New Music Reviews
Lucy Farrell, Catherine MacLellan, The Green Note review - sublime frequenciesThursday, 15 May 2025
Lucy Farrell, one quarter of the brilliant, award-winning Anglo-Scots band Furrow Collective, and a solo artist whose stunning debut album, We Are Only Sound, was released in 2023, divides her time between the UK – she’s a native of Kent – and Prince Edward Island, a musically rich parcel of land off Canada’s eastern seaboard. The island is home to the other half of this sublime folk-acoustic double bill, Juno Award-winning songwriter Catherine MacLellan. Read more... |
PUP, SWG3, Glasgow review - controlled chaos from Canadian punksTuesday, 13 May 2025
According to PUP lead singer Stefan Babcock, the Toronto foursome practiced together a grand total of twice before embarking on their current UK and European tour. Given the band’s well-known habit for disagreements and teetering on the edge of imploding, that might have been a wise decision. It didn’t affect the show itself, for while the group’s history is littered with chaos, this was a lively but controlled display. Read more... |
Music Reissues Weekly: Roots Rocking ZimbabweSunday, 11 May 2025
“Soul Scene,” by Echoes Limited, is built from elements of the James Brown sound. But it’s put together in such a way that the result is unfamiliar. The angular drum groove edges towards a 5/8 shuffle. The circularity of the guitar suggests Congolese rumba. Funk, but outside recognised templates. Read more... |
Supergrass, Barrowland, Glasgow review - nostalgia played with youthful energySaturday, 10 May 2025
It is a family affair at Supergrass shows these days. There were plenty of parents and offspring filing onto the Barrowland’s famous old dancefloor, and during the encore a pair of excitable, bouncing teenagers turned around and started bellowing for their dad, off on the sidelines, to join in pogoing. He declined, but was singing along with vigour nonetheless. Read more... |
Louis Cole, Roundhouse review - nothing is everythingSaturday, 10 May 2025
London's iconic Roundhouse, packed to the rafters, provided the perfect setting for the UK premiere of Louis Cole's groundbreaking album nothing – his fifth album and third on Brainfeeder. This one-night-only performance, featuring Cole on drums and keys with an orchestra conducted by Jules Buckley, delivered electrifying musicianship, fascinating stylistic mash-ups, and melodies that imprinted themselves on your consciousness. Read more... |
Shack, Union Chapel review - the surprise return of the Liverpool legends does not run to planTuesday, 06 May 2025
After kicking off with the psychedelia-tinged “Sgt. Major,” they keep coming. A string of songs as Sixties-influenced as they are edgy and propulsive. The tempo may not be speedy but there is always forward motion, even in a song where different sections unite in a portmanteau structure. Read more... |
Music Reissues Weekly: John McKay - Sixes and SevensSunday, 04 May 2025
Sixes and Sevens is a surprise. A big one. Since leaving Siouxsie and the Banshees in September 1979, John McKay has largely been a mystery. On record, the only suggestion this influential guitarist had continued with music was the EP his post-Banshees band Zor Gabor issued in 1987. Otherwise – nothing. Read more... |
Adrian Utley / Eddie Henderson Project, Ronnie Scott's review - beyond fusionThursday, 01 May 2025
On the eve of recording an album at Real World Studios, guitarist Adrian Utley and the American trumpet player Eddie Henderson brought their “project” to the hallowed ground of Ronnie Scott’s in Soho, along with four other top-class British musicians. Read more... |
Music Reissues Weekly: The Hamburg RepertoireSunday, 27 April 2025
The blurb on the front of the double-CD set The Hamburg Repertoire says it collects “The original recordings of songs performed by The Beatles on stage in Hamburg.” Disc One opens with Little Richard’s “Long Tall Sally.” Disc Two ends with Chet Atkins’ version of the “Theme From ‘The Third Man’.” Read more... |
Album: Jenny Hval - Iris Silver MistThursday, 24 April 2025
Had I read the contextual blurb about Jenny Hval's latest album first, I might have assumed it was a perfume company collaboration. The album is named after a fragrance created by renowned perfumer Maurice Roucel for French house Serge Lutens, a connection that initially seems tenuous. Read more... |
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