If I told you that this album is recorded by a 26 year old male from Glasgow, you probably wouldn’t believe me. That’s because – putting Chris Duncan’s geographical origins to one side for a moment – ‘Architect’ sounds like it might have been recorded at some point during the sixties. It’s so far away […]
Judith Owen describes her latest album, her 10th studio release, as “a love letter to Laurel Canyon”. In the late 1960s and early ‘70s, Laurel Canyon in Los Angeles was home to several members of the Californian rock music community. Joni Mitchell lived there and David Crosby, Stephen Stills and Graham Nash first met in […]
Dave Pen and Mike Bird formed BirdPen while sharing a flat in their hometown of Southampton. Self-releasing a handful of well-received EPs, the duo went on to release their debut Album On/Off/Safety/Danger in 2009. Evolving and honing their sound, new album In The Company Of Imaginary Friends, their third, harnesses subtle melodies to evoke widescreen […]
Duo Inga Calstrom and Leck Fischer were discovered by producer Mike Mason in a club in the small Swedish town of Sveg. Unimpressed by the entertainment on offer, Mason was on his way out. “A monstrous bass line rabbit punched me in the back of the head and a voice made me weak at the […]
Woozy Summer days. The French TV version of Robinson Crusoe. Sky Ray ice lollies. If these things could have a sound, it would be the sound of Sarah Cracknell’s new album. An album that the words “pastoral” and “sun-kissed” were made for. Sarah Cracknell is, of course, the singer with Saint Etienne; a band that […]
Back in November 2013 I reviewed Bird Radio’s first outing “The Boy and The Audience” and said ” Bird Radio is like a demented Pied Piper cum Cat Weasel character for the Ableton Live generation – fail to listen at your peril!” and he’s just released is his Oh, Happy England album. Oh, Happy England […]
Known as the French Elvis, Johnny Hallyday is a bit of an iconic figure here in France and he still manages to draw huge audiences. Eighty or nine years ago he headlined the Vieilles Charrues festival a few minutes up the road from where we live and folk travelled from all over the country to […]
The support act for Bryan Ferry’s current tour is Welsh singer-songwriter Judith Owen who describes her new album, Ebb & Flow, as “a love letter to Laurel Canyon”. Earlier in the day while I was on the phone to my friend Terry, arranging to meet up for the concert, he checked out Judith’s website and […]
Since forming in 1983, Ozric Tentacles have released almost 30 albums of psychedelic, space rock goodness. Technicians of the Sacred, their first double album since 1990’s classic Erpland, delivers dubby bass, trippy electronic grooves and extended Steve Hillage-influenced guitar explorations over the course of 11 tracks. Ethnic instruments are marinated with guitars, synths, bass and […]
Recent output from 4AD continues to amaze me. One minute you think you’ve pretty much nailed the type of musical output which 4AD produces – and then comes along ‘Platform’ by Holly Herndon, like a kid who comes running into the room, kicking over everybody else’s creations and then leaves through a different exit, completely […]
Panamanian (now resident in Minneapolis,, USA) José James attended The New School for Jazz and Contemporary Music. In 2008, he debuted with his first album, The Dreamer, on the Brownswood label with Blackmagic following in 2010. 2010’s For All We Know came out on the Impulse! label and became the winner of both the Edison Award[ and L’Académie du Jazz Grand […]
Thore Pfeiffer is a young German producer who first came up on my radar on Kompakt’s excellent Pop Ambient album we reviewed back in October of last year. This is the second artist album to come from the Pop Ambient compilation series that is so carefully curated by label head honcho Wolfgang Voigt.
Tejada is a 41 year old producer and Dj based in LA who joined the Kompakt imprint in 2011 with Signs Under Test following his previous album The Predicting Machine and a load of 12 inchers. This is very much in the bleep and beats techno category with Tejada working the machines at his disposal […]
Simon Lomax is predominantly known as a producer of music for film and television, but his self released A Glimmer Of Memory sits firmly in the ambient and atmospheric category. The six tracks on this album are sparse, with pads ebbing and flowing to produce an album that is quite beautiful in its textural quality […]
Drummers have a hard time of it. You’ve all heard the jokes: How do you know when a drummer is at the door? The knocking speeds up. Or alternatively: How do you know when a drummer is at the door? He doesn’t know when to come in. It’s fair to say that, generally speaking, solo […]
You know, whatever your thoughts of Björk, what you really can’t knock is the quality of her recordings. As the first track on ‘Vulnicura’, Björk’s ninth solo album draws to its close, I really can’t help feeling that it sounds – well – fantastic. The string arrangements are just sublime. In fact, there are several […]