Posts by Burra

I was lucky enough to discover this band for the first time after catching them as the support act at a Pixies show. I mega enjoyed and was intrigued by them. “How have I not heard of these before?” I asked myself. Purchasing this album was then an absolute no brainer for me, and I immediately got into it; what a cool sound we have going on here, cracking melodic harmonies, and a big dreamy…

This is the debut solo release here from Hayley Williams of Paramore (despite other current members of Paramore actually having a part to play in the album at various points throughout). An unique and refreshing sound – and move away from Paramore – adapting a clever and dark sort of indie pop vibe. A fantastic selection of songs here, and a really tight bunch that fit perfectly together as an album and compliment each other…

Here we have Ellie Goulding’s fourth studio album, the number one selling Brightest Blue. So, I believe the premise of this record is that it is split into two sides; two parts – one being the very sort of sound we started seeing Ellie creep into around the time of her Halcyon record and the latter part a series of collabs with various sort of EDM artists (all of which I’d never heard of prior…

Released right in the heart of national shutdown, I can honestly say this has without doubt been the soundtrack to my entire 2020 lockdown listening wise. This is the second full length release from Bryde, and a very welcome one at that; a wonderful selection of songs from catchy big chorus numbers like one of the albums singles “The Trouble Is” to the track “Flies”, with its big yet dark and haunting sound, and of…

Here we have the latest and 3rd album from the Haim sisters. A straight up sixteen track offering too which is quite rare to often see. Certainly delivering the content here. The album kicks off with the laid back smooth jazz sound of “Los Angeles”. It’s difficult to quite label but it has a certain kind of smooth groove to it, with the horn/brass sounds that introduces the record, and with that really nice under-groove…

TT is a guise – or pseudonym if you will – of musician Theresa Wayman, who is known for being a member of the band Warpaint. I’ll first off admit that I discovered this album on the off chance of a bit of a CD browse and haul; a sort of musical gamble I suppose, having not heard any material from the album or the artist. I decided to take a chance on it, and…

Laura Marling returns with her Mercury Prize nominated seventh studio album, “Song For Our Daughter”. This is a really nice album. It has a lot of soul to it; some beautiful melodies, harmonies and an overall big warm sound, and is a really good album to just pure chill out to, with it’s strong summer-esque, lazy day vibes and the odd sombre moments. There is fabulous songwriting and a captivating performance throughout that just takes…

Cracking Morrissey album, this! The strongest sounding Morrissey album since 2004’s You Are The Quarry, very easily so in my opinion – yeah Christ, I really enjoyed this one. Great sound here, especially from the very grand opener “My Love, I’d Do Anything For You”, with its horn section coming into play, adding to that nice big band vibe. I keep going back to this one – a definite favourite! I won’t waffle on about…

Head Noise are a 3 piece Electro Art-Punk band from South Wales, often using a keytar as a primary instrument as well as an array of nontraditional instruments. With no live drums or an actual drummer they are certainly a different act and stand out from the crowd with their less conventional, more experimental approach. So here we have the bands new 6 track mini-album “Special Effects Improves The Defects”, a very fun sounding release…

Here we have the Earth EP by South Wales based acoustic singer/song writer Craig Watkins; a well put together collection of soulful acoustic material, with lots of raw energy and passion coming through, with a very real sense coming off of it all as an artist (real in the sense of you can tell he’s passionate about what he’s playing and what he’s singing about, which is always great to hear). Production wise the EP…

So here we have Eisley’s first release since the departure of Stacey and Chauntelle (as well as drummer Weston who remains as a studio member but not a live member), leaving vocalist Sherri Dupree Bemis and bassist Garon Dupree to pick up where the band left off and move forward. It is always tough to lose band members, especially ones that brought a lot to the table and in this case, the loss of the…

This Becomes Us is the solo collaborative release from Future Of The Left (and not forgetting ex-Million Dead) bassist Julia Ruzicka. This debut contains ten tracks of absolute pure gold, featuring a different vocalist on each track, including Black Francis from The Pixies, among others. Opener “The Picture of Delorean Gray”, is a cracking little number; a nice and fast-paced, hard-hitting, fuzzy, punky number that leads into the bouncy “Undervalue Love”, which has a kind…

(words by dance, Gareth, dance!) I decided to say a few words on this album after seeing the band perform live a week or so ago, where I was actually lucky enough to see all 3 versions that have been of the band perform since all current and ex-vocalists were present as part of the band’s 10 year anniversary tour. So, here we have Mothership, the latest release from the Tilian Pearson era of the…

This is the brand new album from a recharged Sum 41 and the first with guitarist Dave Baksh back in the group. My initial impression upon listening was “Oh it’s darker, keep this theme going please and we may have a good record here,” and I wasn’t too far off with such a request; its a lot darker, especially to those that may only know Sum 41 for “In Too Deep” or “Fat Lip”, as…

(Words by Burra, who recently gave back Wednesday) I really like this album. Overall, it feels so much more alive with energy than any of the more recent releases; maybe with a slight return to their classic sound at times. Although nothing they do will ever be as good as Tell All Your Friends or Where You Want To Be, unfortunately thats just how it is! So anything they do always lives in the shadow…

