Beans on Toast can be an acquired taste. I don’t mean the light lunchtime snack – most of us have enjoyed that since childhood – but the singer-songwriter. His lo-fi folky ramblings come with pretty basic vocal stylings, an overwhelmingly…
English-born with a Welsh name (Cariad means ‘love’), and living in Brooklyn. It provides an eclectic background which is clear to hear in Cariad Harmon’s excellent self-titled effort. Before we get to Harmon’s warm, expressive voice, her supreme guitar work…
Two years between albums tends to be a perfectly reasonable turnaround for most artists, but for Jim Noir it feels like an unnecessarily long delay. After all this is the man who released 13, yes that’s right 13, EP’s during…
I first stumbled across The Portraits at the Small World solar tent at Glastonbury 2013 – admittedly I was hiding from the rain but half an hour (and a lot of personal peddling and bubble blowing) later and I was…
Alpha Mike Foxtrot: Rare Tracks 1994-2014 ——————————————- What’s Your 20? Essential Tracks 1994-2014 The end of 2014 gives us a grand old gift from one of America’s very finest. For those who love Wilco comes the definitive and essential rarities…
The first thought regarding this record is that In The Fullness of Time is the result of a classy operation. It sounds like a band not just in love with Neil Young at his peak but able to turn that…
Twenty years ago, Nan Warshaw, Rob Miller and Eric Babcock founded a roots, indie and punk rock record label in Chicago, self-funding a debut compilation release featuring artists from clubs and independent labels around the city. The booming country scene…
The two north-east musicians, best known for their respective work with Maxïmo Park and Field Music, offer up an unusual departure with a project based on Smith’s travel writing. Originally commissioned for, and performed at, the 2013 Festival of the…
It is so refreshing to be blown away by an artist who, previous to this record, had been unknown to this writer, and especially with a record as strong as Indian Ocean, which over the course of its 40 minutes…
Gather round close. The warm glow of the Barr Brothers’ long-awaited second LP burns like the family room fireplace. Three years in the making, Sleeping Operator is a meticulously prepared piece of art, an hour-long meditation which can transport you…