This is probably the last one for the year, although I might do one closer to the end of December to round up anything that got released during the holiday season. As usual most releases will be big classic rock packages or compilations or box sets or the like, so there won’t be too much to list here.

The Highlights

Adele – 30

★★★★

Released on Columbia Records

A lot of people have reduced this to being the British singer’s “divorce album”, much like Kacey Musgraves and a few other women of their generation’s latest albums have been reduced to. On one hand, it is something that’s going around. On the other, this is more nuanced than simply covering the same ground as the last Dixie Chicks record. These are songs about big feelings, as the songwriter herself admits to her child on the third song. They also ride a wave of hard-hitting soul that’s both softer and heavier than her previous work. It’s vulnerable and personal, an admission or confession of her all-too-relatable sins.

Deap Vally – Marriage

★★★☆

Released on Cooking Vinyl Records

Mainstream rock is dead and stinking – rotted, bloated, and lying in the middle of the street. Deap Vally takes one of the last good ideas it ever had (see the K.T. Tunstall guest spot for further information) and rubs it with the caustic juices of punk rock to make one hell of a swaying zombie.

Palomino Blond – ontheinside

★★★☆

Released on Limited Fanfare Records

Back in the Nineties they made these kinds of albums all the time and they were put out on major labels and pushed onto radio and MTV. Now people put on bullshit like Imagine Dragons and call it rock. Sad!

Resina – Speechless

★★★☆

Released on FatCat Records

Dark modern classical music, a soundtrack for a slow-burn deeply disturbing horror show that has yet to be written.

Joe & the Shitboys – The Reason For Hardcore Vibes (Again)

★★★☆

Released on Tutl Records

It took me longer to get the album art and write this out than it does to play the album. Pure modern snot, over before it gets annoying and pogo af.

The Rest

Ovlov – Buds ★★★ (Exploding In Sound)

Elbow – Flying Dream 1 ★★★☆ (Polydor)

Ladyhawke – Time Flies ★★★ (Mid Century/BMG)

Weakened Friends – Quitter ★★★☆ (Big Scary Monsters)

Beach Fossils – The Other Side of Life: Piano Ballads ★★☆ (Bayonet)

Maybeshewill – No Feeling Is Final ★★★ (Wax Bodega)

Tiny Little Houses – Misericorde ★★☆ (Ivy League)

Mr Twin Sister – Al Mundo Azul ★★★ (Twin)

Traffik Island – A Shrug of the Shoulders ★★ (Flightless)
Half Beatles, half Dead, all derivative.

Frogpond – Time Thief ★★★☆ (Self-Released)
Swampy and thick, layering on the old septic alt days for effect.

Palm Ghosts – The Lost Frequency ★★★ (Ice Queen)

Desert Liminal – Glass Fate ★★★☆ (Whited Sepulchre)

Rubber Band Gun – Cashes Out ★★★ (Earth Libraries)

You’ll Never Get To Heaven – Wave Your Moonlight For The Snowfall Train ★★☆ (Mystic Roses)

Teeth Agency – Cherry Blossom Child ★★★ (Stones Throw)