albums
Father John Misty: Chloë and the Next Twentieth Century
Grade: A– In which Josh Tillman reimagines the whole back catalogue of 20th-century American pop music (except for rock), tilting…
Toxic testosterone
Squaring up to the prospect of a new Red Hot Chili Peppers album, I’m reminded of a vintage quote by…
Band of Horses: Things Are Great
Grade: B That thing, ‘indie rock’, is so well played and produced these days, so pristine and flawless, that it…
Oxxxymirin: Beauty & Ugliness
Grade: A+ I was going to review hyperpop chanteuse Charli XCX’s album this week, but it was such boring, meretricious,…
The Weather Station: How Is It That I Should Look at the Stars
Grade: C– Anyone remember that TV advert for Canada from the 1980s – a succession of colourful images, including a…
Avril Lavigne: Love Sux
Grade: B Yay, life just gets better and better. World War Three and now this. More petulant popcorn pre-school punk…
Black Country, New Road: Ants From Up There
Grade: A+ It is not true, fellow boomers, that there is nothing new under the sun nor no good new…
Jethro Tull: The Zealot Gene
Grade: C+ I bought the ‘seminal’ Jethro Tull double album Thick as a Brickfrom a secondhand shop when I…
Mike Yarwood moment
Any artist who has habitually written or performed in character — from David Bowie to Lady Gaga — eventually arrives…
Neil Young and Crazy Horse: Barn
Grade: A I have persisted in buying everything Neil Young releases since I first heard On the Beach as a…
The potency of cheap music
Christmas: the most vulnerable time of the year. I heard ‘A Winter’s Tale’ by David Essex on the radio the…
Ed Sheeran: = (Christmas edition)
Grade: C= My wife’s ill with Covid and demanding inexhaustible libations and difficult meals, which she will leave uneaten. The…
Orpheus Chamber Orchestra
Grade: B It must have been an interesting day in the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra’s press office when Blair Tindall’s memoir…
The weird turned pro
Pop quiz time: which act was named Melody MakerGroup of the Year in 1975? The answer is not, as you…
Adele: 30
Grade: C The problem I have is that I thought she was pretty awful before — when she was just…
Beach House: Once Twice Melody
Grade: B+ Everything these days devolves to prog — and not always very good prog. Where once synths were vastly…
Oh dear, Abba’s new album is a bit of a dog: Voyage reviewed
Time has been very kind to Abba. No one back in the 1970s thought of them as geniuses. But they've even lost the talent for writing memorable tunes
The death of the live album
Next week The The release The Comeback Special, a 24-track live album documenting the band’s concert at the Royal Albert…
Going for Goldberg
I sometimes think the classical record industry would collapse if it weren’t for the Goldberg Variations. Every month brings more…
Billie Eilish: Happier Than Ever
Grade: C+ Time to get the razor out again — Billie’s back. The slurred and affected can’t-be-arsed-to-get-out-of-bed vocals. The relentless,…
State of the union
Big Red Machine release their second album later this month. It’s a fine name for ten tonnes of agricultural apparatus…
Bobby Gillespie and Jehnny Beth: Utopian Ashes
Grade: B– Is there anyone in rock music more irritating and stupid than Bobby Gillespie? The rawk’n’roll leather-jacketed self-mythologiser. The…
Kings of Convenience: Peace or Love
Grade: A– The problem with Norwegians is that they are so relentlessly, mind-numbingly pleasant. Well, OK, not Knut Hamsun or…
Ska struck
When Trojan Records attempted to break into the United States music market in the early 1970s, it hit an insurmountable…
In search of an ending
There are many Symphonies No. 10 by Gustav Mahler, or none. The situation is rare, if not unique, in the…
