It would be over the top to suggest that, at the age of 22, it was make-or-break time for Alessi Laurent-Marke. But there is no denying that Alessi’s Ark needed a third album of substance, something to erase words like…
Category: Records
Album | Haiku Salut – Tricolore
According to Haiku Salut themselves, the sound they make is “Baroque-Pop-Folktornic-Neo-Classical-Something-Or-Other”. Whatever that is, they can safely claim to be Derbyshire’s premier exponents of it – a fact demonstrated on Tricolore, which helpfully comes with a series of wonderful drawings…
Album | Hiss Golden Messenger – Haw
Trying to get a handle on Hiss Golden Messenger’s fourth album isn’t easy. Named for a river – which gave its name to a now lost Indian tribe – in North Carolina, Haw meanders through an array of different styles.…
Album | Laish – Obituaries
Obituaries are quite clearly the best part of the newspaper. Why? Because you get a short and easily digestible bit of history, written by a person with actual knowledge of the topic, and you always learn something new. It’s perhaps…
EP | Annie Dressner – East Twenties
Annie Dressner sings deftly-told stories with a comforting love of the everyday. East Twenties opens with ‘Heartbreaker’, settling old scores with nostalgia and forgiveness: “But I won’t be back again, no I won’t be back again”. ‘I Can’t Forget’ deals…
EP | Anna Lena & The Orchids – Anna Lena & The Orchids
This self-titled EP from Anna Lena & The Orchids is full of doomy beauty; they cite influences as diverse as PJ Harvey and Grizzly Bear, but ‘See It In Black’ reminds me of Radiohead, in that its creepiness shrouds an…
Album | The Milk Carton Kids – The Ash & Clay
The Milk Carton Kids are Joey Ryan and Kenneth Pattengale from suburban Los Angeles. They sing pretty and gentle close harmonies woven around their two vintage acoustic guitars with no further accompaniment, and they are very good at it. Pattengale…
Album | The Leisure Society – Alone Aboard the Ark
Their debut was bittersweet indie pop at its finest and the second record was a masterpiece of lush orchestration. Now Alone Aboard the Ark – the third album from Londoners the Leisure Society – sees the band expand their sonic repertoire with…
Album | Simone Dinnerstein & Tift Merritt – Night
Tift Merritt has been producing a rather fine brand of Americana since first releasing Bramble Rose back in 2002. Late last year she released her fifth album Travelling Alone, so we weren’t expecting her back so soon, and certainly weren’t…
Album | Son Volt – Honky Tonk
You tend to know what you’re going to get with a Son Volt album. Jay Farrar was always the straight man in Uncle Tupelo, as evidenced by how far apart he and Jeff Tweedy now are in musical terms. Son…