Review: Having celebrated his 50th birthday late last year, Ryan Adams has naturally been in an introspective mood. It makes sense, then, that the long-serving rock/country fusionist should offer up an album made up entirely of covers of songs by other artists that have in some way inspired him over the years. Generally gentle, with string-laden, largely acoustic arrangements, Changes features some genuinely brilliant interpretations - as well as some surprise ones. For proof, check his piano-and-strings wander through 'Panic' by the Smiths, a wonderfully heartfelt rendition of 'Don't You (Forget About Me)' by Simple Minds, a country-folk take on the Rolling Stones 'Sympathy For The Devil' and a lilting, poignant Prince cover ('When Doves Cry', which comes complete with extended harmonica solos and some genuinely lilting strings).
Review: PAX-AM is the brainchild ofJacksonville singer-songwriter and author Ryan Adams, originally dreamed up during his high school years as a DIY cassette label for home-recorded genre experiments. Though those early tapes never left his inner circle, the name stuck. It's been a sandbox for Adams' prolific output ever since, blurring lines between alt-country, punk, classic rock and tape-hiss pop, all under his naive yet total creative control. Now, in homage to his favourite ever recording artists - many of whom you will likely recognise from the track titles alone here - Adams sings atop the altar, dirging covetously over the best of the Rolling Stones, Daniel Johnston, Bon Jovi, Oasis and Bob Dylan.
Review: Hotly-tipped South London newcomers Ain't release a limited edition 7" featuring two singles produced by Theo Verney, who is one of Brighton's most celebrated guitar music producers, having worked on records by the likes of Traams, Blood Wizard and Lime Garden. As a group, Ain't cleverly weave shoegaze guitars with emo vocal cadences to create a sound that's likely to do just as well within the burgeoning new wave of American shoegaze scene as it is on the London indie scene, where they are currently among the most talked about new bands.
Review: Writers will appreciate the double play on words no doubt, and trying to figure out who wouldn't get off on the Au Pairs is part of the brain teaser here. That said, the British post punk outfit only managed to peak at 79 in the album charts with this one, so clearly back in 1982 plenty of people either felt differently to us or weren't actually listening. Rediscovering the record now confirms their ignorance. Musically, Sense & Sensuality is a far broader collection than the group's preceding work, smashing through the limitations of a genre that was in its Informed by free form jazz, theatrical cabaret, new wave and art pop, it's a wild and unarguably fun ride instrumentally speaking, while lyrics speak to personal challenges and timely political issues.
Review: Back in 1994, Reading-based band Blueboy released their first album for Sarah Records: Unisex. The LP, which is one of the great indie/jangle pop records of the 90s, stands the test of time thanks to mesmerizing songcraft. To celebrate its 30th anniversary the band got together in May 2024 to perform live at The Water Rats in London's Kings Cross. It was their first show in 25 years and thankfully someone had the foresight to record the set. Whilst not limited to songs from Unisex, the key numbers from it are on here: 'Self Portrait' is up there with anything by Pulp or The Smiths. And on 'The Joy Of Living' co-singer Keith Girdler has an air of The Only Ones' Peter Perrett about him. Plus the synth parts and cello make for stunning instrumentals and the lyrical directness is refreshing in an age of smoke and mirrors and metaphor.
Review: Welsh indie Sub Pop-signees The Bug Club return with their fourth album. Similar to their 2024 LP, On the Intricate Inner Workings of the System, they had the fortune of fellow Welsh indie star Tom Rees of Buzzard Buzzard Buzzard produce the album in Rat Trap Studios in Cardiff, Wales and birthed an incredible new record in the process. The Bug Club's appeal comes in their natural affinity with melody and born sense of humour and the single 'How To Be A Confidante' has an air of The Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah Band. Meanwhile, certain vocal parts in 'Jealous Boy' soar like Brett Anderson of Suede if he had grown up listening to Daniel Johnston. Sounding on the form of their lives, there's no chance of swatting The Bug Club's success.
