Album Reviews
ALBUM REVIEW: Junkboy – ‘Sovereign Sky’: fraternal pastoral-psych excellence finally gains a proper issue
ONCE you’ve taken a listen to Junkboy’s Sovereign Sky – out on Fretsore on September 25th – you’ll have reason to thank label boss Ian Sephton. He signed the band, at whose heart are brothers Mik and Rich Hanscomb, and released their rather lovely album from last year: the baroque acoustic wondrousness of Trains, Trees, …
ALBUM REVIEW: Huw Marc Bennett – ‘Tresilian Bay’: Welsh psychedelic Afro-jazz warmth
EMERGING from the London jazz and groove scene, South Wales producer and bassist Huw Marc Bennett is a low-key enigma whose musical vision means he won’t stay that way for long. What do we know of Huw? He’s a South Wales boy, as he evidences in the title of his debut LP, Tresilian Bay, named …
Album Review: Buddy Glass – Wow and Flutter
Buddy Glass is the nom-de-plume of Bruno Brayovic who plays in Sydney Peabody (a veritable institution). He has a colourful history – arriving as a refugee from fascist Chile with his family in 1983 and starting life in the infamous Villawood Migrant Hostel. This colourful past bleeds into his new album ‘Wow and Flutter’: a …
Album Review – Marilyn Manson – We Are Chaos
Marilyn Manson’s eleventh studio album ‘We Are Chaos’ has just been released via Loma Vista Recordings. Co-produced by Manson and GRAMMY® Award winner Shooter Jennings [Brandi Carlile, Tanya Tucker], the ten-track opus was written, recorded, and finished before a pandemic blanketed us all. “Making this record, I had to think to myself: ‘Tame your crazy, stitch your suit. And try to pretend …
EP REVIEW: The Illness – ‘Descending’/’Phrases Redacted’: alt rock gets the tronica feels on cassette
HERE at Backseat Mafia, we’re really quite fond of The Illness. No, god, not that one – not the year-destroying one; we’re talking the Transpennine band who’ve been something of an in-house Wrecking Crew for York’s Sea Records, and who finally got their name up on their own 12”, “Descending”/”Phrases Redacted” back in July. We …
EP Review: Semisonic Release Their New EP – You’re Not Alone
After 2 decades away Semisonic have returned with a five track EP entitled ‘You’re Not Alone’ via Pleasuresonic Recordings/Megaforce Records. Due September 18th, the EP was recorded on and off over the last few years at Grammy-winning singer, songwriter and producer Dan Wilson’s Los Angeles studio with his co-founding bandmates John Munson and Jacob Slichter. From the opening jangling …
ALBUM REVIEW: King of the Slums – ‘Encrypted Contemporary Narratives’: the life we live now as we may not wish to see it
MANCHESTER: that great north-west city with, in the words of an idol very much on an unfortunate downward curve these days, so much to answer for. It’s given us some of the most amazing acts and subcultures of the popular music age. But I’ll advance a theory here, if I may; there’s very much two …
Album Review: Eight Rounds Rapid – Love Your Work
We’re late to the party (literally, this album has been out a couple of weeks already) but we’re happy to commit their third album ‘Love Your Work’ to review because, well, it’s so damn good. It’s the sound of new British music, cutting edge style – referencing Sleafords, Fontaine’s, Cabbage and Idles even, but wrapping …
Album: BOB – You Can Stop That For A Start
I recall a time in the late eighties and early nineties where one could venture out to see a band and BOB were almost always the support act! One of the hardest working bands at the time (possibly only Mega City 4 hit the road more often), BOB toured everywhere on an endless crusade to …
EP: Jeremy D’Antonio – Spinnin’ Wheels
Out now is the debut solo release from former Tiny Television and San Geronimo man Jeremy D’Antonio, Spinnin’ Wheels. He’s accompanied by musicians from the Buck Owens band (and ended up playing with Merle Haggard) which, according to Jeremy, “came to fruition because of studio owner John Macy and has been in the country music …