Reviews archive

April 2024

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58 articles

April 29
- "Veritas arrives as their first album in six years. It wasn't worth the wait." P.O.D. fail to capitalise on the nu metal nostalgia train with an underwhelming return
- “Surreal and observational lyrics, daftness and majesty… With the benefit of hindsight their music makes more sense now”: Stackridge’s The Forbidden City
April 28
- "Seven Turns is professional, competent, and worthy": the Allman Brothers Band look to the past on Seven Turns but fall just short of living up to it
April 27
- “Substantial pleasures… even if they arguably venture too far into prog indulgence”: Renaissance’s 2024 reissue of Tuscany, featuring live Japan set
- “Vim and vigour fizz… energy levels are cranked up compared to the studio versions”: Transatlantic’s two-night Live At Morsefest 2022
April 26
- “Once inserted, they can comfortably stay in until the end of the night”: D’Addario dBud earplugs review
- “An expansive, widescreen sound… and when Ian Crichton gets the wind in his sails, the results are spectacular”: Six By Six’s Beyond Shadowland
- "Vividly conjures echoes of Chelsea Wolfe, Marissa Nadler and even touches of Depeche Mode." MWWB vocalist Jessica Ball explores new sonic paths with new project Eye and debut Dark Light
- "Like a covers band trialling material in a dive bar": Lee Aaron occasionally shines on otherwise patchy covers album Tattoo Me
- "A hurricane of monolithic thud and skronk": Neil Young revisits his grunge past with Crazy Horse on the familiar but different F##in' Up
- The 40th anniversary edition of Def Leppard's Pyromania: Come for the originals, stay for the "utterly fierce" unreleased live album
April 25
- "OU frequently sound like they’ve beamed in from the 25th century." Devin Townsend-approved Chinese metallers OU take prog metal into strange new worlds on II: Frailty
April 24
- "Given titles like Bury The Cross… With Your Christ, it’d be a sucker’s bet to imagine Deicide taking their boot off the throat of organised religion." Satanic death metallers return from the abyss with Banished By Sin
- Think Blur had it bad at Coachella? The Jesus And Mary Chain may as well have been the Spice Girls so far as Roadburn is concerned
- "Nostalgia is big business, and Mantras is swimming in it." Alien Ant Farm's first album in almost a decade is pretty much what you'd expect, and that's just fine
April 23
- "Rather than a fascinating document of Linkin Park’s movements over the years, Papercuts is little more than a playlist set to shuffle." Linkin Park's first greatest hits album is a disappointing missed opportunity
- "The wave of legacy bands striking new gold in their twilight years continues unabated." Almost 50 years in, German heavy metal legends Accept have found a new career peak with Humanoid
- Graphic videos, disturbing lyrics and a bloodsoaked vocalist: Couch Slut's European live debut at Roadburn Festival 2024 is terrifying yet undeniably thrilling and triumphant
- "A doom take on trance by way of Radiohead." Chelsea Wolfe bewitches and delights with spellbinding set at Roadburn
April 22
- Dry Cleaning's EPs tour is a delicious reminder of what a fabulously odd, game-changing band they are
- "The line between a Clipping. and Slayer gig is tighter than you'd think." Daveed Diggs' alt hip hop group challenge notions of heaviness at Roadburn Festival 2024
- "She looks and feels like a next-gen star." Zambia-born Canadian rapper Backxwash looks to evolve beyond her trap metal roots with surprise set at Roadburn Festival 2024
- "Adore weaves its dark spell a little bit deeper. It's brooding, gothic and hypnotic in spades": Smashing Pumpkins embrace the sadness but lose fans on Adore
April 20
- “Ewan Pearson and Mogwai are by far the best, while the Manic Street Preachers remix is misguided”: Steven Wilson’s Record Store Day special, Harmonic Divergence
April 19
- "Orange Goblin have made the journey, and they're very much the real thing." London's stoner metal legends finally reach New Zealand and put on a magnificent rock 'n' roll show
- “If you enjoy anything from Architects to Deftones, metalcore to pop, there’s something here for you”: Unpeople’s self-titled EP is UK metal’s most promising first impression of 2024
- Glen Campbell left us seven years ago, but his new album of duets suggests that the end isn't the end it once was
- "He tackles wars, political turmoil, crime and weather, in another compelling affirmation of his irrepressible muse": Ian Hunter shows no sign of erosion on Defiance Part 2: Fiction
- "They've gone out of their way to turn up the dial and make things as heavy as possible": Pearl Jam sweep the pretenders away on Dark Matter
April 18
