New album: Mesmeric, meditative, mercurial – an experimental, dream-like release by the London trio of singer and multi-instrumentalist Cathy Lucas, drummer Valentina Magaletti and bassist Susumu Mukai with folky electronica, minimalism, cosmic post-punk and psychedelic pop
Read moreOneohtrix Point Never: Again
New album: Pioneering avant-garde electronic musician and producer Daniel Lopatin returns with another mind-boggling mix of synths, samples, chamber music, prog, pop and more, playfully entwined with AI-induced effects
Read moreArmand Hammer: We Buy Diabetic Test Strips
New album: A mesmerically smart, articulate, experimental hip-hop LP packed with ideas, samples and slick delivery by the New York rapper aka Billy Woods and guests, interweaving endlessly inventive, dreamlike hazy maze of voices, stories and sounds
Read moreModern Nature: No Fixed Point In Space
New album: Following 2021/22’s music and art project Island of Noise, another release of lovely simmering stillness by Jack Cooper and his Cambridge-based band, one that with delicate instrumentation captures nature’s processes “like the sound of roots, branches, mycelium, the intricacies of a dawn chorus, neurons firing, and the unknown”
Read moreSirens of Lesbos: Peace
New album: Fascinatingly cool, crisp, delicate, experimental futuristic pop-funk by the band based in Bern, Switzerland, sprinkled with oddball instrumentation and electronica and including a guest appearance by bass legend Bootsy Collins
Read moreWaqWaq Kingdom: Hot Pot Totto
New album: Quirky, itchily inventive and eccentric, a wondrous fusion of electronica, African tribal rhythms, Jamaican dancehall, other genres and traditional instruments by the Japanese “minyo footwork” duo of Shigeru Ishihara (DJ Scotch Egg / Seefeel) and Kiki Hitomi in an LP of frenetic fun and ecological anxiety
Read moreThe National: Laugh Track
New album: A surprise release, the 10th overall and second LP of 2023 after First Two Pages of Frankenstein by Matt Berninger, the Dessner brothers and co, minimalist, darkly existential, vivid, poetic and engagingly nihilistic
Read moreMatthew Halsall: An Ever Changing View
New album: An LP of delicious, delicate jazz- and African-inflected instrumentals by the Manchester jazz trumpeter, here with a gorgeous, colourful palette of sounds – woodwind, harp, electronica, thumb piano, organ and his own beautiful brass
Read moreAlabaster DePlume: Come With Fierce Grace
New album: After last year’s Gold, another offbeat, truly oddball but original offering by Manchester-raised, London-based Gus Fairburn, his jittery side-of-mouth sax style and gnomic, mantra-style lyrics with guest such as Guinea vocalist Falle Nioke and polyrhythmic drummer Sarathy Korwar to fuse Afrobeat with clunky alt-folk-jazz
Read moreCorinne Bailey Rae: Black Rainbows
New album: A landmark of powerful storytelling and songwriting in this fourth album by the Leeds-born singer with songs inspired by immersion into a rich collection of art, books and artefacts about Black history organised by Theaster Gates at the Stony Island Arts Bank in Chicago
Read moreCLT DRP: Nothing Clever, Just Feelings
New album: Brilliantly original and fresh post- and dance-punk and electro-pop by the Brighton band with songs about heartbreak and queerness, feminism, vulnerability and gender fluidity, packed with unique sounds, passion and humour
Read moreRóisín Murphy: Hit Parade
New album: Recent controversies aside, the Irish singer-songwriter’s collaboration with German producer DJ Koze is a mesmerically inventive, intimate, candid exploration of funk, pop, disco and house, skilfully pushed through an wonderfully warped aural lens of vocal effects and sounds
Read moreYussef Dayes: Black Classical Music
New album: Taking a title cue from Miles Davis, a brilliant, landmark 19-track debut LP by the supremely gifted British jazz drummer variously exploring and re-interpreting many sides of 70s funk, reggae and afrobeat, joined by a stellar group of musicians and vocalists
Read morePale Blue Eyes: This House
New album: After last year’s promising debut, Souvenirs, the Devon trio return with an uplifting fusion of electro-pop and krautrock, one that deals with parental loss, but with a fondness, stylistically with some echoes of Django Django and some 80s sounds reminiscent of New Order and The Cure
Read moreKofi Flexxx: Flowers In The Dark
New album: Another vibrant new project by the illustriously creative tenor saxophonist Shabaka Hutchings of Sons of Kemet, The Comet Is Coming and Shabaka and the Ancestors, with a potent mix of jazz, spoken word and hip-hop and a stellar lineup
Read moreSlowdive: Everything Is Alive
New album: The classic British shoegaze band of the 1990s return again after 2017’s self-titled comeback, resurgent with a new and old audience, blending dream-pop haze with resonant, atmospheric, noise-guitar textures
Read moreeee gee: SHE-REX
New album: Packed with smart, witty lyrics and an eclectic mix of dreamy pop, disco, folk and electronica, a wonderful new melodious LP by the smooth-voiced Danish artist Emma Grankvist from Copenhagen
Read moreDanger Mouse and Jemini The Gifted One - Born Again
New album: Delayed by almost two decades, but worth the wait, this stylish hip-hop follow-up to 2003’s acclaimed Ghetto Pop Life LP is a second collaboration between producer Brian Burton and New York MC
Read moreJaimie Branch: Fly or Die Fly or Die Fly or Die ((world war))
New album: A posthumous release for the brilliantly innovative New York Chicago-raised jazz trumpeter with punk ethic or died last year aged just 39, with wonderful experimental sounds following 2017’s Fly Or Die and 2019’s Fly Or Die II – Bird Dogs of Paradise albums
Read moreGenesis Owusu: Struggler
New album: A stylish, punchy, truly eclectic release by the Ghanaian-Australian singer from Canberra, (real name Kofi Owusu-Ansah) with a potent mash of hip-hop, punk, funk, metal, soul and electro-pop, and a running lyrical metaphor of cockroaches
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