She Keeps Bees – Dig On

Jessica Larrabee and Andy LaPlant have undertaken very much the done thing in the indie world (Bon Iver anyone?) and made a record in a cabin. Perhaps Brooklyn was getting just a bit too crowded for them. Maybe they had an argument with Interpol. Who knows? Either way, the radical change in surrounding hasn’t quite been matched with a change in sound for She Keeps Bees, but nonetheless Dig On does mark somewhat of a shift from the band’s previous album. … Continue Reading

Okkervil River – I Am Very Far

Okkervil River’s sixth full-length album sees the Austin boys make an emotionally-driven break with their last pseudo-double album effort, The Stand Ins and The Stage Names. Double albums are never easy to do well and critics were often far from restrained in pointing out the failures of Okkervil’s attempt. This was perhaps accentuated by the fact that Okkervil seem to be one of those bands who struggle to shake off the shadow of an earlier critically-acclaimed L.P., namely 2005’s Black Sheep Boy. I Am Very Far is a record that learns from its predecessors’ mistakes and builds on earlier successes. … Continue Reading

Singing Adams – Everybody Friends Now

The Broken Family Band is one of those bands that occupies a happy place in the heart of many an indie fan. Unfortunately, the band felt they had reached their artistic limit last year and the outfit was put to bed. The smart money was on frontman Steven Adams being the first to return to the fray and that bet has come in with his latest outfit, Singing Adams. Adams has assembled an impressive collective of accomplished British indie musicians – Matt Ashton (Saloon and The Leaf Library) takes guitar, Michael Wood (Michaelmas) is on bass, and Melinda Bronstein (Absentee and Wet Paint) hammers away on drums. Everybody Friends Now is their delightful debut album. … Continue Reading

Craft Spells – Idle Labor

Though 2011 has featured political revolutions in North Africa, some things have not seen such change. Take the popularity of lo-fi synth-pop. Last year we had the likes of Wild Nothing and Secret Cities to dance along to, now we have Justin Vallesteros’s Craft Spells to keep the theme going. Craft Spells might have been just another bedroom DIY project that went unnoticed if it was not for Captured Tracks. The Brooklyn Label snapped up Vallestros and before you know it ‘Party Talk’ was released as a single. Idle Labor is the anticipated debut LP. … Continue Reading

The Decemberists – The King Is Dead

The Decemberists‘ The King is Dead marks a departure from recent form for the increasingly prolific Oregon quintet. Colin Meloy seems to announce this from the start with his opening line, ‘Here we come to a turning of the season’. Gone are the meta-narratives that drove 2009’s The Hazards of the Love and the album that started that particular penchant, 2006’s The Crane Wife. The concept of The King is Dead is that there is no concept. The band as such seem to be setting themselves free from having to correlate their work with what risked becoming overbearing storylines. Indeed, Meloy has said in recent interviews that he has wanted to free his mind from ‘more academic music interests’ and to play music that inspired him in his youth. What we have as a result is a tribute to Americana. … Continue Reading

The Russian Futurists – The Weight’s On The Wheels

The Russian Futurists - The Weight's On The Wheels

Just when you thought Matthew Adam Hart had thrown in the towel – just what has he been doing for five years? – The Russian Futurists come from nowhere with The Weight’s on the Wheels; the fourth studio album and one which returns to familiar territory.  In common with Hart’s past output, this album is pop-electronica drenched and rattles out twee synth melodies at speed. Like 2005’s Me, Myself & Rye, the record is also done and dusted in a little over thirty minutes. This is a good thing. Hart’s lo-fi electronica template, though admittedly effective, is at risk of getting a bit tiresome if stretched to a longer album. Russian Futurists records have never been the kind where you would want to listen to two in a row. The Weight’s on the Wheels is no exception to this, it is enjoyable for the thirty-seven minutes it lasts but does stray close to repeating itself on occasion. … Continue Reading

The Divine Comedy – Oxford, O2 Academy

Neil Hannon (photo by Andrew Seaton)

November 17, 2010

‘An evening with’ somebody suggests class; comfortable seating, a copy of the Guardian and a glass of red. I’m not seeing this as I enter the bottom floor of the 02 Academy, escaping from the rather strange Dickensian fog that seems to have returned to Oxford for the second time today. The familiar smell of B.O and the notices reading ‘NO CROWD SURFING YOU WILL BE REMOVED’ is all the class I can see. There’s a mature crowd stand around me; a family to my left talking about the X-Factor, a man behind predicting the result of the Ashes (this guy later asks Hannon his opinion; 3-2 for those who care/understand). There are some younger faces too, mostly students, as the garish leavers hoodie in front testifies.

… Continue Reading

Broken Records – Let Me Come Home

Broken Records - Let Me Come Home

Broken Records are one of those bands that attract a lot of labels. The NME described the indie rockers on the release of their first studio album, Until the Earth Begins to Part, as the ‘Scottish Arcade Fire’. Back in 2007 the band did 60 shows. All of this amounts to a concerted effort on Broken Records’ part to break into the big leagues; to stand alongside the likes of Interpol or Band of Horses. … Continue Reading

Black Mountain – Wilderness Heart

Black Mountain - Wilderness Heart

If you can answer ‘yes’ to the title of British Sea Power’s 2008 album, ‘Do You Like Rock Music?’ then you should know about Black Mountain; the vanguard of the ‘Black Mountain Army’, a collective of Vancouver-based musicians and artists. Black Mountain stand out in the current Canadian crop for being unashamedly guitar-heavy; they like to rock out, and there’s not a violin in sight. One wonders what Win Butler makes of it all. … Continue Reading

The Thermals – Personal Life

The Thermals - Personal Life

The Thermals have dealt with their fair share of heavy topics in their time. The kind of things thrashed out in the minds of all the greats; Hobbes, Locke, Machiavelli, Marx and Hicks – Bill Hicks that is. Yep, the discography of The Thermals is starting to look like something that could run as a soundtrack for the sets of the late Hicks as they, like him, have sceptically grappled with politics, war and religion as touchstones for their art. 2006’s The Body, The Blood, The Machine saw the Portland trio craft an image of a Christian totalitarian state that had to be escaped from; a theme that for many chimed well with the moralising of the late Bush era. But now that The Thermals find themselves in the liberal paradise that is Obama’s America they decide with their latest record, Personal Life, to write an album about that, at least theoretically, apolitical topic; love. … Continue Reading