FacebookAfter writing up some bands lately whose names have either undersold or misrepresented the music they present, it’s rather refreshing to have an artist whose public identity promises exactly what they have to offer. And that artist is Beth Jeans Houghton & The Hooves Of Destiny. A grandiose name, to be sure, and one that’s matched by the title of their just-released debut album Yours Truly, Cellophane Nose.

There’s no way that labels like those could herald anything less than grandiose ambitions, so the question is really whether the 21-year old Newcastle-Upon-Tyne native who gives the band their name can deliver on them. And the answer is an unequivocal, “yes”. Nature has given Houghton not only a richly smoky voice and operatic range, but a tremendously vivid imagination upon which to draw on for her songwriting. All these gifts are combined to impressive effect on Cellophane Nose, which is by turns whimsical and dramatic, dark and technicolour and enchanting throughout.

Houghton’s roots as a folkish/singer-songwriter are perceptible in the record’s quieter moments, but more often they take a backseat to the ornate, often baroque-ish arrangements that adorn everything. By rights they should be overpowering, even with veteran producer Ben Hillier on hand to keep things on track; a case of too much too soon for an artist let loose in the sonic costume shop filled with horns, strings, choirs and harpsichords. And yet, rather than collapsing under the weight of it all, Cellophane Nose finds Houghton not only standing straight and tall in all her finery, but galloping off towards greater things. Hooves of destiny, indeed.

DIY and The Quietus have interviews with Beth Jeans Houghton.

MP3: Beth Jeans Houghton & The Hooves Of Destiny – “Dodecahedron”
Video: Beth Jeans Houghton & The Hooves Of Destiny – “Sweet Tooth Bird”
Video: Beth Jeans Houghton & The Hooves Of Destiny – “Liliputt”
Video: Beth Jeans Houghton & The Hooves Of Destiny – “Dodecahedron”

NPR is streaming the whole of the new Field Music LP Plumb, ahead of its release next week. MusicOhm also has an interview with the David half of the Brewis brothers.

MP3: Field Music – “A New Town”
Stream: Field Music / Plumb

Though The Big Pink’s second album Future This has been out a few weeks now, the band has only now made a track from it available to download. So download it. And read these interviews with Milo Cordell at The Skinny and The Province.

MP3: The Big Pink – “Give It Up”

The video for M.I.A.’s new single surfaced last week, just in time for her appearance at the Super Bowl halftime show this weekend. It’s her video that’s got everyone talking, right? Right?

Video: M.I.A. – “Bad Girls”

The Line Of Best Fit welcomes Lianne La Havas for a video session; her debut album is due out in the Spring, to be preceded by the Forget EP on March 6 in North America.

Video: Lianne La Havas – “Forget”

Daytrotter sessions up with Anna Calvi.

The 405 enlists Summer Camp’s Elizabeth Sankey as an advice columnist.

A Heart Is A Spade and STV have interviews with The Twilight Sad and Le Blogotheque offers up a Take-Away Show with the band. No One Can Ever Know is out today and they’re at Lee’s Palace on February 29.

Band Of Skulls will follow up the release of Sweet Sour next week with a North American tour that hits Lee’s Palace on May 15, and if you can’t wait that long they’re also at The Phoenix on March 30 opening for We Are Augustines. The band takes Gigwise and Spin through the new record track-by-track, with Spin also offering a stream of the whole thing. And over at The Independent, bassist Emma Richardson talks about her painting.

MP3: Band Of Skulls – “Sweet Sour”
MP3: Band Of Skulls – “The Devil Takes Care Of His Own”
Video: Band Of Skulls – “Sweet Sour”
Stream: Band Of Skulls / Sweet Sour

Ca Va Cool caught up with Los Campesinos! on their recent Canadian tour for an interview.

In conversation with The Daily Mail, Noel Gallagher reveals he thought that the Iron Lady was great. No, not the movie.

Liam Gallagher of Beady Eye sounds off to The Daily Mail about fashion, fitness and family.

The Quietus talks to XTC’s Andy Partridge about the making of English Settlement.

Dose gets to know First Aid Kit, in town at The Great Hall on April 4.

The video for the first single from Ladyhawke’s forthcoming Anxiety is now out. The album arrives March 27 in North America.

