Maria Somerville and the never-fulfilled promise of shoegaze electronica
You’d think that in this world of near infinite music offering, of 80k tracks uploaded every day to streaming platforms, that music lovers would never want...
Singles going steady - new music reviews
This week on the Substack I did something a little different: 13 pictures from the Sublow don Jon E Cash, with his own commentary. I hope you enjoyed it. And...
Tranquil indeed: Why Oneohtrix’s latest album leaves me cold
Tranquilizer, the new album from Oneohtrix Point Never, has sent me into an emotional tail spin this week. Not so much the music, which is, on the whole,...
The Three strangest records in my collection
Before I start, can I just say that this piece was inspired by Stephan Kunze’s post 3 Of The Strangest Albums Ever Recorded, which he published in 2024. Go...
An ode to Royal Trux - or perfectly imperfect humanity in music
What does it mean to be human? For me, the answer is Royal Trux. And I don’t mean that in the sense of being relatable, warm, decent or any other of the...
Burn It Up - or how Hans Zimmer, Rick Astley and Steinski ignited British dance music (with Bill Brewster)
Side one, track one, of Burn It Up, Bill Brewster’s new compilation of the best British dance music from 1986 to 1991, is Coldcut’s Beats + Pieces, a song by...
An interview with Lawrence, the last of the great pop stars
Have you read it yet? Well have you? Soon enough the world will divide along the lines of people who have read Will Hodgkinson’s remarkable book Street Level...
A guide to Masters at Work - aka the most influential duo in dance music: Part three
Two weeks ago I have you part one of my guide to the most influential duo in dance music. Last week: part two. This week, it’s part three (of three), in...
A guide to Masters at Work - aka the most influential duo in dance music. Part two.
First, some news: I have a new book coming out next year: It’s called Space Age Batchelor Pad Music: The Story Of Stereolab In 20 Songs and it pretty much...
A guide to Masters at Work - aka the most influential duo in dance music. Part one.
Putting together a Masters at Work best of is like trying to force a particularly obstinate tent back into its bag: you think you’ve got it in hand only for...
High Contrast - bringing French House funk to D&B: Part two
Last week on the newsletter, I looked at the early career of Welsh D&B don High Contrast, taking us right up to 2004’s High Society and Racing Green. This...
High Contrast - bringing French House funk to D&B: Part One
High Contrast - Make It Tonight / Mermaid Scar Welsh drum & bass wizard High Contrast is supremely well named: not only is there a high contrast between his...
Romanthony, or the strange isolation of house music
For the vocalist on one of dance music’s biggest ever hits, Romanthony remained a very elusive character, right up to his tragic death. Daft Punk...
Mazzy Star at the rave - or why DJs should grow a backbone
Back in June, Four Tet released his allegedly long-awaited Mazzy Star remix Into Dust (Still Falling) to general acclaim and critical fawning. I was not...
10 songs to make (some) sense of Sun Ra - part two
Last week I wrote about the first five songs in my guide to Sun Ra. This week, things get chilled, pop, remade and live in part two. Sun Ra and his Arkestra...
10 songs to make (some) sense of Sun Ra - part one
When I was a teenager, getting into jazz, Sun Ra was the Great White Whale. However deep I would get into the freakier, weirder edges of jazz, however far...
Weird 90s - Jack Your Body and a childhood in rave
I’ve talked before about Weird 90s, the book I was writing about 90s rave hits that eventually got shelved. I’ve even shared three (and a half) chapters, one...
Britpop carpark aka my adventures in Oasis, from outside Murrayfield
I was in the Glastonbury dance tent when the toilet cleaning machine malfunctioned and spit raw human waste all over the dance floor; I spent a night at a...
Peter Buck on Luke Haines, Shiny Happy People, the Supreme Being and more
Line Noise might veer towards the electronic side of sounds. But I love pretty much all kinds of music, with the notable exception of bagpipes, so when I was...
Sabres of Paradise - The reunion interview, live at Primavera Sound
In October 2024, with absolutely no knowledge of what was to come, I started to think about Sabres of Paradise, the pioneering, obfuscating dance trio formed...