Author: Andy Peterson Page 9
Samiyam - Sam Baker's Album
Part of the Brainfeeder label's non beardy and and only kinda weirdy roster along with the likes of Tokimonsta, The Gaslamp Killer and Thundercat, Sam Baker (AKA Samiyam) comes originally not from Southern California but...
Review posted on 9th November 2011
Blanck Mass - Blanck Mass
When initially researching Blanck Mass I came across a cache of YouTube videos, one of which had a comment something like "Sounds like the theme tune to Blade Runner". Try as I might to dislodge...
Review posted on 9th November 2011
Flogging Molly - Speed Of Darkness
Watching the spirit of protest being drained out of music's mainstream over the last 20 years has been one of its least appealing trends; a few largely sidelined mavericks aside (The likes of Bjork, M.I.A.,...
Review posted on 9th November 2011
Various Artists - R&S Records - IOTDXI
The global recession, environmental disaster and the battery life of the iPhone 4S - none of these things are probably bothering Andy Whitaker and Dan Foat, supremos of the revitalised R&S label. Founded in Belgium...
Review posted on 8th November 2011
Penguin Prison - Penguin Prison
Pop. It's an odd kingdom at the bets of times. It has Kings and Queens, Princesses and Plantagenets. The currency is youth and it's always had a language completely of its own making. Just lately...
Review posted on 17th October 2011
L-Vis 1990 - Neon Dreams
Maybe it's a bit early for a changing of the guard at the the top of the club music empire, but with the kings of the late noughties ouevre now off in different directions (As...
Review posted on 27th September 2011
The Chain - Lostwithiel
Founded in Belgium, the R&S label were one of the coolest and most progressive techno labels of the early 90's - get your uncle to dig out his copy of their moment defining 1994 compilation...
Review posted on 24th August 2011
Death Cab For Cutie - Codes And Keys
Whoever said that the meek shall inherit the earth would have probably felt pretty vindicated when Death Cab For Cutie's previous album, 2008's Narrow Stairs, reached the top of the US album charts on release....
Review posted on 17th August 2011
Whirl - Distressor
Far more influential than its brief creative and commercial peak in the early 90's would suggest, the shoegaze movement left behind a number of artefacts still worth taking a detour for today, not least My...
Review posted on 16th August 2011
Ford & Lopatin - Channel Pressure (Software Records)
Is it 1979 again? That's what the Gary Numan-esque style of Joel Ford and Daniel Lopatin immediately sounds like on Channel Pressure. Formerly Games, until legal disputes with the West-Coast rapper forced them into just...
Review posted on 2nd August 2011
Iron Maiden - From Fear To Eternity - The Best Of 1990 - 2010
Fans: Iron Maiden have them. There's the 3,867,811 of them on Facebook for a start (That's almost twice the number of those giving it up for those whippersnappers the Arctic Monkeys), whilst in the course...
Review posted on 28th July 2011
Duran Duran - All You Need Is Now
You have to feel sorry for Simon Le Bon - well, ok may be sorry is bit of a stretch, but how about concerned then. I make this somewhat dubious statement because whilst the Duran...
Review posted on 25th July 2011
Memory Tapes - Player Piano
They'd probably be offended - or more likely remain completely totally non-plussed - but of all the fascinating acts to emerge from America in the last few years, surely the most influential right now has...
Review posted on 18th July 2011
Blood Arm - Turn And Face Me
The last time we came across LA four piece The Blood Arm was on 2007's Suspicious Charachter, a song whose opening line was "I like all the girls, and all the girls like me" -...
Review posted on 12th July 2011
Washed Out - Within and Without
Everyone has a story, and for native Georgian Ernest Greene it began towards the end of 2009 when he moved back home to his parents house from South Carolina, his folks being situated in a...
Review posted on 4th July 2011
Okkervil River - I Am Very Far
The term "Overnight sensations" certainly can't be applied to Okkervil River; I Am Very Far is Texans sixth album in a thirteen year career so far, and one which fans have had to wait patiently...
Review posted on 27th June 2011
The Tunics - Dabbler's Handbook
Almost in spite of some of the rhetoric in their press release - hokey stuff about reclaiming the soul of pop music from droning synths using just charisma and a few carefully chosen chords -...
Review posted on 21st June 2011
The Click Five - TCV
There is something inexplicable in the circular nature of pop culture; the more and more people are exposed to it's changing dynamic, the more they seem to reject it and head for the hills. By...
Review posted on 16th June 2011
Foster The People - Torches
When I look back, I've no real idea how I stumbled across Pumped Up Kicks by Foster The People, sometime last year. At that point there was no official video, in fact it probably hadn't...
Review posted on 16th June 2011
Various Artists - Trentemoller's Late Night Tales
Dane Ander Trentemoller created a minor stir in electronica circles with his 2006 debut The Last Resort, an exercise in minamalist techno which owed a debt to Riche Hawtin's work as Plastikman. Taking the road...