Video: Ladyhawke – “Black White & Blue”

Nic ShonfeldFrom the outset, The Twilight Sad weren’t shy about proudly pronouncing their influences. The publicity photos for their 2007 debut Fourteen Autumns & Fifteen Winters may as well have featured the band staring intently at their footwear, so obviously indebted were the Glaswegians to the walls of guitar construction techniques laid down by their shoegazing forebears. But what set them apart was the songwriting blueprints they applied those lessons to, choosing to build giant monuments to miserablism from giant slabs of distortion, mortared together by James Graham’s thickly-accented bellow. Where they were coming from was familiar but what they did with it was unexpected, fresh and intense.

Their 2009 follow-up Forget The Night Ahead used the same tools but took their writing in more conventional directions with a greater emphasis on dynamics and feeling more traditionally pop, at least relatively speaking. It represented important artistic growth for a band whom one could have reasonably feared had but one impressive trick in their bag, but wasn’t likely to dramatically broaden their fanbase.

While their third album No One Can Ever Know may likewise not represent a broadening of who The Twilight Sad may appeal to, it’s definitely a wholesale retargeting. Guitars remain in the mix, but rather than the crucial load-bearing roles they’d played in the past, they’re now consigned to decoration and detail. Structural duties are now handled by cold, gleaming synths drawn from the electronic and industrial eras of the late ’70s and ’80s. Whereas their earlier works were studies in emotional catharsis, No One feels rather more sinister in its avoidance of feeling. This isn’t to say that Graham’s vocals are any less expressive, it’s just that the way they’re mated with driving rhythms and icy textures, they feel more like threat than release. It’s an unexpected turn from the Scots, but a rewarding one – and that’s coming from someone who loved their guitar-centric approach.

No One Can Ever Know is out next Tuesday, February 7, and is currently available to stream in whole at , while DIY has a track-by-track annotation of the album by James Graham and The List a short interview. They’re at Lee’s Palace on February 29.

MP3: The Twilight Sad – “Another Bed”
MP3: The Twilight Sad – “Kill It In The Morning”
Video: The Twilight Sad – “Another Bed”
Video: The Twilight Sad – “Sick”
Stream: The Twilight Sad / No One Can Ever Know

Mogwai have been rather snakebit as far as North American touring goes in the past few years, seemingly having to cancel as many shows/legs as they manage to play, but they’re looking to make up for it all with a Summer tour that includes a June 18 date at The Phoenix, tickets $29.50. And if you’re thinking of taking them for granted and catching them the next time around – as I have their last couple visits – note that the press release says, “it will likely be the last extensive touring we do for some time” so sit at home and watch reruns of How I Met Your Mother at your peril.

MP3: Mogwai – “San Pedro”
MP3: Mogwai – “Rano Pano”

Spin reports that Spiritualized’s forthcoming Sweet Heart Sweet Light has been pushed back a couple weeks from its intended March 18 release date. While a new release date hasn’t been confirmed, it’ll almost certainly be before May because that’s when the band begins an enormous North American tour that hits Toronto early on, with a show at The Phoenix on May 5. Tickets for that are $27 in advance.

Video: Spiritualized – “Do It All Over Again”

Spin has a stream of the first taste of the forthcoming Wedding Present album Valentina, due out March 20. They’re at The Horseshoe on March 25.

Stream: The Wedding Present – “You’re Dead”

The Vaccines update NME on their plans for recording album number two.

NPR tried to contain the greatness of Anna Calvi behind a Tiny Desk.

The Stool Pigeon and The Evening Chronicle interview Beth Jeans Houghton, whose debut Yours Truly, Cellophane Nose will be released on February 28.

Oh hey M.I.A. has a new single to stream, a precursor to her fourth album which is targeted for release this Summer. And she’ll be performing at the Super Bowl this weekend with Madonna? Oh, OK.

Stream: M.I.A. – “Bad Girls”

Another week, another episode of Austin City Limits to stream – this one featuring Florence & The Machine and Lykke Li.

Paste chats with the sisters of First Aid Kit, in town at The Great Hall on April 4.

Acid House Kings have opted to give away a track from their 2002 EP Say Yes If You Love Me, just because.

