Pre-sale of the week: The Beths – Expert In A Dying Field, out 16 September

On The Beths’ new album, Expert In A Dying Field, Elizabeth Stokes’ songwriting positions her somewhere between being a novelist and a documentarian. The songs collected here are autobiographical, but they’re also character sketches of relationships – platonic, familial, romantic – and, more importantly, their aftermaths. The shapes and ghosts left in absences. The question…

Pre-sale of the week: Tim Burgess – Typical Music, out 23 September

Has there been a busier musician over the last two years? A more prolific artist? More creative? More heroic? Tim Burgess – as self-effacing a band leader, solo star, label runner, repeat memoirist and all-round caffeinated can-do kid as you’ll find – would certainly shrink from that last accolade. “A hero??” he’d likely mutter with…

Pre-sale of the week: Amanda Shires – Take It Like A Man, out 29 July

Take It Like A Man is a fearless confessional featuring 10 emotionally raw tracks from Amanda Shires, produced by the talented gender-fluid singer-songwriter and producer, Lawrence Rothman (Angel Olsen, Girl in Red, Courtney Love). Upon hearing Amanda for the first time Lawrence said: “I was just mesmerized. I thought she was the new Dolly Parton;…

Pre-sale of the week: Death Cab For Cutie – Asphalt Meadows, out 16 September

Formed in Bellingham, WA in 1997, Death Cab For Cutie almost immediately entered the ranks of the era’s definitive bands, fueled in large part by the remarkable power of co-founder, vocalist, guitarist, and lead songwriter Benjamin Gibbard’s complex, often bittersweet songcraft. Asphalt Meadows, their tenth studio album, finds them exploring further into their own unique…

Pre-sale of the week: black midi – Hellfire, out 15 July

black midi’s new album, Hellfire, builds on the melodic and harmonic elements of last year’s Cavalcade, while expanding the brutality and intensity of their debut, Schlagenheim. It is their most thematically cohesive and intentional album yet. Note: The LP is initially available on clear red vinyl with a bonus flexi, exclusive to independent shops. Click…