Fresh, young, hyped and absolutely wonderful. Dry The River is the London next big thing, and when everyone was expecting for a weak and badly recorded first album, the guys ran after Interpol’s and National’s producer Peter Katis, and I have to say, they ended up releasing one of the best folk stuff I’ve listened in ages. Shallow Bed contains 11 eleven songs, all of them pretty much enjoyable, from the indie anthem “New Ceremony”, which is being unstoppable  played on NME radio, going through the beautiful and delicate “Demon”, to the powerful hit “No Rest”; there is no such a bad song here. Even the extra track in the second half of Lion’s Dean is amazing. I’m on honeymoon with Dry The River, and not thinking of stopping listening to it that soon. Specially for fans of The Maccabees and Tribes.

01.Animal Skins
02.New Ceremony
03.Shield Your Eyes
04.History Book
05.The Chambers & The Valves
06.Demons
07.Bible Belt
08.No Rest
09.Shaker Hymns
10.Weights & Measures
11.Lion’s Den

My Rating: 9.7

“…I’ve heard there’s a place where we go when we die…”

When Blaine started singing these first words I almost had a musical orgasm. Man, I do love these guys. Seretonin’s following album is crowed by catchy and lovely songs, specially the three first ones. The sequence “Radlands”, “You Had Me At Hello” and the anthem “Someone Purer”, which is being played exhaustively in NME radio, makes a much more easier approach than the last one. Musically speaking, Radlands’ sonority it’s not that impressive, nor innovative. But by stopping using those electronic effects and influences from the last two albums I think they finally reached a point in which their sound can be properly analyzed as a whole. Despite “Someone Purer”, there are no huge, radio tailor-made songs. On the other hand there’s no even a single weak or below-average song (maybe except for “The Hale Bop”, hehe, I didn’t get this one at all). Radland is a nice collection of soft easy-listening melodies, which spread out more enjoable moments with “Sister Everett” and “Lost in Austin”. Eventually, it’s quite good to see again Blaine and Ree making an album together with Mystery Jets, they are the kind of band that will always be a pleasure to listen to, whether they’re playing to small crowed pubs or festivals. 

01 – Radlands
02 – You Had Me At Hello
03 – Someone Purer
04 – The Ballad Of Emmerson Lonestar
05 – Greatest Hits
06 – The Hale Bop
07 – The Nothing
08 – Take me Where The Roses Grow
09 – Sister Everett
10 – Lost In Austin
11 – Luminescense

My Rating: 9.5

New The Mars Volta’s album is a return to the band’s loud, instrumentally sonority, plus a little bit of electronic effects here and there. Of course, it’s not that close to the quality of first releases, i.e. De-Loused in the Comatorium and Frances the Mute, yet a very good album though. The first half of Noctourniquet is a must-listen, comprising amazing songs such as “Aegis” and “Empty Vessels Make The Loudest Sound” and “In Absetia”. I wish the last half were more straight-forward, but I can’t complain at all, this one is an above average one, showing the band trying to make a huge effort to come back to their glory days.

01. The Whip Hand
02. Aegis
03. Dyslexicon
04. Empty Vessels Make The Loudest Sound
05. The Malkin Jewel
06. Lapochka
07. In Absentia
08. Imago
09. Molochwalker
10. Trinkets Pale Of Moon
11. Vedamalady
12. Noctourniquet
13. Zed And Two Naughts

My Rating: 9.40

Finally meeting Loris’ and Monica’s requests.

Let’s start from the beginning. The Rosie Taylor Projects’ new album has a remarkable beginning with “Twin Beds (one)”, “For Esme”,  ”Every Morning (and for the Rest of Our Lives)” (that that is for the best song in the album, with an amazing crescent ending), “The Last Happy Writer” and the folk gem “Last Drinks At Niagra Bar”. This is the kind of first half that put your expectations in the highest percentages. Then it comes the beautiful instrument track “A Young Couple In The Street” followed by the single “Sleep”, with its Club8 afrobeat reminiscences. From this part and on the album gets more folk characters, yet maintaining the great quality but distancing little bit from the first half. Despite this small discrepancy, Twin Beds is a grower and definitely a must-listen.

01.Twin Beds (one)
02.For Esme
03.Every Morning (and for the Rest of Our Lives)
04.The Last Happy Writer
05.Last Drinks At Niagra Bar
06.A Young Couple In The Street
07.Sleep
08.Lovers Or Something Like It
09.A Walk By Moonlight
10.Twin Beds (two)
11.The Bluest Smile

My Rating: 9.4

Leeds is probably the city with the highest number of underrated bands this world already seen. The Pigeon Detectives and iForward Russia! are some of the current cases, and obviously, there is this band that should always be remembered: The Wedding Present. David Gedge has been making indie music since the eighties. This is his eighth  album and Wedding Present’s power, lyrics and sonority almost haven’t changed throughout  all these years, but don’t get me wrong, they certainly improved here and there, but the band’s essence remains intact. David keeps with his usual post-punk vocals singing in a conversation manner (just like Art Brut’s vocal), and overall, this Valentina is one of those albums where songs complete each other, in which is easier to remember of the album itself than to one song in particular. A nice make-it-yourself crowed of indie songs.

