Reviews

It’s been 15 years since Maxinquaye shook up the world and made “Bristol scene” and “trip-hop” oft-repeated phrases. Every few years Adrian Thawes, better known as Tricky, re-emerges in the hope of having the same impact. All swirly menace and admonition, “Ghetto Stars” echoes his peak period. Like everything on Mixed Race, it could be […]

Black Country Communion may not be a well known “super-group”, but the moment you see the line-up it becomes apparent. Glenn Hughes (formerly of Black Sabbath), Derek Sherinian (Dream Theater), Jason Bonham (son of John Bonham) and Joe Bonamassa make up the band. BCC’s eponymously titled debut album is not typical commercial fare, challenging listeners […]

For all the brouhaha about the subjects of Taylor Swift’s new album—John Mayer! Joe Jonas (still)! Kanye West!—not enough has been made of what a spectacular package of pop hooks Speak Now is. The first single, “Mine,” is a classic Swift love story, so catchy you may miss the deftness of a line like “You […]

Glasgow’s The Vaselines might have been forgotten had Kurt Cobain not been their biggest fan. Nirvana covered three of their songs: “Jesus Don’t Want Me for a Sunbeam,” “Son of a Gun” and “Molly’s Lips.” Eugene Kelly and Frances McKee have reunited for an album for the first time in 20 years. A listen makes […]

The man who can break a thousand hearts with one warble, Antony Hegarty, examines the dark side of nature in his usual morose-cabaret style. At times he follows the path too closely: Hegarty’s most memorable songs are the ones where he shifts the melodrama out of the darkness. He follows Björk’s lead on “Fletta,” a […]

Producer Wrongtom takes tracks from Roots Manuva’s four proper studio releases and reworks them to re-imagine, perhaps re-emphasize the dub underlay of the UK MC’s material. Whole new beats are brought to bear, but sometimes it’s just a matter of making a small change to make a big difference. Tom alters the tempo for “Proper […]

The Don Killuminati this is not. This is the kind of music that’s going to make you hide in an alleyway as the car playing it drives by. One of the biggest questions raised after hearing a couple gun onomatopoeias is whether Flocka’s empowering the ignorant or relieving people under a lot of stress. The […]

With a stripped-down aesthetic, Lisbon presents a slightly cleaner, less distorted sound than earlier records, filled with laments and an ode to Lisbon, where the band spent some time being motivated to work on the record. Strong drum rhythms pervade the album, with subtle brass harmonies kicking in on some songs. Opening track “Juveniles” has […]

If Ryan Bingham’s Academy Award in any way went to this young man’s head (his song “The Weary Kind” won Best Original Song Oscar for the film Crazy Heart), it doesn’t show. There is no catering to the masses or cashing in at all on his third album. Bingham is still singing about hard-living, wayward […]

Consider the colour of this album’s cover and liner for a clue to the music within. Packaged in an aquamarine that’s at once cool and warm, these two currents meet and flow together in D’Arcy’s vocals, the instrumentation and arrangements. Again working with John McEntire, who produced and engineered the recording, and getting the whole […]

When bandleaders go solo, the results are invariably similar, even when the leaders insist it’s different (Matthew Good, Dave Matthews, Gwen Stefani). But so what, when they’re packaged in a tacklebox full of hooks? Flowers treads familiar Killers ground here, to the point where the chorus for “Jilted Lovers and Broken Hearts” is a reshash […]

When you’re as flamboyant and bizarre as Of Montreal’s Kevin Barnes, sometimes the risks do pay off. Kanye’s producer lifts up the production values—this is a slickly produced collage of r&b, ’80s pop, disco, dance and glam-funk, elevated by Barnes’ lyrics, which run from confessional poetic rants to high-register squeals. Janelle Monáe joins Barnes for […]