Take a deep dive into April... but not before you have listened to these albums that were all released in March. We promise you won’t regret.
⇥ PUBLISHED ON 4 April, 2024
The Muscle Shoals Sessions
Texas & Spooner Oldham ⇥ Signed to [PIAS] Recordings
Texas and American songwriter & pianist Spooner Oldham have released their first joint album 'The Muscle Shoals Sessions', a collection of Texas’ greatest hits, and three covers – reimagined and laid bare. Stripped back to their bare bones, guided by the soulful voice of Sharleen Spiteri, accompanied by the delicate piano lines of Spooner Oldham, the songs simply shine in this format and prove their worth as sheer standalone timeless classics.
Up To The Glass
Morgan Harper-Jones ⇥ Signed to Play It Again Sam
Singer-songwriter Morgan Harper-Jones has released her debut album 'Up To The Glass', a delicate exploration of finding yourself in your twenties against a backdrop of love, self-acceptance and loss. Her confessional dream-pop will speak to countless other people: a comforting “you’re not alone” in musical form.
Interplay
Ride ⇥ Signed to Wichita
'Interplay' is Ride’s third album since reforming in 2014, having now been together longer in their current second phase than their original iteration as 90s shoegaze pioneers. Interplay’ is a record in the old-school sense, a rich listen that flows from start to finish, at times urgent and formidable, at others wistful and melancholic.
Curves and Bends
Amatorski ⇥ Signed to Crammed Discs
After a hiatus of several years, Amatorski has released her new album, its title taken from Timothy Morton’s book All Art is Ecological, which explores the complex and nonlinear nature of reality. Unlike Amatorski’s previous releases, the new album focuses less on interpersonal relations, it rather attempts to conduct a modest and subtle search for the relationships between humans and nature, time and phenomena.
Self Hell
While She Sleeps ⇥ Signed to Spinefarm
Drawing upon a far wider palette of influences to create a sonic collage of each member’s musical passions, 'Self Hell' feels like a second debut album from a band who have become such a vital force over the past decade. This incarnation of While She Sleeps is uncompromisingly unpredictable, the riffs are still granite heavy, but this album sees them drawing upon more diverse influences such as Aphex Twin, Gorillaz, Bicep, The Prodigy and Kendrick Lamar.
Celebrate
Halo Maud ⇥ Signed to Heavenly Recordings
For multi-instrumentalist, singer and producer Halo Maud (previously known as Maud Nadal), the title of both song and album reflect from her natural reactions to the creation of the music itself. Those multiple waves are 'Celebrate'’s twelve tracks. Collectively, they offer a seamless mix of French and English; analogue electronics, scratchy guitars and tumbling drums; dream pop, woozy Yé-Yé and 1960s and 2020s psychedelia.
Notebook Fantasy
Chicano Batman ⇥ Signed to ATO Records
Since forming in 2008, Chicano Batman have followed their own visionary impulses to tremendous heights. In the making of Notebook Fantasy, Chicano Batman worked with producer John Congleton (Erykah Badu, Death Cab For Cutie, St. Vincent) to double down on their hyper-creative tendencies, discovering new dimensions of their prismatic music while infusing the lyrics with an unflinching honesty.
Swansongs
Odetta Hartman ⇥ Signed to Transgressive Records
Odetta Hartman’s second album is a dynamic and powerful reflection of love and ambition, hopeful, energetic and at times chaotic but always captivating. It’s a nod to the origin of Hartman’s namesake: the white swan Odette from the famous Tchaikovsky ballet Swan Lake. Swansongs is the elegant yet fierce dance between Hartman’s black and white swans, symbolized on the album’s black and white cover portrait.
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