01. You’re Dead 5:46
02. You Jane 3:07
03. Meet Cute 3:48
04. Back A Bit…Stop 3:16
05. Stop Thief 3:36
06. The Girl From The DDR 3:59
07. Deer Caught In The Headlights 5:25
08. Fidelio 3:07
09. End Credits 4:10
10. Mystery Date 5:32

Oh, I forgot to say I just love the shoegaze atmosphere in the last minutes of “Deer Caught in the Headlights”, what an emotive song!

My Rating: 9.5

These guys have been treated as one of the most exciting British live bands. This certainly helped out in selling their music, and if you realize that they compose songs which are tailor-made for being any TV show’s soundtrack, then you have a bombastic combination. The first great moment of the album is definitely “Running Down The Aisle”, which reminds us right away of Keane and the earlier Snow Patrol, a piano-driven melancholic and emotional song with a nice breakdown. By the way, Morning Parade’s debut is crowed by build-ups and breakdowns that turns the album into a very easy-listening experience. Perhaps this is the negative point here, they don’t go much further on their sonority, it’s a album full of hits and ballads, but c’mon, in these times who are giving horses ass about it? It’s amazing to see another British band breaking through with such quality and freshness.

01 Blue Winter
02 Headlights
03 Carousel
04 Running Down The Aisle
05 Us & Ourselves
06 Under The Stars
07 Close To Your Heart
08 Half Litre Bottle
09 Monday Morning
10 Speechless
11 Born Alone
12 Speechless (Acoustic)

My Rating: 9.45

New EP of this amazing Swedish band. The Crystal Lake’s visitors know very well these guys. I’ve been listening this Love Forever throughout this morning and in my opinion it looks a step back in their discography, not a bad release though. Islands had already shown us a slightly change in their sonority, but was able to mantain the quality of the debut, which it did amazingly. Love Forever doesn’t have the power of their older stuff, “Love’s Taking Strange Ways” is a great song, but the others like “A Breaking Heart Is a Brilliant Start” for instance, are too slow that requires Philip to sing in high notes, quite different from band’s hymns “Lost” and “Puzzles”. As I said, it still a nice EP with good proposals, but I hope they don’t take this direction in their new releases.

01.Love’s Taking Strange Ways
02.Will I Ever Be Ready
03.A Breaking Heart Is a Brilliant Start
04.8th of June

My Rating: 9.2

I took some time to review this album, however, everybody should at least give a try to it. This Melbourne-based duo has released 7 Eps before Vacation, their debut. Due to the amount of singles and Eps, the band’s sonority ranges from indie-rock ballads (“Mix Tape”, “Purple”) piano-driven melodies (“Of Desire”, “Falling Away”) and my favourite: slow core, in which they provided amazing and minimalist compositions, such as “Leaving Home”, “Bad Friends”, and the outstanding “Got it, Lost it”. A remarkable and unprecedented album, proving that it’s possible to compose a nice and round work with simple songs and melodies.

01.Gladiator
02.Leaving Home
03.Mix Tape
04.Purple
05.Child In A Tree
06.Bad Friends
07.Got It, Lost It
08.Falling Away
09.Of Desire
10.Rolling By

My Rating: 9.55

No One Can Ever Know is the third release from Scottish band The Twilight Sad. They were one of the most different and exciting Scotttish bands arising from that unforgettable 2006, even though with their debut being released several months later. The next album was the successfully acclaimed Forget the Night Ahead, in which they moved to a more experimental area, and I have to admit I felt a lack of direction in this one. No One Can Ever Know is driven by 80’s and industrial influences, without losing the noise and dark characteristic of their works. You probably will be astonished when listen to “Dead City”, it’s powerful, melodic, has great lyrics and a catchy chorus hard to be forgotten. “Sick” could be misunderstood as a new Radiohead’s song easily, (of course, not so easy, since the singer’s accent is quite notable). I don’t want to be repetitive here, but summarizing this album is really enjoyable from beginning to end, dosing perfectly the atmospheres between the songs. I wasn’t expecting such a great album, but it looks like that The Twilight Sad finally found their sound, and I’m really happy to know that one more band survived healthily through these last six years.

1.Alphabet
2.Dead City
3.Sick
4.Don’t Move
5.Nil
6.Don’t Look at Me
7.Not Sleeping
8.Another Bed
9.Kill It in the Morning
10.A Million Ignorants (Bonus Track)

My Rating: 9.4

01.No Future/No Past
02.Wasted Days
03.Fall In
04.Stay Useless
05.Separation
06.No Sentiment
07.Our Plans
08.Cut You

My Rating: 9.2