Song of the Day: Maruja - Trenches

August 30, 2025 Peter Kimpton

Maruja’s single Trenches is the latest to herald their debut album *Pain To Power*

Song of the Day: Influenced by Rage Against The Machine, a seething, menacing new track by the Manchester jazz-punk band, one they describe as “a call for revolution in the face of the oppressive,” with searing, combative lyrics by vocalist Harry Wilkinson and interweaving sax by Joseph Carroll, heralding their debut album Pain to Power, out on 12 September via Music For Nations

Song of the Day: Yussef Dayes - Black Classical Music

May 2, 2023 Peter Kimpton

The cover of Yussef Dayes’ forthcoming album, Black Classical Music

Song of the Day: A whirlwind of brilliant dynamism, energy and invention by the British jazz drummer with the title track of his forthcoming debut solo album, out on Brownswood Recordings, Warners and Cashmere Thoughts Recordings

Song of the Day: Nubya Garcia - The Message Continues (Mark de Clive-Lowe Remix)

March 23, 2021 Peter Kimpton

Cover art for Nubya Garcia’s album – Source

Song of the Day: With a brilliantly bold melody, added developed rhythm and carefully crafted keyboards, an addictive new arrangement of the original instrumental from 2020 album Source by the Camden-born jazz saxophonist, composer and bandleader

Song of the Day: GoGo Penguin - Atomised (and Machinedrum remix)

March 16, 2021 Peter Kimpton

Machinedrum, aka Travis Stewart, left, remixes Manchester trio GoGo Penguin

Song of the Day: Intricate, pace-changing and with beautiful narrative arcs, two versions of the recent piece by the Manchester experimental jazz trio of pianist Chris Illingworth, bassist Nick Blacka, and drummer Rob Turner with a new dance remix by American producer Travis Stewart

Billy Taylor Trio / Nina Simone – I Wish I Knew How It Would Feel To Be Free

October 10, 2018 Peter Kimpton

Song of the Day: Moving on to another TV theme, best known for the original Barry Norman BBC TV film review programme that began in 1972, this wonderful jazz piano piece was originally associated with the 1950s civil rights movement

Roy Budd – Get Carter theme

October 7, 2018 Peter Kimpton

Get Carter (1971) starring Michael Caine, with soundtrack by Roy Budd

Song of the Day: Resuming a thread of film soundtrack music that transcends their original source - this time the classic thriller starring Michael Caine and directed by Mike Hodges from 1971

Clara Smith – It's Tight Like That

September 5, 2018 Peter Kimpton

Song of the Day: After yesterday's sprinkling of tragic and dirty songs by Bessie Smith, let's get a little filthier courtesy of the so-called Queen of the Moaners from South Carolina who actually had a chirpy, perky, high voice

Bessie Smith – Nobody Knows You When You're Down And Out / Need A Little Sugar In My Bowl / Blue Spirit Blues

September 4, 2018 Peter Kimpton

Bessie Smith, carrying more than weight on her famous shoulders

Song of the Day: After a series of early bluesmen, it's time to sprinkle some attention on the first true star of of the blues crossing into jazz, who not only mixed a little dirt into her powerful voice, but also into her lyrics

Rotary Connection – I Am The Black Gold Of The Sun

March 27, 2018 Peter Kimpton

Rotary Connection, featuring Minnie Riperton and Charles Stepney (right).

Song of the Day: How to move from bluesy road tunes to this elaborate jazz-soul number at the peak of the psychedelic movement? Partly because this band also backed Howlin' Wolf and Muddy Waters

Funny Valentine? Chet Baker – Let's Get Lost

February 14, 2018 Peter Kimpton

Song of the Day: The world wide web will be awash with Valentine's songs today, so here's one too - a jazz standard but with a darker edge, embellished with extraordinarily beautiful trumpet and voice of Chet Baker

J Dilla – Two Can Win / The Sylvers – Only One Can Win

February 3, 2018 Peter Kimpton

Maybe nine can win? Fabulous family band The Sylvers

Song of the Day: After yesterday's Ty Segall/Hot Chocolate cover comparison, more material playing on the topic of who or may not be the winner in a relationship from the brilliant hip hop and jazz producer and the 70s funk and soul family group

Moondog – Lament I, Bird's Lament / Moondog Monologue

January 28, 2018 Peter Kimpton

Song of the Day: After Captain Beefheart, could there be any musical figure more influential, eccentric, strange and innovative? Louis Thomas Hardin, aka the Viking figure who for years silently stalked New York's 6th Avenue, is a strong contender

Captain Beefheart & His Magic Band – Moonlight On Vermont / Tropical Hot Dog Night

January 26, 2018 Peter Kimpton

Captain Beefheart, aka Don Van Vliet – musician, artist, visionary.