Review: Cafe Tacvba's Re was released in July 1994 but remains one of the most groundbreaking albums in Latin rock. The sprawling double LP produced by Gustavo Santaolalla fused punk, norteNo, funk and traditional Mexican sounds into a daring, genre-defying opus. Tracks like 'El Baile y El Salon' and 'La Ingrata' became almost instant anthems, while deeper cuts elsewhere explored death, identity and national pride. Often compared to The White Album by The Beatles, Re delivered cohesion through diversity and elevated Mexican rock to new artistic heights. Thirty years on, it's a cult classic and cultural cornerstone and is essential listening that reshaped rock en espaNol and inspired generations who came after.
Review: While not the band's final album, there's a solid argument to be made that 1995's Worry Bomb was Carter USM's last hurrah - a top-ten set that marked the beginning of the end for the distinctive South London duo. This expanded 30th anniversary edition pairs a remastered version of the original album -which boasts typically gritty, soaring and powerful classics such as 'Young Offenders Mum', the punky 'Airplane Food/Airplane Fast Food' medley, the riotous 'Me & Mr Jones' and the introspective 'My Defeatist Attitude' - with a disc of B-sides and rarities and, most excitingly, a previously unreleased live album of their performance at the 1994 Pheonix Festival. Throw in a DVD featuring videos, Top of the Pops appearances and freshly recorded interviews, and you have an essential item for Carter fans.
I Can Never Say Goodbye (Paul Oakenfold 'Cinematic' remix)
Endsong (Orbital remix)
Drone:no Drone (Daniel Avery remix)
All I Ever Am (Meera remix)
A Fragile Thing (Ame remix)
And Nothing Is Forever (Danny Briottet & Rico Conning remix)
Warsong (Daybreakers remix)
Alone (Four Tet remix)
I Can Never Say Goodbye (Mental Overdrive remix)
And Nothing Is Forever (Cosmodelica Electric Eden remix)
A Fragile Thing (Sally C remix)
Endsong (Gregor Tresher remix)
Warsong (Omid 16B remix)
Drone:no Drone (Anja Schneider remix)
Alone (Shanti Celeste 'February Blues' remix)
All I Ever Am (Mura Masa remix)
Review: A four sided selection of remixes of the goth kingpins' widely acclaimed and long awaited latest album Songs of a Lost World. From the moment Paul Oakenfold's 'I Can Never Say Goodbye' rework opens proceedings i lush strings, half-submerged vocals, and a cinematic pace i it's clear that curation, not just contribution, has shaped the form. Orbital turn 'Endsong' into a glistening spiral of sequencers and tension, while Sally C's raw house take on 'A Fragile Thing' ups the pulse without disturbing the gloom. Smith i still unmistakably the same outsider from Crawley, West Sussex i guides things with restraint, letting the space speak louder than the noise. Four Tet's version of 'Alone' closes the first disc like a forgotten lullaby, cracked and glinting. You don't get every remix i the more textural, post-rock turns are gone i but you do get a sharp cross-section that keeps faith with both atmosphere and momentum. It's the kind of record that feels designed for the night: not to lift it, exactly, but to sink into it willingly, track by track.
I Can Never Say Goodbye (Paul Oakenfold 'Cinematic' remix)
Endsong (Orbital remix)
Drone:nodrone (Daniel Avery remix)
All I Ever Am (Meera remix)
A Fragile Thing (Ame remix)
And Nothing Is Forever (Danny Briottet & Rico Conning remix)
Warsong (Daybreakers remix)
Alone (Four Tet remix)
I Can Never Say Goodbye (Mental Overdrive remix)
And Nothing Is Forever (Cosmodelica Electric Eden remix)
A Fragile Thing (Sally C remix)
Endsong (Gregor Tresher remix)
Warsong (Omid 16B remix)
Drone:nodrone (Anja Schneider remix)
Alone (Shanti Celeste 'February Blues' remix)
All I Ever Am (Mura Masa remix)
I Can Never Say Goodbye (Craven Faults rework)
Drone:nodrone (Joycut 'Anti-Gravitational' remix)
And Nothing Is Forever (Trentemoller rework)
Warsong (Chino Moreno remix)
Alone (Ex-Easter Island Head remix)
All I Ever Am (65daysofstatic remix)
A Fragile Thing (The Twilight Sad remix)
Endsong (Mogwai remix)
Review: Robert Smith has always treated remixing less like revision, more like ritual i a habit that's followed him since his days in Crawley, West Sussex and then surfacing officially on the first Cure remix album, 1990's Mixed Up. This triple-disc release of reworkings from the band's latest LP Songs of a Lost World feels assembled with obsessive care, mapping out every possible mood lurking beneath the surface. There are club-ready flips, yes i Sally C, Danny Briottet and Gregor Tresher all push the rhythm forward i but they sit beside glacial pieces that feel more like haunted sketches than reworks. Mura Masa's take on 'All I Ever Am' is disintegrated almost beyond recognition, its vocal a flickering memory. Mogwai's 'Endsong' feels like the end of the world in slow motion. Even Chino Moreno turns in something striking i 'WarSong' morphs into a sludgy howl with heat-warped edges. But it's the sequencing that surprises: these aren't bolted together, but grouped in arcs, as though Smith were arranging the bones of an old idea into something still alive. Four Tet's version of 'Alone' is a high point i deeply textured but featherlight. Like all The Cure's output, what really matters is the feeling of being drawn somewhere, and Smith's hand never letting go.
