No Frills Reviews

James Redmond – Video City 2

Redmond is a veteran of the Liverpool music scene, having played with members of The Coral, The La’s, and The Zutons – a couple of who feature here. His debut is a semi-concept album taking inspiration from a pre-internet age where video shops, VHS tapes, and arcade games ruled. Each track is like a vignette providing a window into a new scene; from Spaghetti Western standoffs to Super Mario-themed raps. It’s a real record collector’s record and the highlights come when you can hear the varying influences merging; like the 50’s novelty hit turned Sci-Fi banger, The Fang, or the Beatles meets Crosby, Still, & Nash of Will She Meet Me. Fun, easy, and inventive, with some exceptional moments to top it off.

Top Tune: Will She Meet Me

Motorbike – Motorbike

Motorbike are an underground supergroup from Cincinnati who recorded this within their first few rehearsals together. Given their relative unfamiliarity, this is surprisingly fully-formed, while retaining an undoubtedly raw edge. Gritty garage punk is the order of the day, but there’s a smattering of flavours from rock history thrown in along the way. From the charging proto-punk of The Stooges, to Buzzcocks-style power pop, to Petty-ish heartland rock, just to name a few. An all-action, no-nonsense reminder of what you love about rock music.

Top Tune: Spring Grove

Celestial North – Otherworld

Sometimes the names and titles used by an artist tell you everything you need to know; these songs sound exactly like their titles suggest they should sound like. The Lake District-based, Scottish artist combines elements of folk, electronica, and dream pop, to create soundscapes which are appropriately cosmic and otherworldly, yet are a celebration of nature as much as anything. Big anthemic choruses emerge amidst ritualistic rhythms and hushed moments of ethereal beauty. An album that’ll make you want to escape into the woods for a campfire-lit rave.

Top Tune: Olympic Skies

Arborist – An Endless Sequence of Dead Zeros

Belfast’s Mark McCambridge aka Arborist begins his third album with a disorientating psychedelic trip, which slightly stands at odds with what follows, yet strangely sets the scene. Throughout, there’s a sense of everything being off-kilter. A line like “Is he taking the piss?” really shouldn’t be delivered as nicely as it is on standout Matisse. This is often desperate and tormented songwriting but rendered with a gently upbeat, understated beauty. An excellent experiment in folksy Americana, where nothing is quite as it seems.

Top Tune: Matisse

Thrillhouse – Something About This Place

On their debut, Brighton’s Thrillhouse deliver an album about getting older, but not quite growing up. About longing for a simpler past that’s just out of reach. This melancholic undertone is contrasted by a sense of forward momentum musically. While the lyrics can feel hopeless, they’re set against a triumphant backdrop of stinging riffs and big sing-along choruses. A kind of Springsteen-style bombast washed over with the laid-back, hazy Americana of The War On Drugs. It sounds like an American road trip; or at least how I imagine, as someone who’s never been on an American road trip.

Top Tune: Something About This Place

HOUSE Of ALL – HOUSE Of ALL

A band formed of alumni from across 40-years of notoriously turbulent lineups of Manchester greats, The Fall. I’ve seen a couple of reviews say that they don’t sound like The Fall but… nah, they clearly do. And that’s certainly no bad thing, because The Fall were fucking great. It’s ok to sound like another band, particularly when that other band is pretty much your reason for being. Frontman, Martin Bramah may not actually sound like Mark E. Smith, but he takes on his vocal inflections and lyrical tone; bizarre abstract poetry that feels as nonsensical as it is insightful. And the band lock into Fall-like grooves; swirling guitar lines, and driving, repetitious rhythms that verge into psychedelia through sheer stubbornness. Whether they intended to sound like The Fall or not is kind of irrelevant as this was always going to be compared to them, and thankfully this album would stand up alongside the classics in their back catalogue.

Top Tune: Magic Sound

Miranda and the Beat – Miranda & The Beat

The Brooklyn-based band produce the kind of scuzzy garage rock that continues in the lineage of leather jacket-wearing, whiskey-soaked rebels and weirdos from classic rock history. Front-woman, Miranda Zipse’s voice is a mix of raspy rock growls, aloof swagger, and heart-rending laments. While the music feels rooted in the past, it’s a surprisingly versatile tour through its influences. From the Stooges-evoking sleaze of Sweat, to the organ-heavy streak of Doors-y psych that runs throughout, to stuttery punk freakouts. But the real standouts come in their sweetest moments, like the lo-fi soul lullaby, Don’t Feel The Same, or when they suddenly turn into a Phil Spector girl group on Not My Guy. This album feels like you’ve just uncovered a treasure chest of late 60’s lost classics.

Top Tune: Not My Guy

Rogue Jones – Dos Bebés

On their second album, Welsh husband and wife duo, Rogue Jones, invite you into their world. As demonstrated by the contrasting outfits on the cover, it’s a world where the everyday and the mundane are injected with a sense of mysticism and magic. The album alternates between Welsh and English in an almost restless manner, which is mirrored in the stylistic detours. It takes in slow-burn orchestral epics, sparse electronica, Kate Bush-y pop and, of course, stripped-back folk ballads about Matt Le Tissier. With the potential language barrier and the quirkiness of the music it feels like it should be a challenging listen, but it’s actually really accessible and full of sing-along moments; even if you don’t quite know what you’re singing along to.

Top Tune: Off By One

Class – If You’ve Got Nothing

This album from Arizonans, Class, feels like it could have been released about 40 years ago. It’s rooted in the sounds of that first wave of late 70’s punk and some of the power pop that followed. It’s a very British sound; indebted to the likes of Buzzcocks and The Only Ones, with a hint of revivalism about it. And I’m not saying this as a negative, because they’ve produced a pretty great version of that sound. Every song here is packed with big choruses, hooks, riffs, and a barrage of machine gun drumming. And there’s an undercurrent of melancholia which can catch you off guard as they toss out lines almost nonchalantly, like “Another year sober, with nothing to show”. Fast, fun, and disarmingly philosophical.

Top Tune: As If It’d Even the Score

Allie Crow Buckley – Utopian Fantasy

The second album from LA songwriter, Allie Crow Buckley, is a slow-burner but it’s worth sticking with as its brooding beauty slowly unfurls. Her songwriting combines hyper-referential world-building, where she swims with Brian Jones’ ghost and stays up all night dancing to Led Zeppelin, with epically poetic love songs. This is set against a dream-pop backdrop, all ethereal vocals with a hazy minimalistic cool underpinning everything. Like Lana Del Rey fronting Beach House.

Top Tune: Cowboy in London