Album: Morcheeba - Escape the Chaos

★★★ MORCHEEBA - ESCAPE THE CHAOS The trip hop perennials, delivered with tunes and ease

More of the same from the trip hop perennials but delivered with tunes and ease

Morcheeba reach their 30th anniversary this year. The 1990s band, a unit once synonymous with phrases such as “trip hop” and “chill-out”, are up to album number 11. Their multi-million-selling oeuvre is based around a hazy combination of low-slung hip hop beats, stoned electronic atmospherics, spacey, slightly John Barry wah-wah guitar, and the luxurious voice of frontwoman Skye Edwards.

Album: Ammar 808 - Club Tounsi

Tunisian country roots meet urban tech

Ammar 808 is the high octane vehicle for the Tunisian-born producer Sofyann Ben Youssef, now based in Denmark. His first album Maghreb United (2018) struck hard and fast in a field already well-populated by the fusion of traditional Arab sounds and modern electronics. It was a marriage made in heaven. His second album Global Control/Invisible Invasion (2020) explored links with South Indian sounds, but in the latest, he returns to his roots and the result is a frenetic and very danceable mix of ancient and modern.

Album: MØ - Plæygirl

Scandinavian singer injects a dash of outsider melancholy into her fizzing electro-pop

Danish singer MØ is a paradox. Initially she appeared to be another Scandi electro-pop princess of the bangers. The monster 2015 hit “Lean On” with Major Lazer jacked her profile, briefly, through the roof, but, while she’s worked with everyone from Iggy Azalea to DJ Benny Benassi, she seemed to step sideways from pure pop, tempering it with something more Nordic and melancholy. Her fourth album persuasively continues in this direction.

Album: Alley Cat - The Widow Project

★★★★ ALLEY CAT - THE WIDOW PROJECT Quiver in the shadows with dubstep auteur

Enter a haunted factory and quiver in the shadows with a dubstep auteur

If the names Pinch, Vex’d, Burial, Digital Mystikz, The Bug mean anything to you, stop reading now and buy or stream this album. Seriously, go. Go get it. That honestly is all you need to know: if you like the imperial phase when British dubstep was first establishing lasting artistic careers and extending its tendrils into the wider musical world – completely separately from its branching into a fizzy, EDM / rave form in big arenas – then you will love this record.

Aurora Orchestra, Collon, Drumsheds review - surround-sound magic in the super-club

★★★★ AURORA ORCHESTRA, COLLON, DRUMSHEDS Surround-sound magic in the super-club

On a vast dancefloor, the chance to listen from inside the orchestra

Every lover of folk-tales knows that the seeker has to endure dangers and setbacks before they finally win the prize. Last night, the ever-enterprising Aurora Orchestra played The Firebird – Stravinsky’s own musical vision of the intrepid hero who outwits the forces of darkness – on a unique site that presents an audience with its own kind of ordeals. Once the Tottenham IKEA, Drumsheds has undergone a metamorphosis from super-store to super-club.

Album: Caribou - Honey

★★★★ CARIBOU - HONEY The psychedelic indie-dance individualist still setting off fireworks

Almost a quarter century in, the psychedelic indie-dance individualist still setting off fireworks

Dan Snaith’s career has been a joyous thing to watch. Almost a quarter of a century the Canadian started out as Manitoba (soon renamed to Caribou) making a giddy mixture of dreamy ‘60s psychedelic pop, glitchy electronica and then cutting-edge dance music.

Moby, O2 review - ebullient night of rave'n'rock'n'Johnny Cash

★★★ MOBY, O2 Ebullient night of rave'n'rock'n'Johnny Cash

The millennial electronic star returns with his first European tour in over a decade

Sometimes a gig suddenly and completely elevates. Such is the case tonight when Moby, on his first UK tour in 12 years, plays “Extreme Ways”, his 2002 anthem for hedonism and its desperate consequences. What has been an adequately entertaining night blossoms into something more riveting. The 20,000-strong O2 crowd, previously mostly seated, rise en masse, move and sing along. The place is a-buzz.

Album: Jamie xx - In Waves

Get right on one, matey, with a glorious capturing of dancefloor dissolution of self

There’s been a lot of early 90s rave aesthetics in popular culture lately, but an awful lot of it has been at the level of signifiers. Fila, Stüssy, Air Max 90s, smiley faces, sirens, rewinds, crowd noises, hop in a Ford Cortina, tribes coming together, dancing at dawn, baggy hoodies for goalposts, isn’t it, wasn’t it, hmm? There’s been a little less discussed, though, about what raving actually felt like, and in particular that it its revolutionary character came from everyone having the same feeling of being on the same drug at the same time.