New album: The south London singer-songwriter’s sophomore LP takes different direction to her 2022’s more social and political issue-based debut The Power In Us, with a more mainstream route of stylish, smart, soaring pop, soul and R&B centred on fraught, divided, candid emotions
Read moreJack Cheshire: Interloper
New album: Following 2020’s acclaimed Fractal Future Plays, the British experimental musician returns with his sixth LP, an excellent exploration across pastoral psychedelia, lysergic polyrhythms and beautiful field recordings on tricky themes of belonging in age of post-Brexit and gentrification
Read moreKim Deal: Nobody Loves You More
New album: After various singles over the years, the former Pixies member, and Breeders musician finally releases her first full solo album, a truly fabulous execution of superb songwriting, sharp, heartbreak lyrics, diverse musical styles and instruments across indie, rock and pop, all performed with beautiful tenderness, grit and gusto
Read moreMichael Kiwanuka: Small Changes
New album: A fourth album by the Mercury prize-winner, another gorgeously crafted and performed set of songs drawing on 70s soul and slowly simmering psychedelic rock, and the third produced by Danger Mouse and Inflo
Read moreFather John Misty: Mahashmashana
New album: The king of killer opening lines Josh Tillman returns with another majestic, beautifully melodic, grandiose, playfully clever, darkly humorous and philosophical set of eight epic songs fuelled by a sense of mortality and enduring irony
Read moreFazerdaze: Soft Power
New album: This sophomore album by New Zealand singer-songwriter Amelia Rahayu Murray is dreamy, soft-sheen, shoegazey “bedroom stadium” electro-pop and indie on themes of womanhood, devotion and compassion
Read moreShe Drew The Gun: Howl
New album: Powerful, passionate highly accomplished fourth indie-rock album by singer/songwriter Louisa Roach and band from Wirral in Merseyside, one broadening her musical scope and perspective, not just socio-political and soul-searching personal, but also spanning eons, fuelled by some personal heartbreak
Read moreOrchestre Tout Puissant Marcel Duchamp: Ventre Unique
New album: Wonderfully energetic, rhythmic stylish, inventive and witty sixth album by the 12-piece experimental Geneva collective who sing politically in French and English, their music decorated with oodles of of clever brass, violins, double-bass, marimbas, percussion and more
Read moreSofie Royer: Young-Girl Forever
New album: The California-born, Vienna-based Iranian-Austrian multidisciplinary artist’s newest LP is a very catchy mix of eclectic, political and mainstream, electro-pop, disco and new wave, centred on the contradictions of being a female artist today with all of its freedoms and capitalist trappings
Read moreDu Blonde: Sniff More Gritty
New album: With a startling new look, the multi-talented British singer-songwriter and video artist Beth Jeans Houghton returns with her powerfully anthemic glam rock, grunge pop and fuzz guitar indie in this follow-up to 2021’s Homecoming
Read moreWarmduscher: Too Cold To Hold
New album: The mischievous mayhem post-punk band of Clams Baker Jr.), Mr. Salt Fingers Lovecraft, Quicksand, The Witherer, Three Piece aka the Worm and Bleucifer return with more songs on the seedier side of life, but also one of their most musically adventurous LPs of their five, with guest vocalists including Lianne La Havas, Janet Planet and Coucou Chlo
Read moreFie Eike: Water
New album: A delicately beautiful distillation through fluid subject in different contexts by the Copenhagen-based artist composer and singer, Anne Sofie Strandheim Eike, with Norwegian roots, creating a soundscape from piano, electronic elements and natural field recordings
Read moreFriedberg: Hardcore Workout Queen
New album: A wonderful engaging, energetic third LP by Anna Wappel, aka Anna F, the Austria-born singer-songwriter and indie band, with witty, eccentric, warm, humorous, hair-in-the-wind LP with the feel of a road trip
Read moreOur Girl: The Good Kind
New album: The London indie trio of singer/guitarist Soph Nathan, drummer Lauren Wilson and bassist Joshua Tyler’s new LP has a beautiful warmth of sound and optimistic honesty in lyric, borne from a theme of celebrating of determination against difficulty
Read moreLou Hayter: Unfamiliar Skin
New album: Sleek, smooth, shimmering synth-pop and and funky disco, very much with an 80s retro sound by the London-based musician, DJ, singer, producer and former New Young Pony Club member, comes with echoes of artists such as Bananarama to Axel F and Harold Faltermeyer
Read moreHaley Heynderickx: Seed of a Seed
New album: Delicious, intelligent, playful, gorgeous, witty folk with a country flavour by the honey-voiced Oregon singer-songwriter, packed with lyrically vivid images and perceptive, humorous lyrics, with fabulous finger-picking guitar, with added cello and trombone
Read morePrimal Scream: Come Ahead
New album: Looking cool in shades, a 1960 photograph the father of frontman Bobby Gillespie decorates the band’s 12th LP, and their first for 8 years, serving very much as a inspiration with a Glaswegian phrase, but musically filled with 70s Philly soul and funk, and with the input of Belfast producer David Holmes, it’s one of PS’s most stylish for years
Read moreSoccer Mommy: Evergreen
New album: Wistful, melancholy, candid country-folk, but also punchier, passionate indie in this fourth LP by the American singer-songwriter from Nashville, Tennessee – Sophia Regina Allison, with a release that goes back to her roots, but also adds some gentler acoustic guitars, strings and flutes
Read moreTHUS LOVE: All Pleasure
New album: This second LP by the post-punk quartet self-style queer post-punk band from Brattleboro, Vermont, is pulsating, visceral, panache-filled, and themed about the so-called nourishing euphoria that comes from real-life experiences rather than easy-access digital dopamine hits
Read moreTyler, the Creator: Chromakopia
New album: American rapper and producer Tyler Okonma’s eighth LP is an eclectic, electric, eccentric creation featuring his oddball masked persona, and addresses subjects such as fame, getting old, and with several songs featuring his mother Bonita Smith
Read more