(words by Burra; eater of worlds, rustler of Jimmies) Here we have the band’s latest 11 track release: Integrity Blues; a beautiful sounding record from start to finish, and one that definitely shows off the slower, softer side to the band (which I love) with lots of atmosphere and lots of emotion. Haunting, soothing and yet, at times, harder hitting. It’s very difficult to pick any stand-out tracks from this album, simply as this is…

Everything I could have wanted from a Billy Talent album is right here. I’m happy that they’ve released yet another solid album from start to finish, as few bands nowadays manage to release cracking record after cracking record with little filler, but so far Billy Talent haven’t let us down there at all, I feel. This is full of catchy hooks – both vocally and musically; the catchy riffs and shouty choruses that this band…

So pretty much, if you’re not already a fan of The Beatles, then there’s an extremely slim chance you’ll be buying this record, as a live album is pretty much in my eyes a fan-targeted release. Normally I’m not a fan of live albums, I’ll be completely honest. There are exceptions, however I just feel that some moments you can’t recapture when it comes to this type of thing, kinda like how 90 percent of…

(Words by Burra; The 6th Beatle) This is the debut EP from fresh on the scene South Wales-based female-fronted four piece, Montreaux Fires. The EP starts with a quick spoken word intro taken from the recording process (it’s worth noting that this was self-recorded by the band’s bassist in his living room) before launching into the track “Our Little Life” – a cracking opener and one I can imagine would go down really well live,…

(words by Porth’s man-in-thon-know, Gareth Burra) Here we have the new 6 track release – The Great Depression Act 1 – from South Wales 5 piece Calling Apollo. What a huge sounding record this is; production wise, instrumental and vocal wise – it’s great! A very wisely chosen opening track comes in the form of “Light The Way”; I love the guitar tone in this, it’s very reminiscent of a lot of the 2000’s era…

(Words by Burra) Ok, so I’ll state the obvious, but there may be a lot of people who may not realise founding member Tom DeLonge is no longer a part of the group. Anyway… this is Blink 182’s first record with their revised lineup, featuring Mat Skiba who most of you will recognise as frontman of Alkaline Trio. A nice opener to this album comes with the track “Cynical”, which might I add has a…

It’s been a while since the last Gwen Stefani solo album, and being a No Doubt fan and enjoying the bands last release (Push and Shove), I was interested to hear how this new solo effort would sound, and mainly the vibe it’d have this time around. Opening track “Misery” is a great introduction to the album; and in regards to the route the album goes down, this album is an awful lot less R’n’B/hip…

I was recommended this band to check out, and having known literally nothing about them I was interested to hear what was going on. The LaFontaines are a very difficult band to pigeonhole; I’m finding myself presented with rapping, smooth sounding vocals, riffs, indie guitar licks, lovely guitar tones amongst really big sounding anthems. What a mental combination! On paper this shouldn’t work, it really shouldn’t… however these guys have seemed to pull it off…

I’ll admit this was actually my first time listening to a full ELO studio album, having only really been familiar with the singles (i.e. the greatest hits) of the ELO brand, but I’ve been meaning to check this lot out for a while. This is a really great sounding album, it sounds like I’m listening to a big, iconic classic rock record despite this being a moderately new release – it just has that kind…

I went into this release not sure what to expect, but what a fun record! Opener “Double Trouble” immediately sets the mood with John Lydon’s spoken intro; a catchy number with a catchy, repetitive bass line and an indie pop guitar sound. There is a similar vibe and sound throughout the whole record, instrument-wise, mixed in with angst-ridden yet humorous vocals and lyrics from Mr Lydon. I think what really draws me in to this…

(Words by Burra, Porth’s last hope for redemption) I’ll be honest, I went into this album not expecting a great deal, and with the mindset it would never be another Mechanical Animals (for me Marilyn Manson’s finest hour). However, I was actually quite surprised by this record; it holds itself up quite well as an album. I think it is definitely the best thing to come out of the Marilyn Manson camp, in recent years…

Sad Strange Beautiful Dream is a solo album from Taking Back Sunday guitarist/backing vocalist John Nolan. I’ve been meaning to give this a listen for a while, after being a fan of Taking Back Sunday since the beginning as well as enjoying the Straylight Run project, so I thought I’d actually sit down and give it a good listen. This is a very mellow and minimalist album. I actually find it quite refreshing and laid…

As debut albums go this one is certainly one Pvris can be proud of – what a remarkably strong album that could easily be a greatest hits album rather than that of a debut release, and from such a young band. Opening track “Smoke” is an incredibly good opener and one that shines through as a live set opener for the band too (which I can confirm after being lucky enough to catch them live)….

Having considered Weezer’s Blue Album a fantastic debut and one of the best of its era and genre, as well as a being a big fan of their earlier releases (yet admittedly my attention dipped somewhat in and out of Weezer’s more recent releases), I was very keen to hear if Weezer would really grab my attention with the self titled “White Album”. This is overall a very upbeat sounding Weezer album, and also one…