Category: Uncategorized
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John Butler Trio: Tin Shed Tales
This came out a couple of years ago (who says we’re not on the ball?) but we only came across it recently. We’re making you aware of its existence in case you caught JBT’s 2014 album Flesh and Blood. This double CD is an acoustic collection of his tunes played live and we should make…
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DeStijl: Something Wicked This Way Comes
The backstory to this band is (sadly) slightly more interesting than the CD. Pascal DeStijl is a musician and artist from France, who now lives in Manchester and Montpellier. He works for magazines, musicians and commercial companies, producing edgy designs. The band was formed in France in 1995 by DeStijl and John Cleary, bassist. Subsequent…
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Christmas Joy In Full Measure: Various
This was obviously planned some months ago, but we got it too late for Christmas. Bad planning, someone. Still you can buy it now for next year. The backstory is that record label Hand Of Glory records asked 12 artists for an original Christmas song. Presumably they left the remit wide open, because the songs…
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Linos Ensemble: Kalkbrenner: Sextet, Septet and Piano Fantasy
This is a charming CD, featuring the word of Friedrich Kalkbrenner (1785-1849). As with many of the CDs we like, his name may not be familiar to most music lovers; in his day he was said to be the foremost pianist in Europe and (according to Wikipedia) became enormously rich because he had a sound…
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Ratworld: Menace Beach
Someone, somewhere must have said something wise about music constantly reinventing itself and this is the latest incarnation of shoegazy, scuzzy, distorted guitar pop. Teenagers who are new to all this will find this to be exciting and moshpit friendly music; older musos who’ve heard it all before will find Menace Beach entertainingly enthusiastic and…
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Team Me: Blind As Night
This is a proper mix of styles and influences: think Arcade Fire covering Kate Bush by way of a generic American pop punk band. The first time we played it through it all just slipped by, but it’s not an album you can half-listen to. We’ve warmed to it via successive plays. Opener Ride My…
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Aled Jones: The Heart Of It All
He’s come a long way since Walking In The Air and now he’s almost a national treasure, appearing on Songs of Praise as he does. We’re not being judgemental (and could be wrong) but we’d guess a lot of his fanbase are churchgoers, probably members of the WI or Mothers’ Union, and perhaps their spouses.…
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Wu-Tang Clan: A Better Tomorrow
This has met a mixed reception: the general Press has given it good reviews, long-time fans and the specialist writers have been less generous. One long-time fan on Amazon writes: “There are no moments that make you think ‘that was a clever lyric’, that you are listening to a potential single, or even something that’s…
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