5 BEST ALBUMS OF THE MONTH – FEBRUARY 2026

28 February 2026

Band: KULA SHAKER
Who:
British psych rock vets, fronted by charismatic
vocalist/songwriter Crispian Mills. Their 1996 debut LP,
titled K made them instant indie stars.

Album: WORMSLAYER
Their 8th one.

Press info: “Named after a 9th-century Indian poet king, the band have always existed
in an alternate reality, mixing mysticism, psychedelia, and raucous rock ‘n’ roll energy.
With Wormslayer, they continue that quest, creating a kaleidoscopic journey that feels both
timeless and urgently fresh.”


Press photo

TUTV: KS show again their passion for 60s psychedelic rock/pop flavered with
Indian sitar vibes and Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds symphonies. Think early Pink
Floyd, The Kinks
, The Pepper Beatles, Traffic and Arthur Lee’s Love.

And they are very good at it. Wormslayer is stuffed with top-flight pop-edelia tunes, elevating this 8th LP to a must-hear on repeat level. Voice/face/songwriter and vibrant guitarist Crispian Mills lifts his troops to ecstasizing heights of nostalgia. Retro delirium
at its todays best. Formidable record.

KEY SINGLE

ALBUM

Instagram – All Albums
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Band: THE NUDE PARTY
Who: North Carolina collective THE NUDE PARTY, active
since 2012, are a well-oiled 7-piece machine of choogling
rock‘n roll

Album: LOOK WHO’S BACK

Press info: “Look Who’s Back took shape in a homegrown, late-night party atmosphere, playfully debaucherous sessions ran late into the night, the cozy room as crowded with mics, cables, and recording equipment as it was with friends, pizza boxes, and beer cans.”

TUTV: This party squad keeps it simple, but oh irresistibly efficient with laid-back
melodiousness, sparkling guitar play, euphonious harmonies, and top-drawer sing along/tap along/clap along tunes with at times, a cosy country feel. It’s called pop-ular music. Instantly entertaining, chipper and ear-pleasing fun.

Trust me, the cliché, no fillers, all killers, is 100% accurate here.

SINGLE

ALBUM


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Instagram – Twitter

Artists: DEAD ANYWAY
Who: British duo who set the dark lyricism of Kate Arnold against the music
and soundscapes of Marc Symonds. They offer a mix of poetry, electronica
and guitars. A heady brew of dark, glitchy head-messing wonder.

Album: SQUEAK PIGGY SQUEAK
Their 7th one.

TUTV: Again, DA takes you on a relaxing wander, entertaining your ears, mind,
and psyche en route. They trip and hop their way through eight new pieces. Sonically,
as we experienced so many times before, Tricky, Arab Strap, and Portishead come
to mind.

Sydmonds designs a fitting, easy-listening atmosphere, flavored with scintillating guitar
sparks, shiny synth,s and bass-dipped Massive Attack-like percussion, for Arnold‘s spoken
word reflections.

Her laid-back vocals suit the whole sonic picture organically, and her hush-hush
tonality creates an inviting, intimate ambiance. Thematically, the songs are Arnold reflections on her mental issues. The overall outcome of this new LP is engrossing
once again.

SINGLE


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ALBUM


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Spotify – Instagram – Linktree
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Band: RONKER
Who: Belgian most terrifying noiz turbine,
fronted by manic demon Jasper De Petter.

Album: RESPECT THE HUSTLE, I WON’T BE YOUR DOG FOREVER
Their sophomore.

Ronker about the record: “The initial plan was to write half of the record completely sober. We mostly succeeded in that effort. Not quite. We noticed that the songs we wrote in those sober sessions had a very distinct nature compared to the more fierce banger-like
songs we hammer out when we have some sort of intoxicants in our veins.”


📸 Nathan Dobbelaere

TUTV’s impressions.

Ronker rage and race once again.
These volcanic punk hyenas develop
an earsplitting havoc that crushes
your mind, your psyche and your
shaking stereo.


Manic demon Jasper De Petter – Trix, Antwerp – Photo by Turn Up The Volume

Vociferous vocalist Kasper has 4 lungs
and iron pipes. He growls, barks, howls
and spits and sneers at a sizzling speed.

His backing crew hits hard, really hard.
Schizo riot gun riffs and a Herculean
bass/drum tandem. What you hear
is what your terrified ears get.

On the short & soft, classical piano-driven
instrumental in the middle, you can take
a breather, and the closing ballad, an
intensity-growing ballad Using Eyes is
one of my favorite pieces on the record.

This 2nd LP could easily be the soundtrack
to Quentin Tarantino‘s first horror movie.

SINGLE

ALBUM


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Album On Spotify – Instagram – Linktree – Tour Dates
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Band: GORILLAZ
Who: The brainchild of Blur’s Damon Albarn and comic book artist
Jamie Hewlett, who celebrated the 25th anniversary of their top-ranking
project this year.

Album: THE MOUNTAIN
Their 9th.

