When she was dropped by 4AD around three years ago, it seemed as if Mackenzie Scott was sputtering out of momentum in her career. The…
Billie Eilish was always renowned for her stern, unwavering self-conviction, hard work and talent. Going viral with ‘Ocean Eyes’ at only 15, she’s been in…
Nandi Rose Plunkett’s previous albums as Half Waif have frequently been noteworthy for their high degrees of reflection, introspection and self-evaluation. Given the enforced isolation…
London, 2020. A city that should have been thriving and loud is quiet, contained. There’s a lot of uncertainty everywhere, but more so than ever…
Snapped Ankles revel in their weirdness. Dressed in ghillie suits and claiming to be “descended from the trees”, the London-based band makes music that is…
For any long-term fans of Primal Scream or Savages, hearing their respective lead singers Bobby Gillespie and Jehnny Beth sounding so restrained on Utopian Ashes…
Catch up with all the best new music released throughout August 2021 with our Spotify playlist below! Happy listening! https://open.spotify.com/playlist/2w33e0Cy8VEAkPCmO2HRg8?si=31ac29fd49f04a14
Revisit all the best new music released throughout July 2021 with our Spotify playlist! Happy listening! https://open.spotify.com/playlist/6sNJgFR1rUvfGzy4tV8ALi?si=115a3e8e3fa24e0e
Catch up with all the best new music released throughout June 2021! Happy listening! https://open.spotify.com/playlist/5z9zfaqT9t1tYa0QdPMABi?si=b4f18007800d4142
Gigs & Festivals
All information correct at the time of publishing - to our knowledge! - regarding Coronavirus cancellations Band.io presents ‘Grl Pwr’ @ Hyde Park Book Club,…
Mush @ Brudenell Social Club, Saturday 7th March Riding high on the recent release of their debut album 3D Routine, a collage of jaunty DIY…
Supergrass @ Leeds O2 Academy, Sunday 1st March Commercially successful yet perennially underrated in the context of Britpop, Oxford-based trio Supergrass announced last year that…
2000s
From the point of view of this writer, now in his mid-thirties and on the brink of first-time fatherhood and actual, tangible adult responsibilities, to…
Created with a gargantuan effort to blend the more acoustic sound of For Emma, Forever Ago with Justin Vernon’s more intriguing electronic inclinations and even…
When two tracks by The Shins’ debut album Oh, Inverted Worldappeared on the soundtrack to 2004 film Garden State - a movie proudly espousing liberal…
1990s
Although he had spearheaded one of hip-hop’s most influential groups as a member of Ultramagnetic MCs – their 1988 debut Critical Beatdown is one of…
In the summer of 1996, at the height of Cool Britannia, a remix of a little-known minimalist house single that had stalled well outside the…
While much is made of the studio in which an album is recorded, and often rightly so, it’s always worth remembering that less conventionally professional…
1980s
The difference between visibility and obscurity in pop music is surprisingly often a matter of timing. One illustration of this rule is the story of…
At the turn of the Eighties, despite having established a perfectly successful career in commercial terms, Grace Jones was not the towering, influential pop genius…
While they had spent the previous half-decade ahead of the pack with their futurist electronic symphonies – the unstoppable run of albums from Autobahn to…
1970s
For some people, hearing the name Funkadelic may likely conjure up images of the rhinestone-studded, outer-space wackiness of mid-to-late ‘70s P-Funk, complete with Bootsy Collins…
Before even beginning to think about the significance of Blue, it’s worth remembering and appreciating the extent to which Joni Mitchell was a trailblazer in…
For anybody who thinks that the Motown label was a flawless hit-generating machine that churned out classic after classic, consider the reception that greeted Marvin…
1960s
Pop critics and historians have never been able to agree on what exactly caused the Sixties utopian ideal of love, peace and understanding to expire,…
Progressive rock, or ‘prog rock’, has consistently had something of a tainted reputation in the world of music criticism ever since the punk revolution in…
Not only is it one of the defining pop culture images of the 20th century, but, in retrospect, the iconic front cover of Abbey Road…
More than any other year in living memory, music has felt incredibly important in 2020. Not just as a structural means for idling away lockdown…
The indestructible gold standard for pop since the dawn of the recording age, the single format benefitted from an explosion in technology that made its…
To adapt that famous misquotation attributed to Mark Twain, reports of the album’s death have been greatly exaggerated. Ever since the turn of the millennium,…
If the universe was a fair place – and for various reasons, let’s face it, it isn’t – then Echo & The Bunnymen would have…
When the Manic Street Preachers began their career on the cusp of the 1990s, they conceived of themselves as a reaction, a contemptible sneer against…
As a presence and influence in popular music, Nick Cave is an institution easily worthy of being mentioned in the same breath with the likes…
