Category: Uncategorized
-
Jess Morgan: Edison Gloriette
Morgan is a singer-songwriter who has crowd-funded her previous albums, though this is on Norwegian record label Drabant Music. She creates rootsy folk / country / Americana music that’s beautifully simple. Opener The Longest Arm has harmonica and prompts Neil Young comparisons with its downbeat harmonica/acoustic guitar sound. It’s hard to pick other comparisons but…
-
New Order: Singles
Everyone else is going to praise this, so for the sake of cussedness we’re going to dissent. You can never tell which bands are going to live for ever and which will disappear. When bands are new, it’s hard to pick the stayers, like that U2 lot, who flogged Fire round for ages and looked…
-
The Ramona Flowers: Part Time Spies
This album is an odd mix of cool electronic dance and 80s synth pop: one minute it sounds like a tune from Rob da Bank on the radio (or think Delphic), the next a Duran Duran B side. Opener Dirty World is not bad, despite having an intro that melds Kim Wilde’s Kids in America…
-
Mutter Slater Band: The Champ
Mike “Mutter” Slater was front man and flute player for 70s cult band Stackridge, produced by George Martin and signed by Elton John. They played for The Old Grey Whistle Test and John Peel, but their story resembles a Ripping Yarn script for a spoof 70s rock band. Stackridge Lemon was formed from the remains…
-
Philip Henderson: From The Old World To The New World
You could almost class this is a pop album — there’s an osmotic connection between ambient pop and classical music and this excellent CD is most definitely the pop side in places. Henderson wrote the music for shows such as The Far Pavilions and this awareness of what the masses wants infuses this easy-on-the-ear classical…
-
Shakin’ Stevens: Echoes Of Our Times
The Brexit vote, the death of Elvis, John Major/Edwina Currie — some events are so unexpected that they change your world view. Right up there with them is this is new album from Shakin’ Stevens. It’s very, very good. In a proper, serious rock, sounds-a-bit-like-the-Beatles way. It’s a collection of strong songs with a blues/…
-
Area 11: Modern Synthesis
Opener Override (C) promises Enter Shakiri style dance/rock/metal, but with more neck twiddling on the guitar. But The Contract is more pop punk than anything while Watchmaker suggests Muse-like ambitions, with a synth opening, though it’s a pop take on Muse, Area 11 not quite having the heft to do a full muse. Versus goes…
-
Masaaki Suzuki: Stravinsky, Pulcinella Suite / Apollon Musagète / Concerto for Strings
Rather like the other classical CDs this week, we suspect that because we like this, purists may well have something to harp on about. Suzuki is an expert on Bach — he is recording the complete choral works of Bach, as well as Bach’s concertos, orchestral suites, and solo works for harpsichord and organ —…
-
The Handsome Family: Unseen
Based on a series of complex algorithms, this is the second best album* we have received to review in the <mumble mumble> years we’ve been doing this reviewing game. That doesn’t mean it’s got the best tunes or the best singing or the wildest guitar solos: it’s a combination of meticulous song-writing, musicianship, production and…
Review Corner 