BASTILLE – GIVE ME THE FUTURE
BASTILLE return after almost 10 years with Give Me The Future, which sees the pop-rock band maintain their distinct sound while offering lyrics that visualise the future while exploring past turmoil.
Distorted Light Beam sets the album in high-energy motion. The Grammy-nominated band reference pop culture throughout, particularly with Back To The Future – which also hints at the 1982 sci-fi epic Blade Runner – and Thelma + Louise, which features a trademark catchy chorus where dance meets pop.
Breaking up the album with a second interlude is award-winning actor Riz Ahmed, who performs Promises, while Shut Off The Lights and Club 57 offer a contagious dancefloor feel.
Future Holds features gospel singer Bim, offering an uplifting end to an album exploring dark topics.
Give Me The Future is among Bastille's best work, toying with reality while providing optimistic escapism. It achieves everything a pop album should.
Rating: 4/5
Ellie Iorizzo
BLACK COUNTRY, NEW ROAD – ANTS FROM UP THERE
JUST days before the release of their second album, Black Country, New Road singer Isaac Wood announced he was leaving as he was "feeling not so great". The rest of band say they will carry on making music, but future material will likely sound very different.
Black Country, New Road have been tagged as post-punk along with the likes of Yard Act, but in truth they have little in common.
Just a year on from their debut For The First Time, this album is an impressive achievement. While For The First Time careered through unexpected genres at often breakneck speed, Ants From Up There slows things right down and adds melody.
The 55-second instrumental Intro, mournful sax on Mark's Theme, fragile vocal on the anthemic Good Will Hunting and the funereal ballad Bread Song all demand close attention.
Whatever the future holds for Black Country, New Road, this is an album they can be proud of.
Rating: 4/5
Matthew George
ANIMAL COLLECTIVE – TIME SKIFFS
ANIMAL Collective's regular topics – the importance of preserving nature, the challenge of human interaction in the modern world – have proved incredibly prescient.
Time Skiffs, their 11th studio album since forming in Baltimore in 2003, is their most coherent work in years and a pleasing change of direction and pace.
Their last album together, 2016's Painting With, was a sonic mess – more a collection of under-developed ideas than an album proper.
Time Skiffs is the opposite, with tracks like Strung With Everything and Cherokee striking for their relatively conventional structures and clear melodies.
It is perhaps their most accessible record since 2009's Merriweather Post Pavilion, which was hailed as a landmark release in experimental pop.
Animal Collective have sometimes infuriated fans with their refusal to deliver another record like Merriweather, choosing instead to explore solo projects, score films and deliver albums that fluctuate wildly in their sound.
Time Skiffs will scratch an itch for something more cohesive, and scratch it well.
Rating: 4/5
Alex Green
HOLLIS BROWN – IN THE AFTERMATH
NEARLY a decade ago, New York rockers Hollis Brown released a track-by-track reinterpretation of The Velvet Underground's 1970 album Loaded to mark Record Store Day.
The band enjoyed the process so much that a sequel seemed all but inevitable.
Now, they have tried their hand at another seminal album and the result is In The Aftermath – an unrestrained, feral take on one of The Rolling Stones' most beloved releases.
The original US album, from which Hollis Brown have cribbed their tracklisting, saw the Stones exploring darker themes and sounds through original compositions.
Singer and guitarist Mike Montali draws additional menace from tracks such as Paint It Black, while the band deliver funky, driving versions of Under My Thumb and It's Not Easy.
The album was recorded in one whiskey-fuelled 24-hour session and it shows.
In The Aftermath sounds both ramshackle and incredibly tight, making for exciting listening.
Rating: 3/5
Alex Green
