mixtapes, released sporadically and used as a way to experiment with the disparate influences and sounds that give 925 its distinctively modern and apocalyptic sound.

Where previous singles and mixtapes earned the band their status as one of the most vital and relentlessly creative new British bands of the moment, 925 is a record which will undoubtedly cement their status as true originals and cross-genre innovators in 2020 and beyond.

TRACK LISTING

1. Right Round The Clock
2. In Unison
3. Snakes
4. Starstruck
5. Rosie
6. Perfect
7. As The Sun Sets
8. Wolf
9. Rock 'n' Roll Star
10. Heather
11. More
12. Ode To Boy
13. Lies (Refix)

Having waited 17 years for Drift Code, some may be surprised at Clockdust’s swift arrival, but the album’s roots can be found in the same extended sessions. “Early on I realised I had two albums worth of material,” Webb explains. “The first tunes I wrote were electric guitar based, with long arrangements that built up in layers to something sonically quite dense. These became the bulk of Drift Code. As a reaction, I wrote a batch of songs that were tighter in their structure but had more feeling of space. These make up the bulk of Clockdust.”

Once he’d identified each song’s greater role, Webb took pains to ensure the albums would stand alone. “Through the year of mixing and releasing Drift Code,” he continues, “I made a conscious effort not to listen to Clockdust. It became some long-lost twin everybody had forgotten. There was an older, wiser atmosphere to it, more cinematic, but in a romantic way”.

Clockdust draws upon an armoury of instruments, some, like the euphonium, unfamiliar in such contexts, and plenty – the kokoriko, the okónkolo – with even more unfamiliar names. Each track, too, indicates Webb’s fondness for the path less travelled, its twists and turns at first jarring but soon intuitive. That they’re embellished by a voice which has seemingly endured many lifetimes emphasises their mysterious nature. That its recording was soundtracked by Jacques Brel, Jet Harris and Kurt Weill no doubt contributed too. That many songs are inspired by old movies enhances their ageless atmosphere yet further.

Lead single “Jackie’s Room” is about a dysfunctional yet romantic relationship in which the protagonist believes “as long as she’s desired, she’ll never grow old” and the resulting track sways with the grace of its aging seductress. “I think of the album as containing stories from people who’ve reached their present situation through many years of experiences,” Webb says.

Idiosyncratic and quietly haunting, Clockdust is seeped in sepia-tinted nostalgia, “a powerful force of nature,” Webb states, “up there with love and desire”. The album blurs the boundaries between past and present. Webb insists that he prefers to live in the here and now, but in looking back he’s found a magical, mesmerising manner in which to forge a path forward: for him, for his music, and for his audience.

TRACK LISTING

Carousel Days
Gold & Tinsel
Jackie’s Room
Love Turns Her On
Rubicon Song
Old Flamingo
Kinky Living
Night In Evening City
Man With A Remedy

Porches, a.k.a. Aaron Maine, is back with a new album, Ricky Music. With contributions from Mitski, Zsela, and Dev Hynes, and with co-production by Jacob Portrait, Ricky Music expands on the Porches discography (The House, 2018; Pool, 2016; Slow Dance In The Cosmos, 2013) by delivering 11 emotionally open, cracked-glass pop songs.

About the album, Maine says: “My new album, Ricky Music, was written and recorded between Dec 2017 and the spring of 2019. Mostly in New York at my apartment, but some of it in Chicago, Los Angeles, and various cities while touring around Europe. This record is an account of the beauty, confusion, anger, joy and sadness I experienced during that time. I think I was as lost as I was madly in love. In these songs I hear myself sometimes desperate for clarity, and other times, having enough perspective to laugh at myself in some of my darkest moments. That’s sort of what this album is about, I hope you enjoy it.”

With the album announcement comes a new song – “Do U Wanna” – and a video for the song directed by prior Porches collaborator Nick Harwood. ““Do U Wanna” is a song about looking at yourself and realizing the disparity between how you’d like to act and how you actually act. The fun you vs. the isolated you. I feel like with the refrain I’m almost taunting myself to get up and do something.”

TRACK LISTING

Patience
Do U Wanna
Lipstick Song
PFB
I Wanna Ride
Madonna
I Can’t Even Think
Hair
Fuck_3
Wrote Some Songs
Rangerover (7" Bonus Track)

Traditional Techniques, Malkmus’ third solo LP without the Jicks (or Pavement), is new phase folk music for new phase folks, with Malkmus as attuned as ever to the rhythms of the ever-evolving lingual slipstream. It’s packed with handmade arrangements, modern folklore, and 10 songs written and performed in his singular voice. An adventurous new album in an instantly familiar mode, Traditional Techniques creates a serendipitous trilogy with the loose fuzz of the Jicks’ Sparkle Hard (2018) and the solo bedroom experiments of Groove Denied (2019). Taken together, these three very different full-lengths in three years highlight an ever-curious songwriter committed to finding untouched territory.

Malkmus took on Traditional Techniques as a kind of self-dare. Conceived while recording Sparkle Hard at Portland’s Halfling Studio, Malkmus had observed the variety of acoustic instruments available for use. The idea escalated within a matter of weeks into a full set of songs, and shortly thereafter into a realized and fully committed album. When he returned to Halfling, Malkmus drew from a whole new musical palette--including a variety of Afghani instruments - to support an ache both quizzical and contemporary. The resulting Traditional Techniques is expansive and thrilling. Alongside gorgeous folk music, there are also occasional bursts of flute-laced swagger, straight-up commune rock (“Xian Man”), and mind-bending fuzz.

Centred around the songwriter’s 12-string acoustic guitar, and informed by a half-century of folk-rock reference points, Traditional Techniques is the product of Malkmus and Halfling engineer/arranger-in-residence Chris Funk (The Decemberists). Additionally, Matt Sweeney (Bonnie “Prince” Billy, Chavez) plays guitar throughout.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Malkmus returns, bringing with him a healthy line-up of shimmering folky ballads and swooning angular acoustic guitar work. Ranging from hypnotic drones and soul-affirming melodicism to jaunty, swaggering grooves and all topped with Malkmus' unmistakeable vocals. Superb.

TRACK LISTING

1. ACC Kirtan
2. Xian Man
3. The Greatest Own In Legal History
4. Cash Up
5. Shadowbanned
6. What Kind Of Person
7. Flowin’ Robes
8. Brainwashed
9. Signal Western
10. Amberjack

In the summer of 2018, Anna Calvi released her third album Hunter. On the album, she explored sexuality and breaking the laws of gender conformity. Following a stellar 18 months, which saw Calvi write her first television score (for Peaky Blinders) and receive her third consecutive Mercury Prize nomination (the first solo artist to achieve this feat), Calvi has now crafted a stunning reworking of Hunter into Hunted. Revisiting her first recordings for Hunter, Calvi found they offered an intimate and private view of the songs’ initial intentions. Distilled to their bare essence on Hunted: her masterful guitar playing and formidable vocals, Calvi then asked Courtney Barnett, Joe Talbot (IDLES), Charlotte Gainsbourg and Julia Holter to collaborate with her and further transform the songs.

On Hunted, Calvi said, “During a break from touring I went back and listened to the first recordings I ever made of ‘Hunter’. These recordings capture the very moment I first wrote these songs, and recorded them on my own, in my attic studio. I find something especially intimate about sharing these most private recordings with my favourite singers and asking them to lend their voices and artistic sensibility. Courtney Barnett is an amazing artist. Her voice and guitar playing together are mind blowing. Her ability to connect the profound to the smallest moments of human experience is the unique talent of a true artist.”

On working together, Barnett said, “Anna is a completely awe-inspiring performer, it’s impossible to take your eyes off her onstage. I love her songwriting for its beautiful and perfect balance between aggression and tenderness.” More raw-sounding than their original incarnations, the tracks on Hunted shine under the light of a different lens, one that brings the innate fragility of the compositions to the forefront and exquisitely melds together the dichotomy of the hunter and the hunted, the primal and the beautiful, the vulnerable and the strong.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: The superb turnaround of Anna Calvi's 2018 LP 'Hunter' into 'Hunted' sees Calvi collaborating with a selection of some of the greatest names in modern indie music, and adds futher gravitas to the stunningly written and brilliantly performed pieces on show. Deep and soulful, swimming with gothcic drive and singularly enchanting, this is a perfect companion or a wonderful listen on it's own.

TRACK LISTING

Swimming Pool (feat. Julia Holter)
Hunter
Eden (feat. Charlotte Gainsbourg)
Away
Don’t Beat The Girl Out Of My Boy (feat. Courtney Barnett)
Wish (feat. Joe Talbot/IDLES)
Indies Or Paradise

With Mystic Familiar, Dan gives us the result of years of obsessive work, play, and self-discovery. It’s at once his most emotionally open record and his most transcendent, 11 kaleidoscopic tracks of majestic synth-pop that exponentially expand his sound with unfettered imagination and newfound vulnerability.

Since 2015’s Gliss Riffer, Deacon has branched out into an array of collaborative projects including film scores to Rat Film, HBO’sWell Groomed, ESPN’s30 for 30: Subject to Review; collaborating with the NYCBallet’s resident choreographer Justin Peck, LAPhil and Baltimore Symphony Orchestra.

While fulfilling, these projects lacked Dan’s singing voice. In the midst of that whirlwind of activity, he returned whenever he could to a personal oasis⁠—the songs that would become Mystic Familiar, informed by all these collaborations but built from within. Deacon’s writing took an exploratory new direction developed with therapeutic practices of self-compassion and mindfulness, daily prompts from Brian Eno’s deck of Oblique Strategies and the use of meditation. These techniques produced songs that paint life as a psychedelic journey brimming with bliss and disruption, darkness and light.

It’s a vulnerable shift in a songbook abundant with characters, metaphors, and modulations. This voice-focused album is also the first record in which each song was built around one central concept—the Mystic Familiar, a supernatural other being that we carry with us everywhere in our head, which only we can hear and with whom we live our lives in eternal conversation.

Mystic Familiar takes a propulsive leap with the robot-performed drums and soaring melodies of “Sat By a Tree.” Lyrically, the song conjures campfire reflections on key memories with the hard-won clarity of time, a dialogue with an anthropomorphic tree on chilling out, and befores and afters of life and death. The video, directed by Daren Rabinovitch offilm and animation studioEncyclopedia Pictura and starring comedian Aparna Nancherla, uses natural world elements, vivid colors, and a cartoon-like aesthetic to reflect on time and the precious shortness of life (not for those with an aversion to bugs).

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: 2015's 'Glass Riffer' didn't some off my turntable for quite some time, and i'm pretty sure this will meet the same fate. Huge swathes of synth and bright percussives shine through below the off-piste vocals and chaotic bitcrushed scree. It's marvellous, and completely insane.

TRACK LISTING

1. Become A Mountain
2. Hypnagogic
3. Sat By A Tree
4. Arp I: Wide Eyed
5. Arp II: Float Away
6. Arp III: Far From Shore
7. Arp IV: Any Moment
8. Weeping Birch
9. Fell Into The Ocean
10. My Friend
11. Bumble Bee Crown King

Navarasa : Nine Emotions is the trio’s third record. The first fruits of their fantastic expedition entitled Everything Sacred appeared in 2016. The second, Neuk Wight Delhi All-Stars, followed in 2017. Navarasa : Nine Emotions takes their journey many, many leagues on.