Song of the Day: With the recent passing of The Fall's Mark E Smith, and all the songs, tributes and stories that have followed, it now seems only appropriate to follow up with music Smith loved by one of his major influences

Hugh Masekela - Grazing In The Grass / Khauleza / Soweto Blues

January 23, 2018 Peter Kimpton

Song of the Day: A triple tribute to the sadly departed but hugely influential South African trumpeter, composer, singer, cornet and flugelhorn player, and leading anti-apartheid campaigner

Amy Winehouse – Tears Dry On Their Own / Back to Black

January 13, 2018 Peter Kimpton

Song of the Day: The voice, the lyrics and the timing – tears don't get much more moving than this – a double from the much missed singer who had many downs, but undoubtedly hit the heights with her Back to Black album of 2006

Weather Report – Birdland

January 6, 2018 Peter Kimpton

Song of the Day: The opening track to the jazz-funk fusion band's 1977 album Heavy Weather is not only a tribute to the legendary New York jazz club inspired by Charlie Parker, but a wonderfully evocative instrumental conjuring up sights and sounds of the city streets

Frank Zappa – Peaches en Regalia

January 5, 2018 Peter Kimpton

Frank Zappa: masterful, mischievous invention

Song of the Day: How could there a more joyful, eccentric, evocative and infinitely inventive opener than this, on album described by Zappa as "a movie for the ears" – 1969's Hot Rats?

Mel Tormé – Comin' Home Baby

December 27, 2017 Peter Kimpton

Song of the Day: For those facing what is often an arduous, weather-affected journey, travelling home after a Christmas visit, or waiting for their beloved to return with this 1962 classic

RJD2 – A Beautiful Mine (Mad Men theme) / 1976 / Let There Be Horns

November 8, 2017 Peter Kimpton

Song of the Day: Echoing yesterday's great drum break, let's now celebrate the work of the Ohio multi-instrumentalist and hip-hop artist, who is behind the theme tune to Mad Men, and so much more

Nat King Cole – Nature Boy

October 30, 2017 Peter Kimpton

Song of the Day: The opening vocals and style of yesterday's 3WW by alt-J, "There was a wayward lad" may spark a musical echo, this beautiful 1948 recording by the jazz pianist and singer, written by the original 'hippie' eden ahbez

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New Albums …

Featured

Devotion & The Black Divine by anaiis.jpeg

Dec 2, 2025

anaiis: Devotion & The Black Divine

Dec 2, 2025

New album: Following a summer Song of the Day - Deus Deus, a review of the autumn release and third LP by the London-based French-Senegalese singer-songwriter of resonantly beautiful, dynamic, sensual soul, gospel, R&B and experimental and chamber pop, with themes of new motherhood, uncertainty, religion, self-love and acceptance

Dec 2, 2025

Nov 26, 2025

De La Soul: Cabin In The Sky

Nov 26, 2025

New album: The hip-hop veterans return with their first without, yet including the voice of, and a tribute to, founding member Trugoy the Dove, AKA Dave Jolicoeur who passed away in 2023, alongside many hip-hop luminary guests, with trademark playful skits, and all themed around the afterlife

Nov 26, 2025

The Mountain Goats: Through This Fire Across From Peter Balkan

Nov 26, 2025

New album: An evocative musical journey of a concept album by the indie-folk band from Claremont, California, fronted by singer-songwriter John Darnielle, based on a dream of his in 2023 about a voyage to a fictional island by the titular captain, charting adventure, wonder and tragedy

Nov 26, 2025

Allie X: Happiness Is Going To Get You

Nov 26, 2025

New album: A hugely entertaining, witty, droll, inventive, chamber and synth-pop fourth LP with a goth twist by the charismatic and theatrical Canadian artist Alexandra Hughes, who brings paradox and dark themes through sounds that include string quartet, harpsichord, classical and pure pop piano with killer lyrics

Nov 26, 2025

Nov 25, 2025

Tortoise: Touch

Nov 25, 2025

New album: A welcome return with a cinematic and mesmeric groove-filled first studio LP in nine years, and the eighth over all by the eclectic Chicago post-rock/jazz/krautrock multi-instrumentalists Dan Bitney, John Herndon, Douglas McCombs, John McEntire and Jeff Parker

Nov 25, 2025

What of Our Nature by Haley Heynderickx, Max García Conover.jpeg

Nov 24, 2025

Haley Heynderickx and Max García Conover: What of Our Nature

Nov 24, 2025

New album: Beautiful, precise, poignant and poetic new folk numbers inspired by the life and music style of Woody Guthrie as the Portland, Oregon and New Yorker, now Portland, Maine-based singer-songwriters bring a delicious duet album, alternating and sharing songs covering a variety of forever topical social issues