- St. Vincent's superb All Born Screaming offers up thrillingly unfiltered reflections upon life, death, and all the chaos that occurs between those two inevitabilities
- “There’s plenty to sustain and even expand the myth of their mission to reconstruct rock music”: Faust’s Momentaufnahme III
- "Tarantula Heart is the best Melvins album since the 90s": They shaped sludge metal and inspired Nirvana, but Melvins are still punk metal weirdos on new album Tarantula Heart
April 17
- “SYSC will take over, so get on board or get out of their way.” Seeyouspacecowboy spread their wings and shed their demons on magnificent new album Coup De Grâce
April 16
- “The humorous interludes may prove divisive; it’s strongest when they dig hard into a groove”: Trifecta control the fusion in The New Normal
- "Between this and Dune: Part Two, 2024 is already proving a spotless year for fans of bat**** cosmic maximalism": Dvne's Voidkind is the best album about desert-dwelling space worms you'll hear this year
- "Few bands can compete for sheer atmosphere and elegiac beauty": Doom metal legends My Dying Bride stay the course on gorgeous - if a little predictable - new album A Mortal Binding
April 15
- “A handy reminder of why he’s revered as a player, tickling the ear with pleasurable sounds”: Anthony Phillips’ Strings Of Light reissue
- "Achingly beautiful, haunting music that marks Big Brave out as so much more than just another doom metal act": Big|Brave transcend boundaries on new album A Chaos Of Flowers
- "Sometimes its songs are a gentle caress, sometimes its songs are a maelstrom": Melissa Etheridge mixes it up on Brave And Crazy
April 14
- "This was no mere warm-up; this was a declaration that Bruce Dickinson is still a force of nature in the metal universe." Iron Maiden's irrepressible frontman played his first solo show in over 20 years - and it was a triumph
April 13
- “There’s no questioning the quality of this collection… but is it truly essential?” Carl Palmer’s Fanfare For The Common Man box set
- “Transportative music… a deeply cosmic record that might be out there with their very best”: Hawkwind’s Stories From Time And Space
April 12
- With the swagger of Happy Mondays and the politics of Crass, Kid Kapichi's sold out Birmingham show hints they might be Britain's next breakout stars
- “A much better testimony to ELP’s legacy than the original incarnation’s risible swan song Love Beach”: Emerson, Lake & Powell’s The Complete Collection
- “More aggressive but with a parallel tranquillity… they continue to separate themselves from the post-rock pack”: Sleepmakeswaves’ It’s Here, But I Have No Names For It
- "Gorgeous songs, sung in a voice that sounds like it's lived a life that's full": Mark Knopfler repeats his formula to great effect on One Deep River
- Getting harder and heavier with each album, Devon’s Kris Barras Band come flying out of the blocks on Halo Effect
- "Sounds like a band remembering where they buried the treasure": Gun have stalled in the past, but on Hombres they sparkle
April 11
- "This is the quartet’s darkest, most varied and heaviest album by some margin." Symphonic metalcore mavericks Imminence have stepped out of the shadows of their influences in style with The Black
April 10
- Gen Z superstar Girl In Red has lived and learned between albums, and I’m Doing It Again Baby! gleams with new perspectives
April 9
- "Her expression seems to say, if you even try to take this child from me, I will kill you": Family Values is a beautiful, tender and moving document of the love shared by Kurt Cobain, Courtney Love and their most precious creation
April 8
- "An edgier, cooler and more affordable option, particularly if guitar music is your jam": Marshall Motif II A.N.C. review
- "This has to be the album against which every rock album that followed should be measured": Led Zeppelin attain peak Led Zeppelin status on Led Zeppelin IV
April 6
- “The sonic aggro and infectious licks are there in spades”: For better and worse, Slash strips rock to its basest elements at Wembley Arena
April 5
- "Half Living Things is a record that satisfies that mosh-hungry hardcore itch." Alpha Wolf mix rampaging heaviness with injections of vulnerability on album number three
- "The work of a band on the form of their career": Fresh from supporting Bad Omens and Northlane, unsung metalcore heroes Erra step up to the big leagues with new album Cure
April 4
- "Exactly how you’d hope Korpiklaani to sound in 2024 if your expectations revolve around zippy, accordion-driven tavern metal.": Folk metal's biggest party band have found the sweet spot on new album Rankarumpu
April 1
- "A charcuterie board of delightful music, with all sorts of flavours, textures and surprises": Steve Harley & Cockney Rebel keep it leisurely on Timeless Flight