This is the debut album from Oxford punks The Young Knives. They are angular punk from the Buzzcocks/Ramones/999 school of stark and cutting guitars with pulsating bass and drums as evidenced by the albums opening track ‘Walking On The Autobahn‘. That they have been inspired by Frank Black and Steve Malkmus is also evident. ‘Working hands‘ could easily be a lost Pixies track. The Young Knives blend the whole lot together with an infectious zeal and energy.

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Henry Knife sings a lot like Crispin Hunt (of Longpigs fame - Whatever happened to them?), which is no bad thing in my book. There is a dry humour running through ‘…are DEAD‘ with tracks like ‘John‘ and the Carry On Scary capers of ‘The Night Of The Trees‘.

How can you not love a band who have a bassist called The House Of Lords?

Label : Shifty Disco

Release Date : October 21, 2002

Website : www.theyoungknives.com

Tracklisting

Diamonds In The West

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‘Some Cities’ departs from the cosy intimate sound that Doves mastered in their earlier work. This new, grander, album has a sweeping air of a soundtrack. It is full of broad dramatic sweeps and extended downtempo passages that inspire majestic scenery in the minds eye while also sounding like the creation of a mind experiencing desolate loneliness. This conflict between the mundane and magical is the backbone of the Doves new sound. The jangle of guitars and metronomic drumming provide a beat to nod to but the dancing vibe, thanks to the generally ghostly ambiance, is missing from nearly all the tracks (notably ‘Walk On Fire’).

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I would be lying if I gave the impression that the album is without a spark of joy and moments of redemption, but you have to look for them. This is a mature and reflective collection of songs that is a satisfyingly emotive listen.

Label : Heavenly

Release Date : 21 February 2005

Website : www.doves.net

Tracklisting

• Some Cities
• Black And White Town
• Almost Forgot Myself
• Snowden
• The Storm
• Walk In Fire
• One Of These Days
• Someday Soon
• Shadows Of Salford
• Sky Starts Falling
• Ambition
  

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Listening to these singles is like an amalgam of music from the last 50 (or more) years. Think new wave meets 80’s indie with a serious splash of rock and touch of popular punk. When I hear ‘Don’t Look Back At The Sun’ it sounds like the Only Ones ‘Another Girl, Another Planet’ sung by a voice somewhere between Buddy Holly, Jilted John and Elvis Costello. The demo of ‘Tell The King’ sounds like The Smiths while ‘Mockingbird’ is an old style rock & roll number. For all that, The Libertines, with producer Bernard Butler, have kept the recordings fresh and lively with far more of a homage than a theft to those that have come before them.

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The only planned live dates this year are at the Reading and Leeds festivals (playing on the 23rd and 24th respectively).

Label : Rough Trade

Release Date : 18 Aug 2003

Website : www.thelibertines.com

Tracklisting

CD1

Mockingbird

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The Oxford duo are back again, surfing a wave of adulation from the press (Metal Hammer, Radio One, Xfm, Kerrang!, etc) and public alike. Ben’s frenetic guitar assault is backed by the other Ben manically assaulting his drum kit. The combination is once again incandescent rock of the highest order. ‘Manhunt’, taken from their debut album ‘Plato O Plomo’, is their first single on the back of their extensive, and ongoing, tour.

Catch Winnebago Deal at one of the following gigs.

Manhunt (Video)

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Jaggedly blasting it’s way from confines of the sublime ‘Fever To Tell’ and going solo for your pleasure is the Yeah Yeah Yeahs new single ‘Pin’. It was one of the many highlights from the album and loses nothing taken out of that context. Karen O purrs and screams deliciously above the driving guitars of Nick Zinner while Brian Chase pounds the drums for all he is worth.

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Along with ‘Rich’ on the B-sides is a cover of ‘Mr You’re On Fire Mr’ by the Liars (Taken from their album ‘They Threw Us All In A Trench And Stuck A Monument On Top’ which is well worth a listen if you have missed it).

Label : Dress Up/Polydor

Release Date : 23 June 2003

Website : www.yeahyeahyeahs.com

Tracklisting

Pin (Video)

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The highly anticipated debut album by the Yeah Yeah Yeahs turns out to have been worth the hype. The 12 tracks included on ‘Fever To Tell’ have the charm of New Wave, the spirit of punk and a rock zeal. Karen O is alternately seductive, spleen venting and desolate whilst retaining a playful and off kilter bearing. There is an ever present energy and power in these songs that is contagious.

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From the opening keyboards and rich guitar work of ‘Rich’, through to the screaming pop of ‘Date With The Night’, the gutter mouth vocals of ‘Black Tongue’, the teasing ‘Cold Night’, to the beautiful and tension filled ‘Maps’ this is full of potential (and an actual) singles. It has been said in other reviews that this is an excellent album, for a debut. For me, that sentence is 3 words too long - This is an excellent album.

