First out of the traps this week are Bangs & Talbot – acid jazz founding figure Chris Bangs and Style Council founding member Mick Talbot – who return with their new album, Smokin’ Aces. It follows their acclaimed 2022 debut album as a duo, Back to Business, and two rapid sell-out 7″ singles, ‘Sumthin’ Else’ and, most recently, ‘K-Jee’. The album features 12 new tracks recorded and developed over a 2-year spell, with Bangs & Talbot joined by instrumentalists and voices from all over the world.
The Damned return with a celebratory and very personal record, Not Like Everybody Else: a tribute to the band’s guitarist Brian James, who passed away on 6 March 2025. Recorded in an astonishingly swift five days at Revolver Studio in Los Angeles with producer Mikal Blue (OneRepublic, Jason Mraz), the album includes renditions of 10 well-known songs by some of the artists who influenced Brian on his musical journey and inspired the rest of the band.
Throughout her long career, Lucinda Williams has never shied away from writing about difficult but real things. If you think about it, you could call ‘Change the Locks’ a topical song ahead of its time. There were several biting and brave songs on her Good Souls Better Angels album, as well as the post-Covid masterpiece Stories from a Rock n Roll Heart. With World’s Gone Wrong, Lucinda ups the ante on topical songs. It is a pure reflection of our very turbulent times, intense and musically powerful.
Megadeth sign off with one final, self-titled studio album, which serves as the definitive closing chapter to one of the most influential catalogues in heavy music and represents a creative milestone. “There’s so many musicians who have come to the end of their career, whether accidental or intentional,” says Dave Mustaine. “Most of them don’t get to go out on their own terms on top, and that’s where I’m at in my life right now. I have travelled the world and have made millions upon millions of fans and the hardest part of all of this is saying goodbye to them. If there was ever a perfect time for us to put out a new album, it’s now.”
Metal and avant-pop artist Poppy returns with 13 bold new tracks on her seventh album, Empty Hands – a daring set of songs that blurs the lines between heavy and hypnotic, cementing her status as a rising visionary within the rock genre. From performance-art provocateur to video director, sci-fi graphic-novel author and globe-travelling recording artist whose songbook encompasses anything from brutal metal breakdowns and snappy ’60s bubblegum to trap-pop and grunge-punk, absolutely nothing has been off limits when it comes to Poppy masterfully executing her varied artistic vision.
Our release of the week is from Craven Faults: a genuine word-of-mouth success story who have maintained an element of anonymity throughout their career. The journey on Sidings begins in an isolated community that built up around one of the great engineering projects of its age – 14 tunnels and 22 viaducts to open up the north – and finishes at an enclosed field on a moor in 1858. It takes in studios from Los Angeles to Rochdale from 1952 to 1980, while drawing inspiration from the progress in manmade infrastructure and the transport of goods.
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