album review
Album Review: Land Trance & Aging produce utter cinematic-sonic immersion with ‘Embassy Nocturnes’
Very rarely does a record manage to capture a spectrum of cinematic detail in it’s profoundly illustrative composition, spinning yarns across it’s runtime like neighbouring scenes. However – with far greater ambition and grace than any crassly conceived concept album – the new collaborative project between Land Trance and Aging does just that, envisioning a …
Album Review: Aliens – 30lbs of Air
Aliens have dodged a bullet with 30lbs of Air – a “concept album” that captures the essence of war while escaping the clichés. The term “concept album” tends to send a shiver down my spine. This turned into a shudder when I heard that the concept of this particular album was the ordinary men and …
Album Review: Smote – Drommon
Newcastle has been a veritable hub for a wide spectrum of psych and noise, from the raw trio of Blóm to the relentless clamour of Pigs x7; the same city’s Smote offers a different, but similarly singular, vision of psych. Drommon comprises the previously released titular, two-parter, bookending new material ‘Hauberk’ and ‘Poleyn’; a more …
Album review: The Pro-Teens – ‘I Flip My Life Every Time I Fly’: low-key cinematic funk immaculacy from mysterious Melbourne collective
THE PRO-TEENS – or, to give them all due full credit, Snooch Dood and the Pro-Teens, and we wouldn’t want to be putting Snooch’s nose out of joint quite this early in our relationship, who knows what vengeful redress he might seek – describe themselves as being “a collection of professional teenagers from the Darebin …
Album Review: GOAT – Headsoup
All manner of questions abounded throughout the long absence of psych collective Goat, since the 2017 release of their third album Requiem. Would the great Gods of psych-dom return, especially considering the fullness and finality of this last record – and the ambiguous, ominous meanings given off by the title? Would a goat – perhaps …
Album Review: Otherish cast a glittering, intrigue-filled environment with their self-titled debut
Featuring a blend of Belfast and Bristol musical genes – primarily from four multi-instrumentalist’s – the first full statement from Otherish splices Pink Floyd, Radiohead, and folk elements to nourish their fermenting threads of philosophy, humanity, and fallibility. The band carry deliver these themes with deserving musical diversity and grandiosity; along with their rippling drums …
Album Review: Infinity Broke swagger out on to the streets with ‘Your Dream My Jail’: a brilliant and visceral coating of indulgent excess and cathartic chaos – plus tour news.
Infinity Broke are a band that does not go gently into the night: their new album ‘Your Dream My Jail’ is an excoriating, driven, thunderous slice of post-punk cake that is angular, studded and visceral. Guitars wail and caterwaul, drums crash like waves on an exposed coast and singer Jamie Hutchings (formerly of nineties indie …
Album review: Dusted – ‘III’: A cross-country relocation blows the dust off an intimate, autumnal beauty
THERE’S a very strong argument to be made, in the sphere of the more introverted singer-songwriter and that of Americana, that the best music is the living music, the real music, captured in the moment, not fussed with in any way – far removed from the sheen and multi-tracking and the endless possibility of the …
Album Review: Tunnel Traffic’s elegiac ‘Take my Power’ is a shimmering and immersive work of art
Adam Hachey is a brilliant and underappreciated song writer whose talent has been lauded by Backseat Mafia since almost our inception when he emerged with the band Meesh, creating a genre of what he termed anti-folk. His songwriting is in fact folkish, but with an indie pop sensibility and a more layered and rich approach. …
Album Review: Sunshine Coast’s Swimsuit Issue reveal their true magnificence with their sterling debut ‘Burn for the Buzz’
It was only back in March that I was first introduced to Swimsuit Issue through their atomic blast of a debut single ‘Addict’. However impressive this debut was, it didn’t portend the incredible sonic versatility this band has within its canon. Indeed, there was much more to come over a series of singles that have …