• Albums of the Year- 2025

    Music is amazing. Music is powerful, beautiful, myriad, a marvel, my favourite thing, and, genuinely, life-saving. And there’s so much of it, so much music to fall in love with, […]

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  • MILDRED- ‘Mildred’

    While a lot of new records arrive on cue, fresh and clean, at the end of an extensive promotional campaign to an expectant and prepared public, others seem to appear […]

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  • EMPTY COUNTRY- ‘Empty Country’

    Joseph D’Agostino has been through hell. And of course that doesn’t just mean the injustice of his former band, the terrific but terribly-named Cymbals Eat Guitars, never getting the credit […]

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SEPULTURA – ‘A-Lex’

If there is another band more haunted by their past than Sepultura, then god help them. Despite the fact that frontman Derrick Green has been centre stage with the Brazilian titans for almost as long as original member Max Cavalera, despite the fact that this is Green’s fifth record at the helm, and despite the fact that none of those […]

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DEFTONES- ‘Diamond Eyes’

They say every cloud has a silver lining. And while the darkest of clouds rolled in for Deftones in 2008 when bassist Chi Cheng was involved in a car accident that keeps him in a coma today, the band’s sixth album, ‘Diamond Eyes’, is brilliantly, blindingly special. That might sound trite but it’s no joke- this thing glitters, sparkles, shines, […]

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WHALE WATCHING TOUR. Concert Hall, Reading. 25.04.2010

This is special. Seriously special. Not like a ‘great night out’ or ‘what a brilliant gig’ kind of special, more than that. Not bigger maybe, but better, definitely better. And that’s thanks to the members of the Bedroom Community, an international but decidedly down-to-earth recording collective that have somehow found their way to Reading, and the mystical magical sounds they’ve […]

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IMPENDING DOOM- ‘Serpent Servant’

These dudes weren’t messing about when they named their band. One listen to The Serpent Servant and you’ll be convinced that the end of days has come. But don’t panic; now we’ve got the perfect soundtrack. This is no devilish new noise- it’s the sort of booming, impossibly-heavy, super-intense metal that bands like The Acacia Strain and Emmure do so […]

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The Ghost Of A Thousand. West End Centre, Aldershot. 13.12.08

This shouldn’t work. Not just because of the weather (torrential rain is great at keeping gig-goers at home) or the location (far-from-rock’n’roll Aldershot), but because the bands collected here tonight sound so very different. And how- newcomers The Casino Brawl bash out distinctly American-sounding post-hardcore, Rolo Tomassi ram wonky pop into thrash weirdness, and The Ghost Of A Thousand put […]

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ARCHITECTS – ‘Hollow Crown’

Brighton bunch Architects have evolved with an assured steadiness over the last five years. Their debut bristled and roared but owed a huge debt to legends like Botch and The Dillinger Escape Plan, their second record ‘Ruin’ dropped some of the technicality for raw power and the feral bellow of new frontman Sam Carter, and now ‘Hollow Crown’ has combined […]

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