At the heart of YTK’s transporting new album is the subcontinent’s navarasa; the nine (nava) emotions or sentiments (rasa) of the arts. This central unifying underpinning is a centuries-old organising principle. The individual artistic emotions range from Shringara (love, beauty) through Hasya (laughter, mirth, comedy), Raudra (anger), Karuna (sorrow, compassion or mercy), Bibhatsya (disgust), Bhayanaka (horror, terror), Veera (heroism, courage), Adbutha (surprise, wonder) to Shanta (peace, tranquillity).

Each song on YTK’s new album is connected to one of these emotions, and the first track to be shared from Navarasa : Nine Emotions is “Westlin’ Winds”, paired with Adbutha.

“Westlin’ Winds” starts with the life-destroying Act I of Robert Burns’ poem ‘Now Westlin Winds, (And Slaught’ring Guns)’ and deliciously transplants its disjoined, nature-extolling and life-affirming Act II onto Indian soil with a composition “in Purbi, a specific dialect of old Hindi. I learnt the song,” says Suhail, “by listening to various qawwali [Muslim devotional song] singers singing at Hazrat Nizammuddin’s dargah [shrine] in Delhi. Its source is Hazrat Amir Khusrau.” Thus YTK unite one of the key spiritual visionaries and architects of Hindustani art music, the poet-philosopher Hazrat Amir Khusrau with the key literary visionary of Scottish and Scots-language culture, Robert Burns.

This bricolage of diverse cross-cultural elements is apparent across Navarasa : Nine Emotions and all of what YTK create. James Yorkston weaves in Scottish folk, sangster and literary strands. Jon Thorne is grounded in jazz and groove. What the New Delhi-based, eighth-generation hereditary musician Suhail Yusuf Khan brings to this feast of pulses and cycles is northern Indian classical, light classical (thumri, for example) and Sufi devotional musical and literary forms. What binds these diverse musical strands together is, in James’ phrase, “a dark happiness”.

TRACK LISTING

Sukhe Phool
The Shearing’s Not For You
Thumri Bhairavi
Westlin’ Winds
Song For Oddur
The North Carr
Twa Brothers
Waliyan Da Raja
Darbari

Bonus Tracks Exclusive To Vinyl:
All Saved But One
Jon's Poem
Skinfast Haven Blues

Richard Dawson, the black-humoured bard of Newcastle, returns to release his sixth solo album 2020, his first since the critically acclaimed, Peasant. 2020  is an utterly contemporary state-of-the-nation study, that uncovers a tumultuous and bleak time. Here is an island country in a state of flux; a society on the edge of mental meltdown.

On 2020, Dawson introduces us to grand themes through small lives. His are portraits of human beings struggling with recognisable (and dare we say it, relatable) concerns, conflicts and desires, each reminding us that tragedy and gallows humour are not mutually exclusive, and that the magical can sit next to the mundane. Lyrically it is by far Dawson’s hardest-hitting and unflinchingly honest album to date. It is his poetic masterwork.

Within, we find disgruntled civil servants dreaming of better days, anxiety-addled joggers listlessly searching Zoopla for houses they cannot afford in their spare time, amateur footballers who think they’re Lionel Messi and beleaguered pub landlords battling rising floodwaters.

Here is life, in all its strange and wonderful ways.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Massive stadium rock choruses and strolling folk meet headfirst in this decidedly odd but absolutely on-brand distillation from Richard Dawson. Fiercely political but with a wry humour and unmissable melodic drive (an often overlooked aspect of the more 'humorous' releases) coupled with Dawson's flawless delivery and brilliant ear for a progression make this his most direct and essential release yet.

Blood Orange’s latest critically acclaimed mixtape, ‘Angel’s Pulse’. Released on the heels of Negro Swan, this album is the overflowing aftermath of that incredible album – the more Dev Hynes the better in my opinion.

‘Dark and Handsome’ encapsulates everything I love about Hynes’ music, those drops of recognizable Blood Orange trademarks which are so prominent throughout all his albums. Something that sets the album apart for me is the heartbreaking track ‘Birmingham’ which is referencing the church bombing in Alabama by white nationalists in 1963. Kelsey Lu and Ian Isiah vocals are incredibly emotive and cut through the soul.

The album includes collaborations with Toro Y Moi, Kelsey Lu, Arca, Porches, Ian Isiah, Justine Skye and many more. The tracks are short in quick succession, it’s easy to glide through the album and want to hear it all over again for the parts you missed the first time around.

STAFF COMMENTS

Millie says: Dev Hynes bringing us this incredible mixtape, Angel’s Pulse filled with emotional, raw material. Blood Oranges distinct sound flows throughout with glimpses of his trademark echoes, the album flows seamlessly from start to finish but holds his most diverse mixture of songs to date. Absolutely love this and can’t wait for the next.

TRACK LISTING

I Wanna C U
Something To Do
Dark & Handsome Ft Toro Y Moi
Benzo
Birmingham Ft Kelsey Lu & Ian Isiah
Good For You Ft Justine Skye
Baby Florence (Figure)
Gold Teeth Ft Project Pat, Gangsta Boo & Tinashe
Berlin Ft Porches & Ian Isiah
Tuesday Feeling (Choose To Stay) Ft Tinashe
Seven Hours Part 1 Ft BennY RevivaL
Take It Back Ft Arca, Joba & Justine Skye
Happiness
Today

The musical touchstones of Tom Fleming, former Wild Beasts songwriter, vocalist and multi-instrumentalis, were Bruce Springsteen, Don Henley, Tom Petty alongside Depeche Mode and Swans. He wrote and played everything himself and then brought in Ben Hillier (Nadine Shah, Graham Coxon) on mixing and production duties.

One True Pairing is an album shaped by class frustration and self-despair and there is a continuation of the exploration of masculinity that made Wild Beasts so unique. As well as being deeply personal, OTP has a wider political resonance. "This country is going through a terrible moment and if you listen to the art nobody seems to give a shit,” Fleming says emphatically. He believes that class is entirely discounted from the current conversation about inclusivity and privilege. In its 11 songs of discordant guitar and aggressive synth Fleming channels his discontent with Britain in 2019 and a “feeling of directionless rage and cheatedness which hasn't gone away."

TRACK LISTING

Zero Summer
I’m Not Afraid
One True Pairing
Weapons
Dawn At The Factory
Blank Walls
Reaper Of Souls
Elite Companion
Alive In The Resplendent Flames
King Of The Rats
Only God Can Judge Me

(Sandy) Alex G, aka singer, songwriter and musician Alex Giannascoli, announces new album ‘House of Sugar’. The album is the Philadelphian’s ninth overall and third for Domino.

Giannascoli worked closely with Jacob Portrait, who mixed both ‘Rocket’ and 2015’s ‘Beach Music’ and helped to balance each of ‘House of Sugar’s dense, multi-faceted tracks. As the product of extended focus and planning, ‘House of Sugar’ emerges as Giannascoli’s most meticulous, cohesive album yet: a statement of artistic purpose, showing off his ear for both persistent earworms and shifting textures and the out-there sonic adventurism that’s made previous (Sandy) Alex G records so singular.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: From twisted, Beck-y ballads to euphoric synth-led stormers, Alex G has always had an uncanny knack for writing a tune and these richly orchestrated, beautifully constructed off-piste tunes show more and more ability in every passing album. This stuff is properly gorgeous ; heartfelt, soaring and emotive works of genius. Spellbinding from the outset.

TRACK LISTING

Walk Away
Hope
Southern Sky
Gretel
Taking
Near
Project 2
Bad Man
Sugar
In My Arms
Cow
Crime
SugarHouse (Live)

Glasgow’s Spinning Coin are back with their first new music since their debut album ‘Permo’ was released in 2017. The quartet release new 7” single ‘Visions At The Stars’ via The Pastels’ Geographic Music imprint. ‘Visions At The Stars’ was produced by Gregor Reid and Stephen Pastel at Castle of Doom Studios, Glasgow.

TRACK LISTING

Visions At The Stars
Not A Dream

‘Started Out’ is an upbeat and euphoric track infused with hedonism and influences from the Chicago house scene of the 80s. Using the same original 909 drum machines and sequential analogue synths used by dance legends of the 80s and 90s, ‘Started Out’ is another shining example of Georgia’s flair in the studio; melting her thrilling pop lyricism, with her rich wealth of experience in the studio. Includes a remix by Tuff City Kids.

TRACK LISTING

Started Out
Started Out (Tuff City Kids Remix)

‘About Work The Dancefloor’ is a defiant slice of electro-pop, exploring love, passion, melancholy and the thrill of finding yourself on the dancefloor. Synth-pop extraordinaire, Georgia mixes electronica vibes and indie to create these stunning twelves. Showcasing her upbeat pop brilliance, the track is a reflection of the rich influences of Georgia’s personal experience with club culture. Includes a remix by the renowned The Black Madonna.

TRACK LISTING

About Work The Dancefloor
About Work The Dancefloor (The Black Madonna Remix)

Nérija are the septet of contemporary jazz luminaries, Nubya Garcia (tenor saxophone), Sheila Maurice-Grey (trumpet), Cassie Kinoshi (alto saxophone), Rosie Turton (trombone), Shirley Tetteh (guitar), Lizy Exell (drums) and Rio Kai (bass). Rooted in friendship, Nérija is a collective whose breakneck shifts in tempo and style rely on a deep understanding of mood, temperament and expression, a solid show of trust that extends beyond the usual bonds between musicians.

Recorded in the boat-shaped confines of London’s legendary Soup Studios and produced by Kwes, the overarching goal with Blume was to simply capture the rawness, warmth, joy and the spirit of their relationship and performance. One of the recording aims was to channel the feel of Teo Macero and Stanley Tonkel’s records with Miles Davis during his Columbia years, thinking “forward” as they did but for this band, capturing the controlled chaos and frame it with a timeless elegance.

"Blume" is a truly breath-taking collection of compositions that perfectly encapsulates everything Nérija; vibrant, engaging, infectious and truly current. For just over an hour, they take us on a sprawling wonderful journey, arriving at what is a majestic body of work; their personal and collective experiences and inspirations over the last half decade or so.

STAFF COMMENTS

Emily says: New London jazz supergroup Nérija have debuted their radiant, horn driven sound in 2019 to great acclaim. ‘Blume’ expands on the foundations they established earlier this year with their self titled EP. Teeming with lush harmonies, syncopated riffs and plenty of afrobeat shuffle, it is sure to impress fans of Kokoroko, Ezra Collective and Maisha.

TRACK LISTING

1.Nascence - Composed By Nérija
Solos From Sheila Maurice-Grey, Rosie Turton And Lizy Exell
2. Riverfest - Composed By Nérija
Solos From Shirley Tetteh And Rio Kai
3. Last Straw - Composed By Sheila Maurice-Grey
Solos From Nubya Garcia And Sheila Maurice-Grey
4. Partner Girlfriend Lover - Composed By Shirley Tetteh
Solo From Shirley Tetteh
5. EU (Emotionally Unavailable) - Composed By Cassie Kinoshi
Solos From Cassie Kinoshi And Nubya Garcia
6. Blume - Composed By Nubya Garcia
Lead Line From Sheila Maurice-Grey And Nérija On Vocals
7. Equanimous - Composed By Rio Kai
Solos From Rosie Turton And Shirley Tetteh
8. Swift - Composed By Lizy Exell
Solos From Lizy Exell And Cassie Kinoshi
9. Unbound - Composed By Rosie Turton
Solos From Rosie Turton And Nubya Garcia
10. Blume Ii - Composed By Nubya Garcia
Lead Line From Sheila Maurice-Grey And Nérija On Vocals

Hunter, the third album from Anna Calvi, is the embodiment of the feeling of truly letting go. For the art-rock singer-songwriter it was a catharsis, and an opportunity to be more truthful than she ever had been been before. Revered in the British music industry since she emerged in 2011 (BRIT Award and twice Mercury Prize nominated), she has teamed up with esteemed producer Nick Launay (Nick Cave, Grinderman), Adrian Utley (Portishead) and Martyn Casey (The Bad Seeds) to bring this galvanising record to life.

