Album, Single, EP and Live Reviews

Albums: Richard Youngs - Beyond The Valley of Ultrahits (Jagjaguwar)
Merely the response to a friend’s challenge to ‘make a proper pop record’, this is a collection of songs that really will stick in your head
Posted on Jul 14th, 2010
Albums: Marconi Union - A Lost Connection (Just Music)
Synthesizers are played like instruments, instead of treated as just noise making machines, and there is an element of great control to even the most fleeting sounds.
Posted on Jul 12th, 2010
Albums: Fang Island - Fang Island (Sargent House)
Sometimes it brings to mind those god-awful mobile phone advertisements where hoards of douche bags sing with each other in false unity. Hey everyone! Come on! Let’s get together! Groan.
Posted on Jul 9th, 2010
Albums: Jean Jacques Perrey and Cosmic Pocket - Froots (InVitro)
Do you have a penchant for elderly gentlemen transfixing you with transdimensional bleeps and beats? Don't you think that perhaps you should?
Posted on Jul 9th, 2010
Albums: Pernice Brothers - Goodbye, Killer (One Little Indian)
At little over 32 minutes, this is a quality rather than quantity collection
Posted on Jul 8th, 2010
Albums: Natureboy - Natureboy (Own)
Keeping the backing music suitably spartan and Sara Kermanshahi’s voice center stage is an intelligent plan but Natureboy seem to be under the impression that weaving loops and samples with acoustic folk is creative of a synthesis. It isn't, it's already an over-crowded genre on its own.
Posted on Jul 7th, 2010
Albums: Lessons In Time - Swords and Spears (Forthesakeofthesong)
As if after a particularly wild night out with a tape recorder and a toy harmonium, he'd unknowlingly woken up on the lo-fi bandwagon with no idea how he got there.
Posted on Jul 7th, 2010
Live Reviews: Memoryhouse @ The Social, London 02.07.10
After walking into the Social, albeit a tad late, the second band on the bill, How To Dress Well, was already standing behind Harley’s projected screen, opening with an a cappella. Singing to a backing track, it unfortunately appeared to be no more talented than a karaoke performance, and instead, the audience’s attention was fixated on the visuals - an intensely warming display of dreamy, antique family VHS tapes from the 70’s, or what they should look like.
Posted on Jul 6th, 2010
Albums: Cherry Ghost - Beneath This Burning Shoreline (Heavenly)
You can see why they picked up an Ivor Novello song writing gong for the way they mesh a sense of laidback grandeur with crowd-singalong tunes
Posted on Jul 6th, 2010
Albums: Mantler - Monody (Tin Angel)
Vocal chords that send shivers up your spine set to a musical backdrop that oozes a sort of sun-drenched West Coast vibe
Posted on Jul 6th, 2010
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