indie albums
EP: Swedish Magazines release the otherworldly rockabilly of Worried Sick
Under the direction of a certain Hull resident Tom Fish, Manchester based Swedish Magazines have released their new ep/mini-album (delete as appropriate) Worried Sick, on magnificent cassette via the brilliant DIY outfit, Alphaville Records. Fittingly, especially on further investigation, it was recorded in a bedsit on a laptop with, at least if the press release …
Album Review: John Grant – Boy From Michigan
Michigan boy John Grant has always moved to the beat of his own drum. If you were to ask me to fit him into a box – a genre that he could comfortably placed in, then I could only call it John Grant. From the dream-pop beginnings of his debut solo, Queen of Denmark, to …
Album review: Sennen – ‘Widows (Expanded Edition)’: now twice the size, Noughties shoegaze torchbearers’ debut packs a glorious punch
WHEN shoegaze was so cruelly traduced by the British inkies, dazzle-eyed by their enthralment with the twin coming of grunge and early Britpop, us aficionados shed a quiet tear for a lovely sound, a gorgeous aesthetic seemingly consigned to the history books; but you can’t, as we can see in retrospect, keep a great idea …
Album review: Tashaki Miyaki – ‘Castaway’: LA dream poppers embrace a West Coast pop-glamour hush
LOS ANGELINO trio Tashaki Miyaki really do put the dream into dreampop, with a deliciously languorous, hazy cast to their music, which seems to call on the Mary Chain, Lush, Hole, Mazzy Star, soothe them into a shoegazey drowse; and they’ve a new album, Castaway, out now on July 2nd – slightly delayed – on Metropolis Records. The new …
Album review: The Catenary Wires – ‘Birling Gap’: Amelia and Rob take a look at how we’re doing as an island in folk-rock and fuzzpop
AMELIA FLETCHER and Rob Pursey have been making intelligent British indiepop together through more incarnations than your current, faithful scribe cares to shake a stick at, and thus that stick shall remain firmly static. Their relationship goes right back to the days of the lovely Talulah Gosh, one of many bands tarred only partly accurately …
ALBUM REVIEW: Lambchop – ‘Showtunes’
Much as we’d all like to believe in a world of nuance, in most scenarios, the general population can be broken down into two rival groups. Marmite; the X Factor; Leeds United; Guinness – they all split us firmly into one camp or another. Lambchop’s Kurt Wagner creates a similar division, chiefly being between those …
Album review: Paul Jacobs – ‘Pink Dogs On The Green Grass’: Pottery man breaks out with a low-slung, psych-boogie blur of brilliance
SPREADING his wings from his excellent mothership, the wiry post-punkers Pottery, Paul Jacobs is shortly to unveil a gently slackercore beauty of a full debut solo album, Pink Dogs On The Green Grass. Which is, y’know, the reason we’re all gathered here today. Stepping away from the dependable sticksman role which is propelled Pottery right …
Album review: Lou Barlow – ‘Reason To Live’: a crisp Americana homecoming that reveals its beauties slowly
NOTHING less than absolute royalty of the US alt.rock scene, Lou Barlow, formerly of Dinosaur Jr., Sebadoh and Sentridoh, The Folk Implosion, is set to grace our ears with his first solo album in six years. Good things come to he who waits. That album, Reason To Live, will be out this very Friday, May …
Album review: Cheval Sombre – ‘Days Go By’: Chris Porpora’s second of the year delivers an airy, dreamy space-folk coda
IT’S ONLY his fourth album at all in the catalogue; the second, Mad Love, was almost nine years ago now; but the third, Time Waits For No One, is only three months old. Oh: more importantly, most importantly, Time Waits for No One was also absolutely beautiful. Chris Porpora, the thoughtful architect who guises as …
Album review: Raoul Vignal – ‘Years In Marble’: a solid third chapter in an accomplished songwriting career
A small miracle of the independent European songwriting scene