Album Reviews
Album Review: Bellbird – ‘The Call’: From free jazz to post rock, a quartet that find their own trajectory.
Constellation Records have long provided a portal for the extraordinary experimental music which orbits around their Montreal home base, but here we have them opening the apertures and focusing in on a gem from the city’s jazz/improv scene. Bellbirdare a quartet of players who gelled jamming in Covid times, formalised things at the 2021 Ottawa …
Album Review: Christo Graham – ‘Good Covers’: An authentic singer-songwriter gem that shouldn’t get forgotten.
Besides being an actor and graphic designer Christo Graham is one of those heart and soul singer/songwriters. You can’t imagine a day when there’s not a tune or lyrical snippet going around in his head. There’s something spontaneous and vibrant about his music, built from a process of lo-fi home recording where Graham plays most …
Album Review: Zone Null – ‘Phase 1’: Taking the bass to unknown places- epic, long form electronic improv from the Berlin-based duo.
Pounding into January with the irrepressible Ruptured Records and a debut album, ‘Phase 1’ from a new collaborative project Zone Null, featuring bassist Tony Elieh and electronic composer/performer Burkhard Beins. Elieh has long has been a pivotal contributor to the Beirut alt rock scene having been a member of the seminal noughties band Scrambled Eggs, …
Album Review: It’s all ‘In The Manifesto’ – Sacred Cowboys unveil a collection of attitude-laden gems that burn brightly.
Sacred Cowboys have been – and still are – a legendary bunch of misfits together in various forms since 1982, but always with Garry Gray as a mainstay at the reins along with Mark Ferrie. They essentially began in 1982 as a supergroup with Gray from seminal new wave outfit Negatives and Ferrie from the Models. …
album review: megadeth, megadeth
Megadeth’s latest album arrives carrying a sense of gravity that’s impossible to ignore. Decades into a career defined by volatility, reinvention, and sheer stubborn survival, the band sounds acutely aware of its own history. Whether or not this record ultimately stands as a final statement, it feels deliberate and self-conscious in a way few Megadeth …
Album Review: Mi3RAJ – ‘Callings Of The Owed’: Powerful and poetic electronic fusion from Cairo’s rising underground scene.
A new project from their long lasting musical connection, poet/vocalist Mohamed Tarek Moussa and producer/multi-instrumentalist Abdelrahman Shaat (aka Mi3raj) emerge with a new album, the intense ‘Callings Of The Owed’ نداءات الموعودين. It’s the pair’s debut for Ruptured Records, that perennial portal which sources the most vital sounds from the Swana region for experimental music …
Album Review: KEELEY – Girl On The Edge Of The World
Anglo-Irish artist KEELEY returns with her explosive third album, Girl On The Edge Of The World. Jangly and atmospheric, veering between grunge-edged intensity and ethereal, fuzz-soaked pop, the album occupies familiar dream-pop-meets-rock terrain while pushing further into richer, stranger, and more immersive territory than her previous releases. Drawing comparisons as readily to Cocteau Twins and …
Album Review: ‘I’m In My Brain Again’ – stunning debut from Slowcoaching reveals a luscious dreamscape and soaring melodies.
Slowcoaching is the nom de plume of Naarm/Melbourne musician Dean Valentino, and his debut album ‘I’m In My Brain Again’ is a delicious collection of dreamy songs that seem to float in the consciousness. Born in that fertile era of COVID isolation, Valentino says of the creation of the album: I’ve always been a notoriously …
Album Review: Julianna Barwick & Mary Lattimore – ‘Tragic Magic’: A compelling, emotional electro-acoustic collaboration which haunts and hopes.
Some collaborations are just meant to be and this is one of those. Composer, vocalist and electronic musician Julianna Barwick and experimental harpist Mary Lattimore have been more than crossing paths within the ambient/neo-classical world over the years. Both moved to LA at around the same time and built a friendship from playing live shows …
ALBUM REVIEW: KID KAPICHI ‘FEARLESS NATURE’
Kid Kapichi is a band known for hard-hitting and pointed music that isn’t afraid to express a distaste for aspects of modern politics and society. Their new album, ‘Fearless Nature’, might have been expected to continue refining the forceful sound that has defined the Hastings band since their formation, but instead takes the music in …