Album: Bastille - Give Me the Future

★★★ BASTILLE - GIVE ME THE FUTURE A sometimes persuasive spec-fic concept album

Dan Smith's pop success story delivers a sometimes persuasive spec-fic concept album

Since exploding to fame a decade ago with the single “Pompeii” and its parent album Bad Blood, Bastille have maintained impressive success on both sides of the Atlantic. To this writer’s ears, the bombast of their early music was off-putting, and the voice of songwriter and frontman Dan Smith unpleasant.

Album: MØ - Motordrome

Scandi-pop mainstay adds a dash of indie despondence to her third album

Danish pop star MØ is as well known for her collaborations as her own music. Shining brighter than all of them is the globe-slaying, 24 carat dance craze "Lean On” from 2015, created with Major Lazer and DJ Snake, and, for a few years, Spotify’s most-streamed song.

Music Reissues Weekly: Jon Savage's 1977-1979 - Symbols Clashing Everywhere

MUSIC REISSUES WEEKLY Jon Savage's 1977-1979 - Symbols Clashing Everywhere

Personal take on three years when disparate outlooks could happily coexist

The title borrows from the lyrics of Siouxsie and the Banshees’s August 1978 debut single “Hong Kong Garden”: “Harmful elements in the air, Symbols clashing everywhere.” It also refers to Marcus Garvey’s prediction that on 7 July 1977 two sevens would clash with damaging consequences, a forewarning acknowledged that year by Culture’s Two Sevens Clash album.

Albums of the Year 2021: Marina - Ancient Dreams in a Modern Land

Newly Los Angeles-based Brit pop star goes right over-the-top in the best way

We did that whole state-of-things COVID/Brexit/anxiety/neurosis blah-blah in the end-of-year pieces last year. And, indeed, the year before (when Bozza was elected). Not this year. I’m over that. Let’s crack on. Live life. Own it. All that. An equivalent bullishness of tone, filtered through a defiantly feminine aesthetic, rules Marina Diamandis’s fifth album (she of Marina and the Diamonds). Or, at least, the parts of it that aren’t concerned with “highly emotional people” or mourning the end of her five year relationship with Clean Bandit’s Jack Patterson.

theartsdesk on Vinyl 67: Squid, The Beatles, Beach Riot, Black Sabbath, Quantic, Heiko Maile and more

THE ARTS DESK ON VINYL 67 Squid, The Beatles, Beach Riot, Black Sabbath, Quantic and more

The biggest, most wide-ranging, regular vinyl reviews in the galaxy

The first of two December round-ups from theartsdesk on Vinyl runs the gamut from folk-tronic oddness to Seventies heavy rock to avant-jazz to The Beatles, as well as much else. All musical life is here... except the crap stuff. So dive in!

VINYL OF THE MONTH

Simo Cell Yes.DJ (TEMƎT)

OMD/Scritti Politti, Brighton Centre review - an engaging, ebullient good time

★★★★ OMD / SCRITTI POLITTI, BRIGHTON CENTRE An engaging, ebullient good time

Heritage synth-poppers turn Tuesday night into party night

A persistent moan of this writer in recent years, about gigs attended by those his own age (54) and up, is that, however good the band is, the audience are stationary, staring, semi-catatonic. They don’t twitch or move, facing stage-wards earnestly, silent, as if watching Chekov at the theatre. Their joy, if it exists, is internalised, unreleased. Dancing something forgotten long ago.

Kero Kero Bonito, Heaven review - euphoric bubblegum

★★★★ KERO KERO BONITO, HEAVEN Euphoric bubblegum

Feel-good electropop taking on climate change and visions of peace

Here comes the bride. True to Kero Kero Bonito’s unique musical and visual style, a chaotic but masterfully executed fusion of Japanese kawaii culture, kaleiodoscopic synth and indie rock, the audience at Heaven were greeted by lead singer Sarah Midori Perry entering in a wedding dress complete with bridesmaid, while instrumentalists Gus Lobban and Jamie Bulled both played the part of disaffected ushers behind their synth decks.

Album: Anne-Marie - Therapy

★★ ANNE-MARIE - THERAPY Homegrown pop star's second is predictable to the max

Homegrown pop star's second is predictable to the max

Anne-Marie Nicholson is a hard-working young woman from Essex whose career description is “Global Girl-next-door Pop Star”. She has incrementally worked her way there, attended the marketing meetings. Anyone requiring a CV that exemplifies the steady, data-farmed, disciplined path to contemporary major label pop stardom, should look to hers. Spontaneity and originality are out, every media detail is micro-managed, but a multi-platform, multi-territory project such as this can reap grand rewards.