Review Corner

Author: jerobear

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    Wylderness: Big Plans For A Blue World

    This is a nice little album for fans of dreamy indie rock and shoegaze (mostly without the volume), with elements of folk. You could turn to Swedish post-rock band Logh (pronounced Log) as a soundalike, or then again Martin John Henry, the Scottish fella who was in De Rosa but whose The Other Half Of…

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    The Black Angels: Wilderness of Mirrors

    The Black Angels play psychedelic rock that’s somewhere between stoner and space rock, with a blend of sounds. Opener Without A Trace has the echoey smack of Led Zep’s When The Levee Breaks, guitars droning solidly, the surprisingly gentle vocals out the front (a little Stone Roses) and the drums gently Bohamesque. History of the…

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    Kramies: Kramies

    If anyone tells you there’s no good music any more, point them towards this delightful and all-too-short album from Ohio songwriter Kramies (pronounced Kraim-iss). The album opens with the gloomily majestic Days Of, which has (in the words of the Press release) a nostalgic warmth, particularly in the chorus, which would warm the heart of…

  • Shakespears Sister: Hormonally Yours

    Shakespears Sister passed us by back in the day, so we listened to this with fresh ears, and it is – as one might expect if they’re bothering to re-release it 30 years on – a strong album. It doesn’t sound too dated; a cool indie pop band could put something like this out today,…

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    Death Cab for Cutie: Asphalt Meadows

    We’ve been fans of Death Cab for years – and they’re one of the loudest bands you’ll see live, despite the gentle songs – and at first play-through of this new one were a bit meh. Death Cab have a sound, they’ve gradually got poppier, and this is largely a pop album of easy-on-the-ear music.…

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    Rob Heron and The Tea Pad Orchestra: The Party’s Over

    Rob Heron and The Tea Pad Orchestra’s fifth album is a homely offering. It’s not a classic release but it might encourage you to see them live. The sound is cliched country and western, familiar to fans of Bob’s Country Bunker where the Blues Brothers were forced to play Stand By Your Man and Rawhide…

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    Camden Reeves: Blue Sounds

    This is not a classical pianist’s take on the blues but a study on the colour, from its abstractness as an electromagnetic wave to blues as a scale, a genre and a harmonic structure. Blue is clearly an inspiring colour: artist Yves Klein famously went through a blue phase, selecting blue after audiences failed to…

  • Fülöp Ránki: Béla Bartók Piano Music Vol.8 Rhapsody, Variations, For Children, Études

    The first seven volumes in Naxos’ series of Béla Bartók’s complete piano works were recorded by Jeno Jandó, one of Naxos’ longest established artists, but for this he has handed over to one of his students, Fülöp Ránki, a young Hungarian pianist; this is his Naxos debut, and he plays impressively. It’s a rich and…

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    We Are Scientists: Huffy

    We’re ashamed to admit we’ve underestimated We Are Scientists. We liked some tracks but never really got them; possibly because 2006’s debut With Love and Squalor came out at a time when there were lots of good guitar bands, notably Arctic Monkeys (and My Chemical Romance’s The Black Parade) and Razorlight, as well as decent…

  • Robin Stevens: Music for Cello and Piano

    This modern album is not so instantly accessible but despite its modern and sometimes austere sound it’s a long way from being difficult. The PR says that Stevens writes “stimulating and expressive” work influenced by everything from the music of the Romantic era to mathematics and the eclectic nature of the composer means that something…