NEW ALBUMS (released within last month/30 days) Worth a Listen

New Deftones album Ohms dropped earlier.
One of the rare bands that I listened to twenty years ago that I still have time for today:

S.M.B. wrote: »

New Deftones and Sufjan both available to stream today.

Best. Friday. Ever.

Try as I might - and I gave tried - I can't get into Sufjan. It think it's his voice.

I really liked Gore at first, but, over the years I've come to think of it as one of their weakest albums. It's not bad but it's a bit average, the songs in the main are a bit meh IMO. When they played in Vicar Street all the songs from that record just didn't stand up to the rest of the material they played, again IMO.

I think there's a few average songs on Ohms too, but there's some damn good ones too - Urantia, Pompeji, Radiant City all stand out so far. And the album has a cohesive kind of feel to it, which Gore lacked. They'll never top White Pony but at least they're still trying and not trading on past glories.

This is a bit of a cheat because I'm going to big up an album that isn't new, it's in fact nearly forty years old, but it's only recently been made available to streaming services: Deceit by This Heat.

It's a hard album to describe. The weirdest mix of experimental rock, tape loops, found sounds, improvisation and biting social criticism. It's very abstract and has an apocalyptically dark and suffocating atmosphere. The best explanation I've read is this era of rock produced Remain in Light, whereas this album is more like Remain in Dark. Raging against the machine; but in the full knowledge that the machine will eventually crush you.

It will not appeal to everyone, but for those of you who like experimental rock it's essential listening. It's a unique album, which to this day sounds like nothing else. And it was way, way ahead of its time. It really doesn't sound like an album from 1981, it seems to have no direct ancestors or descendants. This is the closest thing on the record to a straightforward song:

ShaneU wrote: »

Idles album is great, particularly like Reigns, very Joy Division. Shame their Vicar street gigs are sold out

I think it's not that great to be honest. I appreciate that they've leaned more into noise rock a bit more on this album, but, I dunno, I don't find the album all that satisfying. There's not much interesting stuff going on musically and the lyrics and vocals sound even more like sloganeering than ever before. It's not bad, but it's not doing much for me. They've been serving up diminished returns since their first album, IMO.

same here - I love the first two Fleet Foxes albums, but the new one (and it's predecessor) just sound a bit generic, the songs don't stick in your head in the same way.