The kids are coming up from behind.
Maryland DIY singer-songwriter Marcus Elliot Brown AKA Nourished By Time released the much-anticipated follow up to 2023’s Erotic Probiotic 2, The Passionate Ones, a unique singer-songwriter approach centred on a DIY aesthetic and a compositional style that blends the starry synth-pop of the 1980s and the vocal melodies of 90s New Jack Swing with icy … Read more
Chicago vocalist, guitarist and composer Hannah Frances followed up her breakout album in 2024 Keeper of the Shepherd, which put forward a set of eerie and baroque progressive folk tunes. With the help of Daniel Rossen of Grizzly Bear (and perhaps inspired by Rossen’s 2022 album You Belong There), Nested In Tangles expands further on … Read more
Mac Demarco further stripped his sound back on the melancholic folk-pop home recordings of Guitar, a series of lazy, relaxed meditations, reminiscent (as always) of John Lennon, barely 30 minutes in length. The shy delivery works best on the cute Shining and the solemn lament Home, where the melodies are given space to breathe. Terror, … Read more
Brixton’s Black Country, New Road – originally a Slint-type organism with a backing team of classical musicians – had shifted towards Orchestral and theatrical suites on the live album, Bush Hall, after the departure of lead vocalist and songwriter Isaac Wood. Forever Howlong signals the complete break from the band’s post-punk origins. Instead, it indulges … Read more
Cameron Winter of the New York band Geese went solo on Heavy Metal, co-produced by drummer and composer Loren Humphrey. The album presents a unique musical persona backed by a dramatic vocal quality and homespun aural choreography. The lyrical style has a stream-of-consciousness quality – absurdist, comic and often meta. Musically, the album references a … Read more