All in all though, a fair return.

All the pieces are beautifully composed and played, as you would expect from someone whose orchestral arrangements are sought by artists ranging from Gorillaz to Katherine Jenkins, but what Postcards From really needs is an accompanying, immersive Virtual Reality video experience that would allow us to see, and understand, what Brice heard.

After a 39-year hiatus, Altered Images pick up more or less where they left off with Mascara Streakz, a perfectly retro-fitted album, with enough of the modern added to retain interest.

It's an energetic affair, a barrelling collision of Britpop and electro, lots of distorted vocals, the sort of thing you don't hear so much anymore. [Feb 2026, p.101]

The overall effect is dizzying--a revolving door of treatments and narrators--but usually hits the spot.

He cites everyone from Shellac to Boredoms to Kate Bush as influences, while quoting feminist psychoanalyst Nancy Chodorow and Russian director Andrei Tarkovsky. It takes big balls or hilarious self-delusion to do this, but Grapefruit, pitched somewhere between those two states, just about justifies the aplomb.

The unorthodox means of composition ensures that the material on ATGCLVLSSCAP feels alive; blessed with some formidable grooves it retains a freshness and zeal that might have proved elusive if it had been recorded as a conventional studio album.

Ditching everything he’d been working on, Carr launched himself into New Shapes Of Life, his finest work since The Boo Radleys.

Machineries Of Joy proves that BSP are still in bloom.

The jaunty simplicity of First Time and cod calypso of Sunny Disposition are a tad MOR-by-numbers, perfectly well executed but lacking any real spark. The innate drama in Diamond’s powerful and resonant voice is much better served by the more eloquent and layered In Better Days and the Orbisonesque slow burn, Nothing But A Heartache.

Employing a Drake-like emotional honesty (though thankfully minus the Canadian’s tendency for self-pity) he recounts unflinching vignettes of Seattle street-life shot through with harrowing biographical details.

This extremely brief, fidgety album follows last year’s skronky first outing on DFA, the soon-to-be-reissued Flood Dosed EP, and consistently brings to mind hints of prolific New York underground band God Is My Co-Pilot, or Big Flame if Nanette Blatt from …And The Native Hipsters had been on vocal duties.

Forgiveness Is Yours is without question the band's best album to date, full of surprising diversions and even more surprising musical ideas that sometimes border on the sophisticated. Even though there's little uniformity, it hangs together nicely and is always intriguing, like a series of vignettes or short stories. [May 2024, p.104]

What began as a series of bold experimentations dressed in a warm fuzzy melding of genres feels half-baked second time around.

It’s edgy, but civil, and it looks like the war will rage on for the time being at least, regardless of the outcome of each emotional battle.

The sigh of relief provoked by Doom Or Destiny morphs into a mile-wide smile as Pollinator unfurls some of the most resonant music Blondie have recorded during their second phase.

While Vast Aire and Vordul Mega rarely hit the heights of their former lyrical ingenuity, their stream-of-consciousness rapping style remains one of the most potent forces in hip-hop.

At times, there is an element of either hesitance or a deliberately low-key style at work here, but one feels that upon picking up the requisite fans, this could combine with the music’s welling elements to translate into some quite emotional concerts.

You’re Welcome ups his game, injecting infectious doses of glam-punk muscle, melody and engagement into Wavves’ trademark surf-punk melees.

While Knock Knock and The Signs admittedly veer close to theatrical, declamatory pastiche, Solstice--which laudably endeavours to track the journey from the shortest to the longest day-- is nine-and-a-half minutes of bona-fide neo-prog: a shimmering three-way between Camel, the Super Furries and David Gilmour.

Radial, a 17-minute symphony in three parts: first, a foreboding, dark-tinged awakening, replete with nonhuman sounds in the vocal register; after six minutes the band comes in with another trademark minor-key song; then a final, tense, otherworldly coda hinting at stranger worlds to come.

Punchy, purposeful and convincingly contemporary, it’s frequently spiced-up with exhilarating examples of the band’s trademark, Television-esque guitar duels.

The follow-up to 2014’s Get To Hell sees the band further exploring the country element which has always underpinned their music, resulting in a compelling set which effortlessly tramples many of the more buffed-up new bands pulling from the same well.

It’s challenging, occasionally difficult stuff, but in a modern world ever more tailored to undemanding audiences and reduced attention spans, that makes it all the more important.

Musically, TROUBLE grows more assured as it goes on.

Knee deep in dashing, erudite pop, the band’s 13th LP Cosmonaut will hardly sully their reputation.

Jake undoubtedly knows his way around a catchy melody, even if he seems reluctant to break fresh ground any substantive distance from his previously established comfort zone. [Nov 2024, p.99]

Big names bookend this collection, courtesy of Johnny Cash's stately narrative on Johnny 99 and Steve Earle's pleading State Trooper (both songs originating from Bruce's Nebraska album), but the remaining 18 tracks are a mixed bunch. [Jul 2025, p.99]