SOUND JUDGEMENT

THE LATEST ALBUM RELEASES RATED AND REVIEWED

WHO is the band’s first album in 13 years (and their second in 37), but has a vitality that belies their years – singer Roger Daltrey is 75 and guitarist/ songwriter Pete Townshend is 74.

All This Music Must Fade is an object lesson in how to start a rock album – with a powerful, upbeat song that sets the scene.

The bluesy Ball And Chain is about the Guantanamo detention camp in Cuba. Detour is poppier, with even a touch of lounge, but with its name (The Who evolved from The Detours), is fondly sentimental of Townshend and Daltrey’s 60-year history.

Townshend sings lead on orchestral pop song I’ll Be Back and we can only hope they are.

A BEAUTIFUL THING: LIVE AT LE BATACLAN – IDLES

WITH their long hair and sweaty, shouty punk-rock music, it’s hard to ignore IDLES at the best of times. Now, with the current inescapability of all things political, it’s impossible.

But it isn’t just the Tory-bashing lyrics or tongue-in-cheek reminders that “Islam didn’t eat your hamster” that make IDLES such a cracking listen – it’s the performance and the passion.

The album is a mash-up of previous content from Brutalism and Joy As An Act Of Resistance but, while there’s nothing new, the live performance gives the songs a new dimension, and we hear some lovely audience interaction.

The result is an audio experience that brings out the band’s angry, political, head-banging brilliance.

LOW FIDELITY VOL.1 JOHNNY LLOYD

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FORMER Tribes frontman Johnny Lloyd is living the best years of his life. Signals from their camp indicate that he and girlfriend Billie Piper are living in domestic bliss with their nearly one-year-old daughter Tallulah.

So it seems prescient that Lloyd has released a retrospective of his demos “in their rawest form”. It’s an insight into his progression from indie rocker to introspective troubadour.

Low Fidelity Vol.1 is not only for hardcore fans, it’s pleasingly packed full of unrefined gems.