Suffering from a similar fate to Crash by Charli XCX earlier in the year, Hold the Girl I think holds its own better in terms of the sounds, standing distinctly apart. However, it feels like the more experimental edges of Rina Sawayama's songwriting are missing on this project, making itself hard to differenciate from its contemporaries. The hooks are generally sticky, but sometimes they get drowned in the noise of nostalgic synth pop that seems to be everywhere right now.

While I wouldn't call the majority of songs on this album terrible, it really feels like something is missing from Charli's recent works to this. While she's holding her own, she's stepped out of her recent hyperpop lane back into a pop lane, with decent songwriting but losing some of the aspects of her music that caused her to stand apart, instead, by her own admission, trying to make something more accessible to a wider audience. It stands as a pretry good release in this current wave of ... read more

While I wouldn't say the personality that they exploded onto the scene with in their first album is gone on this album, it feels like the sheer fun and swagger that Confident Music for Confident People displayed is dulled down to the point that this album blends into so much of the electro pop around it. The sacrifice of personality for more conventionally minded songwriting is always an unfortunate direction for artists.

Absolutely breathtaking record once it gets going it takes some time to get really going but my god once it does it's amazing, down to how well it plqys with it's ghost concept. Went in not really paying much attention to Quadeca at all and now genuinely can't wamt to hear what comes next.

Exmilitary has aged like fine wine, even after stepping further and futher into the world of industrial hip-hop and generally more abrasive music, I tend to look back at stuff I used to find noisy and abrasive and realise all I'm actually getting is ear fatigue. The debut from Death Grips still manages to hold up all these years later through all the noise of its competitors, with some insanely catchy riffs laden throughout the tape from front to back.

An absolute ripper of a ska punk record that taps into the intensity of metal at the best of times. The ferocity explodes on this album, and layering the rhythms and vocal timbre you'd find in the best ska with some absolutely blistering guitar-work. Then from the penultimate track of the record they begin to tap into some near drone vibes on the guitar work lead into a haunting track about the state of antisemitism and racist violence in America, adding chilling guitars to a recording ... read more

At least Dance Monkey was creative in how bad it was that I kind of enjoyed its badness, this is just painful.

An absolute step up in quality for Willow's music, finding her place in the raging riffs that found the best success on her previous LP and doubling down, turning to metal for inspiration, similar to Boston Manor when they tried to find a sound for themselves in the pop punk sphere on Glue. Taking the energy that she's had in her best moments and truly finding her voice on this album, songs like <maybe> it's my fault and curious/furious find themselves scratching a very unique sort of ... read more

While some songs on this album, showed huge amounts of potential for Willow to create a name for herself in the pop punk sphere, the majority of this album tends to end up drowning in the sea of Blink-182 pop-punk revivalism kickstarted by MGK and Travis Barker the past few years. Unfortunately, despite how good standout tracks like t r a n s p a r e n t s o u l and naive are, it tends to blend way too hard into its influences too hard, and her longer wails just don't hit as hard as they really ... read more

This album is one of the most sleep inducing things I've ever heard in my life. Not only is it filled to the brim with the most bland pop you'll find out there right now, the lyricism is the most "hey, I'm not like those mean guys, I'm the nice guy" before proceeding to post the most misogynistic threads on 4chan known to man. For real, why does he just sound like he hates women for half of this album?
Also the fact that they panned that terrible midi drum with the vocals mid hit at ... read more

Camp Cope's swap away from their initial pointed, emo-tinged indie rock started as a worry for me, I was worried about the way that this record was going to miss out on the highlights that previous Camp Cope projects had. However, this album seems to have found peace where the previous albums found anger, and the overall a short reprise from the anger that the band have felt over their first two records. And the wit that they show in their previous albums isn't lost with their transition to a ... read more

This entire album just blends into itself, coming off way edgier than it actually is over most of the run time. Very little new material comes in after track 4. Also, just because you're writing a metal album doesn't mean you can throw nuance to the wayside, plenty of metal, even at the time of this record, had tackled complex and heavy subject matter in a way that was so much stronger than this, songs like Down With The Sickness want to be a RATM song but instead just find their way into an ... read more

Sly Withers' follow up to their smash album Gardens comes in the form of Overgrown, taking the themes of mental health that were already present on their previous record and cranking them up to 11. The opening track makes it clear that between their previous album and now, something has spiralled, comparing the garden that was being tended to in Gardens now becoming unruly, messy and overgrown. The lead single Passing Through gave us a look into this struggle, with the feeling that all you're ... read more

Kyogen is an unfortunate disappointment of an album from one of the biggest talents to come out of Japan right now. The problem comes less from Ado herself but the production choices surrounding Ado's vocals. Songs like Usseewa became such smash hits because the instrumentals went just as hard as Ado's vocals do throughout the song itself. Across most of this record though, the instrumentals behind Ado rarely even reach that same height that her highlights have shown. Hopefully whoever produced ... read more

As a long time Arctic Monkeys fan, this records is probably the worst record the group have ever dropped. The cabaret aesthetics that Alex Turner and the boys explored on Tranquility Base are kept, but without the camp that made the concept of that album fun. Instead, this album turns into Alex Turner trying his damndest to sound smarter than he actually is. The instrumentals on their own could be turned into a pretty okay at best lounge jazz record or something, but Alex Turner is just doing ... read more

While there are some amazing standout tracks on this record, the ballads really let the experience of this record down. The boys don't quite have the chops to really pull off the sentimental tones that they clearly want to and it makes some punchier moments not hit the highs they need. However, when this album hits, it absolutely hits. Cracks as the lead single being the first song the two singers ever did vocals together on a song created absolute magic. Breakfast and Bougainvillea are both ... read more

Nihmune came through with one of, IMO, the better projects to come out of any VTuber I've heard. It has a level of care and thought to it that I think is solely lacking from a lot of VTuber projects, which tend to just hop on the trend of making the most basic sounding j-pop possible. Instead going for a more indie rock angle, Nihmune manages to find a lane for a decent chunk of this record that she can ride in well.

However, this album greatly suffers from a lack of focus IMO. While Nihmune ... read more

Even as someone who doesn't really like Calli's music, this is just a new low. Somehow the mixing is just horrible throughout, the instrumentals are all overblown, and for known producers like Camellia and DECO*27 to be on this record, they either somehow dropped the ball or whoever decided to mix it just decided to try and drown out Calli's vocals with it to the point it got so compressed and scratchy it became unlistenable.

The singing and lyricism themselves don't fare much better, ... read more

One of the best albums in modern ska, combining charged social commentary with some great songwriting. If your only exposure to and opinion on ska is still somehow just from bands like Reel Big Fish in 2022, please give this record a listen, amazingly sticky tunes. Absolute treat of a record.

I initially came away from this album thinking it was the best thing Joji had put out so far, but that was solely because the album starts with Glimpse of Us and two more pretty damn good songs. These tracks feel like the perfect evolution of Joji's melancholic style that he started with Slow Dancing in the Dark.

Unfortunately from there the album starts to feel lifeless from that point, never fully living up to that same potential as it came out of the gate with. It really feels like ... read more