The first of this week’s top picks is Satanic Rites of The Wildhearts, an album is conceived as a belated follow-up to the band’s classic debut, Earth vs The Wildhearts. These are songs of defiance and hope, of ragged glory, of true heart-on-sleeve emotion; songs that sound like no-one else on this planet (or the explored parts of space). Lead single ‘Failure Is the Mother of Success’ sums up the album via a spectacular eight-minute lap taking in all manner of twists and turns, and the message here is plain, forged through sharp-end experience.
Curious Ruminant, which follows new Jethro Tull albums in 2022 and 2023, is an album of mostly full-band music, consisting of nine tracks varying in length from two and a half minutes to almost seventeen minutes. Amongst the musicians featured are former keyboardist Andrew Giddings and drummer James Duncan, along with current band members David Goodier, John O’Hara, Scott Hammond and, making his recording debut with the band, guitarist Jack Clark.
Spiritbox’s second album, Tsunami Sea, builds on the band’s massively successful 2021 debut, Eternal Blue, which topped charts and dominated critics’ year-end lists, and 2023’s Fear of Fear EP, which earned the band two consecutive Grammy nominations. The album, co-produced by the band’s Mike Stringer and Dan Braunstein, features the band’s signature visceral sound, elevated to new heights of intensity and musicality highlighted in singles ‘Soft Spine’ and ‘Perfect Soul’.
The Melancholy Season marks Benmont Tench’s true arrival, after four decades as keyboard player in Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, as a singer-songwriter, without compromise or doubt. It was produced by Jonathan Wilson, an acclaimed singer-songwriter himself and touring guitarist for Roger Waters, who has worked on career-defining albums for Dawes, Father John Misty and Margo Price. The album’s core studio band includes Dawes’ Taylor Goldsmith on guitar, Sebastian Steinberg of Soul Coughing on bass and Wilson on drums, among other instruments, with contributions from Jenny O. and Sara Watkins.
Oceanside Countryside is the latest of the great ‘lost’ albums to be released as part of Neil Young’s Analog Original Series (AOS). The album was recorded from May to December 1977, preceding the release of Comes a Time in 1978, and shares the same country/folk sound. This long-awaited vinyl release of Oceanside Countryside includes, for the first time ever, the track list originally planned for this album, in the original analogue mixes done at the time of recording, along with some extra tracks since released on Archives Vol. III.
There are also 50th anniversary editions of David Bowie’s Young Americans, Autobahn by Kraftwerk and Close to the Edge by Yes (52½ years young!).
Our release of the week comes from Bob Mould, the legendary former frontman of Hüsker Dü and Sugar, who returns with his new album. Here We Go Crazy finds Bob on top form, delivering 11 slices of anthemic, emotional driving alt-rock, featuring the singles ‘Here We Go Crazy’, ‘When Your Heart Is Broken’ and ‘Breathing Room’.
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