Album of the Week – 20/03/26

A new release this week worth checking is Ellie O’Neill’s Time Of Fallow. If you like what you hear, she’s playing the Bello Bar, Dublin on the 10th April.

The enigma that is Kanye West has just released Bully. There’s also new sounds from The Dandy Warhols called PIN UPS, and a lovely live album from St. Vincent (Live in London!)

For our album of the week, we’ve gone for Colleen, with her new album Libres antes del final” (Free before the end). It’s a little unusual, but give it time!

Album of the Week – Libres antes del final by Colleen

The compositions of Colleen, aka multi-instrumentalist Cécile Schott, are as richly varied as they are precise. Each of Colleen’s albums is shaped by her predetermined distinct instrumentation and parameters, including works composed entirely of music boxes, pocket synthesizers, and baroque stringed instruments. The connective essence of Schott’s music is in her ability to create pieces within specificity that are both transcendently expansive and imbued with profound emotions. Libres antes del final is an album that reaches for the hope and desire to be truly freed from unnecessary suffering and harmful thoughts before reaching the end of one’s life cycle.

Schott sees the album as “an ode to movement, to the body, to water, to urgency; to repairing old wounds, overcoming personal blocks and starting all over again.” The initial spark of Libres antes del final was borne of a realization perhaps best described by Schott herself:

“In April 2024, I made a decision that deeply impacted me, one on which I had procrastinated for years: learning to swim again, in the sea, after 30 years of water phobia. I longed for a reconnection to that feeling I had felt as a child swimming so freely and confidently, and when I moved to Barcelona in 2019, the sight of the Mediterranean Sea made me feel this limitation more and more acutely with each passing year. A show in the Azores in March 2024, corresponding to my 250th live show, functioned as a wakeup call for me: surrounded by this gorgeous environment where seeing dolphins is the norm, I realized I had to stop making excuses, and a month later, I finally contacted an open water teacher.

— Band of Horses – Everything All The Time (20th Anniversary Edition)

— The Dandy Warhols – PIN UPS

— Ellie O’Neill – Time Of Fallow

— Kanye West – Bully

— Nubiyan Twist – Chasing Shadows

— Robert Lester Folsom – If You Wanna Laugh, You Gotta Cry Sometimes: Archives Vol. 3, 1972-1975

— St. Vincent – Live in London!

— Whitney Johnson, Lia Kohl, and Macie Stewart – BODY SOUND

— Witch Post – Butterfly EP

March 20th:

— Aerosmith – Aerosmith (Legendary Edition)

— Alessia Cara – Love Or Lack Thereof

— Alex Isley – When The City Sleeps

— Anna Calvi – Is This All There Is? EP

— Aubrie Sellers – Attachment Theory

— Avalon Emerson & the Charm – Written into Changes

— Band of Horses – Everything All The Time (20th Anniversary Edition)

— BTS – ARIRANG

— Carlos Niño & Friends – Bubble Bath for Giants

— Colleen – Libres antes del final

— Damaged Bug – ZUZAX

— The Dandy Warhols – PIN UPS

— The Dear Hunter – Sunya

— Dylan Brady (of 100 gecs) – The Needle Guy EP

— Ego Ella May – Good Intentions

— Exodus – Goliath

— Footballhead – Weight of the Truth

— GAEREA – Loss

— Gladie – No Need To Be Lonely

— Girl Scout – Brink

— Grace Ives – Girlfriend

— Haircut 100 – Boxing the Compass

— Hurray for the Riff Raff – Live Forever

—  Inara George – Songs of Douglass and Littell

— Jimmie Allen – Wild Dreams – The Cover Collection

— Kanye West – Bully

— Luke Combs – The Way I Am

— Manchester Orchestra – Union Chapel, London, England

— mclusky –  i sure am getting sick of this bowling alley

— Microwave – Much Love (1oth Anniversary Edition)

— Mike WiLL Made-It – R3SET

— more eaze – sentence structure in the country

— Naomi Scott – F.I.G

— Nessa Barrett – Jesus loves a primadonna EP

— Nubiyan Twist – Chasing Shadows

— OneRepublic – Dreaming Out Loud (Vinyl Reissue)

— Peach PRC – Porcelain

— Poison the Well – Peace in Place

— RealestK – Forgive To Forget

— Ringing – another cycle in the cosmic wash

— Robert Lester Folsom – If You Wanna Laugh, You Gotta Cry Sometimes: Archives Vol. 3, 1972-1975

— Samara Cyn – Detour

— The Silver – Looking Glass Hymnal Blue

— Son Little – CITYFOLK

— Spencer Thomas – Cynical Vision

— St. Vincent – Live in London!

— Tedeschi Trucks Band – Future Soul

— Vero – Razor Tongue

— Via Doloris – Guerre et Paix

— VIAL – Hellhound

— Whitney Johnson, Lia Kohl, and Macie Stewart – BODY SOUND

— Witch Post – Butterfly EP

— Yeek – Zodiac EP

— ZHU – BLACK MIDAS