ARCTIC MONKEYS — LIVE AT THE ROYAL ALBERT HALL
“Thank you very much fer ’avin us, Royal Albert ’all.” Alex Turner’s languid cool and swagger may have never been more succinctly expressed than those 10 words, uttered before launching into I Bet You Look Good On The Dancefloor at this charity gig for War Child, staged in 2018 and now released as a live album.
A 20-song set skews towards the Sheffield quartet’s later albums AM and Tranquility Base Hotel And Casino, though early favourites also on show include Brianstorm, 505 and The View From the Afternoon.
Turner and drummer Matt Helders are on prime vocal form, making the most of the venue’s incredible acoustics, while the ferocious guitar work has the enormous crowd buzzing — though a relatively small stage area helps give the gig an improbably intimate feel.
You know what you’re getting and with formats available from a £6.99 download to a £40 box set, here’s hoping for a major windfall for a great cause. 9/10 (Review by Tom White)
THE AVALANCHES — WE WILL ALWAYS LOVE YOU
Anyone expecting the latest Avalanches record to feature the kind of scatty samplemania seen on 2000’s classic Since I Left You or their heavily-delayed 2016 follow-up Wildflower will be in for a bit of a surprise.
Yes, We Will Always Love You has a lot of samples — it wouldn’t really be The Avalanches if it didn’t. But it’s far more centred around a revolving door of studio collaborators, albeit the sort of eclectic blend you might anticipate.
Among the many names dropping in for cameos large and small are Johnny Marr, Jamie XX, Kurt Vile, Blood Orange and Karen O. Some make you see the stars in a different light. Sananda Maitreya — known to most of us as Terence Trent D’Arby — offers an unexpected highlight on the stunning psych-soul groove Reflecting Light.
Meanwhile the Clash’s Mick Jones and California nu-disco artist Cola Boyy provide a surprising but delightful duet on We Go On, a baffling party romp that’s got The Avalanches written all over it.
Not all the borrowed talent is best utilised, however. Leon Bridges is wasted on Interstellar Love, a pool party dance number that comes off flat and repetitive. And the summer-pop Running Red Lights, featuring Weezer’s Rivers Cuomo, is just a little too flimsy and throwaway to be satisfying.
While We Will Always Love You has a lot of the fun fans are used to, there are certainly fewer funnies. Instead, 20 years on from the madness of Frontier Psychiatrist, the Aussie-via-LA producers are now ruminating on some of the bigger questions — asking, in the words of Robbie Chater, “Who are we really? What happens when we die?” It just goes to show that no matter how hard we try, growing up gets all of us eventually. 8/10 (Review by Stephen Jones)
BELLE AND SEBASTIAN — WHAT TO LOOK FOR IN SUMMER
At a time when we can’t go to gigs, Belle and Sebastian remind us what we’re missing with a double live album taken from their tour in the far-off summer of 2019. The 23 tracks come from 10 studio albums and numerous EPs from the 25 years since they started at a college music business class.
Along the way they beat Steps to the 1999 Brits best newcomer gong, causing producer Pete Waterman to demand an investigation into vote-rigging, Donald Trump-style, and left their drummer in his pyjamas in a North Dakota Walmart.
The Glaswegians open with a snippet of Kenneth McKeller’s The Song Of The Clyde, before clattering into Dirty Dream Number Two, brass and spoken word sections present and correct.
They include their best-loved songs including Step Into My Office, Baby, Wrapped Up In Books and indie-disco floor filler The Boy With The Arab Strap, as well as ones for devotees such as My Wandering Days Are Over from debut LP Tigermilk. If You’re Feeling Sinister includes trademark lyrics, “She was into S&M and bible studies/Not everyone’s cup of tea”.
The psychedelic Beyond The Sunrise, soul ballad Little Lou, Ugly Jack, Prophet John and The Wrong Girl, described by the band as “Glaswegian country rock”, show their versatility. Stay Loose features a guitar solo that wouldn’t be out of place on Thin Lizzy’s Live And Dangerous, one of the album’s inspirations (Live And Meticulous was mooted as a title), and the album ends joyously with Belle And Sebastian.
Fans will lament the absence of favourites, in my case Lazy Line Painter Jane, but we do get singer Stuart Murdoch musing between songs on Boris Johnson and austerity. Far more than just a stopgap until Belle and Sebastian can hit the stage again, What To Look For In Summer will delight hardcore fans and serve as a fine introduction for newcomers. 8/10 (Review by Matthew George)
CHRIS KAMARA — …And A Happy New Year
Well pick me up and dip me in glitter, football pundit Chris Kamara is back with …And A Happy New Year. It follows last year’s surprise top 10 album Here’s To Christmas, which was filled to the brim with Kammy cheer and Rat Pack vibes, and if you enjoyed that you will not be disappointed.
In a year where (let’s be honest) we need to grab onto the fun things a little more tightly, Kammy feeds into my personal longing for a jazzy coffee shop soundtrack. Roy Wood introduces a swinging cover of Wizzard’s I Wish It Could Be Christmas Everyday.
Other tracks given the big band treatment include White Christmas, In The Bleak Midwinter and Blue Christmas, each more catchy than the last. But it’s not just covers on this festive collection, Mr Claus and Happy New Year are original songs that already feel like seasonal staples.
Whether it becomes a commuting favourite or you cozy up with a big mug of something warm and comforting (or something equally seasonally appropriate), drink up the cosy vibes. 9/10 (Review by Rachel Howdle)
REUBEN — RACECAR IS VERY FAST
Racecar Is Racecar Backwards and Very Fast, Very Dangerous, both long out of print on vinyl, are reissued 15 years on as a two-LP package. It’s honestly worth doing just for the combined title — which is fortunate because if you were looking for the package to bring anything else new to the party, well, the party will break your heart.
Frontman Jamie Lenman’s new artwork and an accompanying essay from journalist James Hickie are the extent of it, leaving the original 29 tracks to speak for themselves.
It is a welcome cue to revisit the material though — I’d forgotten how good Let’s Stop Hanging Out is, alongside fellow Racecar standouts Freddy Krueger and Missing Fingers, while Very Fast offers up Blamethrower and the epic Return Of The Jedi along with the uncharacteristically delicate Nobody Loves You. A nostalgia trip for the hardcore. 7/10 (Review by Tom White).
