The Airfields - laneways EP

This is the kind of thing i love, noisy dream pop preferably by a band who are "The" something and have a record sleeve with just 1 or 2 colours on it (the band name written in all lowercase natch). Many hours were spent listening to weird and wonderful bands who released singles like this in my youth. Of course this isn't quite the same thing as its a 6 track CD EP but i still got a nostalgia kick.

The music is psychedelic pop, quite 60s in some ways but with a more modern indie twist (distorted vocals et cetera). Tracks like "Lonely halls" jingle jangle their way along very jollily. "Imaginary stars" has a great driving rhythm. Its wonderful yeah.

MV : "When you´re around" by YAST

Like this band.

Duran Duran - paper gods

So the new Duran Duran album (now I'm not one to name drop even if its a bit tenuous, so i won't mention that the Taylors used to live next door to my Nan) and its a very fine record. However the opener and title track is terrible, an overblown dirge which sounds like an unreleased B-side from the late 80s which should have stayed buried in the vaults. Once you get past that however you are hit by a string of excellent dance-pop treats including the blistering single "Pressure off". The trademark big pop sound of Duran Duran augmented with some (fairly) hip and modern rhythms and beats.

"What are the chances" is a change of pace and another highlight, a great ballad. Echoes of my favourite DD track "Ordinary world" in it perhaps. So overall a great album, except the opener, but maybe they just included that for the LULZ?

MV : "Feel you" by Julia Holter

I really like her voice.

Grateful Dead - blues for Allah

The 8th studio album by the Grateful Dead came out in 1975 and is rightly regarded as one of the band's best studio albums. The album tapped, perhaps more than most of their studio work, into the freeform rock/jazz/blues/add-a-few-more-genres-here creativity of the band's live shows and gave us songs like the melodious "Franklin's Tower" which is one of my all-time favourites.

Much of the album is a mysterious soundscape, as you would imagine tracks with titles like "Unusual occurances in the desert" would be! Sometimes it does get a bit tedious and self-indulgent however there is also some lovely rock songs here in the form of "The music never stopped" and the aforementioned tower.