Category: Records

Album | Benjamin Booker – Benjamin Booker

There’s something genuinely exciting about Benjamin Booker. An attitude, an edge, maybe a vulnerability too – a sense that it’s only just all holding together. You’re not going to relax much listening to his self-titled debut, worried that this incendiary…

Album | Cory Branan – The No Hit Wonder

Cory Branan is the musician’s musician, feted and adored by luminaries of the business, including the likes of Frank Turner, Chuck Ragan, and fellow rising Country star Caitlin Rose, the latter guesting on the fantastic steel-stringed ‘All the Rivers in…

Album | Cold Specks – Neuroplasticity

Cold Specks, alleged purveyor of ‘Gloom soul’ (whatever that is), return with second album Neuroplasticity, two years after debut I Predict A Graceful Explosion in 2012. It’s a punchy, powerful album, going straight in for the jugular with the opening…

EP | The Phoenix Foundation – Tom’s Lunch

Tom’s Lunch is The Phoenix Foundation’s latest follow up to 2013’s full length Fandango, and the stalwarts of the NZ music scene have delivered a tasty morsel with this five-track EP. Opening track ‘Bob Lennon John Dylan’ is frustratingly catchy,…

Album | J Mascis – Tied To A Star

We don’t cover too many Dinosaur Jr records on FFS, but the new solo record from band leader J. Mascis is a delicate and pretty affair. The guitars are inevitably gorgeous. The record at first doesn’t seem to go anywhere…

Album | Dan Michaelson and The Coastguards – Distance

Dan Michaelson’s fifth record since the break-up of previous band Absentee captures a theme of heartbreak and sinks it deep into your soul within thirty blissful minutes. Written after his divorce, this is as raw and as gripping as you…

Album | Ivan Campo – Fantastic Blue

Fresh from an appearance at this weekend’s Green Man Festival, Ivan Campo continue the celebration of their tenth year with their ninth album release Fantastic Blue. The trio – Adam Shaw (lead vocals and guitar), Ben Atha (Bass) and Will…

Album | Trampled By Turtles – Wild Animals

It’s safe to say that there is nothing like some fresh-cut bluegrass. You might as well consider Trampled by Turtles a lawnmower then because they provide nothing short of that. Lame puns aside, Wild Animals shows an incredibly different and…