7.8
Stefanie Joyce and Jon Hood Reviewed
October 30, 2025
Stefanie Joyce – Blindfold
How does a songwriter know when they’ve written a classic? I suspect that, among other things, listening back to the song makes them feel uncomfortable and makes them consider erasing the recording before anyone else gets a chance to…
Bonus Room and Dusty Joy Reviewed
October 24, 2025
Bonus Room – Blessed Be
Most of the truly great, wholly famous pop songs ever composed only contain three, four, maybe five chords. The vast majority of these songs can be picked up by an experienced musician within minutes. And, indeed, these musicians will be…
Florntenes and MJ Duke Reviewed
October 24, 2025
Florntenes – The News
It’s often said that rock n’ roll is a young man’s game. But for the most part, the people who keep saying this are either A&R people or famous rock stars. Both of these types tend to be old, wrinkled and look like they’re going…
Good Juice and Karlmer Reviewed
October 24, 2025
Good Juice – Never Backing Down
I can’t help it! It feels immensely satisfying to watch (and, of course, to hear) big corporations try to sell AI-made music to the masses and, for the most part, be wholly rejected. Sure, there will be exceptions. Some late-night…
Morning Wars and Goodspace Reviewed
October 24, 2025
Morning Wars – Man with a Gun
There’s a reason why 1960s pop-rock groups were so beloved. There must also be a way to explain why most of the music can, for some listeners, feel dated, sound like it belongs to a completely different era from the one in which…
Reverse Death and Lily Vakili Reviewed
October 24, 2025
Reverse Death – Lilies on the Water
Up in the really hard-to-get-into universities, they’re desperately studying ancient rituals, African voodoo, and the chants of Middle Eastern people. For many doing the research, this has stopped being an intellectual pursuit a…
Top 10 Songs by MGMT
October 22, 2025
MGMT earned its legend early on by being a band that could absolutely score a hit when it wanted to, but deciding that, nah, it didn’t actually need to. Through this approach, with and plenty of interesting, poppy, yet challenging music, MGMT must already be counted as…
Bells Deep - “Fog” Review
October 22, 2025
Bells Deep makes music that makes you feel sorry about the state of the world and glad that you’re hearing about it from particular sources and closing your ears to all others. If, indeed, for all these years, you’d have trusted most of the pop stars anxious to give you…
Top 10 Songs by Franz Ferdinand
October 16, 2025
Franz Ferdinand was, in many ways, as much an art project as it was a sham, much like Malcolm McLaren turning The Sex Pistols into superstars. But with the band now firmly, and comedically embracing middle age, it’s a fine time for me to recognise them as one of the…