Hunter is an album of visceral guitars and vocals, exploring sexualityand breaking the laws of gender conformity. Passionate subject matter calls for passionate delivery, and on Hunter, Calvi pushes the limits of her guitar and her voice beyond anything she’s recorded before. It was important to Calvi that the record was as vulnerable as it is strong; as beautiful as it is ugly. To be the hunter and the hunted.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Calvi is at once arresting and mesmerising, mixing evocative gothic symphonics and soaring melodic waves with a brittle undercurrent, flipping from shimmering synth pop to dark bubbling ambient in the blink of an eye. As immediately appreciable musically as it is conceptually exceptional.

TRACK LISTING

01. As A Man
02. Hunter
03. Don’t Beat The Girl Out Of My Boy
04. Indies Or Paradise
05. Swimming Pool
06. Alpha
07. Chain
08. Wish
09. Away
10. Eden 

Night Moves’ new album, ‘Can You Really Find Me’, pulsates and glows with the same sublime energy that radiated from breakout single ‘Carl Sagan’ in 2016, however in the intervening years, John Pelant and Micky Alfano have grown up.

The songwriting, while still steeped in super-catchy, velvety riffs and pure pop glaze, feels more sophisticated and modern. Since the pair met in high school, awestruck by such ear-candy wizards as Brian Wilson, Todd Rundgren, Stevie Nicks and Lindsay Buckingham, they set off to craft their version of what sophisticated, emotional modern pop music can and should sound like.

2016’s ‘Pennied Days’ was a breakthrough and set a new bar for the members of Night Moves. After spending the subsequent two years on ‘Can You Really Find Me’, they’ve scaled new heights, where the sounds are still just as sweet but now smarter, more evocative and perfectly designed for a summer release.

‘Can You Really Find Me’ was produced by Jim Eno (founding member and drummer of Spoon) out of Public Hi-Fi Studios in Austin, TX and recorded with live band members Mark Hanson and Chuck Murlowski.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Night Moves expertly craft a brilliantly emotive and drippingly filmic selection of 80's inspired ballads and rhythmically fluid disco-tinged pop anthems on 'Can You Really Find Me'. Any of these pieces could easily be a slow-motion montage soundtrack, dynamic but with a hint of latent morosity, these are modern and eminently enjoyable anthems, and another reason to pay attention to Night Moves.

TRACK LISTING

Mexico
Recollections
Keep Me In Mind
Strands Align
Waiting For The
Symphony
Ribboned Skies
Coconut Grove
Saving The Dark
Angelina
Can You Really Find Me

While the Sex Pistols and The Clash might have soaked up much of the punk spotlight in the ’70s, Buzzcocks brought something equally influential to the table. The Buzzcocks’ influence on indie rock, power-pop, punk rock and pop-punk is hard to overemphasize. When you think of the punk-pop tag, no band embodied it or perfected it quite like Buzzcocks.

Their songs were gritty, speedy and short like a lot of other punk music, but few punk bands remained committed to pure pop songwriting like Buzzcocks. Pete Shelley’s voice was snotty and full of attitude, their lyrics pushed social boundaries and the band’s guitars were pumping and lightning fast, but their infectious melodies might have fallen more in line with the pop or New Wave acts of the day than say, The Damned or The Stooges.
While albums like Another Music in a Different Kitchen or Love Bites are still worth digging into, the general consensus is that Buzzcocks’ most essential release is their 1979 singles compilation Singles Going Steady. It contained album cuts like “Ever Fallen in Love (With Someone You Shouldn’t’ve),” non-album singles like “Orgasm Addict” and “Everybody’s Happy Nowadays” as well as B-sides like “Autonomy” and “Noise Annoys.” The album’s eight singles and eight B-sides buff out the occasionally forgettable moments of their LPs and it’s the most accurate document of Buzzcocks as a band.

The songs that make up Singles Going Steady are largely about relationships and youthful frustration, and the album leads off with “Orgasm Addict,” an explicitly sexual song about everything from masturbation to full-on sex addiction. The song, which also features Shelley’s erotic moans, was unsurprisingly banned by the BBC upon release. Continuing with themes about the universal, inevitable shortcomings of youth, “I Don’t Mind” sums many of them up in a sharp, snappy rock ’n’ roll nut shell. Shelley paints a picture of the longing for another and the highlighting of your own insecurities when you do find that person. What begins with a song about loneliness and escape transforms into a song about fear of unreciprocated romantic feelings, which stems from a lack of self-confidence.

TRACK LISTING

01 Orgasm Addict
02 What Do I Get?
03 I Don't Mind
04 Love You More
05 Ever Fallen In Love (With Someone You Shouldn't've?)
06 Promises
07 Everybody's Happy Nowadays
08 Harmony In My Head
09 Whatever Happened To?
10 Oh Shit!
11 Autonomy
12 Noise Annoys
13 Just Lust
14 Lipstick
15 Why Can't I Touch It?
16 Something's Gone Wrong Again 

It's conceivable that internal friction helped inspire the title of the third Buzzcocks longplayer, 'A Different Kind Of Tension'; the group would splinter shortly after the album's 1979 release. But the U.K. pop punk band went out with a bang, marshaling one of their most diverse and exciting sets of songs under the guidance of producer Martin Rushent. The breakneck pace of their first recordings is well represented by such tracks as opener “Paradise,” though by the closing sound collage “Radio Nine,” chief songwriter Pete Shelley has managed to indulge his more experimental side as well – without ever abandoning the trademark Buzzcocks wit and emphasis on melody.

TRACK LISTING

01. Paradise
02. Sitting 'round At Home
03. You Say You Don't Love Me
04. You Know You Can't Help It
05. Mad, Mad Judy
06. Raison D'Etre
07. I Don't Know What To Do With My Life
08. Money
09. Hollow Inside
10. A Different Kind Of Tension
11. I Believe
12. Radio Nine 

One of the recent past’s most unexpected come-back stories, Peter Perrett - former frontman of The Only Ones - resurfaced in 2017 with ‘How The West Was Won’, an album that saw him chart in the UK, star on BBC Newsnight, sell out rooms at Electric Ballroom and Islington Assembly Hall and collect accolades across the board.

In this new chapter, Peter continues to dissect romance and politics with his trademark sense of sardonic wit and wry humour, if not with more vigour even and a palpable sense of immediacy. He is not unshackled from his past, however. ‘Humanworld’ features a production credit for Peter’s son Jamie who also contributes a song to the album (‘Master Of Destruction’) and the story of knitting a family back together, following a history of chaos and addiction, now takes a step closer to centre.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Peter Perrett, lead singer of the Only Ones presents his newest outing, 'Humanworld'. With big crunchy guitars and a modern take on the soaring 80's jangle we all know and love, Perrett efforlessly and effectively swaggers through a varied but engrossing suite of melodic heft and massive stadium fuzz.

TRACK LISTING

I Want Your Dreams
Once Is Enough
Heavenly Day
Love Comes On Silent
Feet
The Power Is In You
Believe In Nothing
War Plan Red
48 Crash
Walking In Berlin
Love’s Inferno
Master Of Destruction
Carousel

Arlo Day is the moniker of Alice Barlow, a young songwriter and guitarist from South-East London whose unique ear for melody, haunting vocals and rumbling guitar tones have gained a quiet reputation as one of the capital’s best kept secrets. Self-produced and recorded at home, the ‘Bad Timing’ EP is a trio of tracks that showcase her deft ability to write songs that are at once personal vignettes and brooding canvases for introspection. ‘Bad Timing’ introduces Arlo Day as a singular and exciting new songwriting talent.

TRACK LISTING

1. Bad Timing
2. This Love
3. Broke

"Diviner" is a deeply emotional album: lyrically generous in its candid tone and self-awareness, the melodies resonant with sense memory. The album feels like a startling departure from Thorpe’s previous work with Wild Beast. Story-telling, imaginative dynamics and arrangements coincide with a deft and unique vocal prowess. Comparisons could be drawn with Manchester's Dutch Uncles, or even the quirky & eccentric delivery of Calvin Johnson but really, Hayden's conveying emotions and feels all of his own.

TRACK LISTING

Diviner
Straight Lines
Earthly Needs
Love Crimes
Stop Motion
In My Name
Anywhen
Human Knot
Spherical Time
Impossible Object

Los Angeles-based artist SASAMI announces her self-titled debut album.

If you’ve ever drafted an overly long text to someone and decided against sending it, then you'll probably hear something of yourself in SASAMI. Los Angeles based songwriter and multiinstrumentalist Sasami Ashworth wrote the album’s ten tautly melodic rock tracks over the course of a year on tour, playing keys and guitar with Cherry Glazerr, tracking the thrills, disappointments and non-starters of a year spent newly single and on the road.

With featured artists Dustin Payseur (Beach Fossils), Devendra Banhart and Soko, this is a slice of 90s distorted guitar pop wonderment you won’t want to miss.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Wonderfully wonky at points, rhythmically diverse and musically immersive, Sasami's debut LP is an absolute storm of inventive poly-rhythms ('In Hollywood' is a prime example) presenting themselves without getting in the way of the listeners enjoyment. From tender, almost whispered vocals to huge distorted scree, this debut LP is an absolute rollercoaster, and unlike a rollercoaster, enjoyable throughout.

TRACK LISTING

I Was A Window (feat. Dustin Payseur)
Not The Time
Morning Comes
Free (feat. Devendra Banhart)
Pacify My Heart
At Hollywood
Jealousy
Callous
Adult Contemporary (feat. Soko)
Turned Out I Was Everyone

Wheeltappers and Shunters was recorded in 2018 in founding band member Hartley's Liverpool studio, before they brought in Dilip Harris (King Krule, Sons Of Kemet, Mount Kimbie) to mix it. “We thought it felt right to make a fun, dancefloor album in these dark and conservative times,” Blackburn continues. Fun, sure, but this is Clinic – their brand of fun oozes with menace.

The Great Britain that Clinic are evoking is not that ancient, bucolic past of village green cricket, half a mild and hanky-waving Morris Dancers that many seem so determined that the country should return to, but a rather more sleazy past. Clinic’s reverie is for a time when Blackpool was the pleasure capital of the kingdom and the public was kept entertained by travelling circuses and the dirty glamour of the funfair; tacky end of the pier merriment and enforced fun at Butlins; when bell-ringing town criers bellowed their nonsensical broadsides into the ether.

