2 November 2024

Band: THE SMILE
Who: Sort of supergroup featuring 2 radioheads, Thom
Yorke and Jonny Greenwood and drummer Tom Skinner.

Album: CUTOUTS.
Their 3rd LP in just 2 years (Radiohead 8 in 31 years).

NME says: “The Smile return for more jazz-influenced,
experimental rock and they seem to be having more fun
than ever.”

TUTV: By far their best to my ears. On the previous 2 ones they tried too hard
to not sound like Radiohead (which they did frequently anyway) and did it with
too many redundant orchestrations, too many unnecessary layers and a bit of
arty farty structures here and there.

Mind you they are good LPs but on this one they keep it far more simple resulting
in 10 very arresting pieces of mesmerizing music. Trippy fast ones alternate with slow
musing ones and throughout the arrangements are subtle, direct and most entertaining with Thom Yorke sounding, yes, at ease, not forcing his compassionate voice/vocals. It all feels tremendously natural and blithely .

KEY SINGLE

ALBUM

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Instagram – Spotify
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Band: PORRIDGE RADIO
Who: Much lauded indie outfit out of Brighton (UK),
led by emotive songstress Dana Margolin.

Album: CLOUDS IN THE SKY THEY WILL ALWAYS BE THERE FOR ME.

Margolin: “A lot of this album is about a more frenetic and desperate kind of love.
It is about completely losing my sense of self in a relationship, and the deep residue
of insecurity and pain that lingered and clouded a new relationship. There was a lot
of love and confusion, all interspersed with exhaustion and pain. All the songs started
out as poems. I wanted to challenge myself. ”

Uncut Magazine: “Sitting somewhere between alt.rock, indie-pop and a singer-songwriter album, it’s a neat balancing act that feels personal and intimate yet also sonically ambitious.”

TUTV: Spearhead Dana Margolin (guitar/vocals/songwriter) opens her heart and soul
again on this new longplayer. Following a toxic relationship, she recovered, rediscovered her own self, and looks to the future with confidence. As in the previous 3 albums she’s
as expressive and emotive about her turbulent personal life, even more explicit.

Sonically we get the by now familiar song structure. Slow start, building up the fervency, and finishing with haunting outbursts. But this time all pieces/tracks fall more into place than before. The songs have more body, are more elaborated and display Margolin‘s growing composing skills. Yes, it’s PR’s best effort yet.

KEY SINGLE

ALBUM

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Linktree
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Artist: JOE GENI
Who: Passionate singer-songwriter
from New York, NY.

Album: CITIES BUILT UPON CITIES
His 3rd longplayer.

An 8-track offering that traces the transformation of Long Island City, the part of
Queens that Geni calls home. Situated across the East River from Manhattan with its stunning skyline views and now booming with skyscrapers, this place is haunted by its industrial past and friends who have moved on. These recordings explore themes of change, impermanence and loss amidst the city’s constant evolution.

Photo by Alice Teeple

TUTV: I really like the idea of Cities Built Upon Cities. An universal sign’ of the modern
times. Just google old photos of your own town and compare them with today’s views.
Geni seems to have it done in detail with his beloved Long Island City and wrote eight
heavy-hearted songs about it.

Romantic reveries with real/surreal images of the past, present and future of LIC. Bittersweet, richly orchestrated, symphonies with his monumental voice – think of Perfume Genius, Talk Talk’s Mark Hollis and James Bay‘s bewitching vocality – taking them to sky-high heights, up there in the clouds, while floating over the city. This is the kind of record you listen best to with headphones on, dimmed lights and far away from our daily rat race. It’ll evoke mixed emotions about the place you love the most. Well, that’s what I experienced while listening.

KEY SINGLE

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STREAM/BUY ALBUM

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Instagram – Spotify
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Band: AMYL AND THE SNIFFERS
Who: The punk rock whirlwind from down
under fronted by the utterly cool Amyl Tylor.

Kerrang! writes: “Added together, it makes for an instantly irresistible album
that – just like its opening line – is frank, fearless, funny and fucking fantastic.”

Turn Up The Volume: Old skool punk ‘n’ roll? Absolutely. Any good? You betcha!
Amyl and her loud buddies made another roasting riff-manic-monster of a hell fucking
hell yeah record. Pogo madness is back. Sturm un drang from start to finish. HOLY MOLY!

KEY SINGLE

ALBUM

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Instagram – Website
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Artists: DEAD ANYWAY
Who: British duo combining the dark lyricism of Kate Arnold
against the music and soundscapes of Marc Symonds.

Album: TOUGH, LISTEN
It follows the excellent Partially Eaten By Animals
that came out last February.

TUYV: Never change a winning sound. As on their previous album DA keep on
drawing your aural attention with slow/mid-tempo/fast trip-hop tunes. But this time embedded in layers of distortion and feedback, creating an eerie and at times sinister ambiance.

Massive Attack, Tricky, Arab Strap and Mike Skinner’s The Streets
and Laurie Anderson‘s latest opus Amelia.

DA resonates as EBM for people who come alive when the darkness sets in, far away
from the suffocating day life and the world’s destructive nature as we experience now, again.

Kate Arnold‘s spoken word stories evolve on waves of chilling synth soundscapes that actually relax one’s confused mind (mine, for sure) and transfer you to your space of fantasies. Trance massage it is. You’ll feel alive anyway.

SINGLE

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ALBUM

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Instagram – Spotify