Fran Slater: One of the easiest choices I’ve ever had for this feature. From the second Benefits hit the stage at Float Along festival, to the moment they left it, my mouth was open with slackjawed awe. This was the loudest, most visceral, most powerful set I ever remember witnessing and I can’t do it justice with simply words. I attended this gig expecting them to be great – they have made one of my favourite albums of the year, after all – but I left it thinking that they just might be the most vital band in the country right now. Their music won’t be for everyone, but I doubt there was a person in that room who left feeling unaffected and nonplussed. It’s a while since music has hit me in the way that this 45 minutes with Benefits did.
Will Collins: This month saw the return of two of my favourites, Slowdive and Hey Colossus. New music from either is always a cause for celebration, so this was a double treat. Slowdive‘s new record builds on the shoegaze template they helped pioneer in the early 90s, adding electronic textures and more muscular production to their sound. It’s ethereal, anthemic and utterly gorgeous. Rather than simply retreading past glories, it updates their classic sound for the 21st century. Put it on and let it wash over you.
The new Hey Colossus record, meanwhile, is a claustrophobic, atmospheric record that stakes the case for them being the country’s most captivating rock band. By turns graceful, bruising, driving and fleet-footed, it draws a range of disparate influences into its musical orbit for an end product that is never dull and often oddly beautiful. The band are criminally less well known than they should be. This album deserves to change that.
James Spearing: I’ll continue ‘raving on about’ Holysseus Fly, not due to a lack of imagination, but because ‘Teach Me’ is the best new song I’ve heard this month. The simplest bass hook combined with a tight rhythm brings me joy on every listen. If you laughed as hard as I did at the ‘Kens playing guitar’ scene in Barbie, you’ll enjoy the sarcasm in the lyrics here too.
Sam Atkins: I’ve called out video game soundtracks as my best of the month before but the increase in hours I’ve started spending listening to CD’s, Vinyl and even YouTube compilations of video game music has escalated pretty quickly over the last year or so. This month saw the arrival of the soundtrack to Final Fantasy XVI, which I completed just weeks before and it’s place as one of the nicest looking physical CDs I’ve bought this year is pretty solid.
It has been a hell of a month for new albums too, records from Romy, LP and Kylie Monogue have been getting heavy rotation alongside the podcast playlists, while Olivia Rodrigo’s second album Guts may even be better than her brilliant debut. My most listened to artist though? Shania Twain hands down. Her Anniversary re-release of literal ‘biggest selling album of all time’ Come On Over has made me remember just how good that album is front to back, while her live show just a few days ago was an arena show worthy of the setting.
Rick Larson: On September 1, Speedy Ortiz released Rabbit Rabbit, its first album in five years since 2018’s terrific Twerp Verse. A critical and fan favorite, it is a band you should check out if you are interested in the current state of American ‘alternative.’ The new album is a blackberry bramble of music: sharp, sweet, unkempt, all over the place. Sadie Dupuis sings her scrutable poetry as drums and guitars careen and collide. The first single, ‘Scabs’ is a good introduction to a band worthy of your acquaintance.
Tom Burrows: September brought a couple of releases that I was really looking forward to, from Róisín Murphy and James Blake.
Murphy’s full-length collaboration with DJ Koze didn’t quite result in the album of the year that felt possible, given the chemistry between the two on past songs. But it’s still a highly consistent record, with the restraint in the production still allowing Koze’s trademark dancefloor melancholy to ooze through. Of the tracks previously unheard before this month, highlights include the off-kilter ‘Hurtz So Bad’ and the disco bop ‘Free Will’.
Blake’s return to the electronic experimentalism of his early days was similarly not quite as ‘out there’ as one may have hoped, but it is still an enjoyable return to form. In particular, the Dom Maker (of Mount Kimbie) and Airhead-assisted big hitters ‘Tell Me’ and ‘I Want You To Know’ combine the old Blake with the polish of a decade’s worth of experience. Here’s hoping he continues down this road.
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