For most bands about to enter their third decade as an entity the well would be running dry, but eight albums in and Clinic still retain the ability to surprise. Clocking in at just over 28 minutes, Wheeltappers and Shunters is an absolute blast, rich in detail and sonic intrigue, those precious minutes stuffed with ideas. “We’d released albums like clockwork every two years, so it seemed natural to have a break,” Blackburn reveals. “It allowed everyone to do some quite oddball stuff, away from Clinic. I think we all wanted a bit more freedom.”

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Comfortingly warm and brilliantly varied, 'Wheeltappers and Shunters' perfectly treads the line between jagged, unpredictable psychedelia and smoothly redolent rock music, with enough of an edge to remain interesting and the perfect amount of sweetness to keep the listener fully on-board. Lovely.

TRACK LISTING

1. Laughing Cavalier
2. Complex
3. Rubber Bullets
4. Tiger
5. Ferryboat Of The Mind
6. Mirage
7. D.I.S.C.I.P.L.E
8. Flying Fish
9. Be Yourself/Year Of The Sadist
10. Congratulations
11. Rejoice!
12. New Equations At The Copacabana 

Protomartyr can finally answer what is probably their most frequently asked question: “When are you going to reissue your first album?” ‘No Passion All Technique’ has long been something of a mystery. Not available on streaming services; long out of print (and going for ridiculous prices on auction sites), why was this album so elusive?

When Protomartyr - vocalist Joe Casey, guitarist Greg Ahee, bassist Scott Davidson, drummer Alex Leonard - stepped into a studio together for the first time, in November of 2011, they didn’t know they were about to record an album. With only four hours of studio time booked and one case of beer between them, their plan was to walk out with enough songs for a seven-inch single. Instead, at the suggestion of engineer Chris Koltay, the newly formed Detroit outfit recorded as much as they possibly could, in what little time they had.

Sold out and out of print shortly after its original release on Urinal Cake Records in October 2012, ‘No Passion All Technique’ is a sometimes-messy look at one of rock’s most magnetic bands - and lyricists - just as they were coming to life. Primal, cerebral, heartbreaking, funny - it’s an accidental tour de force that’s also become an unlikely collector’s item. “My memory is shot,” Casey says, “but I appreciate now, looking back, how raw and off-the-cuff it was. There’s tons of mistakes in it and that wasn’t because we planned on it. We still can’t really admit that it’s as good as it is. You never want to say that your first is the best, but I’m happy that the first ended up not being terrible. It gave us doorway to what we’d want to do later.”

TRACK LISTING

In My Sphere
Machinist Man
Hot Wheel City
3 Swallows
Free Supper
Jumbo’s
Ypsilanti
Too Many Jewels
(Don’t You) Call Me Out My Name
How He Lived After He Died
Feral Cats
Wine Of Ape
Principalities

The Clang group return with a one off 7” wonder and re-version of 60’s cult legends The Monks’ ‘We Do Wie Du’.

Domino is extremely proud to present Henryk Górecki: Symphony No. 3 (Symphony of Sorrowful Songs) performed by Beth Gibbons and the Polish National Radio Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Krzysztof Penderecki. 

The performance took place at The National Opera Grand Theatre in Warsaw on November 29th 2014, and was part of an evening of programming that also featured Jonny Greenwood's (Radiohead) 48 Responses To Polymorphia and the world premiere of Bryce Dessner's (The National) Réponse Lutosławski.

Following an invitation to collaborate at the concert, Beth Gibbons undertook an intense preparation process, including tackling the challenge of learning the original text (and the emotional weight it carries) without speaking the mother language. Typical to Beth though - the elusive yet iconic frontwoman of one of the most important British bands of the last two decades - the challenge was met and exceeded. Her performance alongside the maestro Penderecki has been hailed as triumphant, as you can see and hear on this release.

The film, was produced by the National Audiovisual Institute, Poland and directed by Michał Merczyński.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: There's no denying that Beth Gibbons is one of the most cherished and highly recognisable vocal talents of the past several decades, but hearing her in this context is nothing less than astounding. The latent sadness inherent in Gorecki's 3rd symphony is only enhanced by Gibbons' stunning vocal range and perfect delivery. Astounding.

TRACK LISTING

I. Lento - Sostenuto Tranquillo Ma Cantabile
II. Lento E Largo - Tranquillissimo
III. Lento - Cantabile-semplice

Avey Tare, aka Dave Portner of Animal Collective, announces the new album ‘Cows On Hourglass Pond’, which was recorded between January - March 2018 by Dave Portner at Laughing Gas in Asheville, NC on a Tascam 48 half-inch reelto-reel tape machine and mixed by Adam McDaniel and Dave Portner at Drop Of Sun Studios in Asheville, NC. The album follows the 2017 release of Avey Tare’s ‘Eucalyptus’ and 2018’s audiovisual album ‘Tangerine Reef’, a collaboration between Animal Collective and avant-garde coral macro- videographers Coral Morphologic.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Frenetic melodies and cavernous vocal reverb work their way around the slo-mo funk and psychedelic melodies, leading the listener on a stylistically varied and fascinating journey.

TRACK LISTING

What’s The Goodside?
Eyes On Eyes
Nostalgia In Lemonade
Saturdays (Again)
Chilly Blue
K.C. Yours
Our Little Chapter
Taken Boy
Remember Mayan
HORS_

Domino present Nérija; the septet of Nubya Garcia (tenor saxophone), Sheila Maurice-Grey (trumpet), Cassie Kinoshi (alto saxophone), Rosie Turton (trombone), Shirley Tetteh (guitar), Lizy Exell (drums) and Rio Kai (bass).

Their debut ‘Nérija EP’ - originally composed, recorded and self-released following their meetings and collaborations via London’s Tomorrow’s Warriors - is re-released, having been remixed by kwes and remastered by Chris Potter at Electric.

STAFF COMMENTS

Millie says: It’s been a while since I’ve listened to anything this warm and soulful, the seven-piece all female collective have breathed new life into jazz. With a mixture of horns, beautiful arrangement and upbeat, bold rhythm they really have owned their sound. Hopefully lots more to come from Nérija…

TRACK LISTING

Pinkham V
Redamancy
The Fisherman
For You
Valleys

The rumours are true: the secret electronic album that Stephen Malkmus has been telling everyone about sees the light of day through Domino. But Groove Denied is not a full-blown plunge into EDM or hiptronica. In fact, there aren’t any purely instrumental tracks on the album. Every song is precisely that: a song, featuring Malkmus staples like an artfully askew melody and an oblique lyric. Groove Denied is Stephen playing hooky from his customary way of going about things, jolting himself out of a routine. As Malkmus commented, “It’s fun to mess with things that you’re not supposed to.”

The first taste of Stephen’s new groove can be sampled today, with the release of single ‘Viktor Borgia’, and its accompanying video starring Stephen alone in a dance club. The title playfully merges the name of the comedian-pianist and the ruthless dynasty of Italo-Spanish nobles. With its stately melody and the almost-English-accented vocal, the coordinates here are early Human League or even Men Without Hats. “I was thinking things like Pete Shelley’s ‘Homosapien’, the Human League, and DIY synth music circa 1982,” says Stephen, adding “and also about how in the New Wave Eighties, these suburban 18-and-over dance clubs were where all the freaks would meet – a sanctuary.”

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: It's bloody brilliant this, with hints of post-punk garage and most of all 80's synth, Malkmus clearly shows his wealth of influence on 'Groove Denied', swinging from snappy grunge to 70's psychedelia without batting an eyelid. Though the diversity in sound shines through, it's not without the Malkmus charm, with his vocal prowess shining through the stylistic patchwork.

TRACK LISTING

Eins
01. Belziger Faceplant
02. A Bit Wilder
03. Viktor Borgia
04. Come Get Me
05. Forget Your Place

Zwei
06. Rushing The Acid Frat
07. Love The Door
08. Bossviscerate
09. Ocean Of Revenge

Produced by Yorkston and David Wrench, The Route to the Harmonium is James’ first solo record since 2014’s Cellardyke Recording and Wassailing Society (CRAWS) and follows the two collaborative albums he made as one third of Yorkston/Thorne/Khan as well as the release of his debut novel Three Craws in 2016.

The album was almost entirely recorded by James himself, in the small Scottish fishing village of Cellardyke, where he lives. Yorkston’s studio is a ramshackle old loft space, originally used to repair fisherman’s nets, and now stuffed full the antique instruments James has collected throughout his life as a musician. Having created hours of recordings, James called up his old collaborator David Wrench - the mixer and producer who has worked with the likes of Caribou, Four Tet, Frank Ocean, FKA Twigs and David Byrne - and someone who has worked on James’ albums since 2003 – to help make sense of the sessions.

The Route to the Harmonium (or, ‘the search for peace’) is intensely personal; it’s the sound of home, of undisturbed craftmanship. Listen closely and you can imagine him putting it together. Overlaying vocal and guitar tracks, adding further with Dulcitones, harmoniums and autoharps, with nyckelharpa, the distinctive Swedish stringed instrument given to him by a friend. And friends and family, past and present swim all over his songs. Remembering them, and those you’ve shared life with, those who leave and those who remain, is the strongest thread running through these affecting, extraordinary songs. This is Yorkston’s world and could be nowhere else in music.

James adds: “I guess, as a musician and writer, I find myself reacting to what goes on around. So, this album is about life, the life that carries on around me. There’s family, place, and the being away from family that the life of a touring musician brings… But there’s also reference to friends departed – the hows, the whys – When a friend jumps ship it’s always a haymaker to the gut, you know? And this album is about them, but it’s more about us, us who are left behind...”

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Tender ballads and brittle songmaship on this stunning outing from the great James Yorkston. Reminiscent of some of the country-folk offerings from Constellation / Alien8 recordings in the early 90's, Yorkston manages to convey a heartbreaking morose air whilst keeping the melodicism intact. A beautifully written collection, as expected.

TRACK LISTING

01 Your Beauty Could Not Save You
02 The Irish Wars Of Independence 
03 Like Bees To Foxglove
04 Shallow
05 The Blue Of The Thistle
06 Brittle
07 My Mouth Ain't No Bible
08 Solitary Islands All
09 The Villages I Have Known My Entire Life
10 Oh Me, Oh My
11 Yorkston Athletic
12 A Footnote To An Epitaph 

Noah Lennox's sixth solo album as Panda Bear is Buoys. The first song to be released from Buoys is “Dolphin”: Lennox’s bright, sincere voice front and center, with miles of space surrounding it, a guitar and some textured samples fleshing out the dubby sparseness and undercurrent of speaker-limit-pushing sub-bass low-end. Buoys was co-produced and co-mixed by collaborator Rusty Santos in Lennox’s adopted home of Lisbon, Portugal. Lennox and Santos last collaborated on the landmark Panda Bear album Person Pitch, which had its 10-year anniversary last year.

Animated by their ongoing interest in contemporary music production techniques, Lennox and Santos envisioned something that would “feel familiar to a young person’s ears.” However, Buoys retains a deep layer of experimentation coursing through the hyper-modern production – a hallmark of Panda Bear releases that will feel intimately familiar to fans of Lennox’s decade-plus body of work.

Alongside Santos, Buoys also features collaborators in Chilean DJ/vocalist Lizz and Portuguese musician Dino D'Santiago, both artists who came to Lennox via Santos’ recent trap and reggaeton production work; the former contributes arrangements throughout the album including “Dolphin,” and both lend their vocals to “Inner Monologue."

