Albums

Kinetic is the latest album from Belgium’s five-piece hybrid jazz combo Black Flower – a call to dance through life’s chaos and to harness the power of movement as a tool for liberation. Listen to Monkey System, also our Song of the Day.

In an age of ‘homogenisation and mass amnesia’, Cynefin’s ‘Shimli’ looks to the diversity of the past for answers, a role he’s well placed to comment on as a researcher and cultural historian. Beautifully presented, it is another remarkable release from this unique musician.

With their retro-sounding harmonies, there is an attractive nostalgia to The Ocelots’ new album, Everything, When Said Slowly. It’s a bittersweet, anthemic affair and a joy to listen to, with a salient groove lifting the whole thing ever so slightly—a haunting and majestic album.

The music Seth Lakeman makes and the passion with which he makes it has never faltered; The Granite Way is another exemplary reason why he’s the benchmark of contemporary English folk music.

Nadia Reid’s ‘Enter Now Brightness’ is an album unfettered by generic pigeonholes and working in complete service to artistic expression. Alongside moments of reflection and introspection, we witness joy, light and a piercing optimism that ruptures this album with vibrant colour.

While Blue Lake’s ‘Weft’ may be a mini-album, it feels like a major work with the delicate, complex music drifting away after five songs and leaving us grateful for the experience and wondering where this craftsman will take us next.

Musically, Ekoya is an engrossing listen in which Jupiter and Okwess succeed admirably in achieving a global outlook while celebrating their Congolese identity. 

Matt Hsu’s Obscure Orchestra’s ‘Forest Party’ and ‘Noodle’ are fearsomely eclectic albums. Genre boundaries dissolve, and everything is suspended freely, creating its own universe with all the randomness and beautiful chaos it implies. He proves that home can exist wherever there is hope and community.

Chatham Rabbits’ fourth album, Be Real with Me, is an honest and open album veined with regrets and desires that moves beyond their bluegrass borders to explore new musical territory.

Following his collaboration with Calexico and the recent trilogy of EPs, Dean Owens finally gets to unveil the atmospheric and evocative Spirit Ridge featuring The Stone Buffalo Band.

Mr Luck and Ms Doom, the fifth album by Portland-based country-soul band The Delines, demonstrates a mastery of big lounge ballads and further proves why Willy Vlautin is rightly considered one of America’s greatest songwriters and novelists.

End of the Middle, as its name suggests, might mark the closing chapter of a particular phase in Richard Dawson’s career, but it does so with panache and potency, proof that he is still the most gifted and generous of songwriters.