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Singles of the Month: Withered Hand and King Creosote & Jon Hopkins

Singles of the Month: Withered Hand and King Creosote & Jon Hopkins

Django Django, The Twilight Sad and more also reviewed

3 Feb 2012

Come hither and let us imagine a world, a perfect world – a realm in which Kim Wilde is engaged in a goth-disco tryst with The Sisters of Mercy. Think about it. Harder. Got it? Congratulations, you are now playing ‘Lafaye’ (●●●●, Full Time Hobby), the…

Various Artists - World Routes: On The Road

Various Artists - World Routes: On The Road

30-track BBC Radio 3 compilation featuring Toumani Diabaté, Tito Paris and Ilham Al Madfai

(4 stars)1 Feb 2012

(Nascente) How would we hear diverse world musics without Radio 3? Thank goodness they still have the budget to travel to far-flung places to capture stunning sounds from ordinary musicians we’d never know about otherwise. Since 2000 the World Routes…

Ibrahím Maalouf - Diagnostic

Ibrahím Maalouf - Diagnostic

A groundbreaking album of brooding French-Arabic tones from trumpeter

(5 stars)1 Feb 2012

(Harmonia Mundi) The brooding French-Arabic quarter tones of Ibrahím Maalouf’s trumpet first seduced as guest on the late Lhasa de Sela’s desert island disc The Living Road. Bewitching then, Maalouf’s own debut with a brace of tremendous musicians…

Trailer Trash Tracys - Captain’s Rest, Glasgow, Sun 15 Jan 2012

Trailer Trash Tracys - Captain’s Rest, Glasgow, Sun 15 Jan 2012

Effects-laden shoegaze fog heavy on the exquisite melodrama

(3 stars)27 Jan 2012

Not, as you might have expected from the name, a clan of bad-mouthin’, whisky-swillin’ Midwestern girls battering badly-tuned guitars and trying to resurrect the lost souls of L7 or The Distillers, Trailer Trash Tracys are instead three guys and a girl…

Real Estate set for UK tour

Real Estate set for UK tour

New Jersey trio take one of the best albums of 2011 on the road

27 Jan 2012

Let England Shake may have topped most of the critics’ lists, but for many it was word-of-mouth, you have to hear this, slow-burner Days by Real Estate that became their hands down musical highlight of 2011. This much-lauded record was an Ariel Pink…

Eat, sleep and breathe: Melanie C

Eat, sleep and breathe: Melanie C

Former Spice Girl on green tea, lemon, ginger and missing spicy food

27 Jan 2012

Eat, sleep and breathe Melanie C What time is breakfast? 8am or thereabouts. Tea or coffee? Green tea. Smoking or non-smoking? NON! Sweet or savoury snacks? Savoury. What food do you miss when you tour? Spicy food – I tend to avoid…

Pulp - It/Freaks/Separations

Pulp - It/Freaks/Separations

Reissue of first three albums from 1980s originally released on Fire

(3 stars)27 Jan 2012

(Fire) Testament to the 80s’capacity to incubate provincial bands until they’re ready for megastardom, Pulp’s first three albums on Fire were a career’s worth in themselves, although hardly anyone remembers. Containing, as all three of these reissues…

Emili Sande - Our Version Of Events

Emeli Sande - Our Version Of Events

Powerful, sophisticated and smart mix of stripped down, acoustic songs

(4 stars)24 Jan 2012

(Virgin) Just imagine it, Adele and Emeli Sandé down the pub, putting the world to rights over copious pints. Men? Screw ’em. Hype? Whatever. But the main reason they’d make great gal pals is because they’ve both worked out ways to channel their…

School of Seven Bells - Ghostory

School of Seven Bells - Ghostory

Third album from New York electro-phantoms, now a duo

(3 stars)24 Jan 2012

(Full Time Hobby) Ghostory – geddit? It’s the way in which our histories are colonised by ghosts. It’s the way in which persons come to haunt our tales of yore. It’s the third album from New York electro-phantoms SVIIB. At best, it is euphoric – all…

Die Hard - Die Hard

Die Hard - Die Hard

Glasgow outfit's eponymous debut of magnificently off-kilter, avant pop tales

(4 stars)23 Jan 2012

(Halleluwah Hits) If this Glasgow outfit had named themselves after any other Bruce Willis film we’d have issues, but as it is we’re rather partial to a bit of John McClane action so we’re giving Die Hard a go. Stick their eponymous debut on and…

The Ting Tings - Sounds From Nowheresville

The Ting Tings - Sounds From Nowheresville

Second album a mixed bag containing glimpses of what makes them fun

(3 stars)23 Jan 2012

(Columbia) Pity the poor Ting Tings. After selling millions of records, the Mancunian electro-pop duo got stressed, scrapped a whole album and hid from their record label. Allegedly. You can see why the pair might worry about following We Started…

Rodrigo y Gabriela - Area 52

Rodrigo y Gabriela - Area 52

Orchestral backing and lots of special guests leads to a fun if over-wrought latin-funk-rock record

(3 stars)6 Jan 2012

(Rubyworks) For their fifth studio album the Mexican acoustic rock duo have teamed up with 13-piece orchestra C.U.B.A. to rework nine previous compositions. The radically increased personnel (which is also augmented by several guests including Cuban…

