Alternative Album Chart: the best new indie and alternative albums this week
In a world with a mass of content on offer 24/7, it can be challenging for new groups to stand out. Yet, with their debut album Ceremony, Glasgow‘s The Joy Hotel have cut through the noise with aplomb. It’s not very often that an introductory opus is so accomplished.
While their music certainly has a definitive context, the group triumphs in combining their influences to create a record brimming with originality. It might seem like a paradox, but it’s one thing ripping people off or even clearly referencing them and expertly taking inspiration and pushing it through your own paradigm to refresh the palette. With songwriting nouse and musical inventiveness coursing through the album, the septet have set themselves up for a bright future. It arrives at the perfect time, too, as the sun decides to bear down on Blighty once more.
Elsewhere this week, King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard pianist Ambrose Kenny-Smith and Gum, the solo project from Pond’s Jay Watson, have teamed up for a special record in Ill Times. A fun and energetic work that quickly does away with any depression the present state of the world might prompt, it’s yet another reminder that Australia is a hotbed of immense creative activity and is, in many ways, the place to be right now.
Some less enjoyable albums have also arrived this week. With their new self-titled work, Philadelphia mainstays Dr. Dog do absolutely nothing fresh and provide little entertainment. Instead, they produce a collection of tracks that are often so mundane and twee that you cannot wait for it to end, which I’m loath to say. Taking up a place with them is Oxford’s Glass Animals, who, on I F***ing Love You So Much, craft a deeply lacklustre listening experience despite the pleasant concept behind it.
Find this week’s Alternative Album Chart below.
The best new indie and alternative albums this week:
Ceremony – The Joy Hotel – 4.5
With the entire history of music at our fingertips, there’s this misguided claim thrown around that nothing can be truly new. People try to argue that referencing is synonymous with a lack of newness and that embracing influences impeaches originality. But inspiration is a powerful thing; why deny it? With the right music education placed in the hands of the right people, The Joy Hotel have created something astonishing. Their work is so assured that the main marvel is: “How on earth is this a debut?”
Ceremony is presented with a masterstroke so polished yet so adventurous that it teeters on genuine genius. The Joy Hotel, a band from Glasgow, stand as an expansive team of seven musicians. They bring together six voices for harmonies, with Emme Woods and Luke Boyce passing the lead between them in a kind of Fleetwood Mac display of dynamics. Their sound as a collective feels like one huge, glorious melting pot of a whole spectrum of colours, genres and eras. There are Queen-like theatrical riffs, Billy Joel-inspired characterful piano moments, Led Zeppelin scale epic rock explosions and an endless list of others. It’s an audio experience that feels deeply influenced by the 1960s and ‘70s but embodies a sense of experimental adventure and maximalism that’s been missing in music since then.
This is the sort of album that’s made when artists are allowed to just follow their ideas to the furthest degree, straying down the path of their vision alone. The Joy Hotel’s venture into their musical world is one paved with pure gold and journeyed with real bravery and confidence. The result is an album that asserts itself with uncompromising power, unlimited potential, and creativity, and it knows no limit. Borrowing from legends that have come before them, it’s a nostalgia trip of a record that will build an incredible future. [Words: Lucy Harbron]
Ill Times – GUM/Ambrose Kenny-Smith – 3.5
If you’ve ever wondered how King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard find time to make so many albums, band member Ambrose Kenny-Smith isn’t here to give you an answer. But you should be warned, he’s going to leave you with even more questions. How do each of the Australian rockers manage to find time for side projects, too? And how do they manage to make such consistently good music?
To be fair, Kenny-Smith hasn’t made his new record alone, it’s a collaboration with Jay Watson, best known for founding projects like GUM and Pond, while touring as a live member of Tame Impala. The pair have teamed up to make Ill Times, which comes after several years of being friends.
Ill Times is a fun album, consistently upbeat and danceable, although some of the tracks are considerably more forgettable than others. Kenny-Smith and Watson both stay rather loyal to the sounds and style that have made them respected musicians, but they would have benefited from pushing the boat out a bit more, as some songs simply sound like B-sides from their already-established bands.
Still, there’s a lot to discover on Ill Times, from the grooves of ‘Minor Setback’ to their interesting take on ‘Fool For You’ by the Impressions. Paired with lyrics about making it through grief and hard times, Kenny-Smith and Watson have made a record full of passion and energy. [Words: Aimee Ferrier]
Stockholm_1974 – Minny Pops – 3.5
Although we remember Factory Records for titans like Joy Division and Happy Mondays and for its part in establishing The Haçienda, the iceberg is broad beneath the surface. Throughout the 1980s, the label signed several fascinating leftfield artists, including Section 25, Durutti Column and all the way from Amsterdam, Minny Pops, which has returned this week with its first new studio album in over 40 years.
