Album Reviews

REVIEW: Heavy Salad – Cult Casual

Manchester based psych-rockers Heavy Salad release their debut LP, ‘Cult Casual’. Chocked full of surf-rock beats and overdriven guitar, ‘Cult Casual’ sucks you into its psychedelic vortex of wonderfully off-kilter pop music. Opening up the album is, ‘Death’. In stark…

REVIEW: Eddie Piller presents The Mod Revival

REVIEW: Eddie Piller presents The Mod Revival

The 2 words Mod Revival when put together in a sentence might conjure up images of young bands dressed in freshly purchased outfits from Carnaby Street trying to look and sing the part whilst playing a Rickenbacker guitar. Mod or…

REVIEW: Gene – Yours For The Taking best of

REVIEW: Gene – Yours For The Taking best of

I remember Gene being indie heroes on the BBC Radio 1 Evening Session with the likes of Steve Lamacq and Jo Whiley whetting their appetite the instant a new track was announced. The weekly music papers also had a field…

REVIEW: Ian Dury - Hit Me! compilation

REVIEW: Ian Dury – Hit Me! compilation

One of the most distinctive artists of the late 70’s and 80’s was the gruff cockney voiced Ian Dury who convened his formidable bands the Blockheads plus Kilburn and the High Roads. With their brash punk anthems that mixed the…

REVIEW: A Certain Ratio – ACR Loco

REVIEW: A Certain Ratio – ACR Loco

Following what was an overly success nationwide UK tour of 2019 Manchester’s funk, samba, indie heroes A Certain Ratio announced their first long player in over 12 years, ACR Loco. To be fully released via Mute Records at the end…

ALBUM REVIEWW: Lido ‘Peder’

Rating: The reviewer’s handbook of national stereotypes tells us that music from Norway should either be doomy death metal or its yearning, melancholic ambient polar opposite. Something to do with the lack of sunlight, the footnotes add. Lido is, we’re…

ALBUM REVIEW: Doves ‘The Universal Want’

Review and live images by Jonathan Taylor Instagram: jonathantaylorphotography After an 11 year artistic break since the release of their last studio album ‘Kingdom of Rust’ we welcome back the re-emergence of the mighty DOVES and the release of their…

REVIEW: The Rolling Stones Goats Head Soup 2020

REVIEW: The Rolling Stones Goats Head Soup 2020

Released back in 1973 Goats Head Soup might be considered by some as The Rolling Stones waving goodbye to their golden period and settling down into stadium rock comfort, Fast forward to this 2020 release and the album settles into…

ALBUM REVIEW: Billy Raffoul ‘International Hotel’

Rating: It’s interesting how lockdown seems to be sorting the wheat from the proverbial chaff when it comes to music making   Regardless of genre, those who feel the need, or even necessity, to express themselves through song, are finding a…