Alternative Album Chart: the best new indie and alternative albums this week
When an artist has grown an audience for a distinctive sound, it can often be difficult for them to reinvent or adapt their music from album to album. We’ve all been there, groaning as the band announce they’ll only be playing their ‘new stuff’ at a gig, but Bat For Lashes showcased the potential for a change in sound to be a truly wondrous thing this week. On her new release, The Dream of Delphi, the singer-songwriter switches out her catchy vocal hooks and radio-ready sound for something distinctly deeper, dealing with introspection, pregnancy and motherhood.
Bat For Lashes managed to capture an intense amount of emotion within our Album of the Week this week, proving that reinvention can often be a beautiful thing. On the opposite end of the spectrum, some of this week’s releases suffer from a distinct lack of progression, as 1990s slowcore rockers Idaho return with their first record in 13 years. While the album is not necessarily bad, it lacks any kind of originality or innovation, making it sound like a lazy rehash of the kind of music that made them popular three decades ago.
In addition to old favourites, this week saw the emergence of some truly groundbreaking new artists. New York-based vocalist and producer Anastasia Coope released her debut record, Darning Woman, which employs experimental production techniques to create a compelling and tirelessly original sound. You could easily be forgiven for assuming that Darning Woman was the product of a mature, established artist who has spent decades honing their craft, rather than a 21-year-old artist from New York.
Elsewhere this week, Sheffield’s finest, Richard Hawley, has made waves with his latest effort, entitled In This City They Call You Love. Awash with a deep adoration for themes of people and community, the album clearly shows that Hawley’s talent for emotionally affecting songwriting has never waned over the course of his long career. If you are looking for something a little more upbeat, this week has also seen fantastic releases from the likes of King Hannah, Arooj Aftab and Maya Hawke.
Find this week’s Alternative Album Chart below.
The best new indie and alternative albums this week:
The Dream of Delphi – Bat For Lashes – 4
Like petals sailing in the wind or a ballet dancer floating on air, the new Bat For Lashes album, The Dream of Delphi, is a cinematic feast of poignance and agape love. Following on from her successful 2019 album, Lost Girls, Natasha Khan, the singer-songwriter and producer behind the project, has turned her back on the radio to embrace significant changes in her life.
As she reflects on pregnancy and early motherhood, Khan traverses a broader range of emotions, tapping into her passion for Japanese ambient and French film soundtracks. The Dream of Delphi unfolds with emotional delicacy, intimate candour and a fine balance of cinematic imagery. Alongside the sounds that inspire Khan, visuals seem equally elemental as she channels the rush and crash of the sea in instrumental swells that almost feel like field recordings.
In spite of progressive synth textures, the album’s sonic timelessness coheres with that of the conceptual mother-child bond, breathing a great profundity into life. Khan carries a distinctive style throughout the ten tracks but maintains the listener’s attention with a careful balance of intensity and emotion augmented by using organs, mellotrons, pianos, bass flutes and harps. [Words: Jordan Potter]
Darning Woman – Anastasia Coope – 4
With oversaturation rampant in the 21st century, eking out originality is increasingly challenging. However, from the very first track of Coope’s debut, Darning Woman, it becomes plainly clear that the songwriter is operating entirely by her own rules. The record sounds unlike anything else being recorded at the moment. The songwriter utilises an innovative layering technique to essentially create a choir of her own voice. The results are equal parts haunting and compelling.
Given the captivating quality of Coope’s one-woman choir, it can often be easy to negate the lyricism contained within Darning Woman, yet – if you listen – those lyrics speak to the sage nature of the New Yorker’s songwriting. Throughout the record, Coope delivers some incredibly emotional and affecting explorations of gender ideology, femininity and her own role within the modern world. In that sense, the album is something of a double threat thematically and musically.
Darning Woman certainly does not feel like a debut album. You could easily assume that Anastasia Coope had arrived at the sounds of this record after decades of honing her craft, exploring a vast array of musical avenues and collaborating with countless innovative musicians.
Night Reign – Arooj Aftab – 4
There is a hushed and mystic grace to the way that Arooj Aftab approaches her new record, Night Reign. Now four solo albums into the Pakistani-American musician’s discography, Aftab has conflated the sounds of her heritage with more elegance and affinity than ever before, creating a jazz-Lahorian sound akin to Billie Holiday performing in the foothills of the Himalayas.