Buoys is the first Panda Bear release since 2018's vinyl-only EP A Day With the Homies, and the follow-up to 2015's kaleidoscopic full-length Panda Bear Meets the Grim Reaper. "The last three records felt like a chapter to me, and this feels like the beginning of something new," says Lennox whilst surveying how Buoys relates to the estimable Panda Bear catalogue. Indeed, the forthcoming Buoys is full of fresh ideas from one of modern music's most fascinating, innovative, and emotionally generous artists.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Having always been the more electronic side of the musical monolith that is Animal Collective, Panda Bear clearly brings the off-kilter melodies and syncopated Books-esque loop manipulation, with 'Buoys' proving to be every bit the staggered and echo-laden monolith we'd expect. Comfortingly avant-garde without stepping too far into art-rock or ostracising the listener, buoys takes a while to reel you in but when it does, you're stuck for good.

TRACK LISTING

01. Dolphin
02. Cranked
03. Token
04. I Know I Don’t Know
05. Master
06. Buoys
07. Inner Monologue
08. Crescendo
09. Home Free 

Rustin Man aka Paul Webb announces his return. Webb, formerly the bass player in Talk Talk, releases his new album ‘Drift Code’ via Domino.

Recorded at his Essex home, a converted barn three miles from the nearest village, the record has a warm, wise kind of euphoria to it, coupled with an acute sense of storytelling and surreality.

Webb has released one record under the moniker Rustin Man so far - the superb ‘Out Of Season’ in 2002, a collaboration with Beth Gibbons of Portishead.

“Like Robert Wyatt, Webb finds the sweet spot between the playful and the mournful” - Loud & Quiet.

TRACK LISTING

Vanishing Heart
Judgement Train
Brings Me Joy
Our Tomorrows
Euphonium Dream
The World’s In Town
Light The Light
Martian Garden
All Summer

Like many first albums, Another Music In A Different Kitchen collected material written by the group - in particular Pete Shelley and Steve Diggle - that had been amassed during the previous years, going back to 1974 and 1975. According to Tony McGartland in his Buzzcocks: The Complete History, the songs were sequenced in the order that they were written. The play through seems to bear this out: the album begins in fast protest punk and ends in the seven minute, definitely non punk length Krautrock of ‘Moving Away From The Pulsebeat.’

Most of Shelley’s songs on the first side concern the vicissitudes of romance, but the opener Fast Cars name drops US campaigner Ralph Nader in an ecological diatribe: “They're so depressing going 'round and 'round/Ooh, they make me dizzy, oh fast cars they run me down.” ‘No Reply’, ‘You Tear Me Up’, ‘Get On Our Own’ and ‘Love Battery’ are sharp, short (all under two and a half minutes), speedy disquisitions on the tortures of interpersonal communication, love and lust played with a perfect balance between pace, abrasion and melody.

Side closer ‘Sixteen’ is something else. It’s longer and contains an avant-garde breakdown around two minutes in, recorded with each group member isolated and unable to hear each other. “It started off as a false ending,” Shelley told me in 1977: “All sloppy, and then it carries on longer so that people are thinking, “Oh I’ve just clapped but they’re not thinking — what’s up?” and then it comes back in again.” It was, as John Maher added, “A remnant of our chaos days.”

Would Shelley like to be sixteen again? “In some ways yes, in some ways no. The words go: “And I wish I was sixteen again/Then things would be such fun/All the things I'd do would be the same/But they're much more fun/ Than when you're twenty one.” Things like going for a drink — now the novelty’s worn off but the enjoyment’s still there. There’s no difference between doing something when you’re 16 and 22, except there is a difference if you’re doing it for the first time.”

Perhaps the most remarkable thing about the song is its rapid fire, venomous ending:
“And I hate modern music/Disco boogie and pop/They go on and on and on and on and on/HOW I WISH THEY WOULD STOP!” Never has a truer sentence been written about the true impetus behind Punk: not just boredom with progressive rock or dinosaur sixties acts but an intense disgust with mainstream pop music, which in 1976, the year of number one singles by Elton and Kiki, Abba, the Brotherhood of Man, Adge Cutler & the Wurzels, seemed not to have anything to do with teenage life and certainly nothing to do with excitement or the true teenage news.

The five songs on side two reflected the group moving away from simple love tropes into something more complex: as Shelley sang on ‘I Don’t Mind’, “Reality’s a dream.” Unlike the increasing militarism and violent posturing of the Clash, Buzzcocks aimed to explore male sensitivity and frailty (‘This pathetic clown’) - which in pop terms was still new, exactly what punk had set out to be. They began to use love songs as a conduit through which they could talk about other things: the nature of human relationships in a capitalistic society, the nature of reality itself.

Onstage Buzzcocks did not present as macho. Sometimes they’d try a group uniform, like the Mondrian shirts of early 1977, but mostly they just dressed as themselves: Diggle and Maher in various permutations of Mod wear, Paddy Garvey in leather jacket and skinny tie, and Shelley in a bewildering variety of styles. “It’s no good me wearing anything like that (bondage pants),” Shelley told me; “I’m just not the fashionable shape.” “You put those clothes on and you become a different character,” Diggle added: “I don’t feel myself, I feel like somebody else.”

‘Fiction Romance’ continues the themes of ‘I Don’t Mind’: male frailty, the commodification of emotions, the difference between reality and fantasy. Steve Diggle’s powerful ‘Autonomy’ spells out the true theme behind Punk: self determination. “It’s a discussion between two sides of your personality,” he told me; “It’s about discipline in yourself, like when you say you’d like to do something and you haven’t got control, you’re not autonomous. Like giving up smoking, which I’m trying to do now and it’s very difficult. I haven’t got control of myself.”

Shelley’s pell-mell ‘I Need’ tackles the capitalist perplex head on: “I used to only want but now I need/To get by with what I got but now I need.” After a fine bass led instrumental break, Shelley lays it out again: “I need sex/I need love/I need drink/I need drugs/I need food/I need cash/I need you to love me back.” ‘Moving Away From The Pulsebeat’ continues the breakneck pace: lasting at least three times the standard punk rock single, it features some stinging psychedelic solos and some rapid fire classic break beats from John Maher.

There’s a pause, then the riff of ‘Boredom’ returns: back to the beginning. Another Music in a Different Kitchen is a perfect circle: thirty five and a half minutes of tuneful, exciting and thoughtful music that stretched the boundaries of guitar pop music at the same time as it delivered on the group’s promise. It was a critical and a commercial success, reaching the UK album top twenty in March 1978 and staying there for nearly three months. But Buzzcocks had no time to rest on their laurels.

Behind the chocolate box cover, Love Bites is an album of paradoxes if not clashing opposites: real/imaginary, past/future, love/lust, connection/alienation, commerciality/experimentation. It’s to the group’s credit that they walk the high wire with ease: the attack is less punk, more measured and on occasion psychedelic, as befits the perceptual and philosophical nature of Shelley’s lyrics. The glossy pop star photo on the sleeve is matched by stranger photo realist portraits on the inner, by Robin Utracik of the Worst: Shelley in particular looks dishevelled, having just vomited when the source photo was taken.

Love Bites hit its moment. The reviews were good, and so were sales: it reached number 13 in the album charts, Buzzcocks’ best showing. They immediately went out on their fourth tour, Beating Hearts - supported by Subway Sect - which was marked in this year of Sham 69 by skinhead violence and stage invasions, definitely not what Buzzcocks were about. The fifth single of that year had already been recorded: ‘Promises’ and ‘Lipstick’, the latter of which used the same riff as Magazine’s debut ‘Shot by Both Sides’. Buzzcocks had reached their commercial peak, but Pete Shelley was deeply troubled.

Late 1978 was a harsh place, with competing styles and fads and the relentless pressure of rapid fire novelty that punk had set up. The pace was killing and on top of that the impetus of 1976 punk had faded. Shelley also felt that the original sense of community had gone: “Once we were in the music industry, people had become more diversified, there was nothing really to pull people together again.” More importantly, the constant touring was driving him mad: “It was a bit unnerving. When we did the Love Bites tour I was convinced by Richard not to leave the band. It was all getting too much for me.”

‘Rocket D.I.Y.’ is the home-recorded follow up to 2003’s ‘Kenny and Beth’s Musakal Boat Rides’. Instead of a collection of songs spanning several years, ‘Rocket D.I.Y.’ contains 12 songs, all written and recorded over a period of weeks. Acoustic guitar and piano based songs have been embellished with accordion, banjo, electronics and a smattering of samples. Collective drummers OnTheFly and Captain Geeko deliver an altogether new punch, with Pip Dylan’s pedal steel adding that final twang. ‘Rocket D.I.Y.’ can best be described as a recollection of a hectic year. From the cosmic highs to the lunar lows come world weary themes of age consciousness and humdrum household chores sitting alongside wideeyed travel adventures and far-fetched yarns. With its scratchy sentiments, anthemic yearnings and downright nonsense, ‘Rocket D.I.Y.’, like ‘Kenny and Beth’s Musakal Boat Rides’ before it, takes you on a Neukian journey possibly not as far as the stars but one you’ll want to take again.

TRACK LISTING

Twin Tub Twin
Saffy Nool
Klutz
Cor’ws Feet
Spooned Out On Tick
PH 6.5
Circle My Demise
King Bubbles In Sand
The Things, Things, Things
A Month Of Firsts
Thrills & Spills
The Someone Else

Yawn is a buckle-up and knuckle-down listen that rewards the listeners’ attention with motifs and melodies that play hide and seek but never fail to deliver on those between-the-lines verities. This musical belief of delayed gratification is something Bill learnt from classical music as a child, from Elgar and Debussy in particular – and over the long hall of his short life, you can hear these riches being polished on Yawn. Most of the 10 songs clock-in over the 5 minute mark and this wide-angle lens affords us time to interpret and translate meaning – or just to revel in it.

Multi-instrumentalist, producer, string-arranger and composer Bill Ryder-Jones has had a career spanning 15 years, a rarity in a world that so often looks to the new. From his musical interpretation of Italo Calvino’s ‘If On A Winters Night A Traveller' (If… in 2011), 2013’s A Bad Wind Blows In My Heart, the acclaimed West Kirby County Primary (2015) and now to Yawn, Bill has constantly widened his scope, weaving in an overarching sense of authenticity, intimacy and wryness as he goes.

Yawn was recorded and produced entirely by Bill himself, with a little help from friends including guest vocals from The Orielles and Our Girl, cello by Rod Skip and mixing by Craig Silvey (Portishead, The Horrors, Arcade Fire). Bill has also been steadily building up a list of album production credits for other musicians including Our Girl, Hooton Tennis Club, Brooke Bentham and Holly Macve, who he records at his own place in West Kirby, aptly titled Yawn Studios.

TRACK LISTING

1. There’s Something On Your Mind
2. Time Will Be The Only Saviour
3. Recover
4. Mither
5. And Then There’s You
6. There Are Worse Things I Could Do
7. Don’t Be Scared, I Love You
8. John
9. No One’s Trying To Kill You
10. Happy Song

Aviary is an epic journey through what Julia Holter describes as “the cacophony of the mind in a melting world.” It’s the Los Angeles composer’s most breathtakingly expansive album yet, full of startling turns and dazzling instrumental arrangements. The follow-up to her critically acclaimed 2015 record, Have You in My Wilderness, it takes as its starting point a line from a 2009 short story by writer Etel Adnan: "I found myself in an aviary full of shrieking birds." It’s a scenario that sounds straight out of a horror movie, but it’s also a pretty good metaphor for life in 2018, with its endless onslaught of political scandals, freakish natural disasters, and voices shouting their desires and resentments into the void.

