Our super soaraway six for 13 June opens with Remembering Now, on which the legendary Van Morrison returns to the transcendent, uncategorisable rhapsodies that make him unique in music. It’s rich with hallmarks of classic Van, with dominant themes of love in spirit, some escapist romance, a smattering of self-deprecating candour and specific references to…
Talkin to the Trees, the debut album from Neil Young and The Chrome Hearts, is a personal and powerful album featuring ten new compositions by Young. ‘Big Change’, the first song from the album, has a message that leaves no doubt where Neil Young stands in these challenging times. The Chrome Hearts are: Spooner…
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…
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. The LP of Oceanside Countryside includes, for the first…
Kicking off this week’s goodies is Neil Young with Crazy Horse. There is something so historic about the band’s earliest recordings that even their most devoted fans cannot contain their excitement when new releases are scheduled. Early Daze collects together in one album some of the most iconic originals by Neil Young, and several with…
Here’s our last batch of recommended releases for 2023, due out in the next couple of weeks. In 2022, Nick Cave and Warren Ellis returned to their native Australia for 16 shows, taking their acclaimed 2021 album Carnage on the road, along with songs from the Nick Cave and The Bad Seeds catalogue. Three performances…
Before and After contains some of Neil Young’s favourites from his playbook, which he performs mostly alone on a solo acoustic journey into his music history. The songs blend into each other and morph with mesmerising clarity into a continuous flow of music, creating a pure and intimate 48-minute listening experience. The 13-track album spans…
The first of this week’s sizzlers is the exciting creative collaboration of two rock icons from different generations. Face to Face is an album of original duets written by KT Tunstall and Suzi Quatro that covers themes of love and loss, fear and triumph – all essential to their experiences as groundbreaking women in rock.…
The first of this week’s soaraway six is The Price of Progress, which stands as The Hold Steady’s most sonically expansive record thus far while also remaining unmistakably them. The album showcases narrative rock’n’roll tales of ordinary people struggling and surviving in a modern world. The front and back of the album cover feature photographs…
The first of this week’s six peaches is And In The Darkness, Hearts Aglow, a celestial-influenced folk album that is Weyes Blood’s follow-up to the acclaimed Titanic Rising, an album that Pitchfork, NPR, and the Guardian admiringly named one of 2019’s best. While Titanic Rising was an observation of doom to come, And In The…