ALBUM REVIEW: Joachim Spieth – ‘Ousia’: tronica sound design to fall deep into
Joachim Spieth’s Ousia finesses current tronica-ambient thinking with some very deep and elemental sound design. Peer closer and you’ll find it hard not to fall in
SEE: John Carpenter – ‘The Dead Walk’; album follows for Sacred Bones in February
LEGENDARY film music writer John Carpenter still has so much to say; so many eerie atmospheres to evoke. The composer of such industry-standard soundtracks as the Halloween series, The Fog and Christine is back early in the new year with a new album for Sacred Bones; and he’s released a single to both prickle the …
NOT FORGOTTEN: Snub TV: when British telly had a decent indie strand
JANUARY 9, 1989. Perhaps not the most auspicious date in world history, though there would be more epochal happenings later in the year, of course. The day dawned with the sad news of the plane crash at Kegworth, Leicestershire, the day before, when British Midland Flight 92 attempted an emergency landing at East Midlands Airport; …
SEE: Robert Glasper feat. Denzel Curry – ‘This Changes Everything’: Grammy nominee’s future rhymes
HOT OFF the back of his recent, Grammy-nominated Fuck Yo Feelings mixtape (it was in the running for Best Progressive R&B Album), genre-spanning Houston writer and producer Robert Glasper has dropped the video for the tune “This Changes Everything”, featuring the lyrical flow of Denzel Curry. The video was filmed at Harun Cafe, in LA’s Leimert …
TRACK: 박혜진 Park Hye Jin & Nosaj Thing – ‘Clouds’: capping a fine year for Ninja
IT’S BEEN quite the year for LA’s South Korean rapper 박혜진 Park Hye Jin, who’s been dropping coolly sophisticated breaks right the way across the twelvemonth. Check her recent retake on “CALL ME” with Blood Orange; intelligent textures and an effortless shuffle, haunting piano, yearning lyrics. Then there was the How can I EP for …
TRACK: Zola Jesus beautifully refashions the Armenian folk standard, ‘Krunk’
ZOLA JESUS has gone back to her roots with a beautiful and deep take on the Armenian folk standard, “Krunk”; be enraptured by our embed herein. The track was originally released on the final Bandcamp Friday of the year, with all proceeds going towards the Armenia Fund, and its efforts to provide humanitarian aid during the …
SEE: The video for the souljazz noir of Madison McFerrin’s ‘Hindsight’
COOL-AS Brooklyn imprint Mexican Summer, which has played host to artists such as Oneohtrix Point Never and Best Coast, has been running a lovely diversion from all the nutsness this year entitled Looking Glass, being an ongoing series of digital singles drops from its fine stable; already during 2020 we’ve had selections from Ariel Pink, …
TRACKS: John Dwyer, Nick Murray, Brad Caulkins, Tom Dolas and Greg Coates – ‘Greener Pools’ and ‘City Maggot’: Osees bods steps out into jazz-psych impro
IF YOU thought a mere four albums in 2020 – the twin suns of Protean Threat and its through-the-looking-glass rerub Panther Rotate, the limited Metamorphose and the cassette-only Levitation Sessions – would maybe dry the wellspring of Osees’ John Dwyer, well boy! were you ever wrong; he’s back with a new associate project, who are …
TRACK: Kathryn Williams & Carol Ann Duffy – ‘Snow Angel’: collaborative Christmas sweetness
THE MERCURY-nominated Liverpudlian singer-songwriter who’s dear to our hearts, Kathryn Williams, has teamed up with poet and playwright Carol Ann Duffy for a two-handed seasonal single, “Snow Angel”, out now on One Little Independent Records. It’s got Kathryn’s breathy, light vocal touch, and focuses on that casting back to Christmases past that we all do …
Willie J Healey – ‘Merry Christmas’: seasonal songcraft to end the year
OXFORDSHIRE songsmith and former amateur boxing champion Willie J Healey is finishing a year of deserved musical resurgence on a seasonal note, as he drops the classicism of “Merry Christmas” for us to raid the selection box to with a wee refresher. Watch below. Willie first glided into our minds back in 2017 when, after …