SOUND JUDGEMENT

The latest album releases reviewed

FOR ALL OUR DAYS THAT TEAR THE HEART

JESSIE BUCKLEY AND BERNARD BUTLER

★★★★✩

Olivier-award winning actress Jessie Buckley and Brit-award winning musician Bernard Butler have joined forces to create an album that grew from a shared love for Ireland.

Opener The Eagle And The Dove features Buckley’s soaring vocals and sets in motion a sense of adventure for the following 11 tracks. She also hits big notes in Footnotes On The Map, while on the piano-led Seven Red Rose Tattoos, her rich vocals are offset by doleful trumpet sounds.

It invokes feelings of passion and is about rawness and spirit – a work of catharsis.

MUNA MUNA ★★★★✩

MUNA make a break for the big time with their self-titled third album, packed full of synth-pop anthems.

Known for heartbreak songs such as Crying On The Bathroom Floor this shift in direction is signposted by first single Silk Chiffon.

Much of MUNA is unashamedly catchy with huge choruses, with What I Want aiming squarely for the dance floor and Anything But Me, an upbeat break-up song.

After the uncertainties of the past few years, when The Los Angeles-based trio – Katie Gavin, Naomi McPherson and Josette Maskin – were dropped by their record label during the pandemic, to return with a record this confident is remarkable.

HERE COMES EVERYBODY SPACEY JANE ★★★★✩

This second album from Aussie outfit Spacey Jane refines their formula with glossy production and lyrics of youthful optimism, heartbreak and anxiety.

At times it is anthemic; Hardlight leans towards the glistening stadium rock of The War On Drugs. At other points, like on Bothers Me, it is quiet and intimate,.

It’s Been A Long Day, with its evocative refrain of “Wake up slowly, drink your coffee, I’ve got something to say”, has the purest of guitar melodies intertwined with a chorus of ethereal voices.

The shaggy-haired quartet, led by songwriter and frontman Caleb Harper, has chemistry that is audible across the record.

This could mark Spacey Jane’s UK breakthrough.