As this month’s edition of theartsdesk on Vinyl appears the sun is blazing outside, a heatwave hits, and our record collections must hide in the shadows or warp. Yet still we want more to join them in their sheltered rows and where better to seek the greatest new releases than the longest, most complete monthly round-up of new vinyl releases. As ever, we run the gamut.

So theartsdesk on Vinyl reaches its 50th edition. That’s at least a novels’ worth of words. Maybe two! But we’re not stopping yet. The heat of the summer has arrived but the vinyl deluge hasn’t dried up, so check in for everything from Germanic electro to Scottish Seventies pop-rock to Japanese minyo music reimagined. And much more. All vinyl life is here. Dive in!

VINYL OF THE MONTH

Quantic Atlantic Oscillations (Tru Thoughts)

Nineteen years, seven albums and untold side projects into their career, Hot Chip have for the first time enlisted outside producers: Rodaidh McDonald and French disco/house don Philippe Zdar. And it's worked. Over the course of the previous albums, the band had steadily evolved from ramshackle and rather self-consciously quirky writers and players to a far slicker operation.

Over the past two decades, Brighton’s Fujiya & Miyagi have managed, without fanfare or fuss, to amass an enviable back catalogue of linear, krautrock driven grooves dresses in slinky, drop-shouldered pop melodies. 

It’s a formula that has served them well and has proved elastic enough for them to grow without it ever seeming to give at the seams. This is, in part, due to an admirable sense of simplicity that reached a peak on 2017’s self-titled near-masterpiece (in fact a compilation of three EPs). 

Now going for over a dozen years, ever-busier since Live Nation took over its parent company in 2015, The Great Escape Festival is the annual multi-venue band showcase and music conference which sees Brighton swamped with music biz sorts.

Pet Shop Boys are never shy of producing stylishly conceived fan mementos. Coming not long after Faber & Faber’s hardback collection of Neil Tennant’s lyrics, this four-disc set is just such a slice of lovingly rendered memorabilia. After well over three decades in the game – but one since they had a Top 20 hit song – the duo retain a devoted following, ever eager to invest in whatever they’re up to.

The French have developed an international reputation for a certain smooth style of electronic music. It’s the place where disco and house collide with something more urbane and far less sweaty. Daft Punk provided a defining moment with their 2013 album Random Access Memories, but the sound referred to is touched upon all the way from the louche downtempo of Air to more recent yacht rock sumptuousness from Papooz.

The Drums appeared a decade ago out of New York, riding a media froth about indie music to critical acclaim and, at least for their debut album, some degree of commercial success. They were a four-piece who owed a large debt to New Order but had enough of their own pizzazz to look promising.

As collaborations go, it’s a doozy. Karen O’s signature vocals over Danger Mouse’s production – it was always going to pique interest. And Lux Prima does much to meet expectations, gorgeous cinematic soundscapes that flit between haunting and defiant. At its best, its damn near mesmerising. But for those expecting a genre-defying, structure-blowing new horizon, it falls just short.

Although American, Sparks’ initial commercial breakthrough was in the UK where their rococo art-rock chimed with ears attuned to, say, Roxy Music. Their sensibility has always been more European than American. In 2009 they issued an album titled The Seduction of Ingmar Bergman. Its theme was a flight of fancy which took the Swedish director to Hollywood. Later, in 2015, Sparks and Franz Ferdinand collaborated as FFS. As ever, Sparks were a bridge between Europe and the USA.