SOUND JUDGEMENT
THE LATEST ALBUM RELEASES RATED AND REVIEWED
IN MOTION (LIVE FROM HAMMERSMITH)
★★★★★
REEF’S latest is a rollicking good time.
For a while it seemed we’d heard the last of the west country rockers who epitomised the festival fun of 1994 and 1995.
Now they’re back. Last year saw the release of Revelation after an 18-year break, and Jesse Wood taking over from Kenwyn House. Original members Gary Stringer and Jack Bessant have aged like a fine wine.
This live performance mixes the classic with the new. Stringer’s voice is rich and soulful, gravelly and dirty, yet clean and wholesome. A sound that really only Reef can pull off.
ETON ALIVE
SLEAFORD MODS ★★★★★ ON PAPER, Sleaford Mods should be laughed out of the record company meeting.
Their verbal delivery would not be out of place at a school talent show for the dads. The accompaniment – similar to ‘demo mode’ on a Fisher Price keyboard, teamed with a kazoo and tinny electronic bleeps – could be dismissed as similarly amateurish.
But on Eton Alive, the genredodging duo’s sound tessellates with lyrics about sportswear, circumcision and kebabs, to form an intoxicating cocktail of tales from Britain in 2019.
The Sleafords’ sound is not for everyone but it has never been more relevant.
CANTERBURY GIRLS
LILY & MADELEINE
★★★★★
SISTERS Lily and Madeleine Jurkiewicz’s fourth record is an indie/folk/pop trip through what it means to be a 21st century woman.
Full of relatable lyrics for millenials, this isn’t exactly easy-listening, but it’s as accessible as could be thanks to genuinely beautiful production from Daniel Tashian and Ian Fitchuk.
The record almost flows as one long track, the sisters’ voices harmonising without fault over catchy, often lullaby-like tunes.
Pachinko Song offers one of the album’s peppier moments, punctuated with the odd lyrical F-bomb, shocking you out of a comfortable stupor.