★Dead Ocean
Along the way
Former Emeralds member Mark McGuire has planned a new album following his 2011 albumGet Lost. Along the Waythrough Dead Oceans. On Along The Way, McGuire writes in the liner notes, “This story is an odyssey through the vast, unknown regions of the mind…the endless unfolding of psychological landscapes, leading to perpetual discoveries and expansions, in a genuinely emergent and infinite world of worlds.” Further he writes “[the new album] is not a critique, it is not instructional, nor is it a p…
Who Is The Sender?
Ask Bill Fay about his relationship with his instrument and he says something revealing, not â€ÂÂEver since I learnt to play the piano,†but “Ever since the piano taught me…†What the piano taught him was how to connect to one of the great joys of his life. “Music gives,†he says. And he is a grateful receiver. But, it makes him wonder, €œWho is the sender? Fay - who after more than five decades writing songs is finally being appreciated as…
Nepenthe
Julianna Barwick returns with the successor to 2011's charming The Magic Place. Given how successful that self-recorded LP was, it’s surprising to see that the Louisiana-born singer has looked to an external producer to document and frame her work this time around, namely Sigur Ros associate Alex Somers. Barwick once again uses delay-pedals to build heaven-scraping towers of chorused plainsong out of her earnestly, achingly pretty soprano, placing them in what John Foxx - whose 90s’ ambient reco…
Life Is People
Gatefold double LP version with download of the entire album - Bill Fay is one of English music's best kept secrets. At the dawn of the 1970s, he was a one-man song factory, with a piano that spilled liquid gold and a voice every bit the equal of Ray Davies, John Lennon, early Bowie, or Procol Harum's Gary Brooker. He made two solo albums but his contract wasn't renewed, which left his LPs and his reputation to become cult items. But he never stopped writing, the music kept on coming. Now,…