MP3: Acid House Kings – “Save It For The Weekend”

Iceland’s Of Monsters & Men are celebrating the April 3 international release of their debut My Head Is An Animal with a North American tour that includes an April 12 date at The Mod Club, tickets $16 in advance.

MP3: Of Monsters & Men – “Little Talks”

last.fmI’ve been meaning to write up Without Why, the debut album from Rose Elinor Dougall, for well over a year now but for whatever reason never actually got around to it. And while normally almost year and a half on from its release is too long to give a record props, the fact that Ms Dougall is back on the radar with a new stopgap release while she wraps up work on her second album is good enough reason for me to revisit it.

If her name isn’t immediately familiar then perhaps her former stage name of Rosay, by which she went when she was one-third of the original lineup of The Pipettes, will ring a bell. The polka-dotted retro-pop trio was all the rage in 2007 but their actual musical merit couldn’t escape the shadow of the novelty and by 2008, things had essentially run their course and both Dougall and Rebecca Stephens, aka RiotBecki, had left the band to pursue their own projects. During her run with The Pipettes, Dougall was clearly the strongest singer of the three and the odds-on favourite to do something interesting on her own; a potential that she seemed set to fulfill based on some early singles and an impressive set at SXSW 2010 wherein she made clear that trading in her polka dot dress for a leather jacket went deeper than just a wardrobe change.

Not that Without Why is a rock record; it’s certainly moreso than the Pipettes ever were but it’s really a pop record that comes without any preset notions of what it should be, though it tends to orbit an uptempo, lightly baroque, and richly conceived and executed aesthetic. You can feel the freedom that Dougall enjoys from having full control over her sound and songwriting – she has sole credits on all but one track – and if there’s any shortcoming to be found, it’s that she takes too much advantage of it. There are points where a less showy vocal approach or lush arrangement might have worked better, but it’s never to the detriment of the song and really, it’s hard to fault someone on their first time out for having too many ideas.

Independently released, I was far from the only one to miss out on giving Without Why its due – hopefully album number two both gets and merits more attention. Dougall has just offered up an EP of unreleased material for free download entitled The Distractions, named for her backing band, but as The Quietus reports these represent more the tail end of the Without Why sessions than the start of the next album’s. But still, new music is new music and free new music is even better – plus it gave me the opportunity to (finally) get this post out of my brain.

Dougall released another free EP of demos a while back, which you can grab over here.

MP3: Rose Elinor Dougall – “The Night”
MP3: Rose Elinor Dougall – “Come Away With Me”
MP3: Rose Elinor Dougall – “Fallen Over”
Video: Rose Elinor Dougall – “Hanging Around”
Video: Rose Elinor Dougall – “I Have Always Known”
Video: Rose Elinor Dougall – “The Night”
Video: Rose Elinor Dougall – “Carry On”
Video: Rose Elinor Dougall – “Find Me Out”
Video: Rose Elinor Dougall – “Start/Stop/Synchro”
ZIP: Rose Elinor Dougall / The Distractions

It took Rebecca “RiotBecki” Stephens a little longer to get her post-Pipettes project together, but Projectionists appear ready to make their mark on 2012 – there’s interviews with them at CityLife and The Von Pip Musical Express and one of their songs available to stream below.

Stream: Projectionists – “Falling Into You”

Daytrotter has posted a session with Laura Marling.

Anna Calvi will be releasing a French version of her cover of “Jezebel” b-sided with her take on TV On The Radio’s “Wolf Like Me” on a limited edition 7″ on February 20. Stream it below.

Stream: Anna Calvi – “Jezebel” (French version)

Writers On Process gets into the nuts and bolts of writing for We Were Promised Jetpacks with Adam Thompson.

Blurt reports that the new Wedding Present album, which will be showcased along with 1992′s Seamonsters on their upcoming Spring tour, has the title of Valentina and will be out in March. They’re at The Horseshoe on March 25.

Rolling Stone has premiered one of the tunes from the new Field Music album Plumb, due out February 21, while The Guardian gets the band to play the tune previously released in a video session.

MP3: Field Music – “A New Town”

BBC and Australia’s Summer Festival Guide chat with The Vaccines.

