These cousins from Melbourne, Kllo (rhymes with “flow”) return with a follow-up to their 2017 electro-pop debut, Breakthrough. As described in their bio, the two abandoned recording together late in 2018, following tours that took them around the world twice, unsure about their musical direction and focus. Drawn back together following a period of collaborations…
Described as a reflection on singer Wayne Coyne’s youthful upbringing in Oklahoma City, The Flaming Lips’ 16th album, American Head steps away from the bombastic sci-fi rock opera visions of 2002’s Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots and last year’s King’s Mouth to make a record of more reflective, often tender ballads akin to 1999’s The…
Sometimes simplicity is the key to great music and what you actually don’t hear can sometimes be the highlight. That is exactly what post-punk unit Sweeping Promises delivers on their debut album Hunger For A Way Out. The group’s swagger, controlled intensity and focused detail on the little things has the cup runneth over with…
The fact that we’re talking about the 17th album by Moby says a lot. Few artists have the distinction of taking a music form often limited to the club scene – dance, electronica, ambient – and giving it mainstream relevance, earning pop radio airplay in the bargain. Early artistic triumphs like Everything Is Wrong (1995),…
With women coming on strong in popular country music last year via strong feminist empowerment anthems from the Highwomen collaborative made up of Brandi Carlile, Amanda Shires, Natalie Hamby, and Maren Morris, and Carlile’s collaborative production giving Tanya Tucker a career reboot, you had to know that we were due to hear from one of…
As influential as UK post/punk rock band The Psychedelic Furs has been in modern music circles, it’s pretty surprising to look back at their discography and realize that the entirety of their studio recordings can be found on seven albums released over eleven years, between 1980 and 1991. The band’s string of hits – “Sister…
After the death of long-time Gang of Four leader and lead guitarist, Andy Gill, in February, the band released the posthumous EP This Heaven Gives Me Migraine. It included a few spoken words from Gibb, a new track that had been slated for their follow up to last year’s full-length Happy Now, another version of…
All Together Now is the Geelong-based quintet Beans (formally Baked Beans) follow up to their 2018 debut record Babble. The group has taken their already organ-driven psych-rock and perfected the formula as All Together Now is bigger, more addictive and dives deeper into the nostalgia of classic rock. Beans succeed because they absolutely play and…
It’s almost hard to say what’s more surprising here, that Taylor Swift dropped a surprise new album last Thursday that was entirely recorded in the months of this coronavirus pandemic quarantine, or that you’re reading about it here, where I primarily focus on independent rockers. However, when the 30 year old pop star turns to…
Like many of the innovative, influential women artists who carved out a name for themselves in the early days of modern rock & roll music – Sister Rosetta Tharpe, Nina Simone, Janis Joplin, Grace Slick, Joni Mitchell, Linda Ronstadt, Joan Jett – Chrissie Hynde is practically a force of nature unto herself. As she sang…
