Albums

JJ Draper’s second EP, The Theft and The Flight is comfortingly familiar, yet fresh and innovative, underpinned throughout by Draper’s personal approach truly coming into his own.

Live Across Scotland is as near as you could get to capturing Skerryvore’s live sound and the atmosphere that goes with it.

Northumbria is truly authentic, it both connects and communicates with a brutal honesty and warrants investigation. I, for one, look forward to future music from ConChie.

An album that picks up steam and spirit moving on to better days, Suzanne Vallie’s Love Lives Where Rules Die lights the darkness that can live within our hearts.

‘Shadow Houses’, the new album from Tremblers of Sevens, featuring the core duo of Dan Weisenberger and Juli Steemson, is absolutely beautiful and rocks like there’s no tomorrow.

Born in Tribes is an auspicious debut and Lisa Marini has the potential to be one of the most significant voices of the next decade and beyond.

While all of her previous releases have been outstanding, this is in another league entirely, unquestionably one of the finest albums of the year and her personal Sirius.

A fulsome & creatively scored mini-album, much in the tradition of psych-folk-pop. Despite the surface gloss it exhibits a powerful identity.

On Mountain Time’s ‘Music For Looking Animals’, Chris Simpson looks back to find a way forward, crafting more mature and cathartic music.

Solidly tinged with a crumbling dream in his rearview mirror, Gustafson views the human impact affecting both our crushed dreams and our haunted soul.

On Acoustic, Oumou Sangare finds the space to let her voice blossom which shines through, along with her personality and her presence.

A delightful aural confection, combining synth, guitar work which is both lusty and beautifully subtle, highly effective drums patterns. Engaging, entertaining and musically astute; it should be on everyone’s playlist.