100 words music reviews
On their debut LP, deathcrash cut the ribbon on a concealed world of frayed tenderness. While ‘Return’ is faithful to a rock palette, the band’s stable patience nurtures a crystalline, spacious sound that shelters everything it touches. Throughout, starry washes of guitar crash down with thunderous emotion as the writing seeks to magnify splintered moments […]
Having marinated in the political tensions of the past two years, ‘IRE’ has arrived with a mob of thumping drums and bass being marshalled by lethal vocalist, Carolina Oliveras. As they call upon the epistemic heritage of spiritual elders, Combo Chimbita envelop their manifesto in a futuristic sound. If ever revolution had a singular epithet, […]
With the saturation of the art pop-punk scene, it is difficult for bands like Bas Jan to sustain peculiarity; punk cannot submit to formulas to be classed as such. On their second LP, Bas Jan lay down an experimental sound that is at once self-aware and humorous. When realised, ‘Baby U Know’ is as compelling […]
EBTG’s ninth album crystalises love and retention in eleven tracks of drum and bass, trip-hop, and pop. Tracey Thorn and Ben Watt had one eye each on the nightclub, seemingly writing and producing with remix vultures in mind. The result is a straight, booming vignette of 90s evening-life. Thorn evokes the casual sadness of a […]
Each of Giuliano Sorgini’s soundtracks and albums tell the story of a dramatic aesthete seeking to stir. The Italian keyboardist and library music icon possesses an enviable ear for fuzzy grooves and emotion-led instrumental narratives. On ‘Under Pompelmo,’ Sorgini incarnated the classic European cool of the early 70s: of turtlenecks, tortoiseshell sunglasses, and wobbling psychedelia. […]
This underground project is equal parts prog rock, jazz, and poetry. With the shabbiness of honesty, ‘sound of sense’ welds the writing of Robert Frost and others to a band of jazz musicians playing straight down the line. Still, this record never feels like a hurried endeavour and is closer to the work of an […]
Che Noir’s 2020 album, ‘As God Intended,’ paraded grisly, fervent portraits of betrayal that rode cleanly over concise hip-hop rhythms. Two years later, ‘Food For Thought’ has been fatally let down by thin production and half-baked beats. Noir’s writing is often compelling, her flow is always tight, but the tinny mastering dotted throughout (particularly on […]
This is heavy metal where ‘heavy’ refers principally to matters of the mind. ‘W’ is an extraordinary ode to the most reflective of emotions, suspended by Boris’ atmosphere of rumination. It is simultaneously delicate, pounding, and dark, but even in ‘W’’s sombre corners, the instrumental tones are looking towards some far off light in wistful […]
Throughout her discography, Eiko Ishibashi has exhibited a range of sonic climates. It is as her orchestral tones lightly interact when ‘For McCoy’ feels at it’s mesmeric best. The problems, however, are underlined when the moods shift too quickly into cacophony and the wonder of Ishibashi’s gentle horizon momentarily cracks. Even so, these hurried sections […]
100 words music reviews 