Music
Track: James anticipate new album with release of the anthemic and transcendent ‘Beautiful Beaches’:
The legendary James have already wet our appetites for their forthcoming sixteenth album ‘All The Colours Of You’ with the release earlier this year of the title track single reviewed here at Backseat Mafia. Hot on the heels of this is another classic James track, ‘Beautiful Beaches’. Written on reflection of the destructive California wildfires, …
EP: Brenso – Demo EP
Brenso (from Bologna’s slang BREve + inteNSO — Short + Heavy) formed in Bologna in 2019. The band defines its music as post-covid, over-the-counter rock, influenced by the many sounds and experiences of its members: from Grunge to Desert rock, through punk, hard rock and 1970s psychedelia. The Demo-EP ‘Brenso’ was recorded in a one-day …
Album Review: Sleeps Society- While She Sleeps
Sheffield metalcore mob While She Sleeps take on the music industry on their fifth record, entitled Sleeps Society. The group tackle societal issues and mental health battles as well as providing empowering messages of self-motivation backed by heaving slabs of metallic riffing. WSS have always felt like a rougher, harsher, more punk alternative to the …
Track: Befell – Ticks
Pennsylvania based Befell are set to release their debut EP ‘Solitude’ this coming May. In preparation the band are sharing the single ‘Ticks’. Befell explain the record and the single in their own words: “Despite the overall dark melodies that sound almost in the black metal area in some parts, but overall the aggression and buildups to explosive parts …
News: Enslaved Postpone 2021 Tour And Announce Release Of ‘Cinematic Tour 2020’ Live Albums And DVDS
Enslaved have launched into their 30th year with thunder and flames. With their Utgard European Tour now taking place in spring 2022, with support coming from Intronaut, Obsidian Kingdom and Crown, the band have announced four new live albums/DVDs. Due 25th June, the audio and visuals for these releases have been taken from their revered Cinematic Tour 2020, with physical pre-orders launching today. Ivar …
Track: E.R. Jurken – ‘John Doe’: a single drop of melodic harrow ahead of Friday’s album
E.R. JURKEN is a singer-songwriter with a deeply moving, beautiful and fragile take on psych-pop with a 1968 Anglophile twist and a Neutral Milk Hotel twirl to his aesthetic, for whom Drag City have initiated a whole new boutique imprint, Country Thyme; you just know they know when they’re on to a good thing. E.R. …
Track: 1000 Robota – ‘ENDE’: German post-hardcore trio reconvene after a decade away
1000 ROBOTA, the trio of Sebastian Muxfeldt, Jonas Hinnerkort and Anton Spielmann, got together while they were still at school in northern Germany and released their debut album of stern post-hardcore, Du Nicht, Er Nicht, Sie Nicht, for Tapete in 2008. A second long player, Ufo, came out two years later, and then; nothing. Nothing, …
Album review: E.R. Jurken – ‘I Stand Corrected’: a psych-folk debut full of catharsis and melody
E.R. Jurken’s first full missive into the world reveals quite the saddest tale at an angle, never telling, always hinting. It also shows an absolute grasp of songcraft, of melody, and an abiding love of British psych-pop and later American geniuses such as Neutral Milk Hotel and Elliott Smith
EP Review: WA’s Pretty Uglys unleash ‘Party Friends’ – a blistering set of very attractive post punk anthems, executed with sneers, attitude and indelible pose.
Blasting off with ‘Emergency Room’, Western Australian band Pretty Uglys‘ new EP ‘Party Friends’ is a pulsating and vibrant set of magnificent, sneering and imposing tracks. Pure guitar-driven riffs over a thundering rhythm section and with vocals so loaded with attitude you can almost see the arched eyebrows and sneer. It is gratifyingly cathartic and …
Album Review: Electro Indie beauty from R Zak ‘s ‘Dialetcs’
Review : 9/ 10 There’s a certain folkloric quality that’s embedded in your mind, as the music shifts from the nuanced beauty to the darker , more solemn places in between. Portland based singer -songwriter R Zak ‘s album ‘Dialects’ is truly a kind of extended passage of discovery, gentle at times then suddenly haunting …