CD: British Electric Foundation - Music of Quality and Distinction Vol 3: Dark

Resurrected after 22 years, does this covers project still work?

It took nine years between the first and second instalments of this series, and another 22 years to make the third. And that's one of the least strange things about this record. The production team of B.E.F. (aka Human League / Heaven 17 members Martyn Ware and Ian Craig Marsh) have dedicated themselves to unusual cover versions, in the past featuring guest vocalists from Gary Glitter to Tina Turner to Paula Yates, and they are still on a mission to rework classic songs in a high-gloss 1980s pop style with very peculiar results indeed.

Tomorrow's World, ICA

Good things happen when one of Air collaborates with New Young Pony Clubber

The ICA was the perfect location for the UK debut of hotly tipped new duo Tomorrow’s World, consisting of Air’s Jean-Benoit Dunckel and English synth-rockers New Young Pony Club’s ivory tickler Lou Hayter. The venue added a prestigious edge to what promised to be an auspicious occasion. A scant crowd suggested this was more of a test run than a full-blown debut, but they needn’t have worried about the reaction. Their music spoke for itself.

CD: Alison Moyet - the minutes

CD: ALISON MOYET: THE MINUTES 'Alf' is back and in energetic mode, but can she carry it off?

'Alf' is in energetic mode, but can she carry it off?

Alison Moyet is not just one of the great voices in pop, she's one of the most likeable figures. A brilliantly no-nonsense character, she consistently skewers music industry pomposity, laughs in the face of the expectations the world has of female artists, and generally does precisely what she wants while retaining an abnormally acute sense of the absurdness of it all.

Just in From Scandinavia: Nordic Music Round-Up 7

JUST IN FROM SCANDINAVIA: NORDIC MUSIC ROUND-UP 7 A Norwegian masterpiece, smart Swedish electropop, a unique Danish voice and much more

A Norwegian masterpiece, smart Swedish electropop, a unique Danish voice and much more

Continuing its voyage through Scandinavia’s music, theartsdesk opens the latest chapter in Norway with Still Life With Eggplant, the 16th album from Trondheim’s prolific, long-lived, occasionally challenging and always vital Motorpsycho.

CD: The Knife - Shaking the Habitual

Swedish brother-sister duo make their declaration for the epoch

Shaking The Habitual’s centrepiece – the seventh of its 14 tracks – is the 19-minute “Old Dreams Waiting to be Realized”. A tone which ebbs in and out, it’s occasionally underpinned by distant rhythmic colour. Although thoughts inevitably turn to the similarly lengthy “SDSS1416+13B (Zercon, A Flagpole Sitter)", the 22-minute amelodic experience exemplifying Scott Walker’s recent Bish Bosch, the astonishing Shaking the Habitual is, over its 97 minutes, an album retaining connections with what is recognisably music. Even so, it’s still pretty far out.

CD: Depeche Mode - Delta Machine

DEPECHE MODE - DELTA MACHINE Is the Basildon synth-goth machine still functioning?

Is the Basildon synth-goth machine still functioning?

The portents were good. The single “Heaven” emerged with all the melodrama and crypto-religiosity hardcore Depeche Mode fans have loved – Dave Gahan hitting some notes that suggested he's spotted certain tics that Muse's Matt Bellamy has nicked from him and gone “ahaa no, THIS is how it's done.” It's a dirge in the best sense, a gorgeously crushing piece with – thankfully – digitally degraded sounds and robotic drum-rolls putting the guitars and pianos in their place: this is Depeche Mode at peace both with their stadium Goth stature and their history as electronic innovators.

Kraftwerk: The Man Machine, Tate Modern

TAD AT 5: KRAFTWERK: THE MAN MACHINE, TATE MODERN A performance of robotic brilliance, but when will Kraftwerk deliver some new music?

A performance of robotic brilliance, but when will Kraftwerk deliver some new music?

A giant arm sweeps across the rapt audience. The newly anointed onlookers all wear the same, white-framed, glasses. A chant is heard:“We are the robots.” Those congregating in the over-sized shoebox of Tate Modern’s Turbine Hall could be at a cult meeting. In gathering to pay respect, the audience share more than a passion for Kraftwerk. They also all wear the same 3D glasses. Performing their 1978 album The Man Machine in full, Kraftwerk restate the uncertainty of the natural order. Whether prophetic or not, their message still resonates.

CD: Tegan and Sara - Heartthrob

Sister duo drop the indie rock, but keep the heart, on album seven

To hear them tell it, Tegan and Sara have always been pop stars. It was harder to see a decade ago, sure, when they were spitting out spiky guitar anthems in matching pixie haircuts, but the roots were always there. That the twins’ seventh record drops the guitars so low in the mix as to render them almost inaudible in favour of bombastic electropop shouldn’t really be that much of a surprise - there were hints of it on 2009’s Sainthood, which itself came not long after they collaborated with DJ Tiesto.

CD: Fimber Bravo - Con-Fusion

The 20th Century Steel Band leader is sounding fine in the 21st

If you listened to the last archived Arts Desk Radio Show you'll have heard me play a couple of tracks from this, and it was all I could do not to play more. As so often I'd gone into the studio with the previous couple of days' post pile and started picking through it for CDs to play. Usually this is a faff involving flicking through tracks and hoping one will jump out, but as soon as this one went into the machine, every single track got a tick by its name.