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David Balfe
Album review: Moving, passionate, angry, grief-stricken and tender, this mix of beats, samples and striking spoken word lyrics by the Dublin performer and producer David Balfe is a powerful tribute to a lost friend
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Nicely worn: Black Honey’s album
Album review: Refreshing, energetic, upbeat big-chorus fuzzbox indie-pop by the four-piece from Brighton with echoes of big-sound styles ranging from Primal Scream to Girls Aloud to Garbage to Sigue Sigue Sputnik
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Nick Cave and Warren Ellis: symbiotic
Album review: "A brutal but very beautiful record nested in a communal catastrophe” is how Nick Cave describes this Covid-19 lockdown-inspired release with his longtime Bad Seed collaborator, and so it is
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Rats on Rafts
Album review: This third album by the alternative post-punk band from Rotterdam is a conceptual journey into the id punctuated with rhythmic kabuki modal mood swings, thunderstorms, digital beeps, traffic noise echoing The Fall and Snapped Ankles
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Mush’s second album Lines Redacted
Album review: The second album by the Leeds-based band extends their distinctive, sonically idiosyncratic style of excellent angular art-rock with mind-bendingly alternative guitar riffs and scales, sharp lyrics and the oddly likeable nasal delivery of songwriter Dan Hyndman
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TV Priest: caustically funny, thunderously angry
Album review: Thunderously angry, caustically witty, burnished with ripping guitar and bass riffs, frenetic rhythm and the imposing vocals of British Charles Bronson-lookalike Charlie Drinkwater, this post-punk band’s debut echoes IDLES and The Fall
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Album review: Liberating, refreshing, eccentric, with a playfully light touch and flourishes of flute and feminist theory garnish this solo debut by the singer who works with Holly Herndon singer and is half of Italian synth new wave duo Itaca
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Mask
Album review: The south London quartet’s second album has is double-edged woozily beguiling in music and caustic in lyrics, a mixture of shoegaze, postpunk, and electronica with a distinctive sound produced by the groundbreaking Dan Carey
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Palberta’s Lily, Ani and Nina
Album review: A new album of abstract indie charm by the New York trio, at times chugging and spluttering in DIY arrhythmic style like some battered old Citroën 2CV, it also has a sweet sounding shambolic quality that grows on you
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Kiwi Jr.’s second album Cooler Returns, out on Sub Pop
New album: Clever, wry, satirical, topical, inventive upbeat indie by the Toronto quartet with their second album following Soccer Money, who have echoes of Pavement and The Modern Lovers, but with added vim and vigour, keyboards and harmonica
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Pom Poko
Album review: The postpunk Indie quartet from Norway return with their second LP after 2019’s Birthday with more wonderfully energetic work in this short, sharp selection of 10 three-minute songs
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Shame. Back for a second trip
Album review: The south London band return with a strong and developed sound from 2018’s Songs Of Praise, with a greater range of postpunk styles in their armoury, and also echoing other bands such as IDLES, Squid and Art Brut
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Stark but vital: Spare Ribs, the latest LP by Sleaford Mods’ Jason Williamson and Andrew Fearn
Album review: Jason Williamson and Andrew Fearn return with their latest album recorded last July in lockdown, and as ever its filled with topical hard-hitting humour and brilliant bass and beats backing tracks by Fearn
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Anything can happen. Lice from Bristol, creating new frequencies
Album review: Experimental, clattering, clanging, sawing, banging, challenging but very rewarding, this is a very alternative, ambitious but brilliant full debut album from the Bristol postpunk band
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Good licks: Viagra Boys
New album: The follow-up to debut album Street Worms, the Swedish post-punk mischief makers fronted by Sebastian Murphy return with their brand of satirically twisted dark humour and stop-start energy
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Great albums of 2020: clockwise from top: Agnes Obel, Phoebe Bridgers, Bob Dylan and Sault’s Untitled (Rise)
Albums of 2020 roundup: Out of crisis comes great art. A year of lockdowns, no gigs, alternative sounds, experimentation and surprises. This is the second half of our roundup of favourite albums of 2020. Part 1 was here
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Lianne La Havas, Fiona Apple and Yves Tumor are among three artists who have released outstanding LPs
Albums of 2020 roundup: A year of lockdowns, alternative sounds, experimentation and surprises. This is the first half two roundups of a total over 50 favourite albums of the year that musicians stayed at home. And here’s Part 2.
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This week’s nine is filled with contrast, but also many 2020 themes …
Album reviews roundup: A selection of contrasts – some dark, 2020-slanted Christmas other recent seasonal releases and other recents and earlier releases, from Chilly Gonzales to Mark Lanegan and a Beethoven anniversary piece
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Nine more albums to help complete further selections reflecting on 2020
Album reviews roundup: From the former Beatle to a country/pop mainstream artist, 2020’s running theme seems inspire isolation, survival, DIY and experimentation. But as this selection shows, there are also many new, innovative artists out there
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Nine more albums to investigate …
Album reviews roundup: Psychedelia, jazz, prog and electronica dominate this week, including a synth album by the Smashing Pumpkins, eastern flavours by King Gizzard, exquisite Norwegian vocals by Ane Grun and a superb debut by Jack Cheshire
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