Album of the Week – 06/03/26

Who is Harry Styles exactly? Seems he released something today.

This week sees the return of Morrissey with the unusual album title Make-Up Is a Lie, and also a bizarre cover to match! There’s also a collection of odds and ends from Talking Heads called Tentative Decisions: Demos & Live. There’s a final album, absolutely ever, for all time from the duo Gnarls Barkley called Atlanta.

You should have a listen to Scout Gillett and her new release, Tough Touch. There’s also some new sounds from Daniel Avery (Tremor – Midnight Versions) and Flying Lotus (BIG MAMA EP). Ireland’s own Seamus Fogarty has just released an album called Ships.

For our album of the week, we’ve gone for a new album from an old friend…

Album of the Week – Bonnie “Prince” Billy – We Are Together Again

“In 2019 we started in to exploring a process of making Louisville, KY records again, in Louisville studios with Louisville musicians. We did I Made a Place this way, then Keeping Secrets Will Destroy You. Things were going well, and then they started going better. The Purple Bird alit on our shoulders and sung its mating call into the ears of listeners all over the world, thanks primarily to the guidance of friend and producer David Ferguson. That bird is out flying around still, leaving abundances of smiling faces in its mighty wake. Having learned thus to fly, Bonny got back to work on the Louisville-first mandate, digging back into songs left open on the table during the Purple process. Bonny went into End of an Ear studio with Jim Marlowe engineering and co-producing; together they assembled a platoon of brilliant singers, blowers and pickers, including especially Bonny’s current tour mates Jacob Duncan (flute and saxophone) and Thomas Deakin (clarinet, whistle, baritone electric guitar, accordion, cornet). Chris Bush applied his modular synth skills to Duncan’s sax for “Davey Dead”. And harpist Erin Hill, who Oldham first met back in the 1980s when he was a wee lad, sings and plays all over “Davey Dead”. Oldham’s cousin Ryder McNair took a break from assistant-scoring Ridley Scott productions to write string quartet arrangements for these songs, and Will’s brother Ned returns after two decades to sing and play bass. This record was made closer to the Ohio River than any Oldham’s been involved with since 1993’s Palace Brothers There Is No-One What Will Take Care of You. Louisville’s current-and-past vital musical community is hi-lighted on every song. Catherine Irwin, who sang on the BPB release Ease Down the Road, is back here on “Hey Little” and “Vietnam Sunshine”. Lacey Guthrie, Tory Fisher and Katie Peabody, the three front women of the band Duchess, sing together on the opening and closing songs, parallel odes to the beast that is fear. The door was swung ajar by the Purple Bird, with its new take on homespun country bombast, and Bonny has stuck his gorgeous foot into that door to whisper his “I love you”s to all who need them (which we kind of all do). We start small, continue small, like oak tree seeds or the sperm-and-egg concoctions mixologized by the parents of movers-and-shakers since the dawn of time. Plant these songs into your soul’s brain, into your existence’s heart and the trees will grow and fruit and flourish and nourish. We thank you. “

Albums of Note – 

— Ships – Seamus Fogarty

— Various Artists – HELP(2)

— These Frightening Machines – Katherine Priddy

— Daniel Avery – Tremor (Midnight Versions)

— Flying Lotus – BIG MAMA EP

— Gnarls Barkley – Atlanta

— Morrissey – Make-Up Is a Lie

— Talking Heads – Tentative Decisions: Demos & Live

— Scout Gillett – Tough Touch

March 6th:

— 2D0GS – ALL THE D0GS ARE BARKING EP

— Barry Can’t Swim – Late Night Tales

— Bosse-de-Nage – Hidden Fires Burn Hottest

— Bitter Branches – Let’s Give the Land Back to the Animals

— Black Lung – Forever Beyond

— Book of Churches – Book of Churches

— Bonnie “Prince” Billy – We Are Together Again

— Bory – Never Turns to Night

— The Brook & The Bluff – Werewolf

— Charlie Puth — Whatever’s Clever!

— Charlotte Sands – Satellite

— Chicago Farmer – Homeaid

— Cobrah – Torn

— Daniel Avery – Tremor (Midnight Versions)

— Dutch Interior – It’s Glass EP

— ERRA – silence outlives the earth

— Flying Lotus – BIG MAMA EP

— Gnarls Barkley – Atlanta

— Godsmack – Awake (25th Anniversary Edition)

— Gregory Uhlmann – Extra Stars

— GUM – Blue Gum Way

— Harry Styles – Kiss All The Time. Disco, Occasionally.

— Hater – Mosquito

— Joshua Idehen – I Know You’re Hurting, Everyone Is Hurting, Everyone Is Trying, You Have Got To Try

— Juanes – JuanesTeban

— Lost Society – Hell Is A State Of Mind

— Marlon Magnée (of La Femme) – Dark Star

— Morrissey – Make-Up Is a Lie

— Mute Swan – Skin Slip

— New Age Doom and H.R. – Angels Against Angels

— OHYUNG – IOWA

— Pat Kelly – Hook

— Prong – Live and Uncleansed

— Seamus Fogarty – Ships

— Scout Gillett – Tough Touch

— The Scythe (Denzel Curry, Ferg, Bktherula, TiaCorine, and Key Nyata) – Strictly 4 the Scythe

— Shabaka – Of the Earth

— Squeeze – Trixies

— Surfbort – Reality Star

— Sun Angels – OPUS EP

— Talking Heads – Tentative Decisions: Demos & Live

— Teenage Bottlerocket – The Invisible Man EP

— Temple of Void – The Crawl

— Travis Bolt – Burning Bridges

— Ty Dolla $ign – girl music vol. 1

— Various Artists – HELP(2)

— Various Artists – Peaky Blinders: The Immortal Man

— Void – Live – 1982

— waterbaby – Memory Be a Blade

— Willa Ford – amanda

— Yebba – Jean