Braids – Native Speaker
Debut album from Montreal's Braids. Like a Canadian Animal Collective with female vocals? Read on and find out...
Webcuts Top 20 of 2010 – Part 2
So that was 2010. What does Webcuts remember most about it? It's hard to say, really. The landscapes shift, the memories flickr and 365 days blur into one long unending soundtrack. One thing our favourite tracks of 2010 all had in common was that they appeared like one night stands that lingered a little longer than usual, almost all of them attached to a singular memory of the song being performed, either from a distance or elbows resting on the stage in mute admiration, or maybe just there emanating from a speaker aimed direct into our inner consciousness, refusing to budge.
Beach House – Teen Dream
Makers of mood music for moderns, Baltimore's daydream duo return with their sweet and sombre third album, Teen Dream.
Magnolia Electric Co. – Josephine
Will Jason Molina blossom on Magnolia Electric Co.'s third album Josephine?
Luke Haines – 21st Century Man
Luke Haines looks back at the 20th Century, and takes pop shots at the maligned and those who got left behind in typical Haines fashion.
Liz Phair – Funstyle
From "Exile In Guyville" to exiled in general. It hasn't been smooth sailing for Liz Phair. In fact you could say things have been downright un-Phair.
Detektivbyrån – Hemvägen
Danarkia, 2006 [8/10] With glockenspiel, accordion and toy-piano Detektivbyrån (Dee-tek-teeve-bu-ron, "The Detective Agency") take their audience on an imaginative musical journey through the urban streets of Paris and the forests of Värmland, the Swedish province
I Break Horses – Hearts
Welcome to the lilting shoegaze world of Swedish duo I Break Horses, "more than just a nostalgic pastiche of an ethereal past".
Robert Forster – The Evangelist
EMI, 2008 [8/10] Robert Forster and Grant McLennan were two months into writing the next Go-Betweens album when on May 6th 2006, Grant McLennan died suddenly of a heart attack at age 48. An indescribable
The Primitives – London – 29 April 2010
What a wonderful world we live in where The Primitives are able to tread the boards once more. A delightful, decorous blend of '60s op-shop pop fronted by the delectable Tracy Tracy. One certified chart smash with “Crash” and some near misses along the way, The Primitives were one of those bands that were championed and loved (the old chestnut about Morrissey being a big fan is worth repeating) but never fully met with pop's good graces.
Destroyer – Dan Bejar talking about Kaputt (2011)
It's been said by Webcuts in the past that Destroyer's Dan Bejar is the Woody Allen of pop music. His idiosyncratic, poetic touch is less that of a lyricist but a storyteller with a revolving cast of characters (mostly women), and picking up on the ripples and waves they create to make them a part of his own interior monologue. An essential eighth of the mighty New Pornographers, Bejar has been recording as Destroyer since the 90's. Kaputt, his ninth album is a sumptious, rhapsodic slice of 80's melodrama, immersing itself entirely in the era from the vintage instrumentation to Bejar's own penchance for seeking the sublime out of what some might find the ridiculous.
Elliott Smith – An Introduction To…
It's hard to believe that he's been gone 7 years now. This collection attempts to define one of last great songwriters of the 20th Century.
Peter Murphy – Ninth
Ex-Bauhaus frontman Peter Murphy returns with his first new solo album in 7 years, proving that there's still life in the old goth.
Factory Records – Communications 1978-1992
Long-overdue retrospective from the label that brought you the Happy Mondays, but don't hold that against them...
Noah and the Whale – Last Night on Earth
A surprising record or a record full of surprises from this indie-pop quartet? Note reviewer in "I loathed it now I like it" situation.