Label : Dress Up/Polydor

Release Date : 28 Feb 2003

Website : www.yeahyeahyeahs.com

Tracklisting

Date With The Night (Video)

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Brimming full of glitchy electronica, dynamic guitars, catharsis, an aural sweet and sour - ‘Hail To The Thief’ is both an extension of the musical direction they have been pursuing and a nod to their previous albums. In making it Radiohead seem to have honed their skills at turning songs upside down and inside out with fourteen rich and complex, multilayered songs. Songs that manage to pull off an entirely unique complexity while not becoming too busy or a mess of chaos and noise. Radiohead have returned with style and panache.

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Beginning with the no wave introduction of ‘2 + 2 = 5′ that blossoms into the classic Radiohead combination of rumbling bass and swooping vocals, ‘Hail To The Thief’ is full of surprises. There are tracks like the rich, languid and pared right back ‘I Will’, ‘A Punchup At A Wedding’ and ‘Scatterbrain’ which are more akin to ‘The Bends’ than ‘Kid A’. While the dark electronica and weirdly entwined beats of ‘Myxomatosis’ or the sharp artificial sounds of ‘Backdrift’ and ‘The Gloaming’ are hypnotically engaging. ‘We Suck Young Blood’ is especially fine and has a particularly claustrophobic feel from the empty sounding handclaps and pronounced echoes. The most striking of all for me is ‘Sit Down, Stand Up’ which progresses towards a frantic and desperate close from its gentle origins.

The first single from the album, teeming with vibrant guitars and almost tribal drums, is ‘There There.’ - out soon.

Label : Parlophone

Release Date : 9 June 2003

Website : www.radiohead.com

Tracklisting

A Wolf At The Door (It Girl. Rag Doll)

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New York’s Radio 4 create an unnatural mix of punk attitude, soul beats, funky bass and buzzing guitars. ‘Gotham!’ sums up the discopunk for me with the chilled out yet menacingly edged tracks like ‘Pipe Bombs’ and ‘Speaking In Codes’, the pure dance vibe of numbers like ‘Dance To The Underground’ and ‘End Of The Rope’ topped off by the energy of their angry siblings like ‘New Disco’ and ‘Our Town’. Radio 4 are inventive, cramming the rough and the smooth together in every song.

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This reissue of the debut album by Radio 4 also comes with contains an additional disk of excellent remixes, additional tracks and the video for ‘Dance To The Underground’. If you missed this the first time round then you have no excuse not to get it now. If you got it already then the additional remixes are well worth having, so buy it again.

Label : City Slang

Release Date : 25 August 2003

Website : www.r4ny.com

Tracklisting

Dance To The Underground Video by Matt Bass

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The foursome that make up Southampton’s Delays, fresh from supporting acts like The Coral, The Thrills, McAlmont & Butler and Clearlake, are releasing their second single. ‘Hey Girl’ sees a welcome return to good old jangly guitar indie, sweetly sung with an earnest edge just like they had in the olden days when I was in the lank hair and leather jacket brigade (Look it was cool then, alright…). The first of the B-sides, ‘Zero Zero One’, is a fantastic waltzing soundscape with vocals evoking The Cocteau Twins at their abstract voiced pop pinnacle. Last, but not least, ‘Overlover’ is a passion fuelled uptempo ballad with rock flourishes that leaves you wanting more.

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Delays are opening for Easyworld on the following dates

Overlover

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This is a very pleasant slice of trip hop from singer, songwriter and blonde Anna Friel looky-likey Rachel Cuming and programmer, songwriter Lee Jones. I had heard that they were like Ruby or Portishead but they sound far more like Mandalay or Dot Allison (She sang on Death in Vegas’s Dirge if you don’t know her) to me. Maybe Goldfrapp without the theatricality. This is definately mood music, nice stuff to have going on in the background. Rachel sings throughout with an air of indifference - as if distanced from the subject matter.

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There are no suprises here. But that doesn’t seem to be the point. The tunes are relaxing and unintusive, more something to lay back and mellow out to rather than dance or scrutenise. There are the odd Jazz flourises that interestingly break the flow, but never the mood of the album.

If you like this then try Empathy the first album by Mandalay or Dot Allison’s solo debut CD Afterglow.

Label : V2 Music

Release Date : 18 March 2002

Website : none

Tracklisting

• Magpie
• Stay Here
• What Gives With You
• City For Us
• Start The Song Backwards
• Blue For The Most
• For All The Times
• Heather
• Freedom’s When
• On A Plane
• Ever So Slowly

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