“Amidst all the internal and external babble we experience daily, it's hard to find one's foundation,” says Holter. “I think this album is reflecting that feeling of cacophony and how one responds to it as a person - how one behaves, how one looks for love, for solace. Maybe it’s a matter of listening to and gathering the seeming madness, of forming something out of it and envisioning a future.”

“In a lot of the songs, when I mention love, it’s about a seeking for compassion and humility in a world where it feels like empathy is always being tested,” Holter says. In Aviary’s case, that search for sweetness - that bridging of the gulf - becomes a metaphor for the creative process itself, cutting through the hierarchies of history, language, and musical form to offer something more fluid, more inclusive, more idiosyncratic.

Aviary combines Holter’s slyly theatrical vocals and Blade Runner-inspired synth work with an enveloping palette of strings and percussion that reveals itself, and the boundless scope of her vision, over the course of fifteen songs.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Since her 2015 album, 'Have You In My Wilderness' (voted our #1 album of 2015) Holter has gone from strength to strength. Treading a similar path to her more recent forays into arty ambience and brittle electronics, 'Aviary' is an epic of Holter's mesmerising vocal talent, backed with an absorbing and progressive instrumental backdrop.

TRACK LISTING

1. Turn The Light On
2. Whether
3. Chaitius
4. Voce Simul
5. Everyday Is An Emergency
6. Another Dream
7. I Shall Love 2
8. Underneath The Moon
9. Colligere
10. In Gardens’ Muteness
11. I Would Rather See
12. Les Jeux To You
13. Words I Heard
14. I Shall Love 1
15. Why Sad Song

Co-produced by Joel Ford (Ford & Lopatin, Airbird), this record plays as a single continuous piece of 21st century psychedelic music and features Krell’s most bewitching sound experimentation to date. Moreover, the stories Krell sings on this record – some biographical, many from the most knotted corners of human life – are deeply personal and human(e). The Anteroom - with its blizzardous electronic noise, fragile melodies and poignant poetry - reclaims the experimental core of the HTDW project.

TRACK LISTING

1. Humans Disguised As Animals | Nonkilling 1
2. Body Fat
3. False Skull 7
4. Nonkilling 3 | The Anteroom | False Skull 1
5. Vacant Boat
6. Nonkilling 13 | Ceiling For The Sky
7. A Memory, The Spinning Of A Body | Nonkilling 2
8. Nonkilling 6 | Hunger
9. July 13 No Hope No Pain
10. Love Means Taking Action
11. Brutal (feat. Ocean Vuong) | False Skull 5
12. False Skull 12
13. Nothing 

Produced in its entirety by Marshall, Wanderer includes appearances by long-time friends and compatriots, as well as guest vocals courtesy of friend and recent tour-mate Lana Del Rey. Written and recorded in Miami and Los Angeles over the course of the last few years, the new album Wanderer is a remarkable return from an iconic American voice.

Wanderer’s 11 tracks encompass “my journey so far,” says Marshall. “The course my life has taken in this journey - going from town to town, with my guitar, telling my tale; with reverence to the people who did this generations before me. Folk singers, blues singers, and everything in between. They were all wanderers, and I am lucky to be among them.”

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: A beautifully produced, bittersweet collection of twinkling guitars, acoustic percussives and Marshall's unmistakable vocal stylings. Brimming with low-key country influences, rhythmic momentum and enchanting, hypnotic drive. Quintessentially Cat Power, superb.

TRACK LISTING

Wanderer
In Your Face
You Get
Woman (feat. Lana Del Rey)
Horizon
Stay
Black
Robbin Hood
Nothing Really Matters
Me Voy
Wanderer / Exit

Always restless and inventive while always true to the power and glory of song-writing and melody, Conor O’Brien has made another great leap forward with Villagers’ fourth studio album, The Art Of Pretending To Swim, released by Domino on Friday 21st September.

Following the exquisitely sparse, intimate aura of 2015’s Darling Arithmetic, O’Brien’s new record reconnects with the multi-faceted approach of Villagers’ 2010 album debut Becoming A Jackal and 2013’s {Awayland} while adding a new-found soulfulness, rhythmic nous and dazzling panoply of sonic detail, both analogue and digital, creating feverish moods while writing effortlessly accessible tunes. Balanced with subtle aspects and lyrical themes that embrace existential fears and hopes in this desperate, technologically-centred dystopian age, The Art Of Pretending To Swim is the most brilliantly realised Villagers album to date.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Beautifully played acoustic guitars, bolstered with tender electronic flourishes and a driving percussive backline, Villagers perfectly mix the appeal of melodic indie with the silken, shimmering swagger of synth pop to great effect. Beautiful stuff.

TRACK LISTING

1. Again
2. A Trick Of The Light
3. Sweet Saviour
4. Long Time Waiting
5. Fool
6. Love Came With All That It Brings
7. Real Go-Getter
8. Hold Me Down
9. Ada

‘Battle Lines’, the new album from Grammywinning duo Bob Moses, is set for release on Domino.

‘Battle Lines’ follows the band’s acclaimed debut album, ‘Days Gone By’, which featured their worldwide hit ‘Tearing Me Up’. The band recorded the new album in Los Angeles’ Laurel Canyon, after writing and testing out new material on the road. Inspired by their time playing raves and rock clubs all over the globe since the release of ‘Days Gone By’, Battle Lines takes a harder look at the world in which they find themselves.

TRACK LISTING

Heaven Only Knows
Battle Lines
Back Down
Eye For An Eye
The Only Thing We Know
Nothing But You
Enough To Believe
Listen To Me
Selling Me Sympathy
Don’t Hold Back
Fallen From Your Arms

Tangerine Reef is a full-length audio-visual album by Animal Collective (Avey Tare, Deakin and Geologist), in collaboration with Coral Morphologic, to commemorate the 2018 International Year of the Reef. Tangerine Reef is a visual tone poem consisting of time-lapse and slow pans across surreal aqua-scapes of naturally fluorescent coral and cameos by alien-like reef creatures (note: no CGI or artificial enhancement was used in this film). Tangerine Reef is the sight and sound of a literal underwater collective of animals.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Another brilliantly off-piste outing from Animal Collective. Scattered percussion, haunting shadowy vocals and that effervescent duality of low-fi production values and hi-fi songwriting make this yet another stormer from the AC camp.

TRACK LISTING

1. Hair Cutter
2. Buffalo Tomato
3. Inspector Gadget
4. Buxom
5. Coral Understanding
6. Airpipe (To A New Transition)
7. Jake And Me
8. Coral By Numbers
9. Hip Sponge
10. Coral Realization
11. Lundsten Coral
12. Palythoa
13. Best Of Times (Worst Of All)

Following her acclaimed EPs released on Greco-Roman, new album Devotion positions Londonbased Tirzah as a unique contemporary soul voice on an innovative modern British RnB record. Delivering what feels like a landmark debut LP, the 11-songs across Devotion are an intimate collection of downtempo love-songs laced with romance and lust, melancholy and desire.

The album was conceived and written with long-term collaborator, Mica Levi who handles the music and production across the whole album, Tirzah providing vocals, melody & lyrics. Additional vocals & lyrics are provided by Coby Sey on stand out track, ‘Devotion’. The album was mixed by Mica & Kwes.

TRACK LISTING

1. Fine Again
2. Do You Know
3. Gladly
4. Holding On
5. Affection
6. Basic Need
7. Guilty
8. Devotion
9. Go Now
10. Say When
11. Reach

As with their previous albums, Across the Meridian mixes instrumentals and songs, weaving a gleeful path through the musical territory of film scores, 30s jazz, sun-drenched pop, electronica, and post-punk experimentation. Haunting and wistful vocals are set to a variety of soundscapes, sometimes appearing as a snatched fragment of the subconscious and dreamlike, at others crafting a story of longing or regret, drawing the listener into Pram’s uncanny world through the mirror. Newcomers to Pram will find a richly detailed collage of influences ranging from exotica, Krautrock and the forgotten film soundtracks that went on to inspire contemporaries Stereolab & Broadcast.

The band convened at the remote Foel studios in Wales to improvise on ideas and record some bases for tracks, before finishing them in their studio in Birmingham. Pram have a working process that has developed over many years and reflects shifts in band personnel and technological advancements. Across The Meridian is a testament to the band embracing these new approaches without losing any of their original allure.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Haunting, dusty melodies and slowly pulled strings mix with echoed vocals, simmering horns and clicking electronic percussion in this multi-faceted and smooth juxtaposition of post-rock, electronic and psychedelic instrumentation. Perfectly balanced and fully immersive.

TRACK LISTING

1. Shimmer And Disappear
2. Thistledown
3. Electra
4. Wave Of Translation
5. Shadow In Twilight
6. Ladder To The Moon
7. The Midnight Room
8. Footprints Towards Zero
9. Mayfly
10. Sailing Stones
11. Where The Sea Stops Moving
12. Doll’s Eyes

Dirty Projectors’ new album ‘Lamp Lit Prose’ is produced by Dave Longstreth at his studio Ivo Shandor in Los Angeles.

The album features guest appearances from Syd, Empress Of, Amber Mark, Haim, Rostam, Robin Pecknold and Dear Nora, as well as longtime Dirty Projectors rhythm section Nat Baldwin and Mike Johnson.

‘Lamp Lit Prose’ arrives just over a year after 2017’s self-titled ‘Dirty Projectors’. Here Longstreth’s band returns with a new album that is the yang to the yin of the 2017 effort. The songs signal a page turned for Longstreth: hope instead of heartbreak, a restorative balance. Guitars have returned to the Dirty Projectors’ world, intricate vocal harmony too. ‘Lamp Lit Prose’ is a recommitment to the sounds and ideals of Dirty Projectors, embracing the band’s trademarks while pushing forward the sonic envelope.

STAFF COMMENTS

Andy says: Luminous, dislocated, lushly produced warm vibes pervade on this gorgeous new record. Ace!

TRACK LISTING

Right Now (ft Syd)
Break-Thru
That’s A Lifestyle
I Feel Energy (ft Amber Mark)
Zombie Conqueror (ft Empress Of)
Blue Bird
I Found It In U
What Is The Time
You’re The One (Ft Robin Pecknold & Rostam)
(I Wanna) Feel It All (ft Dear Nora)

Protomartyr's ‘Consolation EP’, was recorded in part with friend Kelley Deal of The Breeders.

The release features four brand new tracks, delivered in their usual brusque uncompromising style, and follows last year’s superb ‘Relatives In Descent’ album.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Protomartyr are one of those bands that elicit a chorus of head-nods and a flurry of 'Who is this?' from anyone near enough to hear, and this EP will surely be no different. A Galloping and driven EP, led by Joe Casey's unmistakeable snarl, and buoyed by the perfectly precise and ferocious instrumental backing. A great vision for the future.