Consequence Of Sound and Billboard have interviews with The Big Pink while songs from their new record Future This are performed live for 4AD Sessions. It’s out tomorrow.

First Aid Kit’s new record The Lion’s Roar is now available to stream at NPR in advance of its release on January 24. They’re at The Great Hall on April 4.

Stream: First Aid Kit / The Lion’s Roar

Paul RainsOne of the criteria – really, the main one – for my year-end list was basically, “how many times did I listen to this record?”. Which I think is reasonable. If we were to take out the “must have been released in 2011″ stipulation, however, the list would have been rather different – at least to the extent that Allo Darlin’s 2010 self-titled debut would have surely made the list. And if I’d assembled a supplementary list of favourite 7″ singles of the year, their “Darren”/”Wu-Tang Clan” picture disc – a tribute to the Hefner frontman and cover of one of his compositions as The French – would have been at the top (and the bottom as it was the only 7″ I bought this year).

If it’s not clear, the ukulele-powered, Aussie-fronted London quartet rather charmed me this year and for the reasons why, check out my review of the record and also of their live show in June. And so after playing catch-up on their back catalog (well, the one album and a handful of singles) this year, I’m trilled that details on their second album have started to come to light. It was known that it’d be called Europe as far back as the Summer, but now Altsounds reports that a first single entitled “Capricornia” will be out on February 13 with the full-length to follow sometime in May. eburban ups the ante by saying the record will be released in North America by Slumberland – a fact confirmed by the band via Twitter – and on April 3 with a North American tour to follow. Those bits are unconfirmed but I’m certainly on board with hoping its true.

In any case, a first taste of the new album comes via a video assembled from tour footage for the song “Tallulah”, and if you’re guessing that’s a reference to indie-pop forebears Talulah Gosh – spelling aside – you’re probably right. And if you’re guessing I’m saving a spot on the “favourites of 2012″ list for Europe, you’re also probably right.

MP3: Allo Darlin’ – “My Heart Is A Drummer”
Video: Allo Darlin’ – “Tallulah”

Pitchfork reports that Stuart Murdoch has turned to Kickstarter to gather financing for his musical film adaptation of God Help The Girl, hoping to get it done before turning his attention to the next Belle & Sebastian record. So if you want that follow-up to Write About Love sooner rather than later, chip in a bit.

MP3: God Help The Girl – “Come Monday Night”

In conversation with Rolling Stone , Ben Lovett of Mumford & Sons compares the band’s new material to both Black Sabbath and Nick Drake. Neither Black Sabbath or Nick Drake fans are impressed.

Both sides of the new Radiohead single are available to stream and purchase from your preferred digital retail outlet.

Stream: Radiohead – “The Daily Mail”
Stream: Radiohead – “Staircase”

Chart talks covers with Anna Calvi.

Artrocker gets an update on the return of Bloc Party from drummer Matt Tong.

Sweden’s Mary Onettes have prepared a new EP entitled Love Forever, half of it produced by Dan Lissvik who made the last Young Galaxy such a gem. I’d have been looking forward to whatever they put out next but this makes it extra tantalizing. It’s out February 28.

Interview talks to Swedish duo Serenades.

The Guardian interviews Anthony Gonzalez of M83. They’re at the Sound Academy on May 6.

Jim Sclavunos tells Faster Louder that while Grinderman is on the back burner for now, The Bad Seeds are indeed back in action.

Frank Yang

Okay, let’s get this over with. More than any year in recent memory, 2011 was tough to distill down to a top ten – not because there was a dearth of notable releases, but because there was a glut of them. Plenty of records this year were good to great – from those you’d expect as much from, those who surprised by upping their game and/or those who you’d simply never heard of before – but head-and-shoulders standouts? More of a chore than I expected.

But here are ten records which, as of this midway point of the final month of 2011, do a pretty good job of representing what I listened to and enjoyed the most in the past twelve. I like the mix of geography, genres, and genders and also of veterans and up-and-comers – I think most who’d know would agree this is a pretty, “me” list and consistent with past years. And if you can be bothered to read the past prefaces, you’ll see that those, too, are pretty consistent. Which is to say repetitive. So no more talking, yeah?

Yeah. And you like the philatelic angle for this year’s art? I do.

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