Reviews
A Blade Because a Blade is Whole
Emerging from the UK’s experimental underground, DePlume’s Spotify statistics indicate that his concoction of poetry and jazz provides a taste...
Reviewed by Liam Izod in issue: May/2025
Chapter III: We Return to Light
We Return to Light is the conclusion of a triptych of instrumental mini-albums that has seen sitarist Anoushka Shankar explore...
Reviewed by Jim Hickson in issue: May/2025
Ajo Rebirth
Wura Samba (Wura meaning ‘gold’ in Yoruba) from Nigeria and his nine-piece “drumming and percussion” band return with Ajo Rebirth,...
Reviewed by Lucy Hallam in issue: June/2025
Cançons a l’Ombra
La Baula are a new Catalan group committed to collecting and spreading the traditional songs from their region. The title...
Reviewed by GonÇalo Frota in issue: June/2025
When They All Looked Up
For her first album of new material in six years Kate Rusby has recorded, mostly, songs of her own. These...
Reviewed by Julian May in issue: June/2025
El Sonido Bastardo
Madrid’s Danzón El Gato occupy a similar sonic space to US band Khruangbin, melding psychedelic rock influences with a plethora...
Reviewed by Paul Bowler in issue: June/2025
Peripheries of Nahavand
Salek is a Tehran-born, Canada-based ensemble leader and tar player versed in the mores of Iran’s dastgāh system of music,...
Reviewed by Tim Cumming in issue: June/2025
Curandero
The US/Mexican frontier is a hotspot of hope and anguish, drugs and guns, rednecks and refugees. Orkesta Mendoza, formed by...
Reviewed by Chris Moss in issue: June/2020
Pipers
I’m a big fan of the clarinet. Of all the wind instruments it has the widest and most varied range...
Reviewed by Simon Broughton in issue: November/2020
IYA: Songs for the Mothers
For their fifth album, London's Afro-Cuban community choir build on their tradition of performing songs to the Orishas (Yoruba deities)...
Reviewed by Chris Moss in issue: May/2023
