Recent reviews

Our latest album reviews, featuring the records we've most enjoyed (or not) over the past few weeks.

Reviews by score
Browse our album reviews according to score: Highest (9.5/10 or more) or Lowest (2/10 or less)

Portal

Ion
Profound Lore (2018)

There is no easy starting point with a record such as Ion. It’s an album that’s dense, almost to the point of being utterly impenetrable, with vocals from The Curator that swirl with crawling chaos and drums that march to an inhuman beat. Portal are not an easy band to digest and their music is a claustrophobic head-trip into the abyss. Ion is the Australian band’s fifth full length and the engrossing murk of their previous work is here in spades while the tension has somehow been ramped up to ever higher degrees of agony. “Husk” wraps you in cascading guitar lines that occasionally flirt with melody but are more often than not stacked with discordant textures and a feeling of genuine disgust is layered over the entire album. While Portal can be associated with death metal or black metal in one way or another, the base genres have been twisted so grotesquely that to label the music is somewhat of an impossible exercise. Elements of extremity certainly filter into the music but industrial, curious time signatures reminiscent of jazz and a heady dose of experimentation give Portal a flavour that no other band can capture. The darkness they create … Read more

200 Words Or Less

Spiritual Cramp

Mass Hysteria
REACT! Records (2017)

Given their name, it's appropriate that San Francisco's Spiritual Cramp have a sound rooted in the punk rock of 40-ish … Read more

Nick JD Hodgson

Tell Your Friends
Prediction Records (2018)

Erstwhile Kaiser Chief Nick Hodgson has spent the past five years penning songs for the likes of Mark Ronson and … Read more

Orphaned Land

Unsung Prophets & Dead Messiahs
Century Media (2018)

Music with a message has long been a starting point for many bands but for Orphaned Land that message is … Read more

The Dwarves

Take Back the Night
Burger Records (2018)

Take Back The Night isn’t one of those experiment Dwarves records, like the industrio-tinge of Come Clean. On their latest … Read more

Baronen & Satan

Why Does The Blood Never Stick To Your Teeth/Satan Is A Lady
Dirty Water Records (2017)

Every now and then I find it entertaining to randomly pick something out of the promo-bin without overthinking what to … Read more

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One from the archives

Justin Timberlake

Futuresex/Lovesounds
Jive (2006)

You are the biggest solo star of your generation and your first album since leaving the boy-band that made you famous was one of the biggest sellers of that year and everyone is clamoring for your next album; so what do you do? If you are Justin Timberlake, you spend four years making a follow-up that's so radically different from your first album that most people don't believe that you could be behind it. When I first heard "Sexyback," I must admit that I spat my tea all over my monitor in the office. It was a shock to hear Timberlake playing around and that made the build up to Futuresex/Lovesounds, probably the oddest album title of the year, all that more tense. Questions began to swim around my mind … Read more

More album reviews

200 Words Or Less

Damon Eliza Palermo

Beacon of Maracaibo
Johnkôôl Records (2018)

Contemplative and calming, “Delacorta” kicks off Damon Eliza Palermo's Beacon of Maracaibo release with flowing piano and bubbling electronic tones playing under a pleasant, naturalistic bed of chirping birds. Slightly glitchy but undeniably relaxing even when it introduces a cymbal-heavy beat late in the going, the opener transitions into a lengthy title track awash in sweeping synths, seesawing vocal tones … Read more

City Mouse

Get Right
It's Alive (2017)

The Fest is a pretty cool event. The first time or two I went, I went to see the headliners on the big stages, packing a day of well known (by punk standards) into one action-packed 12-hour period. Over time, I’ve come to seek out the newer bands on the smaller stages. The atmosphere is more my vibe, but it’s … Read more

200 Words Or Less

Daniel Ruiz

A Cup of Coffee with Two Sugar Cubes, Cream, and a Tiny Drop of Whiskey
Independent (2017)

Described aptly by its creator, Barcelona songwriter Daniel Ruiz, as an “ode to misery,” A Cup of Coffee with Two Sugar Cubes, Cream, and a Tiny Drop of Whiskey is a relaxed and dreamlike work built around layers of hazy guitar, warbling organ, and just a hint of piano. Vaguely idiosyncratic lyrics deal with a woman, her particular taste in … Read more

Ann Beretta

Old Scars, New Blood
Say-10 (2017)

