Our selection of the best new music across a range of genres from the week ending 23 August 2024.
With his 2021 self-titled debut, Andy Pastalaniec’s Chime School became one of the defining acts of the seemingly never-ending, prolific and multifaceted Bay Area pop scene. His sophomore LP, The Boy Who Ran the Paisley Hotel, is out now. Recorded by Pastalaniec himself, in his home studio on the foggy southern edge of San Francisco, Paisley Hotel sets a moodier tone; slowed and patiently unfolding in moments that highlight an evolution in songcraft, production and arrangement–while still bouncing along with the jangling drive Chime School fans have come to adore.
Melbourne/Naarm singer-songwriter Felicity Cripps Band has released her second album Chasing Volcanoes. Chasing Volcanoes was created over four years with Nick Huggins. It’s her first album since 2017, and during that time Cripps gave birth to her first child as well as owning and operating local Castlemaine arts institution Theatre Royal with her husband. The theme of the album is searching for a connection, both to this world and the spiritual world, and is a beguiling collection of shimmering, moving, warm pop-folk-indie-rock music.
Both Felix and Fanny Mendelssohn are celebrated in glittering style on Isata Kanneh-Mason plays music by the Mendelssohns, the new album from Isata Kanneh-Mason, also featuring the London Mozart Players directed by Jonathan Bloxham. “Mendelssohns” explores three facets of one of the most famous names in classical music: the glittering Piano Concerto No.1 by Felix with the London Mozart Players; the long-lost ‘Easter Sonata’ by his sister Fanny as well as transcriptions by other composers of Mendelssohn’s most famous music. In 2024, Isata featured in the critically acclaimed film ‘The Other Mendelssohn’, exploring the life of the exceptionally talented by overlooked Fanny Mendelssohn, later Fanny Hensel. In the film, they uncover the fact that the Easter Sonata, a piece lost for 150 years, was in fact written by Fanny, not Felix. Isata was the first artist to perform the work attributed to the correct composer. The album features this world premiere recording of the new urtext edition of Fanny Mendelssohn’s Easter Sonata. As well as beautiful solo piano transcriptions by Liszt (‘On Wings of Song’) and Rachmaninov (‘A Midsummer Night’s Dream’), and two of Felix’s ‘Songs Without Words’ and Fanny’s ‘Nocturne’, also for solo piano.
There are ghosts all across AVANTI, the debut album from Malice K – the record wades through a disarray of chaos and loss with a sharp-toothed fervor. At points it’s howling and unhinged, a grungy layer atop a lush foundation of melodic capital-s Songwriting akin to the golden-age pop of the ‘70s, but in other moments it dissolves into a gentle, wistful haunting. Malice K’s songs are blunt, uncomplicated and unflinching as he probes the interiority of memories, of mistakes – saturated with an innate intensity that sucks you into his gnarled and visceral world, so barbed it could draw blood.
Grammy-nominated saxophonist Godwin Louis explores the universality and joy of sacred music in his sophomore release, Psalms and Proverbs. Louis draws on religious musical traditions around the world, including his Haitian roots – Haiti being where European, African and Native traditions converged to create the roots of jazz. The disc includes gospel and liturgical music from West African Ewe and Beninois sources as well as 16th-century French composer Claude Goudimel (for a beautiful sax-trumpet duet), the Scottish-Anglican hymn “Abide with Me,” and compositions he wrote in collaboration with several ministers, including his late father, the Rev. Marcel Louis — Psalms 23 Part II (I Shall Fear No Evil)” and “Psalms 23 Part III (Surely Goodness and Mercy)”.
Out now on XL Recordings, ROMANCE is Fontaines D.C.’s first album with producer James Ford and is without doubt their most assured, inventive and sonically adventurous record yet. It’s set to build on the success of the Dublin-made, now London-based band’s acclaimed 2022 album Skinty Fia, which reached number 1 in the UK and Irish album charts and saw the band receiving a host of accolades including “International Group of the Year” at the 2023 BRIT Awards.
Psych-pop trio Psychic Lines have released their layered, expansive fifth studio album Sunset on Sunset out everywhere now. The LP sees the band expand their sound with bright production, glittering guitar riffs and evocative lyricism. Psychic Lines currently consists of Dann Baker (Love Camp 7, Eljin Marbles) on bass, Nancy Polstein (Girls on Grass) on drums, and Phil Jacob on guitar and alto sax. Whether accompanied by a band, fingerpicked guitar, or piano, Jacob’s songs often feel like short stories with unreliable narrators and characters that confuse the line between dream and reality. The result is reminiscent of Stephin Merritt and Leonard Cohen, with some of Warren Zevon’s self-deprecating humor and Randy Newman’s satire.
Other reviews you might enjoy:
- New music round-up (for w/e 20 August 2021)
- New music round-up (for w/e 15 November 2024)
- New music round-up (for w/e 1 December 2023)
David Edwards is the editor of The Blurb and a contributor on film and television