Press info: “The album is a collection of 15 new tracks featuring artists and
collaborators, living and dead, including: Ajay Prasanna, Anoushka Shankar, Asha
Bhosle, Asha Puthli, Bizarrap, Black Thought, Gruff Rhys, Idles, Jalen Ngonda, Johnny
Marr, Kara Jackson, Omar Souleyman, Paul Simonon, Sparks, Trueno and Yasiin Bey;
as well as the voices of the late Bobby Womack, Dave Jolicoeur, Dennis Hopper and
Mark E. Smith

TUTV: Gorillaz offer us the first summer record of the year. And if you’re a longtime
G fan you know what that means. Yes, a soft stream of easygoing, feel-good, and bubbly reggae-tinted tunes. But it’s not all sunlight and carefreeness.

Albarn and Hewlett both lost their fathers, in between two trips they did together to
India. Those sad happenings resonate in several melancholic musings, embedded in
Indian instrumentation (lots of sitars) and Eastern vibes, yet they obviously want to
keep up the good spirits and look to the future.

It results in one of their most entertaining longplayers in their 25-year career.

SINGLE

ALBUM


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Instagram – Spotify – All Albums

JUKEBOX 2025 – Week 38 Five New Rad Tracks Added Twice A Week

In order to not miss a beat TURN UP THE VOLUME scans the musical
horizon daily, for 10 years now, to pick ace tracks and add 5 new ones
twice per week, to the one and only JUKEBOX playlist that matters.

ALL TOGETHER

The 5 fresh ones
TRACK BY TRACK

Band: SLEAFORD MODS
Who: Rap-punk poetry duo featuring
voice Jason Williamson and instrumentalist
Andrew Fearn.

Track: MEGATON
First new music since the release
of their 12th LP ‘UK Grim‘ 2 years ago.

“Megaton, No War No Death! Such is the weight of trauma, guilt and powerlessness
in privileged societies that we squirm like an overloaded petri dish full of algae fed
by the algorithm.

Everything is wrong and everything as a reaction is argued to be right, and in
this we give birth to behaviours that smother solidarity and cause mass waves
of haemorrhaging alienation while the world quietly collapses offscreen.”

The mods on a characteristic,
sharp-cutting roll. Chop. Chop.

Instagram – Facebook
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Band: CARDINALS
Who: Young Irish indies

Track: MASQUERADE
Title track from their
upcoming debut album.

“The song is definitely one of the more intimate moments on the album.
The vulnerability it reveals is uncomfortable and that’s where we wanted
to be when we were writing the songs on the record.”

Poignant slo-mo torch jam.
Spellbinding. Spine-tingling.

Linktree
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Band: STEREOLAB
Who: Anglo-French avant-pop
veterans from London.

Track: FED UP WITH YOUR JOB One of two new pieces, that follows
last May’s album Instant Holograms On Metal Film, their first in
15 years.

Jaunty take on the daily
rat work race. It will fit
your stereo perfectly.

Instagram – All Albums
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Band: THE NUDE PARTY
Who: 7-piece folk rock collective
originating from North Carolina.

Track: SWEETHEART OF THE RADIO
First single of their 4th album,
named Look Who’s Back.

Shaun Couture (guitar/vocals): “This song is about a truck driver who is so lonely he falls
in love with a country singer on the radio. I’ve always been fascinated with truck drivers, and
as a touring musician, our lives are not that far off from a trucker’s.”

Vocal country elation.
Let’s hit the road.

Instagram – Linktree
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Band: THE LEMONHEADS
Who: Songsmith vet Evan Dando‘s band,
for almost 4 decades and 11 LPs

Track: TOGETHERNESS IS ALL I’M AFTER

Newest single from their 12th album, baptized Love Chant
recorded in Brazil where Dando lives now. It lands on Oct 24th.

Dando delivers another
inspirative and sensitive
reflection.

Instagram – All Albums

Waking Up With Smart Dressers THE NUDE PARTY And New Jangly Groover ‘RIDE ON’

Works faster and harder than caffeine

18 January 2023


Press photo by Clark Hodgin

North Carolina rock squad THE NUDE PARTY who
like to dress smart are back in town to kick ass.

Their new, 3d, LP baptized RIDES ON arrives on 10 March.

Ahead of it comes first single RIDE ON.

Patton Magee: “It started very literally with a teary-eyed old man telling me about a bull
rider he met down in Mexico named Alfredo,” says frontman Patton Magee. “I took note of the conversation because it felt powerful somehow. Shaun in the band had written this great arrangement of chords and when the two came together, the story just kinda poured out. You always hear people say things like, ‘oh, the Rolling Stones should just hang it up… they’re way over the hill.’ I feel bad for people who think that way. I’m saying exactly the opposite. If you’re alive, then live. No brakes. Ride on.

Ride On rolls, rattles and rumbles, grooves and moves as if The Velvet Underground went
spicy country rock. It’s a jangly earworm that augments your adrenalin production.

Have a ride here.

Also st(r)eaming on Spotify.

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THE NUDE PARTY: Facebook – Instagram