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Africa Express Presents ... Bahidorà
New album: The collective that brought Blur’s Damon Albarn together with Malian musicians 20 years ago now assembles artists from four continents, though particularly plants the roots of this superb 21-track double album in Mexico, with a feast of numbers spanning cumbia, hip-hop, kuduro, soul, salsa, pop, reggaeton and more
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Sextile: Yes, Please.
New album: A fun, full-throttle amphetamine-inducing and enhancing LP of pumping, electrifying energy by the post-punk-electronica-dance-rock Los Angeles duo of Brady Keehn and Melissa Scadutom, described as “a vulnerable record that bares its soul as much as it revels in excess”
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The Moonlandingz: No Rocket Required
New album: Seven years since their last LP together, and many different projects in the meantime, Fat White Family’s Lias Saoudi and Eccentronic Research Council’s Dean Honer and Adrian Flanagan return with their clever, witty electro-dance satire on a dystopian world, with guests including Iggy Pop, Nadine Shah, Jessica Winter and actor Ewen Bremner
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New album: The London electronica post-punk, tree-camouflage-dressed quartet return with their vigorously inventive, infectiously dance-inspiring, krautrock-ish defiant work holding up a mirror to the absurdities and injustices of modern life
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Benefits: Constant Noise
New album: Super-sharp, angry and articulate, this is striking, vivid, social and political spoken word and hip-hop on a backdrop of cinematic electronica, dance and punk by the Middlesbrough duo of Kingsley Hall and Robbie Major – a scything sonic and verbal attack on western ills at home and abroad
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Courting: Lust For Life …
New album: A lengthy title for a short, snappy, cleverly interwoven eclectic indie-dancefloor-postpunk experimental third LP by the Liverpool band with a theme of duality, a cyclical intro and outro, and each song paired with a balanced counterpart, sharing specific sonic elements.
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Circuit des Yeux: Halo On The Inside
New album: Dark, vivid, pagan, hedonistic, carnal goth-dancefloor experimental electronica and more by the Chicago-based multi-disciplinary superbly alternative artist Haley Fohr and her otherworldly, mesmerically rich, four-octave voice
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Antony Szmierek: Service Station At The End Of The Universe
New album: Named after Douglas Adams’ satirical sci-fi Restaurant novel, the likeable Manchester spoken word poet’s debut LP is an entertaining, playful, richly observational mix of Streetsy stream-of-consciousness stories inspired by his home city through the classic sounds of 90s dance music and indie
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Marie Davidson: City Of Clowns
New album: The stylish Canadian from Montreal returns with a sixth LP of clever, catchy, droll-delivery dance music and electro-synth-pop, joined by Belgian electronic legends Soulwax aka David and Stephen Dewaele, and Pierre Guerineau
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Maribou State: Hallucinating Love
New album: Created in the shadow of severe mental and physical health problems for the London experimental duo of Chris Davids and Liam Ivory, their latest LP nevertheless has a joyful flavour, mixing electronica, samples, soul and funk, and featuring an ensemble of strong guest vocalists
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FKA twigs: EUSEXUA
New album: Cheltenham’s Tahliah Barnett returns for a third LP edge-pushing electronica, techno and avant-pop with a self-created title fusing euphoria, ecstasy and sex to express that feeling of transcendent losing yourself in the moment
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Moonchild Sanelly: Full Moon
New album: Always infectiously fun and effervescently charismatic, the blue-haired South African star’s third LP bursts with witty, sex-positive braggadocio, sung in Xhosa and English, and spanning the rhythms and sounds of Johannesburg and Durban with electro-pop and cross-genre dance
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The second part of our favourite albums of 2024
Favourite albums of 2024: Welcome to The Song Bar’s favourite albums of 2024 Part 2. Part 1 can be found here. There’s no such thing as ‘best of’ and everything is subjective, but please dig into this rich seam of originality and quality, and even suggest more of your own
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This year’s selections include some returning veterans at the top of their game as well as some fabulous newcomers
Favourite albums of 2024: Welcome to The Song Bar’s favourite albums of 2024 Part 1. There’s no such thing as ‘best of’ and everything is subjective, but rich seams of originality and quality are certainly here to be enjoyed. Peruse away …
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Aphex Twin: Music From The Merch Desk (2016-2023)
Album review: A decade since his last album, Syro, electronica’s brilliant British outsider and pioneer Richard D James returns with a surprise fan-pleaser, a mass compilation release of 38 numbers played at festivals, and previously only on limited-edition vinyl sold at the merch desk of select events
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Legowelt: A Field Guide To The Void
Album review: The Netherlands electronic artist Danny Wolfers returns with a delightful mixture of old-school-influenced synth pop, crafting textured soundscapes, nostalgic, futuristic, eccentric and eclectic, steering somewhere between robot voices, cosmic exploration and the dancefloor
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Sofie Royer: Young-Girl Forever
New album: The California-born, Vienna-based Iranian-Austrian multidisciplinary artist’s newest LP is a very catchy mix of eclectic, political and mainstream, electro-pop, disco and new wave, centred on the contradictions of being a female artist today with all of its freedoms and capitalist trappings
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Primal Scream: Come Ahead
New album: Looking cool in shades, a 1960 photograph the father of frontman Bobby Gillespie decorates the band’s 12th LP, and their first for 8 years, serving very much as a inspiration with a Glaswegian phrase, but musically filled with 70s Philly soul and funk, and with the input of Belfast producer David Holmes, it’s one of PS’s most stylish for years
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Underworld: Strawberry Hotel
New album: The veteran techno rave and electronica king pair Karl Hyde and Rick Smith return with one of their finest LPs of the 11 to date, a miasma of metronomic beats, stream-of-consciousness lyrics, ambience, energy and ecstatic elevation
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Kelly Lee Owens: Dreamstate
New album: The London-based Welsh electronic artist, DJ and producer’s fourth LP takes a new mainstream turn, celebrating daydreaming and emancipated creativity through electronica and dance music, combining ambience and beats with guest collaborators Bicep, Tom Rowlands of The Chemical Brothers, and George Daniel
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