Pile are a rock band. They make rock music. Think Pixies or Polvo or Fugazi. Their last album was a winning combination of off-kilter rhythms, unique, unsettling quiets, and weird, wiry louds. But Pile began life as the solo project of singer-songwriter Rick Maguire. So, when the pandemic locked him and his band members in different places last year, it […]
Read moreTayne’s debut album was like a poorly thought-out mixtape. It was full of great bits and pieces, and packed with exciting potential, but it was a clashing stylistic smorgasbord. Thankfully, the band (led by the do-it-all Matthew Sutton) have streamlined their approach for this new EP, and ‘Coherent’ thoroughly lives up to its name. Sutton still has a varied taste, […]
Read moreJess Webberley is going places. Maybe even to the stars. Because, as Graywave, they have single-handedly conjured up an EP of cosmic dreampop that’s both strikingly immediate and exploding with potential. There were hints of such quality on a handful of singles released since the project began in 2019, but from the very first drum beat here it feels like […]
Read moreA migration is a great journey. A migration is driven by instinct, by something you can feel in your heart just as much as in your head. A migration is something slow but undeniably steady, perhaps even unstoppable. There could hardly be a more fitting title for Bossk’s second record. For a band that are the polar opposite of prolific […]
Read moreSour Widows shouldn’t even be here today. Following the release of the Californian trio’s excellent debut, they should’ve been touring, playing festivals, maybe taking over the world. Like so many things, the band’s plans were permanently altered by the pandemic. Instead of moping though, they’ve taken the opportunity to produce more music. And, while there’s more space, and more subtlety […]
Read moreWith the secret out- that this side project from erstwhile members of Set and Setting and Woe isn’t destined to possess their same sonic intensity- Timelost lean even further away from the heavy on their second record. They still suit their self-described grungegaze tag, but here ever bigger beams of light break through the clouds. ‘Better Than Bedbugs’ is bolder […]
Read moreIt had been so long. Ok, so nobody is calling Justin Broadrick a slacker. There is pioneering industrial, jarring post-punk, dense metal, council estate electronics, and time as a member of Napalm Death on his resumé, and he’s pretty much released something new every year since 1984. And he hadn’t even neglected Jesu really. Fresh mixes of old records keep […]
Read moreConsidering how Marc Richter has excelled at producing some of the most supernatural, least manmade-sounding music of the last 20 years, it was surprising, perhaps even mildly disappointing, to learn that this, his latest venture under the Black to Comm moniker, would be an exploration of the human voice. Sure, Richter has conjured up some ethereal wails before, but what […]
Read moreQuite something, this. Each of the four tracks on ‘Cameo Blue Estate’ sounds better than the one before it. And that’s not because French four-piece Mascara start off on the wrong foot or anything. Opener ‘Concrete/Surface’ goes from a chunky, swirling riff to satisfying alt rock stomp with ease, and if it loses some momentum when the distorted guitars drop […]
Read moreStrangelight aren’t technically a new band. Oh sure, ‘Adult Themes’ is the Californian quartet’s debut album, but some of these songs were written over 15 years ago. Back then, Transistor Transistor frontman Nat Coghlan, and Julia Lancer, drummer of The New Trust, met on tour, made a connection and cut some demos. Now, along with erstwhile members of Swingin Utters […]
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