Review posted on 6th June 2011
Kraak & Smaak - Electric Hustle
Being honest, the omens weren't good. Aside from the obvious nudge-wink implications of their name, that Kraak and Smaak were actually a trio of Dutchmen seemed to have musical portents of either a head crushing...
Review posted on 26th May 2011
Tokimonsta - Creature Dreams
It may well be a cliché, but we here at Contact Music believe that the world is divided into two groups of people: those who have heard and been fascinated by the music of Steven...
Review posted on 24th May 2011
Brookes Brothers - Brookes Brothers
"Hull?" said David Jason. "What the bloody hell am I doing in Hull?". The plot you may not remember; as the mercurial entrepreneur Del Trotter, his character had been deposited after a suitably farcical chain...
Review posted on 19th May 2011
Sin Fang - Summer Echoes
No matter how much the erstwhile brewers of cider try to convince us of the contrary, summer time in Britain is unquestionably the season which brings out the very worst in the nation's Id. Leaving...
Review posted on 16th May 2011
Ancient Astronauts - Into Bass And Time
Whenever we think of Germans and dance music the image of a guy called Rolf covered in day-glo paint and blowing a whistle springs to mind, however unfairly. Ancient Astronauts - duo Tom Strauch and...
Review posted on 12th May 2011
Dreadzone - The Good, The Bad And The Dread
Formed out of the ashes of Mick Jones post-Clash outfit Big Audio Dynamite, Dreadzone didn't exactly rule the charts during the middle of the 90's, but with their use of reggae, dub, techno and rock...
Review posted on 11th May 2011
Paradise Lost - Draconian Time - Legacy Edition
The general rule of thumb should always be to avoid re-issues when the word "Seminal" is dropped in to the accompanying PR blurb. Nine times out of the word is being misused, applied to an...
Review posted on 4th May 2011
Roxette - Charm School
Charm School is Roxette's eighth album, but more significantly the first for Swedish duo Per Gessle and Marie Fredrikssen since the latter fought a successful battle with cancer in the middle of the last decade....
Review posted on 26th April 2011
Sophie Barker - Seagull
Forever damned with the handle "The girl who sang on that really great chill out song" (The track in question being Destiny by Zero 7, from their Mercury-nominated debut album Simple Things), Sophie Barker's career...
Review posted on 26th April 2011
Innerpartysystem - Never Be Content
Now signed to the Red Bull label (Set up by the drinks manufacturer to tap into the young male audience, it says here) after being ditched...er, parting company with Island after 2008's eponymous only major...
Review posted on 12th April 2011
Suggested
Leisure Festival - Dreamland in Margate
On the same day that Glastonbury welcomed back Margate's adopted sons, The Libertines, Margate itself put on it's very own Leisure Festival as it...
Pretty Fierce talk to us about collaborating with Doja Cat, emetophobia, arena tours and staying "true to yourself" [EXCLUSIVE]
Sheffield's very own all girl group Pretty Fierce are still on a high after the recent release of their debut single - 'Ready For Me'.
Will Varley & Jack Valero - The Astor Theatre Deal Live Review
Three nights before the end of his current tour Will Varley returned to his home town of Deal to delight a sold out crowd in The Astor Theatre.
WYSE talks to us about her "form of synaesthesia", collaborating with Radiohead's Thom York and the prospect of touring with a band [EXCLUSIVE]
With only a few days to go before Portsmouth based songstress and producer WYSE releases her new single, 'Belladonna', we caught up with her to find...
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Bay Bryan talks to us about being a "wee queer ginger", singing with Laura Marling and being inspired by Matilda [EXCLUSIVE]
Colorado raised, Glasgow educated and Manchester based Bay Bryan is nothing if not a multi-talented, multi-faceted artist performing as both...
Keelan X talks to us about staying true to "your creative vision", collaborating with Giorgio Moroder and being "a yoga nut" [EXCLUSIVE]
Former Marigolds band member Keelan Cunningham has rediscovered his love of music with his new solo project Keelan X.
![Luke De-Sciscio talks to us about having the courage to be yourself, forgiving that which is outside of one's control and following whims [EXCLUSIVE]](https://images.contactmusic.com/images/home/homepage/luke-de-sciscio-abof-a.jpg "Luke De-Sciscio talks to us about having the courage to be yourself, forgiving that which is outside of one's control and following whims [EXCLUSIVE]")
Luke De-Sciscio talks to us about having the courage to be yourself, forgiving that which is outside of one's control and following whims [EXCLUSIVE]
Wiltshire singer-songwriter Luke De Sciscio, formally known as Folk Boy, is set to release is latest album - 'The Banquet' via AntiFragile Music on...
Annie Elise talks to us about the challenges a female producer has to face and "going through a year of grief and sickness" [EXCLUSIVE]
Electronic music pioneer and producer Annie Elise says that the release of her first EP - 'Breathe In, Breathe Out' feels "both vulnerable and...
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