Already released to the not-so-waiting world of the UK, The Hiss’s ‘Panic Movement’ now gets its American debut. Grown in the evergreen groove marshes of Florida, The Hiss trade in the kind of raucous, well over the top, wall-of-sound guitar orchestra favoured by fellow troublists, Spiritualized and Oasis at their most cacophonous and uncompromising with the customary Americana of more traditional rock outlaws like The Kings Of Leon and Aerosmith thrown in for good measure. Obviously the move to Atlanta Continue Reading

I’ll dispense with their already well-documented musical history, Craig Nicholl’s perfectly manicured insanity and the fact that debut album, ‘Highly Evolved’ became on of the most talked about releases of 2002. I’ll dispense with it because like Craig Nicholl’s perfectly manicured insanity, it’s really quite boring. Last years news is this years fish n’ chip paper, and The Vines have long since been tickling any trout of any worth. Still those carefully choreographed antics on the Late Show with David Continue Reading

There’ll be those of us, of course, who’ll try to squeeze The Walkmen somewhere between The Strokes (ludicrous, although both bands are from New York), U2 (scandalous), Joy Division (close) and Interpol (sorry, but no cigar). And even fans and critics alike have described them as having the sound of two different bands. So I’ll have to agree with the press release on this occasion, as it really is a fair assessment to say that they sound like nothing you’ve Continue Reading

‘And he sang out loud about stuff in your life you might find’. The words could quite reasonably be attributed to Obi frontman and songwriter Damian Katkhuda, as they can the album’s enigmatic star turn, ‘Incredible Jack’. It ain’t nothing in particular Katkhuda sings about, it’s just stuff. What kind of stuff? Just stuff. Pot-luck, lady-luck, the wheel of fortune, misadventure, chance and serendipity. One night in a casino would aquaint you with all these strange bedfellows, so too would Continue Reading

A little fun. That’s what self-styled bad boy, Armand Van Helden promised, and that’s what he delivered. Yep, just as you were thinking your obsession with New York City was on the decline, club music has reclaimed the city that never sleeps and wrenched it squarely from the hands of garage rock just as Casablancas was settling down to a well earned forty-winks. But in this city, you do anything but rest. And this little bristling mix of music spanning Continue Reading

Trading on the increasing popularity of all those canny post-punk algorithms currently being recycled by the likes of The Rapture, Franz Ferdinand and Radion 4, ‘Death Disco:  Songs from Under the Dancefloor 1978-1984′ is a feisty little treasure trove of only the most angular and decisive guitar methane from the period just prior to the onslaught of new-romanticism; just as electro was whooping spotty-faced academic misfits into a mild-mannered frenzy and just as the B52’s were being heard overhead. And Continue Reading

It seems kind of perverse to be sat reviewing a Courtney Love album, especially here today, in 2004. We’re immediately au fait – or at least dismissively comfortable – with Courtney the widow, Courtney the addict, Courtney the love interest, Courtney the plaintiff, Courtney the professional celeb, Courtney in rehab and behind bars, maybe Courtney the actress and certainly Courtney the momentous attention-seeking widescreen-deluxe public fuck-up. But aside from the fact that (including ‘America’s Sweetheart’) she has actually released 3 Continue Reading

Most artists wait until the twilight of their career to invite their friends round for a good old jamming session, and then use the subsequent recordings to boost what is usually an ailing career.  You know who you are.  But when the artist in question is Melissa Auf Der Maur, a modern day musical Mowgly, raised by rock instead of wolves, and the friends are some Queens, a Pumpkin and some desert degenerates, reading like one fucked up pantomime cast, Continue Reading

Whether or not it’s because the songs refuse to gel, or whether it’s because ‘The Angel’ (ah hem) has produced, arranged, programmed, engineered and written this disc herself, ‘Covert Movements’ ultimately conveys an unusual degree of randomness and freestyling. Fair enough, that’s what you get with dub, but with dub you should never have too much going on. And here, there’s precisely that. What could have been a memorable album is by turns shapeless and undisciplined. Tracks like ‘Still Burnin’ Continue Reading

This fourth album from ex-God Machine man Robin Proper-Shepard is very much, as he kindly almost notes himself in the title, like seasons. When winter crashes crassly into autumn for instance, with a flagrant disregard for its moderation and crisp, artful aesthetics, you instinctively resist its harshness and crave for the serenity of the period passed. That is until you find your own comfort and allow yourself a more flattering perspective on the beauty that still surrounds you. Inversely, this Continue Reading