Camera Obscura – My Maudlin Career
Four albums in, Camera Obscura assess their career, wisely trading 'brilliant' for 'maudlin' and coming up somewhere inbetween.
Eels – Hombre Lobo
America's rock werewolf Mark Oliver Everett otherwise known as Eels howls twelve songs of desire on his seventh studio disc.
Primavera Festival – Barcelona – 27-29 May 2010
Ah, Barcelona, your beaches are beautiful, your women are smoking jewels (literally), and this festival by the beach (really an explosion of concrete by the seaside) is clearly the diamond in the rough for the travelling roadshow of bands that litter the skies with one thing in mind - a paid holiday. With a selection of acts that suited this weary hack like a good pair of tight jeans and a band tee, Primavera was a stage to stage delight. The current crop of new band like The Drums, Surfer Blood and Dum Dum Girls rose up to meet the challenge of the '90s alternative old guard of Pixies, Pavement and Superchunk.
Black Mountain – Wilderness Heart
Brooding psychedelic rock with some Zeppelin-esque undertones, Canada's Black Mountain let loose on their third.
The Whitest Boy Alive – Rules
Erlend Øye and company break some rules but also unwittingly create them on their second album entitled, you guessed it, Rules.
Pama International – Pama Outernational
A fusion of dub reggae, ska and soul, the brilliance of Pama International comes to the fore with their seventh album Pama Outernational.