I CAN NEVER SAY GOODBYE (Paul Oakenfold "Cinematic' remix)
ENDSONG (Orbital remix)
DRONE:NODRONE (Daniel Avery remix)
ALL I EVER AM (Meera remix)
A FRAGILE THING (AME remix)
& NOTHING IS FOREVER (Danny Briottet & Rico Conning remix)
WARSONG (Daybreakers remix)
ALONE (Four Tet remix)
I CAN NEVER SAY GOODBYE (Mental Overdrive remix)
& NOTHING IS FOREVER (Cosmodelica Electric Eden remix)
A FRAGILE THING (Sally C remix)
ENDSONG (Gregor Tresher remix)
WARSONG (Omid 16B remix)
DRONE:NODRONE (Anja Schneider remix)
ALONE (Shanti Celeste 'February Blues' remix)
ALL I EVER AM (Mura Masa remix)
Review: More than four decades after he first appeared in smudged eyeliner and a mop of jet-black hair, Robert Smith is still finding new ways to pull his music apart and stitch it back together. This new remix collection i assembled and curated by Smith himself i feels less like a victory lap and more like a restless dissection of a legacy he's still actively shaping. The collaborators here are hardly incidental: Four Tet, Orbital, Ame, Chino Moreno, Mura Masa, Trentemoller, Mogwai. It reads like a list built by someone still hungrily tuned into the present, not stuck in the past. And true to form, the results are all over the place i a feature, not a flaw. Some tracks lean into grandeur: Paul Oakenfold's take on 'I Can Never Say Goodbye' opens with all the sweeping melodrama you'd expect, while Daybreakers stretch 'WarSong' into widescreen synthwork. Elsewhere, Shanti Celeste and Ex-Easter Island Head bring a strange intimacy to 'Alone', teasing out its ache with a different kind of spaciousness. At times, you wonder if Smith enjoys seeing how far his work can be bent before it breaks. But it never does i even filtered through others' hands, his sense of tension, drama and deep emotional unease holds everything together.
Review: This is Eels' most immediately rewarding album Mark Oliver Everett, also known by his stage name E, was on miracle form: it's like some kind of divine intervention played a role in him being able to lay these stone cold bangers. Of the hits,'Souljacker (part 1)' is the most striking with its menacing, memorable riff that adds edge to any scene. Film buffs among us will know it from Wim Wenders' 'Twelve Miles To Trona' short film (2002) where it's a beautiful fit. Another highlight is the haunting 'Bus Stop Boxer', which is intense and emotionally charged in its depiction of the violence of loneliness. For 'Dog Faced Boy', it's been said that PJ Harvey collaborator John Parish wrote most of the music in Bristol and then E added lyrics and other embellishments when they were in LA together - few co-writes come out this well.
Review: A very limited number of vinyl copies have been available of this first EP (originally released 1985) by Stevenage goth legends Fields of the Nephilim over the years, so it's a welcome, bumper return as it's been extended to include a spread of companion material, including remixes and demos. Musically, it's rare to blend dark, growled esoteric vocals with bright, Smiths/Cure-esque new wave guitars, but it really works. Retaining relevance since a swathe of new, up-and-coming bands plumb the depths of post-punk and new wave scenes in creating their sounds, the Fields of the Nephilim renaissance has every chance of spreading even further.
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