DIVORCE - The Grove, Newcastle, 29th November 2025 (LIVE REVIEW)

On a chilly Saturday night at the Grove, Newcastle, Divorce walk out onstage beneath a hand-painted blue banner, a bright, home-made backdrop that perfectly frames their lively, DIY world. The band are touring their debut album, Drive to Goldenhammer, an ode to the band’s home of Nottingham and an escape into the refuge of creation. They open with Karen, a lullaby-esque entry into the world of Goldenhammer, and barrel straight into the anthemic Jet Show without taking a breath. Next is Gears, an older single and the set’s first example of the two vocalists’ perfectly blended harmonies, erupting into a frustrated chorus. 

Getdown Services - Leeds Brudenell Social Club, 12/11/2025 (LIVE REVIEW)

 

Inside Leeds’ Brudenell Social Club, the post-gig after party (1) is in full swing. The floor’s been swept of its discarded beer cups, the residue still sticky on the boot soles. The tunes are uplifting but not quite matching a euphoric aura that hangs in the air - because we’re only midway between back-to-back sold out sets from Minehead’s finest (and only?) - Getdown Services.  

Luvcat 'Vicious Delicious' (ALBUM REVIEW)

Luvcat’s new LP is a Bond–girl–meets–haunted–cabaret spectacle, shot through with the motif of a recurring circus refrain...

Where this melody stands out most is in the fourth track, ‘Dinner @ Brasserie Zédel’, a vaudeville-esque ballad that’s chock-full of manic, jazzy, waltzing orchestration. The track before it, ‘Matador’, introduces the theme on a pared-back acoustic guitar, starting as a playful, jangly tune that hints at the eeriness to come, almost as if the song were playing from a haunted music box. ‘Matador’, as well as the title track ‘Vicious Delicious’, are reminiscent of Panic! At The Disco’s debut album, with their twisted takes on dark romance, performance, and mystique making the listening experience feel more like stumbling onto a shadowy conspiracy.

Will Paquin 'HaHaHa' (ALBUM REVIEW)

Listening to Will Paquin’s debut album, ‘Hahaha’, feels like both a reflection and a rebirth, an energetic, genre-bending journey through memory, heartbreak, and the messy joy of moving forward. Across eleven tracks, Paquin balances raw emotion with jangly riffs, buoyant melodies, and a new, grungey garage-rock sound.

TTSSFU 'Blown' (EP REVIEW)

Fans of dreamy bedroom pop will find TTSSFU’s edgier take on the genre irresistible – ‘nightmare pop’, if you will – the sonic equivalent of scrolling early internet forums and drifting through liminal spaces, with an unsettling sense of doomer unease gnawing at the edges of the tracks. ‘Blown’ is dark, feverish, and feels like its own shadowy twin, industrial and aggressive yet at the same time vulnerable and exposed, flickering between steel, circuits, and flesh sometimes within the same track.  

IDLES Block Party – Queen Square, Bristol - Fri 1 & Sat 2 August 2025

“Are you ready to collide?” echoed around Queen Square in Bristol twice, and twice 15,000 bodies answered the barked question in the emphatic affirmative. IDLES were back in town, making their only UK gigs of the year into full-scale block parties across the first Friday and Saturday in August for an exquisite homecoming.  

Natalie Wildgoose (Supporting Chris Brain), The Attic, Leeds - 21/07/25

 

An instant hush descends over The Attic’s seated audience as Natalie Wildgoose serenely takes her place at the piano. It’s the kind of quiet respect - only to be punctuated by rapturous applause after each delicately crafted song - I wish could be bottled and distributed at will at other events. However.

Big Special 'National Average' (ALBUM REVIEW)

They say it takes a lifetime to write your first album, then six months to write your second. Presumably, the latter only happens if the former generates enough of a splash, certainly the case for ‘Post Industrial Hometown Blues’, last year’s fine ode to not-so-quiet desperation, the debut release from West Midlands troubadours Big Special. 

Black Sabbath: Back to the Beginning - Villa Park, Aston: 5/7/25 (LIVE REVIEW)

So it came to pass, the four original horsemen of the heavy metal apocalypse joined forces for one last riff-laden hurrah in the now post-industrial corner of Birmingham that nurtured Messrs Osbourne, Iommi, Butler and Ward throughout their formative years. 

Orbital - Brown Album (Reissue review)

 

I am fairly sure you cannot improve on perfection. In Orbital’s case, reissuing their spellbinding ‘Brown’ album (London Records) was always going to be warmly greeted, but what else did the brothers Hartnoll have in their locker? In stark contrast to Kraftwerk’s recent unmolested 50th anniversary reissue of ‘Autobahn’, the duo managed to curate a thirty-twotrack 4 CD boxed techno odyssey.

Pup (+Goo + Illuminati Hotties) - The Marble Factory, Bristol - 13/05/2025 (LIVE REVIEW)

Depressing lyrics and utter euphoria combined in a celebration of the underdog at Bristol’s Marble Factory, which hosted Canadian punk-rockers PUP and their frankly dazzling support acts as part of its extended swansong.

Big Special –Interview - 29 April 2025

Unruly West Midlands duo Big Special return to Leeds just over 12 months after tearing Key Club a new one, courtesy of a thunderous set, expertly capturing the raw anger and quiet desperation of debut long player ‘Post Industrial Hometown Blues’. 

Lambrini Girls - Brudenell Social Club, Leeds, 08/04/25 (LIVE REVIEW)

 

No strangers to touring,

a punk vibe so alluring,

Lambrini Girls are coming to town...

We’ve watched them here before,

From the Brudenell 's sticky floor,

This Brighton-based band won’t let you down.

The Darkness 'Dreams On Toast' (ALBUM REVIEW)

It’s a brace of decades since ‘Permission To Land’ catapulted then cult NWOBHM throwback quartet ‘The Darkness’ into the stratosphere, infectious power pop underpinned by tongue-in-cheek 80s metal sonic pyrotechnics, leaving the listener wondering if the East Anglians were the real deal or simply the greatest piss take since Bad News.    

Marie Davidson 'City Of Clowns' (ALBUM REVIEW)

 

Combining the playfulness of Confidence Man, the detachment of Grace Jones as well as the sado-masochistic tendencies of Goldfrapp, the darkly alluring 6th long player from French Canadian producer Marie Davidson provides the somewhat startled listener with a 1990s tinged hedonistic dystopian rave odyssey. 

Zzzahara 'Spiral Your Way Out' (ALBUM REVIEW)

Zzzahara is American singer-songwriter Zahara Jaime; part Filipino, part Mexican, all California; or more specifically, Los Angeles. Waves of sun and grit spill out of this, their third album; a sound so uniquely Angeleno you can almost hear the traffic. Defiantly formed in the ashes of an ill-fated relationship, the emotion is thick and palpable. It’s a cliché to talk about sun-drenched guitar melodies, but the dreamy, beachy sound is undeniable. There are hints of Girls in there, of early Grimes, of Sky Ferreira's better produced moments.