Nov 24, 2025

Tranquilizer by Oneohtrix Point Never.jpeg

Nov 24, 2025

Oneohtrix Point Never: Tranquilizer

Nov 24, 2025

New album: Ambient, otherworldly, cinematic, mesmeric, and at times very odd, the Brooklyn-based electronic artist and producer Daniel Lopatin returns with a new nostalgia-based concept – constructing tracks from lost-then-refound Y2K CDs of 1990s and early 2000s royalty-free sample electronic sounds

Nov 24, 2025

Iona Zajac: Bang

Nov 24, 2025

New album: A powerful, stirring, passionate and mature debut LP by the 29-year-old Glasgow-based Scottish singer with Polish and Ukrainian heritage who has toured as the new Pogues singer, and whose alternative folk songs capture raw emotions and the experience of modern womanhood, with echoes of PJ Harvey, Patti Smith, Aldous Harding and Lankum

Nov 24, 2025

Nov 19, 2025

Austra: Chin Up Buttercup

Nov 19, 2025

New album: This fifth studio LP as Austra by the Canadian classically trained vocalist and composer Katie Stelmanis brings beautiful electronica-pop and dance music, and has a bittersweet ironic title – a caustically witty reference to societal pressure to keep smiling despite a devastating breakup

Nov 19, 2025

Nov 18, 2025

Mavis Staples: Sad and Beautiful World

Nov 18, 2025

New album: A timelessly classy release by the veteran soul, blues and gospel singer and social activist from the Staples Singers, in a release of wonderfully moving and poignant cover versions, beautifully interpreting works by artists including Tom Waits, Curtis Mayfield, Leonard Cohen, and Gillian Welch

Nov 18, 2025

Stella Donnelly: Love and Fortune

Nov 18, 2025

New album: Finely crafted, stripped back musical simplicity combined with complex melancholic emotions mark out this beautiful, poetic, and deeply personal third folk-pop LP by the Australian singer-songwriter reflecting on the past and present

Nov 18, 2025

Nov 17, 2025

Picture Parlour: The Parlour

Nov 17, 2025

New album: Following last year’s EP Face in the Picture, a fabulously stylish, smart, swaggering glam-rock-pop debut LP by the Manchester-formed, London-based band fronted by the impressively raspy, gritty, vibratro delivery of Liverpudlian vocalist and guitarist Katherine Parlour and distinctive riffs from North Yorkshire-born guitar Ella Risi

Nov 17, 2025

Nov 16, 2025

FKA twigs: EUSEXUA Afterglow

Nov 16, 2025

New album: Springing from her much lauded third LP Eusexua, out in January this year, and following a hugely successful and spectacular tour, the innovative British experimental pop artist, dancer and producer extends her palette of ethereal, otherworldly and sensual creations in this new, more carnal, harder, beat-filled parallel release

Nov 16, 2025

Nov 15, 2025

Celeste: Woman of Faces

Nov 15, 2025

New album: The outstanding British singer returns, a long four years after her acclaimed debut Not Your Muse, with a classy, passionate set of nine, simmering, smoky, rippling dramatic, timeless numbers in which her vocal prowess is magnificently on show on songs playing on the theme of self and identity

Nov 15, 2025

new songs …

Featured

The Lemon Twigs - I've Got A Broken Heart.jpeg

Dec 4, 2025

Song of the Day: The Lemon Twigs - I've Got A Broken Heart

Dec 4, 2025

Song of the Day: Despite the title, this new double-A single (with Friday I’m Gonna Love You) has a wonderfully uplifting guitar-jangling beauty, with echoes of The Byrds and Stone Roses, but is of course the brilliant 60s and 70s retro sound of the Long Island brothers Brian and Michael D'Addario, out on Captured Tracks

Dec 4, 2025

Dec 3, 2025

Song of the Day: Alewya - Night Drive (featuring Dagmawit Ameha)

Dec 3, 2025

Song of the Day: A sensual, stylish, dreamy electro-pop single by the striking British singer-songwriter, producer, multidisciplinary artist and model Alewya Demmisse, musically influenced by her rich Ethiopian-Egyptian heritage and early childhood upbringings in Saudi Arabia and Sudan

Dec 3, 2025

Dec 2, 2025

Song of the Day: Radio Free Alice - Rule 31

Dec 2, 2025

Song of the Day: Stirring, passionate indie postpunk by the band based in Melbourne, Australia, with echoes of The Cure’s core sound, new wave, and 90s indie-rock influences, and out on Double Drummer

Dec 2, 2025

Dec 1, 2025

Song of the Day: Sailor Honeymoon - Armchair

Dec 1, 2025

Song of the Day: Catchy, punchy, fuzz-guitar indie rock with a droll lyrical delivery and some echoes of Wet Leg come in this new single by the trio from Seoul, South Korea, out on Good Good Records