TRACK LISTING

Wait
Same Face In A Different Mirror
Wheel Of Fortune (ft Kelley Deal)
You Always Win (ft Kelley Deal)

Melody’s Echo Chamber’s second album finally arrives more than five years after Melody Prochet’s debut, and it’s certainly been worth the wait. Bon Voyage is a mind-blowing mini-opus full to the gunwales with surprises. It’s a capricious trip that builds majestically upon what Pitchfork in 2012 called “enchanting, psychedelic-tinged pop with just the right amount of thematic darkness”. Made up of seven expansive new tracks, it marries Melody’s breathless soprano to the wildest sonic excursions, always pinned to an emphatic, clattering groove.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Brilliantly effervescent indie-pop from MEC, sporting chunky melodic riffage, bright soaring solos and stunningly perfect production. Amazing stuff.

TRACK LISTING

1. Cross My Heart
2. Breathe In, Breathe Out
3. Desert Horse
4. Var Har Du Vart
5. Quand Les Larmes D’Un Ange Font Danser La Neige
6. Visions Of Someone Special On A Wall Of Reflections
7. Shirim

Washington, DC trio Flasher release their debut album, ‘Constant Image’, via Domino.

Recorded in 2017 at Rare Book Room in Brooklyn, NY, ‘Constant Image’ was produced by Nicolas Vernhes (Animal Collective, Deerhunter, The War On Drugs) and crackles with invention. This isn’t the sound of a band finding their feet, it’s the rare sound of three people - Taylor Mulitz on guitar, bassist Daniel Saperstein and drummer Emma Baker - who know exactly what they want to achieve from the start.

TRACK LISTING

Go
Pressure
Sun Come And Golden
Material
XYZ
Who’s Got Time?
Skim Milk
Harsh Light
Punching Up
Business Unusual

In 2017 Joe Goddard released his second solo album Electric Lines, after spending the past 15 years as a member of Hot Chip, production and DJ duo The 2 Bears and founder of tastemaker dance record label Greco Roman.

This summer Goddard returns with two standalone singles, a double A-side 12”, in his own words: “I just want these next few 12"s to be simple club tools really... musically one is meant to be a deep house belter and the other is meant to be dark electro with a romantic touch- like the Boards of Canada mix of 'Midas Touch’”.

TRACK LISTING

So Much
Human Touch (Dub)

Their first release since 2013’s ‘AM’ finds the band intent on continuing to explore new musical terrain with each album. ‘Tranquility Base Hotel & Casino’ ups the ante in a big way; it is a bold and brilliant album reflecting Turner’s ever more comprehensive creative vision. 

Produced by James Ford and Alex Turner, the album was recorded in Los Angeles, Paris and London. 

STAFF COMMENTS

Andy says: Wow! After their biggest hit yet and looming world domination, t'Monkeys swerve left, then up, out and onto the astral plane! This blows up their template in style, and opens new possibilities for this inspirational band.

TRACK LISTING

Star Treatment
One Point Perspective
American Sports
Tranquility Base Hotel + Casino
Golden Trunks
Four Out Of Five
The World’s First Ever Monster Truck Front Flip
Science Fiction
She Looks Like Fun
Batphone
The Ultracheese

Bonny sings Susanna, to simply try and save the world. Sonata Dwarf Mix Cosmos is an old companion of his and with the Chijimi house band +1 they bring it all back home again, this time to the space in Bonny’s place.

“As other practitioners are leaving the room in favor of novel forms of recording and distro and consumption, we are left with a virtual PALACE, fantastical and real structures and practices. Like we are allowed into the museum at night. We can make a great essentially live record with great songs and great players because nobody else is? ‘Wolf Of The Cosmos’... is about, as much as anything, direct engagement with recorded music. So step right up to the replicant.” - Bonnie ‘Prince’ Billy

Bonnie ‘Prince’ Billy is joined by musicians Emmet Kelly (bass guitar, voice, acoustic guitar), Cheyenne Mize (violin, slide ukulele, voice), Chris Rodahaffer (banjo, voice, acoustic guitar) and Elsa Madeline Oldham (juice harp).

“‘Wolf Of The Cosmos’ is a wonderful obsessive trip into the mind of one of the most important living singers” - Country Music

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Beautifully emotive country-tinged plucks, BPB's unmistakable voice and softly pulled strings make for an enchanting an absorbing journey. Yet more evidence of the unwavering excellence of one of today's most successful singer-songwriters. Brilliantly fresh, but comfortable and familiar.

TRACK LISTING

Intruder
Born In The Desert
Hangout
People Living
Stay
For You
Better Days
Traveling
Demon Dance
Home Recording
We Offer
Lily

Alexis Taylor releases a new album on Domino. It is a very new, very individualist and – yes – very beautiful reflection of a life that's changed immeasurably since Alexis first started out in music. This is a musician, writer and singer who has carved his own unique path through the music of the 21st century, completely avoiding getting trapped along the way in dumb oppositions of pop vs avant-garde, dancefloor vs intellect, retro vs modernist and so on. He has worked with living legends from major pop stars to free improvisors in the furthest left field, played huge arenas and tiny clubs without ever privileging one over the other, and through all of it, never stopped listening and learning. All of this accumulated experience is put to work on Beautiful Thing in pursuit of something subtle and elusive but ultimately quite profound and beautifully human. Taylor’s fourth album also represents the first time Alexis has made a solo album with a producer, that producer being Tim Goldsworthy, co-founder of Mo Wax and DFA Recordings and member of UNKLE.

The record is a bold and confident step forward for Alexis both sonically and in terms of his songwriting abilities. It has electronic thrills, dark spaces, memories of dancefloors, heartfelt writing; it's composed, it's improvised, it's accidental, it's strange, but it's also very immediate. It is a beautiful thing itself: a moving, modern and unique sounding long-player, to get lost in on repeated deep listens.

Self-produced, written and recorded in the east London house-stroke-studio-stroke band HQ they all share together (imagine a squat version of the Brill Building, or a lo-fi, DIY take on Max Martin’s Cheiron studio), Superorganism is a spectacularly confident debut record that beams with a sense of wonky fun, a kaleidoscopic riot of sound and visuals. Influenced by the world-building depth of artists like Devo, Beck and The Avalanches, Superoganism soundtracks the band’s rapid trajectory from shared house side project to global audiovisual powerhouse and features previous singles ‘Something For Your M.I.N.D.’ and ‘It’s All Good / Nobody Cares’ as well as their brand single ‘Everybody Wants To Be Famous’.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Brilliantly quirky oddball pop, twee synthy pads and glitched indie come together into this flourescent explosion of melodic power. Unforgettable and a truly exciting concept for the future.

TRACK LISTING

01 It’s All Good
02 Everybody Wants To Be Famous
03 Nobody Cares
04 Reflections On The Screen
05 SPRORGNSM
06 Something For Your M.I.N.D.
07 Nai’s March
08 The Prawn Song
09 Relax
10 Night Time

‘Last Night All My Dreams Came True’ is a career-spanning collection and features songs from each of Wild Beasts’ studio albums, with an emphasis on ‘Boy King’, their most direct record yet.

Looking back on Wild Beasts’ back catalogue and the themes they tackled, there is a sense of prescience - toxic masculinity, gender fluidity, the conflicts surrounding class, politics and art were no bandwagon jumps, often becoming hot topics in the media several years after they’d been eloquently dealt with on record.

Recorded in two days over the Summer at RAK Studios, ‘Last Night All My Dreams Came True’ is the second official Domino Documents release and has more than fulfilled the Domino Documents aim to capture a band at the height of their powers, recording a selection of their finest songs.

TRACK LISTING

Wanderlust
Big Cat
A Simple Beautiful Truth
2BU
Bed Of Nails
Hooting & Howling
This Is Our Lot
He The Colossus
The Devil’s Palace
Alpha Female
Get My Bang
All The King’s Men
Celestial Creatures

Nothing short of a rebirth, the album’s 10 songs are a triumphant recasting of the group, bursting with fresh ideas and vigorous sonic experimentation. 

‘Always Ascending’ was recorded at RAK Studios, London and Motorbass in Paris, with the help of French producer extraordinaire Philippe Zdar (Cassius, Phoenix, The Beastie Boys), the mutual affection between band and producer seeping into every dazzling groove. ‘Always Ascending’ shows Franz Ferdinand broadening their palate, as exuberant as it is euphoric, creating a sound that singer, Alex Kapranos, refers to as “simultaneously futuristic and naturalistic.”

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Franz Ferdinand always stood out from the considerable crowd of potential soundalikes with their jagged brand of majestic indie-pop, relying heavily on split-second key changes and snappy, fuzzy riffage. You'll be delighted to know that this one is no less outstanding, a thoroughly excellent return.

TRACK LISTING

1. Always Ascending
2. Lazy Boy
3. Paper Cages
4. Finally
5. The Academy Award
6. Lois Lane
7. Huck And Jim
8. Glimpse Of Love
9. Feel The Love Go
10. Slow Don’t Kill Me Slow

Microshift is the Leeds band's first new work in over 3 years and marks a seismic shift in their sound, dynamic, songwriting and production, whilst still bearing all the ferocious energy, intricate musicianship and bruised but beautiful song-craft of the previous releases which have quietly made them one of the UK's most revered young bands.

This is the band's third studio album technically but arguably the first in which the studio has been central to its creation. Pearl Mystic and second LP, The Hum were heavily informed by the band's live sound, Microshift on the other hand came to life in the studio, formed out of loops, modular synthesizer sequences, drum machines, homemade samples etc. which were jammed around and layered until the songs began to emerge. The band have also opened their writing to include collaborations with artists such as Richard Formby (on Opener), Christopher Duffin (on Boxing Day) and Alice Merida Richards (on Each Time We Pass).

Radiant, immersive and teeming with light, but still heavy and forceful - the music on Microshift acts as a very deliberate counter to some of the difficult topics the album's lyrics address. Death, disease, heartbreak, body image and even natural disaster are all present here but the overall effect these songs achieve is euphoric catharsis.

The album was written and recorded in full following a complete rebuild of the band’s Suburban Home Studio after the River Aire floods in Leeds in the winter of 2015 which devastated the studio. The band had an incredible response to a GoFundMe campaign and the subsequent help of volunteers over several months to rebuild the studio from nothing is a huge part of the band’s continued existence. Striving through the toughness, it is perhaps no surprise that the record is one of both defiance and darkness. “All of our records are to an extent about mental health,” comments MJ. “Largely this is an album about loss but also about maturing, accepting your flaws and the transience of intimacy”.

Hookworms are MJ, MB, JW, JN & EO.

STAFF COMMENTS

Darryl says: A brilliantly dynamic mix of psychedelic guitars, determined vocal swathes and soaring cosmic synth swells. As fascinating and direct an outing as The Hum, but refined through a good few years of working on their sound. Superb.

TRACK LISTING

Negative Space
Static Resistance
Ullswater
The Soft Season
Opener
Each Time We Pass
Boxing Day
Reunion
Shortcomings

‘The House’ is the third full-length album from New York musician Porches (aka Aaron Maine).

The 14-song affair features contributions from (Sandy) Alex G, Dev Hynes, Okay Kaya, Maya Laner (True Blue), Bryndon Cook (Starchild & The New Romantic), Cameron Wisch (Cende) and Maine’s own father Peter Maine.

‘The House’ was written and recorded over an 18- month stretch, immediately following the completion of Porches’ breakthrough record ‘Pool’. Taking a diary-like approach, Aaron documents a period of time through the 14 gorgeous songs on this record.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Like an introspective mix of the synth-heavy downbeat vibes of James Blake, mixed with grand, room-filling layers of vocals and melody. Brimming with euphoria, but tinged with a covert despair. Stunning.