There’s a lot of analysis when listening to Old Scars, New Blood. When singer Rob Huddleston sings, “Nothing ever changes/ Nothing ever stays the same” in “Fairweather,” it seems to epitomize the experience of this record, a re-recording of 13 songs by the recently born again Ann Beretta.I can’t decide if this album is a great idea, modernizing a reformed … Read more

200 Words Or Less

Otoboke Beaver

Love is Short
Damnably Records (2017)

To put it mildly, Otoboke Beaver's Love is Short doesn't beat around the bush, though that phrase seems wildly inappropriate given the origin of the band's name. Following a churning title track that sets off immediately at breakneck speed and features aggressive foreign-language vocal shouts, shrieks, and howls, even -gasp- a bit of melody, the album transitions to the more … Read more

Book Review

Jesse Fink

Bon: The Last Highway: The Untold Story of Bon Scott and AC/DC's Back in Black
Random House Australia (2017)

Ronald Belford “Bon” Scott.Lyrics, the personality and presence – it is not merely because of his vocal range and the band he headed that he is considered to be one of the greatest frontmen and rock’n roll vocalist of all time.His life and untimely death is being revisited in the new biography Bon: The Last Highway: The Untold Story of … Read more

Ryan Adams

Prisoners B Sides
Blue Note (2017)

Ryan Adams is one of the 21st centuries most prolific songwriters. Like Springsteen on speed, he just can’t seem to stop, whether it’s country, blues, metal, or an assortment of other areas for which he has lent his voice, he is constantly pushing out something new. His drive to write and produce is a great thing and has provided an … Read more

Kid You Not

Never A Dull Movement
Deep Elm (2017)

Kid You Not has some pretty clear influences behind their melodic pop-punk sound. With semi-coarse vocals that lead to big sing-along choruses, Iron Chic and Red City Radio shine through. It’s not really shining music though. These are some cynical songs that wallow in an unpleasant world.As a whole, this is a solid record with some flaws. The overall sound … Read more

Weezer

Pacific Daydream
Atlantic (2017)

I think that sometimes it’s really hard to review a Weezer record… I mean.. Their first record, the self-titled Blue album, is firmly perched on the list of “best debut albums of all time”. It’s quick punch of pop-punk aesthetic, quirky songwriting, and heavy crunch guitar is only mirrored by the sensitivity and honest lurch of songs like “Say It … Read more

Watain

Trident Wolf Eclipse
Century Media (2018)

Spending any length of time with Watain will convince you of at least one thing: this is a band who means it. For this Swedish horde, black metal is life. It’s everything and for frontman Erik Danielsson it’s an integral part of his personality. Interviews with him always tend on the intense side and for Watain that passion spills through … Read more

Remedy

Cool
Laserlife Records (2017)

One thing I love about split albums is that there’s more often than not one band on it that is new to me. I’ve discovered some really great bands or albums because a band I love introduced me to another band through a split record. Case in point: Remedy. I just loved their split with ESC Life earlier this year. … Read more

Book Review

Daniel Miller and Terry Burrows

Mute: A visual document from 1978 – tomorrow
Thames & Hudson (2017)

For the uninitiated, and if you are, you might want to look at changing that immediately – shame on you: Mute Records (commonly known, referred to and stylized as “mute”) by and large is one of the most influential British independent platforms and record labels that helped launch the careers of acts that not only fundamentally changed the idea of … Read more

Book Review

NOFX

NOFX: The Hepatitis Bathtub and Other Stories
Da Capo Press (2017)

NOFX: The Hepatitis Bathtub and Other Stories is a comprehensive autobiography from one of the world’s most prominent punk bands that worked its way up. New aficionados as well as die-hard long time followers will discover new and interesting facts via the stories of counterfeiting, murder, terminal illness, suicide, addiction, riots, bondage, the Yakuza, and drinking urine and the other … Read more

Neil Young and The Promise of the Real

The Visitor
Reprise (2017)

Neil Young releases records at an alarming rate for a septuagenarian. It doesn’t matter, the guy gets a gold pass on whatever he releases. His recent health scare not slowing him down, yet showcasing the mortality we have seen in the recent past with Young’s friends and peers moving on at an alarming rate. Neil Young has walked a frantic … Read more

Reviews by score
Browse our album reviews according to score: Highest (9.5/10 or more) or Lowest (2/10 or less)