ALBUM REVIEWS
St Vincent – All Born Screaming
Annie Clark’s seventh album under her St Vincent persona is the heaviest, and perhaps most unsettling, to date. A suitably sinister intro to Hell Is Near sets the tone but it is the percussive battering in the second half of Reckless which kicks the album into gear. Coupled with glitchy electronica it creates a constantly unsettling soundscape – witnessed to even greater effect on Broken Man with its three flesh-and-blood drummers, including Dave Grohl, along with Clark’s drum programming. The album’s first half is powered by some of the fiercest, hardest-rocking guitar work of Clark’s idiosyncratic career, before the second branches out into a range of styles – Violent Times features an arresting brass hook and an astonishing vocal performance.
Justice – Hyperdrama Review by Mason Oldridge
If asked to name a French electronic duo, most people would probably say Daft Punk because of their international fame, though Justice, who achieved some success in the noughties with their Simian remix We Are Your Friends and some singles from their debut album Cross, offer a more unique sound and are out to prove they have still got it. Their first studio album in seven years, the boys pair electronic music with disco and funk elements. The twosome have teamed up with Australian psychedelic musician Tame Impala on a couple of tracks, a collaboration that works well, especially on lead single One Night/All Night as Parker’s dreamy vocals play over the electronic beat. Generator is the highlight though as it carries Justice’s trademark heavier electronic sound.
Lucy Rose – This Ain’t The Way You Go Out Review by Yasmin Vince
Lucy Rose is back with her fifth studio album, a beautifully honest tribute to her son and the challenges that followed his birth. Most of the songs are stripped back to her vocals and the piano. It’s refreshingly easy to listen to. When the singer-songwriter sticks to her folksy background, the music is perfect. It’s at once ethereal, rich, wistful and bold, like a modern-day Joni Mitchell CD. Whatever You Want, a love letter to her son Otis, is a standout track. Rose masterfully combines melancholic melodies with upbeat lyrics. The result is tender and joyful. Unfortunately, some songs stray from the template. It’s brave of Rose to attempt some more jazzy, heavily arranged music but these tracks, while not bad, do not meet the high standard set by the others.
Lauri Porra – Matter And Time Review by Tom White
An atheist’s answer to the religious masses of the great classical composers, Lauri
Porra’s epic premiered in 2018 with the
Vantaa orchestra. A bold, beautiful and bonkers suite, it uses the words of astronomer Esko Valtaoja, narrated by Stephen Fry – here an intergalactic Sir David Attenborough, illuminating the journey of the carbon atom which serves as our central protagonist. Porra, descended from composer Sibelius, has written a beautiful orchestral score, with his other musical life as the bassist in heavy metal band Stratovarius making its presence felt in frequent rock guitar solos. His wife, renowned composer Dalia Stasevska, presides over the disparate elements which coalesce in prog-rock, War Of The Worlds territory.