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Hot Chip return to reach out with Freakout/Release
New album: This eighth LP by the London synth-pop band of Alexis Taylor, Joe Goddard and co is filled packed with Prince-inspired funk, and catchy melodies, and though not as wild as the title suggests, is still a slick, liquidly fun release that ticks the Hot Chip boxes
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AHudson Mohawke: Cry Sugar
New album: A vibrantly energised otherworld, an innovative concoction of experimental electronica, trash-pop to classical, gospel, 70s soul, house and more by the prolific LA-based Glaswegian DJ and producer Ross Birchard in his fourth LP and first for seven years
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Horse power: Beyoncé bestrides her latest release
New album: The American superstar’s first full solo album since 2016’s Lemonade a ful- throttle 16-tracker filled with taut, sexy, hedonistic disco, soul, hip hop, Afrobeats, gqom, house and other club styles and even a surprisingly effective sampling of Right Said Fred
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Lizzo’s back with her album, Special
New album: Back with a bang (there’s no other way), the wonderfully charismatic American star Melissa Jefferson returns with a mixture of disco, funk, pop, soul and R&B, with bags of attitude, fun, female empowerment, and music to make you dance
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Stealing Sheep: Wow Machine
New album: The Liverpool trio of Emily Lansley, Rebecca Hawley, Luciana Mercer’s wonderfully experimental 10-song album springs from a specially commissioned project with the BBC Radiophonic Workshop, taking inspiration from the female pioneers of electronic music
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Sigrid’s second album
New album: High-quality mainstream pop by the high-voiced Norwegian singer-songwriter Sigrid Solbakk Raabe with this second album packed with of disco bangers and power ballads with a running theme of self-empowerment and gaining control in relationships
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Soft Cell with their first album in 21 years
New album: Fabulous and rather surprising return for the British duo, their first for 20 years, and 41 since their debut, with a wry, witty, catchy electro-pop album about how the sci-fi future dream has not quite turned out how it promised
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Toro Y Moi’s seventh album, featuring his fun new Filipino jeepney truck
New album: A wonderfully eclectic, playfully stylish seventh LP by the American singer, songwriter, producer, and graphic designer Chaz Bear, who integrates wonky and squishy funk, pop, psych, rock, and electronica, and his rich Filipino and African-Columbian heritage
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Lucius: Second Nature
New album: A sparkling mix of retro disco and 80s dance-pop with echoes of Abba by the American quartet, but also a dash of tragic country by front duo vocalists and co-songwriters Jess Wolfe and Holly Laessig who capture many emotions from some recent experiences – motherhood and divorce
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Stylish, strutting, studied performance: Walt Disco
New album: Dramatic, declamatory, stylised and immensely fun, this witty dandy post-punk pop debut with thrumming bass lines and shimmering synths by the Glasgow six-piece with echoes of the 1980s from Associates, Bowie, Human League, Rocky Horror Picture Show to Sparks
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Hedonism unbound: Warmduscher
New album: New sleazy mischief and hedonistic humour at the hands of the British krautrock-style disco-pop funksters fronted by the engaging American drawl of Clams Baker Jr – the gang with something that certainly is, as billed, crunchy on the outside, smooth on the inside
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Electrifying: Ibibio Sound Machine’s latest LP
New album: Superbly energised fourth LP by the afro-funk London band fronted by vocalist Eno Williams, who utilises her Nigerian heritage and the Ibibio language, fused with guitars, electronica, Brazilian rhythms and influences from Fela Kuti to Kraftwerk and Giorgio Moroder
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Charlotte Adigéry and Bolis Pupul: Topical Dancer
New album: Super-sharp electro-pop by the Ghent-based duo, packed with crisp, inventive sounds created in Soulwax’s Deewee studio and clever lyrics about race issues, political correctness and cultural identity
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Awash and wet with disco fever: Ollie Alexander
New album: Now the solo project of Harrogate’s Olly Alexander, this third album is an unabashed set of catchy commercial disco pop numbers, ticking all the usual boxes, successfully doing what it sets out to do with gay abandon
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The multiplicity of Aurora
New album: An impressive range of pop stylings and vocals that cascade like a fresh, breathy mountain stream mark this third LP by the dynamic Norwegian pop artist and TikTok star, who follows up previous more political material with songs more more focused on relationships
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Dawn FM
New album: Canada’s hugely successful R&B and darkwave artist Abel Makkonen Tesfaye’s new LP is a form of concept - light-themed afterlife through the prism of a fictional radio station that generates inventive smooth and clever 80s-style synth pop and disco
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Favourite selection part 2.
Favourite albums of 2021 – Part 2: Welcome the second instalment, following Part 1, which can be found here. A huge number of excellent releases, of which again this is just a selection many of which were written during, and about lockdown, but also saw many outstanding voices emerge as well as innovative sounds developed
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Take your pick. Are your favourites here? Also check out Part 2 coming soon.
Favourite albums of 2021, part 1: Another difficult year for everyone, but from soul and jazz, electro-pop the experimental and avant-garde, an outstanding one for music releases, perhaps in part because out of diversity comes great art. Also feel free to explore Part 2, which is now available to view here.
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From the cover of Parcels’ new album Day/Night
New album: Released in last month by the Australia-Berlin electrofunk/disco quintet, a superbly catchy package of sounds, styles and danceability based on a 24-hour concept across a truly diverse 19 tracks
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The ninth album by Pond
New album: No surprise that this is the ninth album by the Australians psychedelic rock and pop band, a dynamic release with a wide variety of styles, intelligent, atypical lyrics, passionate delivery and wonderful unpredictability
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