The sometime Slowdive and Mojave 3 frontman’s prolific career continues with a simply beautiful third solo album. Recorded over one weekend in a primary school, after Halstead bribed the caretaker to let him and his band into the music room,…
Category: Records
Album | Martha Tilston – Machines of Love and Grace
Political music cannot, as Billy Bragg says, change the world, “but it can change the way you think about the world.” Martha Tilston’s new record Machines of Love and Grace finds its raison d’être – and severe limitations – in…
Album | Bhi Bhiman – Bhiman
Bhi Bhiman’s voice is distinct and powerful. In fact, his delivery is as textured and girthy as the mighty redwood trees near his home in San Francisco. Apologies for the hyperbole, but both the above sentences offer insight into Bhiman’s…
Track-by-track | Shel – Shel
From up on high in Fort Collins, Colorado come SHEL, four sisters who have taken their classical training on piano, violin, harp and mandolin and put it to use to create their own brand of folk-pop. Almost a decade of…
EP | Simone Felice – New York Times EP
After years of producing outstanding records with the Felice Brothers and The Duke & The King, Simone Felice’s debut solo album fell a little short. When it hit its highs, it was beautiful (look no further than opener Hey Bobby…
Singles Round-up | Pistols At Dawn, Grass House, MAIA, Pipers, Mt. Wolf
Pistols At Dawn – Man.Wolf.Man The centrepiece bass on this recording-project-turned-band’s latest single is so like the brooding bass line on ‘Come Together’ it’s uncanny, but its goes far beyond its bluesy sound. The track’s scuffling brush beats, jangling acoustics…
EP | Tiny Birds – Local History
Tiny Birds, tiny portions. This London quintet deal in brevity, following up their eight-song, 25-minute debut album Hymns For The Careless with this new five-track EP. While not straying too far from the folk-pop template that has got them this…
EP | Tom Odell – Songs From Another Love
Two years ago, when I worked at former digital radio station Amazing Radio, Tom Odell and his band Tom & the Tides were a staple of the airwaves with his song ‘Spider’. This was a towering choral number with serious…
Album | Knife and Fork – The Higher You Get, The Rarer The Vegetation
Knife & Fork seem most noticed for performing as a support act for PJ Harvey, which carries some kudos, as she is basically a raven queen with shock and awe in her wings (band leader Eric Drew Feldman has a…
Album | Peter Broderick – These Walls of Mine
These Walls of Mine is without doubt one of the bravest, most boldy conceived albums this year and veers about as far from the standard singer-songwriter template as it is possible for a singer-songwriter to do. It’s also a crashing…