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Malice K: AVANTI
New album: Angsty but beautiful, reminiscent of the whispery, intimate style of the late, great Elliott Smith, but also the occasional punk scream eruption, this darkly mesmeric, candid, introspective indie-folk-grunge-punk LP by New York-based visual artist and songwriter Alex Konschuh is a vivid, ghostly, and deeply emotional
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Fontaines D.C.: Romance
New album: With a new look, the popular Dublin post-punk band return with their fourth LP, one with a much broadened scope of sounds, poetic but also at times cinematic in musical image and in lyric, with big-time producer James Ford at the controls
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Pom Poko: Champion
New album: Vibrant, joyful, frenzied musicianship simply flies out of this third LP by of Norwegian indie quartet whose style has some parallels with the prog-postpunk of Deerhoof, but with their own eccentric twists
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Crack Cloud: Red Mile
New album: Sharp, witty satire and parody abound in this third LP by the Canadian indie-garage-rock collective, playing with cliches across pop to rock with a striking set of clever, aggressively tuneful, curveball songs led by frontman and Zach Choy
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Liv.e: PAST FUTUR.e
New album: Released back in May, a wonderfully wonky short album of electronica and experimental post-punk by the Dallas artist, aka Hailee Olivia Williams, with a clever, menacing, witty delivery over a suite of strange squelchy keyboard sounds
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Redd Kross: Redd Kross
New album: The veteran pop-punk brothers Jeff and Steve McDonald from Hawkthorne, California, return with an energetic, lengthy self-titled release drawing on half a century of rock influences, from the Who to the Beatles, Byrds to US hardcore with vigour, but also self-deprecatory humour
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Been Stellar: Scream From New York, NY
New album: A dynamic, stormy-guitar postpunk debut by the New York quintet in an LP filled with landmark references of that famous city, but also given a texture and edge under the production guidance of by London’s brilliant Dan Carey
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Peter Bibby: Drama King
New album: Witty, self-deprecatory, earthy, emotional and energetic, the Australian singer-songwriter’s superbly fun and sweary new LP of love, loss and addiction has echoes of Suicide and country-era Bob Dylan
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Lip Critic: Hex Dealer
New album: A dazzlingly high-octane, white-knuckle ride of a debut album by the New York-based electronica-punk-hip-hop-hardcore-noise-rock band, who push the musical boundaries with express vocal delivery and double drummers
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Big Special: Postindustrial Hometown Blues
New album: A witty, punchy, restless post-punk debut LP by the heavily accented Midlands duo of Joe Hicklin and Callum Maloney, with echoes of Sleaford Mods who they’ve supported on tour, packed with sharp jokes, wordplay and sweary anger about toxic masculinity and the absurdities of modern life
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Barry Adamson: Cut To Black
New album: The Manchester legendary singer and composer, bass player of Magazine, The Bad Seeds and other bands, returns with a stylish, swaggering, 60s-influenced 10th studio solo LP, including timeless Motown, seductive blues, and vividly noir cinematic hues
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Arab Strap: I'm Totally Fine With It I Don't Give A Fuck Anymore
New album: Menacingly poetic, darkly humorous, searingly sordid and the sweetly sarcastic? It can only be the return of Scotland’s Aidan Moffat and Malcolm Middleton with another fabulously articulate assault on the self and society’s sadness and strangeness
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Fat White Family: Forgiveness Is Yours
New album: Lias Saoudi and co return with their first since 2019’s Serfs Up, one with that despite the troubled departure of founding member Saul Adamczewski during its creation, is an entertainingly sharp, ironic, aesthetic, literary release packed with stylish reference points, soundscapes and tunes
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Melts: Field Theory
New album: Following 2022’s Maelstrom, a fabulous second studio LP from the Dublin quartet of electronic psych-rock with dirty fuzzy synth lines and layered guitars, searing vocals of frontman Eoin Kenny and percussion pushing it all along like unstoppable krautrock train of wizzing, fizzing new wave energy
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A Certain Ratio: It All Comes Down To This
New album: Following last year’s 1984 album, Manchester’s pioneering and highly influential post-punk trio of Jez Kerr, Martin Moscrop and Donald Johnson return with a punchy, potent, stripped-back sound with a dark funk flavour, produced by the prolific and brilliant Dan Carey
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BODEGA: Our Brand Could Be Yr Life
New album: Smart, literary, packed with cultural references from film, books and art, the New York post-punk band’s fourth album is a more melodic release than the punchier of previous, being in part a self-reflexive reworking of much older songs from their previous incarnation as Bodega Bay
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Gustaf: Package Pt. 2
New album: Whipsmart, clever, caustic, wonderfully crafted post-punk? It must be the return of the Brooklyn five-piece fronted by the charismatic, funny and fierce Lydia Gammill with another selection of excellent, angular numbers
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Blue Whale: Last Immediate Images
New album: A brilliantly angular, experimental, partly instrumental prog-post-punk and jazz sophomore release by the Belfast quartet of riveting cross-rhythms, innovative guitar and bass work creating an oddball but ornate aural tapestry
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Yard Act: Where's My Utopia?
New album: With continuing appeal, the experimental post-punk Leeds quartet return with their second LP, with highly entertaining, broadened musical scope, frontman James Smith’s agile, candid, conversational wit musing on the ironies of success, the music business, resultant guilt, climate change, and titular worries about the future
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Talk Show: Effigy
New album: A dark, arresting, gnarly, frenzied fusion of dance-funk post-punk by the south London quartet with an LP that feels like a gripping journey through a fictional night-club underworld, with echoes of the Prodigy and Baxter Dury-style vocalisations
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