Category: Reviews

Video | Michael P Cullen – ‘Do You Believe?’

Following in the footsteps of Leonard Cohen, Michael P Cullen is, in many ways, a poet before he is a musician. That isn’t to say that he isn’t musically inclined, or that his lingering baritone has an unpleasant quality. Rather,…

Album | Magical Beasts – When Love’s a Stranger

Magical Beasts are a rising Chicago roots band whose primary goal is to make “mostly simple folk and songwriter music set to compelling, lyrical instrumentation and interwoven vocal harmonies.” Or, so it goes on their IndieGoGo campaign page, anyway. The…

Album | Soccer Mommy- Clean

The notion of a soccer mommy conjures images of a 35-year-old woman with two kids and an SUV to ferry the kids to practice and games. Yet Sophie Allison is a 20-year-old on leave from NYU majoring in rock and…

Album | Bird City – Winnowing

For nearly two decades, singer/songwriter Jenny Mitchell has been regarded as one of the most original voices within the Canadian indie music scene, and her latest project, Bird City, is her most personal yet. As a beloved fixture of the…

Album | Olden Yolk – Olden Yolk

Admittedly, psychedelic folk isn’t considered the coolest genre in music, nowadays. That’s OK in itself, but in this case the lack of coolness reflects the way that contemporary bands have engaged with the genre; briefly, in a monolithic or static…

Album | Hovvdy – Cranberry

I know what some people are going to think while listening to Cranberry for the first time: “I already know this record”. Mind you, this will spring in the minds of people who either love or hate the album. In…

Album | Jonathan Wilson – Rare Birds

Just at the point when you think you have Jonathan Wilson pinned down he changes the game. Sometime artist, full-time producer (Father John Misty, Karen Elson, Connor Oberst), then all of a sudden he’s playing guitar and singing in Roger…

Album | Winona Wilde – Wasted Time

On her third album, the much-travelled Canadian singer/songwriter Winona Wilde continues to redefine the image of the troubadour, documenting her life and observing the world with both biting wit and heartbreaking honesty. However, what is revealed in the music tells…

Album | Louis Brennan – Dead Capital

Music and misery have long gone hand in hand. In his novel High Fidelity, Nick Hornby pairs the two in a chicken/egg ‘which came first?’ scenario. Certainly, we are moulded by the music we listen to as we grow up.…

Album | Snowpoet – Thought You Knew

When people mention “jazz” to today’s listeners, they will probably think about alternative monoliths like Kamasi Washington, or Colin Stetson. People who were young in the 90s will go as far as recalling the Detroit scene, Tortoise, Sea and Cake,…