New releases last eight weeks: Indie/Alternative

Review: Robert Pollard's output is still a marvel to behold in the annals of US indie rock. As the driving force behind Guided By Voices and a tangled labyrinth of other projects, he's released more music than any one person can surely keep up with. That said, such is the power of his songwriting, a one-off single can be as much of a gem as, for example, the recently released Crystal Nuns Cathedral or Earth Man Blues albums. If you're a fan of GBV then you should know what to expect to some extent, but that doesn't diminish the grandeur of both 'Alex Bell' and the B-side, 'Focus On The Flock'.

Review: Molchat Doma are one of the global music phenomenons of our time. The Belarusian trio first started causing a small stir among the kind of circles that actively hunt out Belarusian synth bands. That grew into widespread rumblings throughout the underground, driven by online shares as much as play on independent radio stations. Skip forward again, and the outfit can claim true viral sensation status, having conquered tastemakers and social networks across the world. Monument is their third album, and was largely written during Covid-19 quarantine in their hometown, Minsk. Again, it's an evolutionary thing. Post-punk vies for your attention next to synth pop, cold wave, New Wave and romantic electronica. Calling to mind, at various points, The Cure, Depeche Mode and Joy Division, among others, nevertheless those comparisons don't feel fair - the work here is fresher feeling and, ultimately, removed from the North Atlantic hegemony, so it should be analysed in that context.

Review: Nirvana's legacy is one of the most compelling of any 20th Century rock band. The voice(s) of a disillusioned generation weaned to sickness on processed culture, ending in tragedy, the ferociously powerful combination of music and message has understandably been long-lasting and still influences people today, but the albums-proper, and sad conclusion, usually dominate conversations about the group's work. Incesticide is proof of how much we're forgetting. Comprising demos, outtakes, cover versions, radio broadcasts, the 1990 non-album single, 'Silver', among other things, much of what's here was circulating among fans in low quality formats prior to the compilation's formal release in 1992, and goes some way to showing off the breadth and scope Nirvana were capable of. An education for the committed and unconvinced alike, grab it while you can.

Review: Contemporary indie icon St. Vincent's (Anne Erin Clark's) seventh full-length record All Born Screaming follows up 2021's The Nowhere Inn, and contrasts to that record with its intense introspective plunging of the personal depths, to find what Clark deemed her own sonic vocabulary. Arriving at a distinction she dubbed 'post-plague pop', All Born Screaming centres on a crooked and menacing sound with a reckless spirit, with lead cuts like 'Broken Man' giving raw Knife-like instrumentation and masc monarchic ironies on the lyrics, as if to suggest a significant patriarchal downfall to come. That line is said to be representative of the album's mood as a whole; "that lustre and swagger that you feel right before things go terribly wrong!"

Review: This massive anthology box set compiles all five volumes of the Stereolab Switched On series: 94 non-album tracks and sought after deep cuts by the group. Beginning with the original Switched On compilation LP from 1992, the series that ensued - though entirely comprised of deep cuts - still makes for a comprehensive jaunt through the Anglo-French auteurs' oeuvre, which never once lets up on quality. Every track here could've appeared on a full-length, so it's a testament to the band's work ethic that they simply had this much material to follow up with. Warp's comprehensive new 8xCD includes experimental highlights such as the original weirdo-chanson 'Plastic Mile', an Autechre remix of 'Refractions In The Plastic Pulse' and the stripped back 'XXXOOO', among many other gemstones.