Okay Kaya: Watch This Liquid Pour Itself review – strange dream-pop tales of thwarted lust
(Jagjaguwar) Kaya Wilkins’ second album ranges from confessional blood-letting to 50s ballads and disco-pop – in her own inimitable style
Bombay Bicycle Club: Everything Else Has Gone Wrong review – songs to buy a mid-range hatchback to
BBC’s fifth album is a disappointment: crowded, ill-written and lacking conviction, it sounds like what it will swiftly become: an ad soundtrack
Courteeners: More. Again. Forever. review – fighting the death of indie
Without abandoning the well-executed anthemics that form the basis of their success, the Manchester band’s sixth album weighs in on the subjects of ageing, alcohol and mental health
Rockaway Beach festival review – a blast of indie retox and roll
John Cale and Jesus and Mary Chain line up with newbies Black Country, New Road and Nova Twins in a January festival as bracing as the wind whipping off the Channel
Field Music: Making a New World review – a concept stronger than the songs
(Memphis Industries)
The Big Moon: Walking Like We Do review – indie crew grow their sound
There was certainly no shortage of competent and unimaginative indie rock in the late 2010s. But the debut album by the Big Moon – 2017’s Love in the 4th Dimension – swerved a landfill indie fate thanks to the band’s … Continue reading
The Big Moon: Walking Like We Do review – endlessly quotable indie-pop
The indie quartet are in a bright mood, though Juliette Jackson can be devastatingly sharp on the disappointments of contemporary womanhood
Beabadoobee review – teen star flies the flag for fuzzy 90s indie
With joy and candour, the 19-year-old songwriter brings the charms of grungy 90s indie to a new generation
The Libertines review – still creating their own mythic England
Carl Barât and Pete Doherty’s punk-rock singsongs may be out of step with today’s reality, but they still have their old vigour
Clairo review – hard-won life lessons from adored DIY pop star
Claire Cottrill’s sparse, low-key approach is no obstacle to building a powerful emotional connection with her rapt following
Pumarosa: Devastation review – brooding turbo-anguish
Pumarosa have long called their sound “industrial spiritual”, but the London band’s second album takes it to a bracing new level, as they sack off the indie guitars of their 2017 debut The Witch and embrace obsidian synths. Its title … Continue reading
Tindersticks: No Treasure But Hope review – more subdued loveliness
The band’s world is a compellingly strange, crepuscular place, into which some warmth is allowed to drip
Girl Ray: Girl review – a north London version of Haim
(Moshi Moshi)
Girl Ray: Girl review – the great sound of a band getting pop wrong
The British trio have pivoted from jangly indie to pop, but the best bits of their second album lie in the spaces in between
Mount Eerie with Julie Doiron: Lost Wisdom Pt 2 review – stark and heartbroken
A set of disconcertingly painful songs about the end of his first relationship after the death of his wife finds Phil Elverum at sea in sadness