If you’re into heavy rock of the tuneful kind then this movie album should be on your shopping list. The previous Transformer album was a cracker with a selection of the best rock bands on earth playing some of their best songs. The formula here is the same although it’s a lot more ‘radio-friendly.’
It opens [...]

A few weeks back I received Dan Black’s new single ‘Symphonies’ which was good enough for me to include immediately on our radio show playlist. Loved it! It lifted my expectations for his debut album that I duly received last week. Dan wrote and recorded the album in the cellar of his Paris home and [...]

I expected more. A few months our people covered a La Roux performance here in Wrexham and reports back were encouraging (much of the material gathered was used by the BBC on its website). Then we received a single off the debut album (’Bulletproof’), and that too was encouraging although not what we would term [...]

London band Lea Shores is fronted by twin brothers Simon and Nick Webb with James Smith on guitars, Gabriel Lloret on bass and Nick Foot on drums. Violinist Neil Catchpole also makes a contribution on this debut album.
In recent weeks I’ve received several albums which are clearly influenced by the psych-rock of the 60s, and [...]

American Andrew Bird is a singer/songwriter cemented firmly in the tradition of simple storytelling and observation. His voice is gentle and fluid, his primary instrument is the violin, but he also possesses the skill to enhance his songs with other instrumental sounds (notably percussion). NOBLE BIRD is his fourth album and the first time I [...]

It’s still only June 09 and I have to pinch myself to ensure that this torrent of great and diverse albums is not a figment of my (very active) imagination. Yup, I can’t thinkof a better year in the last ten for the quality of releases. In recent weeks I’ve also noticed that grand gesture, [...]