Dec 1, 2025

Nov 30, 2025

Song of the Day: Ellie O'Neill - Bohemia

Nov 30, 2025

Song of the Day: A beautiful, poetic finger-picking debut folk single with a mystical, distantly stormy twist by the Dublin-based Irish singer-songwriter from County Meath, out now on St Itch Records

Nov 30, 2025

Nov 29, 2025

Song of the Day: Danalogue - Sonic Hypnosis

Nov 29, 2025

Song of the Day: A full flavour of future-past with mesmeric, euphoric retro acid house and electronica in this new single by Daniel Leavers, producer and the founding member of The Comet Is Coming and Soccer96, out now on Castles In Space

Nov 29, 2025

Nov 28, 2025

Song of the Day: Cardinals - Barbed Wire

Nov 28, 2025

Song of the Day: Another striking, passionate, punchy, catchy single by the Irish postpunk/indie-folk-rock band from Cork, heralding their upcoming debut album, Masquerade, out on 13 February via So Young Records

Nov 28, 2025

Frank-Popp-Ensemble and Paul Weller.jpeg

Nov 27, 2025

Song of the Day: Frank Popp Ensemble (with Paul Weller) - Right Before My Eyes

Nov 27, 2025

Song of the Day: A strong, soaring, emotive, soulful release by the German artist co-written by British singer and former Jam frontman who here sings and plays guitar, the lyrics about witnessing the increasing injustices and demise of the world, out on Unique Records / Schubert Music Europe

Nov 27, 2025

Tessa Rose Jackson - Fear Bangs The Drum 2.jpeg

Nov 26, 2025

Song of the Day: Tessa Rose Jackson - Fear Bangs The Drum

Nov 26, 2025

Song of the Day: Using a musical metaphor, beautiful, crisply rhythmical, soaring piano and atmospheric indie-pop-folk about facing your fears by the Dutch/British singer-songwriter, heralding her forthcoming new album The Lighthouse, out on 23 January 2026 on Tiny Tiger Records

Nov 26, 2025

Nov 25, 2025

Song of the Day: Melanie Baker - Sad Clown

Nov 25, 2025

Song of the Day: Catchy, candid, cathartic indie-grunge-pop by the British singer-songwriter from Cumbria in a melancholy but oddly uplifting emotional work-through of depression, love and exhaustion, out now on TAMBOURHINOCEROS

Nov 25, 2025

Nov 24, 2025

Song of the Day: Holly Humberstone - Die Happy

Nov 24, 2025

Song of the Day: Luxuriant, breathy, femme-fatale dream pop with a dark, southern gothic, Lana del Rey-inspired, live-fast-die-young theme, and stylish video by the 25-year-old British singer-songwriter from Grantham, out on Polydor/Universal

Nov 24, 2025

Nov 23, 2025

Song of the Day: These New Puritans - The Other Side

Nov 23, 2025

Song of the Day: A delicate, tender, and unusually minimalist single, their first since this year’s acclaimed album Crooked Wing, by the Southend-on-Sea-born Barnett twins, here with Jack on improvised piano and George on drums and a soprano register wordless vocal, out on Domino Records

Nov 23, 2025

Word of the week

Featured

Dec 4, 2025

Word of the week: crapulence

Dec 4, 2025

Word of the week: A term that may apply regularly during Xmas party season, from the from the Latin crapula, in turn from the Greek kraipálē meaning "drunkenness" or "headache" pertains to sickness symptoms caused by excess in eating or drinking, or general intemperance and overindulgence

Dec 4, 2025

Nov 20, 2025

Word of the week: discalceate

Nov 20, 2025

Word of the week: A rarely used, but often practised verb, especially when arriving home, it means to take off your shoes, but is also a slightly more common adjective meaning barefoot or unshod, particularly for certain religious orders that wear sandals instead of shoes. But in what context does this come up in song?

Nov 20, 2025

Nov 6, 2025

Word of the week: erythrophyll

Nov 6, 2025

Word of the week: A seasonally topical word relating to the the red pigment of tree leaves, fruits and flowers, that appears particularly when changing in autumn, as opposed to the green effect of chlorophyll, from the Greek erythros for red, and phyll for leaves. But what of songs about this?

Nov 6, 2025

Oct 22, 2025

Word of the week: fennec

Oct 22, 2025

Word of the week: It’s a small pale-fawn nocturnal fox with unusually large, highly sensitive ears, that inhabits from African and Arab deserts areas from Western Sahara and Mauritania to the Sinai Peninsula. But has it ever been seen in a song?

Oct 22, 2025

Oct 9, 2025

Word of the week: gongoozler

Oct 9, 2025

Word of the week: A fabulous old English slang term for someone who tends to stand or sit for long periods staring at the passing of boats on canals, sometimes with a derogatory or at least ironic use for someone who is useless or lazy. But what of songs about this activity and culture?

Oct 9, 2025