Review: Elephant Stone new album Back Into the Dream

Start­ing with a base point of indie-psych, Cana­di­an out­fit Ele­phant Stone’s sound radi­ates out, mor­ph­ing along the way into oth­er gen­res. Rishi Dhir, the band’s front man, sitar and bass play­er plus pro­lif­ic song­writer, remains stead­fast­ly at the helm, con­tin­u­ing to steer their sound in mul­ti­ple direc­tions – not least of all the con­cept album,…

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Bill Ryder-Jones releases If Tomorrow Starts Without Me

A new track has just been released by Bill Ryder-Jones. Called ‘If Tomor­row Starts With­out Me’, it’s the sec­ond track tak­en from his forth­com­ing fifth album Iechyd Da, Jan­u­ary 12th. There will also be a run of solo in-store dates for Jan­u­ary. The sim­plis­tic yet mov­ing phrase of ‘If Tomor­row Starts With­out Me’ is something…

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Firestations UK tour after latest album release

Dream-pop band Firesta­tions released their fifth album called Thick Ter­rain on July 14th on Lost Map, on lim­it­ed-edi­­tion 12” vinyl and dig­i­tal plat­forms. The album is a “clear-eyed and bold state­ment, deft­ly com­bin­ing big ideas with pop sen­si­bil­i­ties in a cap­ti­vat­ing way”. And you can catch Firesta­tions live, start­ing 30th August (venues and dates below). Thick Ter­rain is…

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Sparks new tour and album

It’s an excit­ing moment when we hear of new work… and a tour by Sparks. Endur­ing­ly bril­liant, Sparks return this year with a tour, so be ready on your key­boards (with your cof­fee) very soon…  Hav­ing pre­vi­ous­ly announced 2 nights at London’s Roy­al Albert Hall and 3 per­for­mances at Pri­mav­era Sound Fes­ti­val in Spain and Portugal,…

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Beans on Toast with new album and books for kids

I expect that Beans on Toast, the pop­u­lar folky fes­ti­val artist, will be ton­ing down the sweary lan­guage in his new series of chil­dren’s books. Called The Fas­ci­nat­ing Adven­tures Of Lit­tle Bee, the books will be com­ing out in time for Christ­mas, launch­ing on Decem­ber 1st, and there’s an accom­pa­ny­ing album too. Beans on Toast –…

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Alabaster dePlume new song ‘Mrs Calamari’

There’s a lot of music out there designed to bring down the heart rate, still the breath­ing, calm the soul and send you to a pleas­ant and nour­ish­ing place. There is one artist, an eccen­tric, car­ing and exot­ic being, who has made work which def­i­nite­ly has this effect: Alabaster dePlume, poet per­former has pre­vi­ous form…

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Aftertouch: magical new album from Absolutely Free

Emerg­ing from a misty and dreamy land­scape comes the sec­ond album from Cana­di­an out­fit Absolute­ly Free called After­touch, released Sep­tem­ber 24 on Boiled Records. The band caught my atten­tion ear­li­er in the year with the thought-pro­­vok­ing sin­gle How to Paint Clouds – the sec­ond track on this new release. Absolute­ly Free, com­pris­ing the core trio…

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Kinbote album release: Shifting Distance

Kin­bote – oth­er­wise known as found-sound sam­pling glitch-pop pro­duc­er Matt Gibb – released a quirky and intrigu­ing sin­gle called Hiemalis in the sum­mer, reviewed on Gourmet Gigs. And on 4th Decem­ber he launched his album called Shift­ing Dis­tance. The cov­er of Shift­ing Dis­tance fea­tures slices of scenery, tan­ta­lis­ing but unable to be grasped and expe­ri­enced in…

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Poetic drama: Sylvette release album Stiller than Still

I have to cred­it Chris Hawkins’ ear­ly morn­ing show on Radio 6 Music for intro­duc­ing me to the Man­ches­ter band Syl­vette. The slinky, crys­talline notes of their new sin­gle Kelpius cut through the ear­ly morn­ing blur and I was instant­ly wide awake. Music as caf­feine.  The album Stiller than Still, the band’s sec­ond album, was…

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New single Light Me Up by The Coronas

The Coro­nas released their new sin­gle Light Me Up on 17 July. It is the lat­est song to be revealed from their new album True Love Waits, released 31st July. The sin­gle fol­lows the crit­i­cal­ly acclaimed duet with Gabrielle Aplin called Lost In the Thick Of It.  The band has also announced that all their…

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