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Album: Franz Ferdinand - The Human Fear

Friday, 10 January 2025

Travel back in time to the mid 2000s and you would be hard pressed to escape "Take Me Out" by Franz Ferdinand on the air waves. On the radio, music channels, in discos and clubs, what felt like overnight, the track catapulted frontman Alex Kapranos...

Music Reissues Weekly: Celebrate Yourself! The Sonic Cathedral Story 2004-2024

Sunday, 12 January 2025

Yeti Lane’s second album The Echo Show was released in March 2012. The Paris-based duo’s LP was stunning: holding together overall, as well as on a track-by-track basis. There were obvious influences: Kraftwerk, late-period Spacemen 3, motorik, My...

Albums of the Year 2024: The Last Dinner Party - Prelude to Ecstasy

Friday, 03 January 2025

Does absolutely everything have to get more difficult with each passing year? Apparently so. The amount of time I’ve spent deciding which of the many truly excellent albums I’ve reviewed this year should get the ‘top prize’ has, frankly, been...

Travis, OVO Hydro review - a Christmas night out with some regrets

Tuesday, 24 December 2024

Travis arrived onstage with the theme tune from classic sitcom Cheers as an accompaniment. The cavernous OVO Hydro might not be a place where everyone knows your name, but a Glasgow homecoming by local lads made good certainly tapped into a festive...

Albums of the Year 2024: Mercury Rev - Born Horses

Friday, 20 December 2024

Born Horses remains as inscrutable as it was when it was issued in the summer. While it is about the search for enlightenment through journeying into inner space, much of what’s described – the album’s words are largely spoken – is allegorical,...

Albums of the Year 2024: Amelia Coburn - Between the Moon and the Milkman

Friday, 13 December 2024

I’ve known for some time that Ariel Sharratt & Matthias Kom’s Never Work is my Album of the Year. This lividly witty, no-filler take-down of workplace servitude arrived on vinyl in May. The creation of two Canadian indie-folkies (from The...

Album: Ajukaja & Mart Avi - Death of Music

Thursday, 12 December 2024

Death of Music was created in Estonia. Despite the English lyrics, directness is absent. Take the title track. “Drop the music” exhorts Mart Avi over its pulsing five minutes. “Fight the music” he declares. The word “execution” crops up. There is...

Vampire Weekend, OVO Hydro, Glasgow review - a mixture of brilliance and self-indulgence

Tuesday, 10 December 2024

When Vampire Weekend arrived onstage they numbered only three and were bunched together at the front with a large curtain draped behind them, obscuring their backdrop. By the time this marathon set ended two and a half hours later, they’d more than...

Album: Duster - In Dreams

Friday, 06 December 2024

There’s a lot of anger at algorithm-driven music discovery around – a lot of it justified, as the big platforms push the already-big acts and lowest common demoninator slop is aided in rising to the top. But we can’t talk about the topic without...

Katy J Pearson, Saint Luke's and the Winged Ox, Glasgow review - warm-hearted songs to banish the cold

Thursday, 05 December 2024

'Tis the season for all manner of bugs, colds and illnesses. One had befallen Katy J Pearson, who struck an apologetic note after the night’s first number to say she had been unwell all day and was going to do her best to get through the gig. That...

Album: Lauren Mayberry - Vicious Creature

Thursday, 05 December 2024

Amid the electro-rock crunch of “Sorry, Etc”, Lauren Mayberry spits out, “I killed myself to be one of the boys/I lost my head to be one of the boys/I bit my tongue to be one of the boys/I sold my soul to be one of the boys”. The singer for...

Album: White Denim - 12

Wednesday, 04 December 2024

White Denim’s literally titled 12th album opens with the fidgety “Light on.” Drawing a line between electronica and Tropicália, it exudes sunniness. “Econolining” and “Flash Bare Ass,” up next, are equally peppy, as bright and similarly accord with...

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