Ray Laurél’s new single ‘Freak’
A sly, come-hither cut, all instinct and pulse. Laurél calls it ‘all very Venusian’, and it’s true, it’s magnetic enough to pull you onto the dancefloor and alluring enough to take you home.
Blood Orange’s new album ‘Essex Honey’
He almost vanished from the Blood Orange timeline, but Dev Hynes delivers his long-awaited new album: a reflective, at times mournful snapshot of England and domestic life. Built around yawning cellos, gentle neo-soul and textured breakbeats, the record softly weaves in a heavyweight list of cameos, including Lorde and Zadie Smith, without ever feeling cluttered.
Tracks like ‘The Last Of England’ even incorporate a recording from a final family Christmas, voices of his sister and mother drifting around the living room as they debate The Beatles. It’s a welcome return and a reminder of Hynes’ ever-present sense of musical curiosity.
CMAT’s new album ‘EURO-COUNTRY’
CMAT finally lets her full polyphonic self loose. The tracks thrum with heartbreak, humour and that kind of ferocious yearning only she can summon. The title track, ‘Euro-Euro-Euro-country’ somehow nails both longing and irony, capturing an Irishness that has nothing to do with Claddagh rings or splitting the G.
‘EURO-COUNTRY’ isn’t just a clever name, it’s a literal marker of her sound, a wink to her homeland (one of the first nations to adopt the Euro in 1999) and a sly nod to how capitalism breeds isolation. Threading all that into a song is almost absurdly ambitious, yet CMAT pulls it off effortlessly. On its surface, it’s a sweeping ballad; beneath that bittersweet chorus of ‘my Euro-Euro-Euro-country’ lies a wink, a sigh and a whole country’s worth of contradictions.
Geese’s new single ‘100 Horses’
Geese are running wild these days and ‘100 Horses’ is proof. A bug-eyed, palms-to-the-sky psych-sermon, it’s like the Grateful Dead got a post-punk Edinburgh upbringing, with Cameron Winter shouting that dance music only exists in times of war.
MPH’s new single ‘Until The Morning’
MPH keeps the night moving. Racy speed garage in all its clipped-beat, driving-bass glory, with just enough push to keep you there, until the morning, of course.