May 12, 2012

Gossip: A Joyful Noise

New album transforms one-time riot grrrl Beth Ditto into polished chart-bait

May 12, 2012

The Imagined Village: Bending The Dark

The folk collective returns with a patchy, nautical third album

May 12, 2012

Geoff Barrow and Ben Salisbury – Drokk: Music Inspired by Mega-City One

Composed on vintage synthesisers, this retro-futurist pastiche is a treat for geeks

May 12, 2012

Jazz Bigband Graz: Urban Folktales

The multi-layered big band blends brass sonorities and zippy electronica with a light, disciplined touch

May 12, 2012

Niki & The Dove: Instinct

Debut album casts duo as 1980s pop mystics

May 12, 2012

Steve Kuhn Trio: Wisteria

The group enlivens a well-trodden route with strong melodies, firm structures and a fine-tuned empathy

May 12, 2012

Bang On!: [Sic]

Liverpool rapper stages electrifying debut with raw beats and lithe rapping about “bizzies” (police) and street life

May 12, 2012

Squarepusher: Ufabulum

The album’s unpredictability pays off: the track is a vibrant study in opposites

May 12, 2012

Shostakovich and Prokofiev: The Soviet Experience

Volume two of the Pacificas’ cycle of quartets adds up to another powerful listening experience

May 12, 2012

Vusi Mahlasela: Say Africa

The singer-songwriter delivers an intensely South African album in sound

May 12, 2012

Britten/Finzi: Serenade, Nocturne/Dies Natalis; Britten: Songs and Proverbs of William Blake

English composer is enjoying unprecedented exposure as these two new CDs testify

May 5, 2012

Sunday Driver: The Mutiny

Fusion band mix Victorian waltz and Music Hall stylings with sitar and tabla

May 5, 2012

Diabel Cissokho: Kanabory Siyama

Artist’s first solo album bolsters his kora playing and singing with electric guitar and bass and a female chorus

May 5, 2012

Gallon Drunk: The Road Gets Darker from Here

Frontman James Johnston helms a trip into the sludgy Stooges garage-punk

May 5, 2012

Ren Harvieu: Through the Night

Orchestral arrangements and soaring vocals cast the 21-year-old as a modern-day Petula Clark

May 5, 2012

Richard Hawley: Standing at the Sky’s Edge

Lyrics about young men ‘fighting and losing their lives’ hint at links between Vietnam and now Afghanistan

May 5, 2012

Keane: Strangeland

The Sussex trio liven up their earnest soft-rock with a dash of 1980s synth-pop

May 5, 2012

Damon Albarn: Dr Dee

Album is a curious experiment, combining pastiches of 16th-century church music and madrigals with melancholy 1970s folk-pop

May 5, 2012

Ulysses Owens: Unanimous

The up-and-coming drummer yields a crisp and rooted mainstream set

May 5, 2012

George Crowley Quartet: Paper Universe

The UK saxophonist sees similarities between academic life and the deadline-driven world of the professional musician

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