Massive Champion review | Getdown Services shake off the joke band tag
Self-written, self-produced and self-recorded, Getdown Services' second album is more ambitious than their cult debut, Crisps, without losing what made it work.
Reviews
Anatomy of a Brief Romance review | Bloc Party get Trevor Horn to polish a breakup
Trevor Horn, the producer behind Grace Jones and Pet Shop Boys, helped Bloc Party turn Kele Okereke's breakup into fourteen songs in strict chronological order.
Half-Told Tales review | Arab Strap are still angry, and now they have a brass section
Aidan Moffat says the title Half-Told Tales sounds like a children's book until the final track. Arab Strap's ninth album closes on a list of facts about time.
Act III review | Kasabian still don't know who they are, and that's fine
Critics gave Kasabian's ninth album 80 out of 100. Fans landed closer to 62. The gap comes down to whether this still sounds like the same band.
Something Real review | The Guest List reject the algorithm that made them
Something Real is The Guest List's debut album. Here's how the Manchester band's eleven tracks hold up, track by track.
This Mirror Weighs a Ton review | Interpol finally turn the camera on themselves
The cover of This Mirror Weighs a Ton is a chandelier made of CCTV cameras. Twenty-five years in, Interpol finally turn some of that scrutiny back on themselves.
DMA's review | Twelve years in, DMA's finally put their name on it
Twelve years and four albums in, DMA's have never put their own name on a record. This one breaks that streak, right as they sign their first major global label deal.
A Hole to See the Sky Through review | Mystery Jets build a record around a postcard
Blaine Harrison kept a postcard of a Yoko Ono artwork by his front door for years. Mystery Jets' seventh album grew out of it, one room at a time.
Moby at Labyrinth On The Thames | An appreciation of electronic music’s seminal figure
Surrounded by the extraordinary setting of Greenwich’s Old Royal Naval College, Moby pays homage to UK culture – and demonstrates why, in many ways, he’s an underappreciated force.
Sunshine review | Jungle find odd corners inside a settled sound
The title track on Sunshine builds its groove out of keys that sound almost eight-bit, a small, odd choice inside Jungle's most straightforwardly summery song yet.
The Sweet Goodbye review | Opus Kink bury real feeling under the punchline
Opus Kink's debut took roughly eight years to finish. The cover looks like a crime scene; almost nothing inside sounds like it's mourning anything.
Halcyon Blues review | Citizen pull from every era at once
Citizen's last album is the one nobody much talks about. Halcyon Blues doesn't apologise for it, it just quietly proves the band remembers how to do everything else.
Cannonball review | Six people, one very crowded - but good - debut
Man/Woman/Chainsaw spent four years playing to rooms that barely noticed. Their debut, produced by Margo Broom and Seth Evans, makes it very hard to ignore them now.
Pure Devotion review | Overmono break their gear, keep their sound
Overmono spent part of making Pure Devotion trying to break their own equipment. Tom and Ed Russell pushed two synthesizers and an effects...
The Thread review | Five months on from her last album, Willow slows right down | whynow
Willow released The Thread five months after her last album. It's her eighth solo record and easily the least hurried-sounding of the two.
Reality Awaits review | Nine songs, no consensus
Reality Awaits is nine songs long and somehow still feels too long to some critics. Others think it's the most cohesive thing The Strokes have made in years. Both are right about different parts of it.
Different When It's Silent review | The Tricky album where Tricky goes missing
Recorded quietly between France and Bristol with singer Mitch Sanders throughout, Different When It's Silent is Tricky's 15th album, and the one where he disappears into his own record on purpose.
You're Gonna Need A Little Music review | Yard Act burn the Rover and build a studio
Yard Act's teaser trailer showed their famous old Rover going up in flames. Their third album, recorded live together as a full band for the first time, sounds like the aftermath.
Sungazer review | The Temper Trap finally learn to slow down
The first song The Temper Trap wrote when they reunited was 'Kuru' - the closing track on Sungazer, not the first. Eight years after burnout ended their run, it's the sound of a band that finally learned patience.
Frozen Charlotte review | Jack White proves some things shouldn't change
Jack White's Frozen Charlotte reviewed: how Victorian folklore and a road-tested touring band built his most focused solo record since the White Stripes.
The Black Parade is alive | My Chemical Romance deliver jaw-dropping night in Liverpool
Onstage executions, suicide vests, a new verse in 'Mama' and Gerard Way crawling into a corpse outline: My Chemical Romance's Black Parade show at Anfield Stadium was everything it needed to be.
Role Model Hermit review | Mary in the Junkyard announce themselves with one of the year's best debuts
Clari Freeman-Taylor and Saya Barbaglia met at classical music summer camps when they were fourteen, and both play cello and viola alongside their...
The Ground Above review | Beth Orton has earned the right to say 'what has kept me alive is feral invincibility'
Self-produced and built around a remarkable cast of collaborators including Adrian Utley, Tom Skinner and Shahzad Ismaily, The Ground Above is Beth Orton's most physically present and most emotionally direct record. The opener sets a bar the rest nearly clears.
Your Day Will Come review | The same title, a better album, and music that sounds like nothing else right now
Shane Lavers called his second album the same thing as his first. The question he kept asking himself while writing it was whether love is enough to survive the state of the world. Your Day Will Come (2026) does not answer that question, which turns out to be the right decision.
Castle Park review | Charming, modest and occasionally inoffensive: Graham Coxon's long-overdue pop record
Flamenco, Motown, Scott Walker vibraphone and a whistling solo: Castle Park is Graham Coxon doing exactly what he wants with no audience in mind. It sounds like it, in the best possible way.
Hum review | Swim Deep make their finest record fifteen years in, on their own terms
Five albums deep and still working day jobs, Swim Deep return with Bill Ryder-Jones producing and their most emotionally grounded record yet. 'Mud' alone justifies the fifteen-year wait. The occasional moment of caution is the only thing standing between this and something genuinely great.
Inferno review | Thirteen years of silence and Boards of Canada come back angrier, darker and better than ever
Morse code, unmarked VHS tapes, and thirteen years of near-total silence. Inferno is Boards of Canada's most direct and most menacing record, a 70-minute occult document that ends on a human heartbeat and lands harder than anything they've made since Geogaddi. Worth every year of the wait.
For Love of Grace & the Hereafter review | Iceage stop apologising for being good at this
Five years since Seek Shelter, Iceage return with an album that trades productive nihilism for something more complicated: actual hope. 'Ember', 'Star' and 'No Fear' are the strongest singles run of their career. The mid-album dips slightly. The closer lands hard.
Experimental Rap review | JPEGMafia is still the most interesting rapper alive, for about 12 of these 25 tracks
Total creative control, 25 tracks, and a rollout designed to antagonise the press. Experimental Rap is JPEGMafia at his most unfiltered and his most uneven. When it works, nobody else sounds like it. When it doesn't, it's a long way down.
Blue Morpho review | Ed O'Brien steps out of Radiohead's shadow and into his own
Made during the worst depression of his life and released under his own name for the first time, Blue Morpho is Ed O'Brien's most personal and most fully realised solo record. Paul Epworth produces. Shabaka Hutchings plays flute. The closer alone is worth the price of entry.
