In 1988, The House of Love’s debut album arrived as a fully-formed piece of pop perfection, following two years of intensive writing, rehearsing and live performances. The Gift explores those two years, as the band leapt from the Camberwell squat scene into the centre of the UK’s indie world as it went overground.
Taken from the archive of bassist Chris Groothuizen and compiled by him with chief songwriter Guy Chadwick’s full approval, this 3CD set offers unprecedented insight into the development of one of the standout bands of the late ’80s British music scene. Featuring previously unheard rehearsal recordings and live shows captured in London and Paris, all of which has been carefully restored and remastered using…
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…This release serves as a direct alternative to the controversial 
@ (pronounced “at”) is the art-folk project of Philadelphia-based multi-instrumentalist songwriters Victoria Rose and Stone Filipczak. The band release their new album 
What hits first about Manchester Orchestra’s debut, 
With a gap of 16 years between their first two records, it seems like The Avalanches have almost become prolific these days. Now expanded to a trio (new member Andy Szekeres joined Robbie Chater and Tony Di Blasi earlier this year), the group’s fourth album, No Bad Memories, follows a mere six years after 
The sound of a band expanding their universe – growing bigger and bolder with each record – never loses its thrill. Upon their arrival in 2017, in an era when guitar music was regularly declared to be in terminal decline, 
Matador Records continue its reissue series documenting key catalog titles by the iconic Texas band, The Butthole Surfers. This latest tranche brings remastered audio for 
Philosophising about life comes naturally to Eels’ Mark Oliver Everett. On his 16th studio album, 
It’s hard not to feel disillusioned by the state of the world right now. It’s getting harder to scrape by; our algorithms are a constant whiplash between images of genocide and manmade destruction and TikTok Shop hauls that will end up in rotting landfills; and it feels like few in power are interested in helping anyone besides the rich. Why not just give up, stop caring and bury your head in the sand?
Scary movies usually end. Whatever has appeared at the window or risen from the grave is gone by the credits. The viewer always has the option to leave. Life offers no such sympathetic division. In her memoir Blue Light of the Screen, Claire Cronin wrote about the frightening images that follow us out of the cinema, finding their way into ordinary life. On 
Jonathan Personne is the solo alias of Jonathan Robert, a Montreal-based singer, songwriter, multi-instrumentalist and frontman for Sub Pop band Corridor. His fifth album under the alias is a lovely sweet of dreamy psych-pop with Jonathan largely singing in French atop his warm, lush, welcoming arrangements.
The last time that ominous waves of synth, the sharp clack and echo of gate reverbed drums and a pervading sense of unease like this dominated the airwaves, the 1980s had just dawned. Joy Division had come to its unfortunate end, but New Order was just getting going. The more playful, but still doomy, Depeche Mode offered up a dance beat under the sounds of annihilation. And Margeret Thatcher has just begun her project of cutting the floor out from under working people’s feet, launching a brutal austerity campaign that made life desolate for ordinary Brits.
If I Let It Quiet is the fourth album by the Salt Lake City-based singer-songwriter 
Of all the parts that make up the creative process, time and effort seem most devalued today. This applies to many expressive outlets beyond music, whether the visual arts or written journalism; even furniture making and design put little stock in the learned skill of executing a refined style of carving or decorative embellishment in an age when speedy self-assembly is force-fed to anyone looking for new homeware. And it has absolutely impacted music, with the technology of the day facilitating quick recording and release far above any thought of the subtleties that can lift a record or sequence of songs to another level of deep listening experience. And it is this very same disease of quickfire disposability that 
Being cynical, feeling a bit jaded: it’s a common condition when it comes to a genre as well established as rock. So when someone tells you about a new band doing interesting things in a grungy, punk-pop vein, it can be all too easy to roll your eyes and assume that it’s all been done before, and better. But sometimes curiosity wins out, you press play, and a song like “GirlVsHeart” hits you full in the face with crashing drums and gleefully thrashing guitar. Instantly you’re hooked and lock into a record that turns out to be a stomping joyride of youthful angst and, along the way, offers up a few surprises.