‘In my mind, the Transfiguration Highway is a road that runs from my hometown of Petrolia, through the small southern Ontario towns I grew up in, through to larger and larger Ontario cities, like London, until it reaches me here in Toronto. Along that path, there’s a movement from quiet to loud. From slow to…
Mansions fourth album ‘Big Bad’ signals a new beginning for the now duo of Chris Browder and Robin Dove. Honing in on a more atmospheric sound with plenty of textures, the song finds Chris trying to make sense of getting older and making the most of what’s ahead of you: ‘The real freedom is when…
If, like us, you’ve been listening to BBC 6 Music throughout lockdown, Pottery’s ‘Texas Drums’ will already be one of your most-heard songs of the strange year that is 2020. Now the band are ready to share debut album ‘Welcome to Bobby’s Motel’ – will it live up to their hugely celebrated live show? The…
It feels like a long time since Phoebe Bridgers’ debut album ‘Stranger in the Alps’ started soundtracking our lives. Since the release of that record back in 2017, Phoebe has collaborated with Julien Baker and Lucy Dacus in boygenius and Conor Oberst in Better Oblivion Community Center; both of which she toured with relentlessly. Now,…
Thao & The Get Down Stay Down’s fifth album ‘Temple’ (out on Domino now) is bursting with hugely danceable songs that dip into various genres with aplomb. It opens with the title track which is a rhythmic piece about looking forward with alluring bass lines and disco beats: ‘By day I gave grand speeches. By…
Eve Owen has released her debut album ‘Don’t Let the Ink Dry’. Produced by The National’s Aaron Dessner – and released via 37d03d Records, the label he runs with his brother and Bon Iver’s Justin Vernon – the record is packed with tales of heartbreak and longing set against backing that dips into a multitude…
‘There’s chance, there’s choice and there’s alignment – what forces in the universe do I choose to align myself with?’ Johanna Warren’s reason for referencing Dungeons & Dragons in the title of her fifth record ‘Chaotic Good’ captures the way she considers her life to be part of ‘one big role-playing game’. It finds her…
Wares (Edmonton native Cassia Hardy) releases her second LP (and first on Mint Records) ‘Survival’ on 24 April. It’s an album that Cassia dedicates to ‘decolonial activists, anti-fascist agitators and prairie queers fighting for community and a better life’. A blast of feedback signals the start of album opener ‘Hands, Skin’ before Cassia’s assertive La…
Australian (but now based in California) singer-songwriter Hazel English releases her debut album ‘Wake UP!’ via Polyvinyl Records on 24 April. Prone to bouts of acute anxiety, the album was written following an existential crisis when Hazel felt her life was becoming a series of mundane objectives: ”Am I happy?’ ‘Do I like the direction…
Katie Harkin, formerly of Sky Larkin and session musician for countless awesome acts including Sleater Kinney, Wild Beasts and Courtney Barnett, releases her first solo album under her own surname on 24 April via Hand Mirror – a label she set up with her partner, poet and live arts organiser Kate Leah Hewlett. Written on…