With an array of collaborators, such as Cautious Clay and Chocolate Genius, entering the fray, the record needed to be assured in its mood to tie together all the disparate elements it attempts to weave into one. Thankfully, it most certainly is aware of itself. The result of Pakistani folk toplines colliding with American bebop jazz compositional styles and the inflexions of many collaborators on top is consistently dreamy, thanks to Aftab’s confident and grounding core.
Despite the evident experimentation, the element that proves most captivating throughout is the hushed vocals of Aftab. There is a stirring range to her serene crooning cadence that makes for something that is both gentle yet full of feeling to an almost eerie degree. That alluring mix renders Night Reign an enticing darkness to wade into. There’s a blanket pulled over this record, but it’s as wide as the Himalayan sky, offering great scope and humble comfort in equal measure. [Words: Tom Taylor]
In This City They Call You Love – Richard Hawley – 4
There aren’t many people making music like Richard Hawley. He has the ability to evoke emotions you didn’t know you had, making you pine for a moment that never occurred. His music sounds like roses in water, romance of the highest degree, one of deep longing, sadness and community all at once. This new album stays true to that sound, as Hawley maintains his sweet vocal tone over a backdrop of varying styles of music.
In This City They Call You Love has several different influences, as the songs alternate from the minimalist serenity of ‘People’ to the upbeat rock-infused theatrics of ‘Deep Space’. Regardless of the sound that Hawley is trying to achieve, though, the constant is his voice and ability to hold everything together in the most delightful way. He continues to prove himself to be one of the most prolific songwriters and deep romantics to come out of Sheffield. [Words: Dale Maplethorpe]
Big Swimmer – King Hannah – 3.5
There are few eras in music history that are quite as cool as the 1990s alternative scene. The shoegazers, the trip-hoppers, the grunge scene, each have been revered and referenced in its own way, and King Hannah are the latest to pay tribute. On their sophomore record, Big Swimmer, the influence of the gritty guitar music that preceded them is in almost every strum and every shrugged lyric.
There are sultry, Portishead-esque ballads and delicately driving guitars in the image of Sonic Youth, each brought to life by Hannah Merrick’s playful contemporary vocals. It makes for a hauntingly hypnotic collection of songs for the most part, but 1990s guitar music isn’t the only genre that finds its way into the soundscapes of Big Swimmer.
When King Hannah aren’t borrowing from the aloof alternative scene that preceded them, they dip into the modern indie folk realm with features from Sharon Van Etten. Their efforts in this area are solid, as soft and subdued as any track you’d find on a sad girl indie playlist, but they’re nowhere near as captivating as their slightly edgier leanings. [Words: Elle Palmer]
Chaos Angel – Maya Hawke – 3
Across Chaos Angel, the daughter of Uma Thurman and Ethan Hawke holds her hands up, singing about her “television salary” and all the privileges the mere fact of her birth allowed her, with a candid nuance that few other so-called nepo-babies would brave.Her words exist fully within the realm of tenderness, with every song being pinned down by the overwhelming idea that to feel anything at all is a joy and that any emotion, no matter how small, should be celebrated.
Hawke’s voice is not built for power. Her vocals remain on the soft, singer-songwriter level from start to finish, so the album relies on production and instrumentation to lift it all up. On the tracks that are built of not much more than vocals and an acoustic guitar, it doesn’t do enough or break through anything beyond ‘nice’. [Words: Lucy Harbron]
Lapse – Idaho – 2
Nostalgia is an easy thing to market in the modern age, which probably goes some way to explaining Lapse, the first album to be released by 1990s slowcore rockers Idaho in 13 years. On this album, Idaho suffer from their music now sounding incredibly dated and, frankly, dull. Lapse offers very little in the way of variety or new ideas, despite the album reportedly being two years in the making.
In fairness to Idaho, the confusingly Californian outfit have amassed a pretty dedicated cult following over the years. For this very specific demographic, Lapse probably comes as a long-awaited gift, imbued with all the characteristics and sounds of Idaho that audiences have become accustomed to. If you are already a fan of Idaho and their signature sound, you will probably enjoy this record.