Stockholm_1974 remains mostly faithful to the sound Minny Pops introduced in the late 1970s and early ‘80s. Jagged guitar progressions invariably meet synthesised tones that still sound futuristic after all these years, evoking a sci-fi movie soundtrack. For good measure, Middendorp infolds woodwind and brass instrumentation courtesy of Terry Edwards and even banjo melodies contributed by Pieter Mulder.
Although Stockholm_1974 brings very little new to the table as a reminiscence of a musical epoch long past, it is certainly not banal. Each song carries an identity unmistakably belonging to this album, yet they vary impressively with a range of emotional themes, sonic atmospheres, instrumental textures and tempos. Not every song is perfect, but it is delightful to hear one of the original masters of avant-garde rock back in business. [Words: Jordan Potter]
Heavy Jelly – Soft Play – 3
Back in the 2010s, Isaac Holman and Laurie Vincent – then operating under the name Slaves – were among the most exciting and energetic young punk groups in the United Kingdom. Making a name for themselves with raucous live performances, witty lyricism, and a sense of community among fans, the group helped to breathe new life into a punk scene that was growing tiresome. So, when the pair reunited in 2022 and rebranded themselves as Soft Play, expectations were high, and the accusations of ‘punk gone woke’ were rife.
With Heavy Jelly, the duo’s first record following the rebrand, Holman and Vincent had the opportunity to forever silence their critics, moving the conversation away from name changes to focus entirely on great music. Unfortunately, the album often feels flawed and unimaginative. There is a distinct lack of variety in sound within the tracklisting, which makes the endless assault of distorted guitars and hi-hat-less drums blend into a nondescript wall of sound after a handful of tracks. The few songs which hint at a development in the band’s sound, like ‘Everything and Nothing’, for instance, form the highlights of the record, but they are disappointingly few and far between. [Words: Ben Forrest]
Dr. Dog – Dr. Dog – 1.5
Despite rock encompassing many wildly differing sounds and continuing to expand its borders over the years, some groups neither fit in with the zeitgeist nor provide any real dose of entertainment, two things often described as opposites. If it’s not boundary-pushing, at least it’s fun, is a common trail of thought when discussing contemporary music’s worth. Unfortunately, with their new self-titled album, Philadelphia institution Dr. Dog fail to fit into either camp and find themselves wandering the wilds of the rock landscape with other unwanted stragglers, most of whom will be swept up by the winds of time.
Let’s be clear: this is not a terrible album. Simply, it is so bland that you want to poke your eyes out. While the production and songwriting are undoubtedly accomplished, it seldom provides moments that leave a minuscule lasting mark on the listener. Due to the laid-back and largely maudlin nature of many of the songs – which don’t do anything we’ve never heard before – you often find yourself heading straight to press skip, and sometimes even worse, to slam the off button and save yourself from this frustrating inertia.
I Love You So F***ing Much – Glass Animals – 1
Not long ago, Glass Animals were making tunes that were ever so slightly more interesting than your average indie pop band. They pulled from psychedelic influences and R&B to create hits like the squeakily sublime ‘Gooey’ and the playful ‘Life Itself’, both of which had a certain charm that earned them a place on every indie teen’s summer playlist.
Ten years and one Tiktok sleeper hit later, those influences still remain in place. Glass Animals are still playing with psychedelia and R&B, but it no longer feels quite so fresh or fun. This is, unfortunately, true of their latest album, I Love You So F***ing Much, which marks their fourth full-length offering as Glass Animals.
I Love You So F***ing Much has a solid premise. Like their second album, How to Be a Human Being, the new record is based around a central concept. While the latter focused on the stories of different characters with each song, this new album focuses on a new depiction of love with each song. Along the way, songwriter Dave Bayley sets out to connect emotion with the universe and portray it as the largest thing within it.
It’s undoubtedly a gorgeous concept for an album, albeit an ambitious one. Taking on two concepts as big as love and space in one breath is a mammoth task, and unfortunately, one that I Love You So F***ing Much fails to do justice. The love stories and the instrumentation surrounding them often feel lacklustre, like the kind of song you’d skip while scrolling through Instagram Reels. [Words: Elle Palmer]