The Kills’ eponymous debut mini album ‘Black Rooster’, originally released in 2002, has been reissued for the first time.

The mini album was recorded on an 8-track at Toe Rag Studios by Liam Watson, except ‘Dropout Boogie’ which was recorded during a live performance at Paint It Black.

TRACK LISTING

Cat Claw
Black Rooster
Wait
Dropout Boogie
Gum

Domino Soundtracks are proud to present their first release, an original soundtrack recording from Dan Deacon of the provocative essay-film ‘Rat Film’, to be released in October 2017.

‘Rat Film’ marks Deacon’s first full record devoted to modern composition. In between his four ecstatic electronic-pop albums, Deacon has frequently flexed the 21st Century classical muscles he first developed studying at SUNY Purchase’s Conservatory Of Music.

‘Rat Film’ offers the first recorded document of this parallel career - and both as a self-contained album and a companion piece to an equally potent film, it astounds.

“The aesthetic audacity alone is intriguing; combined with Maureen Jones’s icily robotic narration and Dan Deacon’s eerie electronic score, the effect is somewhere between confounding and mesmerizing.” - New York Times

“‘Rat Film’, in other words, is not your typical documentary, and its mesmerizing electronica score by Dan Deacon - full of whirring, bleeping and blipping, cacophonous noise, and ominous tonal swells - only enhances its eccentricity.” - The Daily Beast

TRACK LISTING

Redlining
Horn Phase
Pelican
OCME
Harold
Reed Clouds
Seagull
Calhoun
Rat Poison
Video Game
Harold’s Lament
Map Overlays

Anxiety about the precarious nature of reality is a recurring thread on Protomartyr's 4th full-length and Domino debut, Relatives In Descent. Though not a concept album, it presents twelve variations on a theme: the unknowable nature of truth, and the existential dread that often accompanies that unknowing. It's no coincidence this missive comes to us at a moment when disinformation and garbled newspeak have become a daily reality. “I used to think that truth was something that existed, that there were certain shared truths, like beauty,” says Protomartyr singer Joe Casey. “Now that’s being eroded. People have never been more skeptical, and there’s no shared reality. Maybe there never was.”

Relatives In Descent offers new layers and new insights, without sanding any of the edges born from their days as a Detroit bar band. Greg Ahee’s guitar still crackles and spits electricity. Casey's voice continues to shift naturally between dead-eyed croon and fevered bark. Drummer Alex Leonard and bassist Scott Davidson remain sharp and propulsive, a rhythm section that’s as agile as it is adventurous. But this is also Protomartyr at their most impressive. After months of rehearsal, the band decamped to Los Angeles for two weeks in March of 2017, to record with Sonny DiPerri (Animal Collective, Dirty Projectors), who co-produced the record and helped capture the band’s long-simmering vision for something more complex, but no less visceral.

It all begins with ‘A Private Understanding,’ pegged as the album's opening statement the second it was finished, and a wellspring from which the following eleven songs flow. At once beautiful and brutal, it mutates from drum-led oddity to unlikely anthem, with some of Casey’s most potent lyrical work at its centre: “Sorrow's the wind blowing through/Truth is hiding in the wire.”

TRACK LISTING

1. A Private Understanding
2. Here Is The Thing
3. My Children
4. Caitriona
5. The Chuckler
6.Windsor Hum
7. Don't Go To Anacita
8. Up The Tower
9. Night-Blooming Cereus
10. Male Plague
11. Corpses In Regalia
12. Half Sister

‘Eucalyptus’ is the new studio album written and produced by Animal Collective’s Avey Tare.

Recommended listening for dawn or dusk. An electroacoustic movement through leaves, rocks and dust. Written on sunlit bedroom afternoons in Los Angeles, practiced in the dark early hours of the California twilight and slept on under Big Sur skies.

Recorded by Animal Collective’s Deakin (Josh Dibb), featuring chamber orchestration arranged by Eyvind Kang, musicians Angel Deradoorian and Jessika Kenney.

TRACK LISTING

Season High
Melody Unfair
Ms. Secret
Lunch Out Of Order Pt. 1
Lunch Out Of Order Pt. 2
Jackson 5
DR Aw One For J
PJ
In Pieces
Selection Of A Place
Boat Race
Roamer
Coral Lords
Sports In July
When You Left Me

‘Platinum Tips + Ice Cream’ is new from Royal Trux.

The songs were written over a span of time as wide as eagle’s wings but the recordings are new, live, unrehearsed and were presented in real time to a few thousand people in California and NYC.

Performance art? Yes! But only because, unlike so many other aural ‘content providers’, Neil Hagerty and Jennifer Herrema are true artists writing their own futures into the present. This was, and will always be, Royal Trux.

TRACK LISTING

Junkie Nurse
Sewers Of Mars
Red Tiger
Sometimes
Mercury
Esso Dame
Deafer Than Blind
Waterpark
Platinum Tips
The Banana Question
Blue Is The Frequency
Ice Cream

With ‘Best Troubador’, Bonnie ‘Prince’ Billy pays homage to a longtime and forever hero, the late Merle Haggard.

A singer who, some 25 years previously, first performed in public by playing a Merle Haggard song, Bonny has often cited Merle’s work in performance, on records and in conversation with anyone who was around, even talking to Merle himself for Filter magazine in 2009.

‘Best Troubador’ flips through his song book, landing on pages unmoored from their time and located anew. Moving from 1978 to 1969 to 2003 to 1981 allows the album to circle Haggard’s music in a simulation of thought and memory, slipping around from spot to spot as if they were discrete impressions, unknown but knowable yet.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Superbly uplifting plucked guitars, swooning woodwind and Mr. Billy's sweet but serious vocal delivery. It's a wonder that there could be any more gold flowing from this supremely talented songwriter, yet it continues. Touching, beautiful and sublime.

TRACK LISTING

The Fugitive
I’m Always On A Mountain When I Fall
The Day The Rains Came
Haggard (Like I’ve Never Been Before)
I Always Get Lucky With You
Leonard
My Old Pal
Roses In The Winter
Some Of Us Fly
Wouldn’t That Be Something
Pray
That’s The Way Love Goes
Nobody’s Darling
What I Hate (Excerpt)
I Am What I Am
If I Could Only Fly

South London trio Little Cub release their debut album, ‘Still Life’, on Domino Recordings.

Marrying a wry, worldly and subversive form of diarist lyricism with sumptuously evocative electronic production, ‘Still Life’ announces the arrival of a band at once deeply in tune with the greatest traditions of progressive, homespun British pop music and at odds with the increasingly vacuous pop culture they are born into.

TRACK LISTING

Too Much Love
My Nature
Breathing Space
Mulberry
Death Of A Football Manager
Hypnotise
Closing Time
October
Loveless
Snow
Television

‘Electric Lines’, the new album from producer Joe Goddard, is all about connections. The title refers to the colourful cables that link the modules in his Eurorack synthesizer and to the invisible wires that run between all the different kinds of electronic music that he loves. An apt title for a record which brilliantly unites the strands of his prolific career: member of Hot Chip and The 2 Bears, songwriter, producer, DJ, Grammy award winning remixer and co-founder of the Greco-Roman label. Like Four Tet, Caribou and Jamie xx, Joe combines a thirst for experimentation, an instinctive understanding of the dancefloor and a love of left-of-centre pop music. ‘Electric Lines’ confirms his place in the front rank of British producers.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Goddard superbly mixes the off-key rotating chord electronica of his day-job at Hot Chip with post-dubstep atmospherics and the warm vintage hum and twisted modulations of analogue synths. An epic journey (even more so in the extended CD version), and one worth undertaking. Brilliantly varied but resolutely enthralling synth 'tronica.

TRACK LISTING

‘Electric Lines’
Ordinary Madness
Lose Your Love
Home
Lasers
Human Heart
Children
Truth Is Light
Nothing Moves
Electric Lines
Music Is The Answer

Bonus 12” (With Indies Exclusive LP Only)
Bumps
Funk You Up
Lose Your Love (Full
Length Version)

Following the chilled-out acoustic draughts blowing through both ‘Further’ and ‘Chorus’, to say nothing of the folkundertones in the 1996 EP release ‘Sally Free And Easy’, it seemed that the direction for future Flying Saucer Attack musics was clear: increased melodicism with more roots exposed in ever-cleaner productions. Apparently not - 1997’s ‘New Lands’ brought a return to the starkness and shadowplay of extreme noise and FSA’s Dave Pearce’s sonombulent vocalizing, along with the introduction of an unanticipated new development - a rubbery, almost dance-rhythmic bottom end that only increased the atmosphere of dread hanging above the fray. This set the stage for ‘Mirror’, which followed ‘New Lands’ over two years later, with only a cover version of Skip Spence’s ‘Goodbye World’ opus, ‘Grey/Afro’ coming between.

‘Mirror’ arrived wrapped in a vibrant, multicolored cover designed by Savage Pencil but the opening sequence of songs offered some of the quietest, most refined Flying Saucer Attack songs committed to tape. The violent spells of ‘New Lands’ had given way to a flattened drone on the electric pieces ‘Space (1999)’, ‘Islands’ and ‘Dark Wind’, while the glittering acoustics of ‘Suncatcher’ and ‘Tides’ highlighted an incredible fragility within the songs. Dave Pearce seemed to be further away in space than ever, a wispy presence over streamlined hard beats and loops of ‘Chemicals’, which create the direction of ‘Mirror’’s second side.

Particularly when considering the silence that followed, this impression makes ‘Mirror’ a distressing encounter at times, though certainly one of the most enervating listens of the FSA catalogue - quite an achievement, when the blinding airs of previous phases are recalled. 

TRACK LISTING

Space (1999)
Suncatcher
Islands
Tides
Chemicals
Dark Wind
Winter Song
Rivers
Dust
Rise
Star City

Likely titled New Lands due to Flying Saucer Attack being lauched upon "phase two" (as the liner notes put it), this release finds FSA down to Pearce and Pearce only, as before with a bit of help here and there from Rocker and, on "Present," the co-writing skills of two members of Amp. That the first two tracks are called "Past" and "Present" and that the first has more of a "classic" FSA sound with a steady rhythm and huge solo while the second revolves around a buried, near inaudible series of loops, seems to be part of the album's plan, such as it is. New Lands in general showcases Pearce in testing mode, seeming to see what works and what doesn't, looking backward as much as forward. Indeed, the lengthy, majestic steady build of "Whole Day Song" reappears from the Goodbye/and Goodbye EP, this time with vocals and a low-key, softly intoxicating piano line. While the more experimental parts of New Lands aren't really Pearce completely trashing his general aesthetic and trying something new, they do show him attempting and often succeeding at introducing further variety to his murky, intriguing field. Thus, "Up in Her Eyes" has a very familiar vocal and guitar style, but the obsessive, upfront yet still shadowy percussion -- sounding more like a chugging train engine than anything else -- dominates the track, at least up until its slightly more ambient, free-flowing end. Other curious rhythms, reminiscent of past comparisons to the work of Main, crop up more than once -- the near arrhythmic, squealing loop that introduces "Respect" or the blunt, brusque punch of "The Sea." Through it all, the combination of Pearce's tender, dark folk vocals and skybursting guitar provides the central point of the experience, making for some fascinating, entrancing results. - Allmusic