New music
Album: Neil Young & the Chrome Hearts - Talkin' to the TreesThursday, 12 June 2025
When Neil Young releases a new album, you can be reasonably sure that you’ll get either a disc of melancholy singer-songwriter fare or a set of blistering rock’n’roll. His debut album with the Chrome Hearts, however, gives a bit of both – and it... Read more... |
Album: Mary Halvorson - About GhostsWednesday, 11 June 2025
Although Mary Halvorson leads the sextet Amaryllis on About Ghosts, instrumentally, she does not place her guitar to the fore. The first time her playing really leaps out on her new album is during second cut “Carved Form,” where it weaves through... Read more... |
Album: Marina - Princess of PowerTuesday, 10 June 2025
Marina Diamandis is a proper pop star, brilliantly full-on, off on her own thing. The Welsh singer is primarily known for success 10-15 years ago as Marina and the Diamonds, but she’s retained global heft as an album artist, including in the US,... Read more... |
Eva Quartet, St Cyprian's review - polyphonic blissMonday, 09 June 2025
Eva Quartet are four outstanding Bulgarian voices of polyphonic purity and depth, drawn from the legendary choir Le Mystere des Voix Bulgares, who guested on Kate Bush’s classic Eighties album The Sensual World.Soprano Gergana Dimitrova, mezzo-... Read more... |
Album: Mary Chapin Carpenter - Personal HistoryMonday, 09 June 2025
In those seemingly long-ago times of loneliness and lockdown, artists around the world invited us into their kitchens and living rooms as they sang into their webcams and iPhones, some more successfully than others, doing what they needed to do. The... Read more... |
Music Reissues Weekly: Gather In The MushroomsSunday, 08 June 2025
“Forest and the Shore” by Keith Christmas is remarkable. In his essay for Gather In The Mushrooms, compiler, author and Saint Etienne member Bob Stanley says it is “as evocative as its title. The song has a deeply wooded sound, like a cross between... Read more... |
Album: Van Morrison - Remembering NowSaturday, 07 June 2025
When Van Morrison last released an album of original songs, during the Covid pandemic, it didn’t go down well. Indeed for many, 2022’s What’s It Gonna Take squats in Morrison’s catalogue like a toad in a fruit salad.“A self-absorbed descent... Read more... |
Caroline, Islington Assembly Hall review - south London octet mesmerisesFriday, 06 June 2025
In 2022 I called caroline “perhaps the best band in the U.K” in my article about their debut, which I named my album of the year. Seeing the band on Tuesday night at a sold out Islington Assembly Hall, I not only feel vindicated but stronger in my... Read more... |
theartsdesk in Fes - world music centralFriday, 06 June 2025
With WOMAD not happening this year, where could one go for a feast of global sounds? Fes in Morocco has been presenting its sacred music festival for 29 years. I’ve been several times and although this wasn’t an absolute classic, it was as ever,... Read more... |
Songhoy Blues, Hare & Hounds, Birmingham review - West African crew raise the roofFriday, 06 June 2025
No-one needs to be living in Trump’s USA to be aware that governments never feel that it’s in their interest to prioritise great art and music over attention-grabbing and ill-conceived populist policies. Mali’s Songhoy Blues, unfortunately, have now... Read more... |
Album: Pulp - MoreFriday, 06 June 2025
While the Gallagher brothers scrabble around in the dirt for their rich pickings, an altogether more dignified experience is on offer from Sheffield. More is Pulp’s first album for 24 years, which is a sobering fact for those of us who... Read more... |
Album: Turnstile - NEVER ENOUGHThursday, 05 June 2025
Turnstile’s NEVER ENOUGH is a vibrant, shape-shifting album that proves the Baltimore-based band is fully committed to evolution. Since their formation in 2010, Turnstile have been known for injecting a fresh, genre-blurring energy into hardcore... Read more... |