Baobab-Gateway – Strings That Sing

Baobab-Gateway – Strings That Sing

Accomplished Scottish-African musicians with healthy, multicultural roots

(3 stars)6 Jan 2012

(Brechin All) Baobab-Gateway’s name pinpoints the West African influences found in their original sound. The international pedigree and multi-ethnicity of these experienced Scottish based musicians (Salsa Celtica, Bhundu Boys, Waa Sylla) is a…

RM Hubbert – Thirteen Lost & Found

RM Hubbert – Thirteen Lost & Found

Beautiful collaborative effort from the percussive guitarist

(4 stars)5 Jan 2012

(Chemikal Underground) Last year’s solo debut, First and Last, saw Glaswegian guitarist RM Hubbert communicate all manner of emotions and stories through his own beautifully lush and percussive playing style. On this second album, Hubbert (who…

First Aid Kit – The Lion’s Roar

First Aid Kit – The Lion’s Roar

Heartfelt ode to Americana from the Swedish siblings

(4 stars)5 Jan 2012

(Wichita) On the surface, First Aid Kit’s obsession with Americana looks a little odd, given that they’re Swedish sisters barely out of their teens. But the pair’s homage is steeped in knowledge, and this second album sounds like it could’ve been…

The Lemonheads - Laughing All the Way to the Cleaners: The Best Of

The Lemonheads - Laughing All the Way to the Cleaners: The Best Of

Expansive look at Evan Dando and co's back catalogue

(4 stars)5 Jan 2012

(Rhino) Evan Dando is still going strong as the lone remaining member of The Lemonheads, although his days as a mainstream slacker rock heartthrob are long behind him. As this two-CD, 47-track collection demonstrates, though – perhaps too extensively…

Single of the month: Trailer Trash Tracys ‘Candy Girl / Strangling Good Guys’

Single of the month: Trailer Trash Tracys ‘Candy Girl / Strangling Good Guys’

Florence and the Machine, Arctic Monkeys and more also reviewed

5 Jan 2012

Music snobs love to flame Florence and the Machine these days. But as ‘No Light No Light’ (Island) ●●●● proves, Welch does epic, pagan pop pretty much perfectly. Her only crime is that lots of people now like it. They’d no doubt sneer at the recent…

Mull Historical Society - City Awakenings

Mull Historical Society - City Awakenings

Varied collection of often backwards-looking eccentricities

(3 stars)5 Jan 2012

(Xtra Mile Recordings) A decade after the Mull Historical Society debut Loss, Colin MacIntyre marks the event with another gentle, curious and occasionally awkward platter, as they called them back in the early 00s. In some ways, MHS are becoming…

Trailer Trash Tracys - Ester

Trailer Trash Tracys - Ester

Dreamily insubstantial album that's very, very Lynch

(2 stars)5 Jan 2012

(Double Six) Rightly or wrongly, a lot of bands find themselves being likened to the soundtrack of a David Lynch film. In the case of Trailer Trash Tracys’ debut the comparison is, in fact, justified. Mixing dark and disturbing soundscapes…

Dan Sartain – Too Tough To Live

Dan Sartain – Too Tough To Live

Old School punk album from the raw rock'n'roller

(4 stars)5 Jan 2012

(One Little Indian) The handsome Alabama rocker’s throwback blues and rockabilly sound has always been fuelled by a raw power reminiscent of punk. For his sixth album, the greasy-quiffed one has embraced the punk rock style as well as its spirit with…

Chris Isaak - Beyond the Sun

Chris Isaak - Beyond the Sun

Listenable but redundant take on some of Sun Records' finest

(3 stars)5 Jan 2012

(Vanguard Records/Rhino) During its 1950s heyday, Sun Records churned out standards by the bucketload from the likes of Elvis, Cash and Orbison. During the recording of Beyond the Sun, David Lynch’s favourite bequiffed rockabilly star was presumably…

François and the Atlas Mountains - E Volo Love

François and the Atlas Mountains - E Volo Love

Breezy, summery pop from the former Fencer

(4 stars)5 Jan 2012

(Domino) Graduating, as James Yorkston and King Creosote did before him, from Fence to Domino, La Rochelle’s François Marry has produced an album here that’s worthy of the increased exposure. A set of breezy summertime pop songs which seem strangely…

Weather Report - Live In Cologne 1983

Weather Report - Live In Cologne 1983

Decent but inessential instalment of the legendary jazz troupe's back catalogue

(3 stars)5 Jan 2012

(Art of Groove / Birdjam) This is the third in a previously unreleased sequence of very well recorded concerts featuring the band in Germany, and arguably the least essential, if only because the later phase of the band’s history was generally less…

Enrico Rava - Tribe

Enrico Rava - Tribe

Great collaboration between Italians Rava, Gianluca Petrella, Giovanni Guidi and Giacomo Ancillotto

(4 stars)5 Jan 2012

(ECM) The great Italian trumpet master and trombonist Gianluca Petrella are a well-proven combination, and are joined here by a new rhythm section for Rava’s regular group, led by the excellent Giovanni Guidi on piano, and augmented on three tunes by…

Kelly Rowland - Here I Am

Kelly Rowland - Here I Am

Sounding like a hastily assembled attempt to cash in on X Factor fame

(2 stars)7 Dec 2011

(Island) Released in the US in July, Kelly Rowland’s latest album Here I Am has hit the shores of the UK, presumably in a not-in-any-way cynical attempt to cash in on her X Factor fame. Frankly most of it sounds like it has been hastily assembled in…

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