A fifteen-year plus career has done little to lift the spirits of Canadian alt-country rockers, the Cowboy Junkies. Although capable of stirring an fine old industry buzz on occasions, the slow, moody and frankly depressing Junkies, sometimes fail to really ignite. Louder and more guttural than their gentle gossamer origins would have ever suggested, their ninth studio album, One Soul Now might pass for a Courtney Love produced Emmylou Harris. And if Jack White can do it with Loretta Lynn, why Continue Reading

So what were you expecting Ikara Colt to turn out like two albums in? Of course this is pretty much an innovation free zone. Of course there are precious few actual surprises. Of course they’ve not really changed, not one little bit. Naturally this is still exactly the place to come for blunt damaging guitars, achingly distracted vocals and beats that will make a forceful entry through your ear-canals without negotiation and pulp your throbbing brain into a gasping mush Continue Reading

Think of Limp Bizkit. Now take away the whining self-pity of ‘My Way or the Highway’, the unconvincing bravado of ‘Rollin’, and you have El Jefe – altogether more chilled, more thoughtful yet equally passionate purveyors of grunge-hop. ‘Amorphous Phormula’, their debut album on Zip Records, is a rattlebag of beat poetry, hip-hop/grunge crossover, reggae beats and mariachi-infused horn playing that combines to create an album of muscular beauty – with tough guy vocals that aspire to something more substantial Continue Reading

Here Come The Warm Jets (1973)Why does the irreverent and experimental Eno leave Roxy Music? Is it because Brian Peter St John Le Baptiste de la Salle Eno finds himself thinking about his laundry during a gig? Not entirely, although, it is a part of it. Ferry wants to experiment with the quality of the music they are making, Eno wants to experiment with the way the music is made. To those not in the know it’s perhaps a little Continue Reading

It’s worth bearing in mind that six full-length examples of bad behaviour, verve and dissonance down the line, while you’d hardly label Polly Jean Harvey eclectic, she’s never gone and made the same record twice. She’s nudged her perimeters, sure, but each record has just been about toiling with a different demon, wearing a different dress, opening the blinds or closing them, approaching the same subject from various directions or different subjects from the same place. Defining her has never Continue Reading

These bad-ass niggaz don’t half swear a lot. That’s what an alien would most likely say in reposte to the new album from Danger Mouse and Jemini. But then aliens would. Aliens are cool. Aliens don’t give a shit about paying lip service to the customary bad-mouth parlances of those customary bad-ass niggaz. Aliens care only about one thing: finding a nice pair of brogues and a nice quiet place to slip them on. And perhaps if folks like Jemini Continue Reading

This is a coool album. No. A coooool album. Little Beaver, singer and guitarist, shone briefly in the early 70’s with his smooth soul minor classics such as ‘Joey’, ‘Party Down’ and ‘We Three’. Signed to TK Records in ’71, he wrote and played session for a number of already established acts such as Betty Wright and Blowfly/Clarence Reed before releasing material in his own right. ‘Joey’, his first hit, is dark, slow funk with soft guitar stabs and narcoleptic Continue Reading

‘Call it nu soul, or call it what you will…’ reads the press release. So I will, thank you very much. I’ll call it lounge music, because that is what it is quite frankly. Okay, tracks like ‘In The Black Of Night’ and ‘Naturally’ might have some tricky, shuffling break things going on and some frisky, frivolous scatting courtesy of easy-listening sweetheart Lady Z, but the core of the material is pretty much based in the soft leathery chairs of Continue Reading