After spending over two decades together, Stars’ ninth album – and first in five years – ‘From Capelton Hill’ finds the Montreal indie rockers discussing the inevitability of mortality while celebrating the joys that make life worth living, with co-vocalist Torquil Campbell saying: ‘I guess what ‘From Capelton Hill’ means to me is from memory,…
Sharon Van Etten’s sixth album – ‘We’ve Been Going About This All Wrong’ – is a record designed to be listened to in its entirety. None of the songs on it were shared ahead of the release and they find Sharon musing on how all the key moments in life – parenthood, partnerships, the past…
Chester trio Peaness finally release their debut album ‘World Full of Worry’ on 6 May through their own Totally Snick Records label. The release follows numerous EPs, tours and a live session with Marc Riley on 6 Music and lives up to its title with a steely determination to get through the mundanity of modern…
‘When It Comes’ finds Canadian-Serbian artist Dana Gavanski splicing her love of music from the 1950s to the ’70s with mythology and trying to find herself: ‘In many ways, this record feels like it is my first. When I could use my voice, I had to focus so there is an urgency and greater emotional…
Sarah Beth Tomberlin follows up 2018’s ‘At Weddings’ and 2020’s ‘Projections’ EP with her second album ‘i don’t know who needs to hear this…’, a record that she says is designed ‘to examine, hold space (and) make an altar for the feelings’. Making use of pedal steel, old acoustic guitars and synths – but in…
Fatherson return with ‘Normal Fears’, their first album in three years. The band have toured with everyone from Lewis Capaldi to Enter Shikari and this new record finds them embracing a new, more melodic sound. They also structured the songs in a different way to before with samples of a Kilmarnock river and 30 ping…
Storytelling troubadour Salvation Bill (aka Ollie Thomas) returns with ‘Has Had It’ – a collection of seven songs that touch upon everything from financial struggles to the imminent and constant threat of death, although there’s some lightness along the way. The album opens with ‘Well Wishers’ and its slightly menacing and repeated mantra of ‘All…
Placebo’s ‘Never Let Me Go’ – the duo’s eight album and first in almost a decade’ finds them trying to make sense of a world that is full of intolerance, division, over-reliance on technology and imminent environmental disaster… The album opens with ‘Forever Chemicals’ and it’s a distorted yet wonky industrial riff-driven piece with Brian…
Specialise Subject signings Don’t Worry – a duo made up of Ronan Van Kehoe and Samuel Watson – offer their take on the foibles of modern life on their new album ‘Remorseless Swing’. Opening with the jangly Wave Pictures-esque indie pop of ‘Head’s Chocka’, the album finds the duo in a hopelessly romantic and nostalgic…
Kevin Devine returns with his tenth (!) solo album, ‘Nothing’s Real, So Nothing’s Wrong’. It’s a record that finds Kevin in reflective mood as he tries to stay empathetic in a world that embraces both chaos and order. ‘Laurel Leaf (Anhedonia)’ opens the album in ambient yet disconcerting style with spoken-word samples being taken over…
