Paddy McAloon had not yet found the key to the elegant compositions that made Prefab Sprout distinctive when it came time to record their debut, Swoon. He certainly tries hard to make his sophisticated contemporary pop sound distinctive, but the problem is that he does too many things at once – the lyrics are overstuffed, and the music has too many chord changes and weird juxtapositions, as he tries to put white-funk beats to carefully crafted melodies. A few moments work, such as "Couldn't Bear to Be Special," but Swoon is primarily of interest as a historical item, since it only suggests the promise the band later filled.

I Know I’m Funny haha is Webster’s most realized manifestation yet of this emotional and musical alchemy. Continuing to bloom from her 2019 breakthrough and Secretly Canadian debut Atlanta Millionaires Club, Webster’s sound draws as much from the lap-steel singer-songwriter pop of the 1970s and teardrop country tunes as it does from the audacious personalities of her city’s rap and R&B community.

Music in High Places, the ultimate international music and travel adventure series, takes music's biggest artists to the four corners of the globe to discover the culture, history and spirituality of some of the most intriguing natural locations around the world. Here, join Alanis Morissette as she visits the Native American Navajo Nation…

Coming in way above their previous effort, 1990’s Smooth Noodle Maps, Something for Everybody is the album Devo's fans had craved for 28 long years, or maybe 29, if you fall on the sour side of the iffy Oh, No! It's Devo. The synthetic, compressed, and punchy production – courtesy of producer and Bird & the Bee member Greg Kurstin – is a modern take on the sound of 1981’s New Traditionalists, and if you judge by hooks, this is right in line with their 1980 breakthrough, Freedom of Choice, although there’s certainly no “Whip It”-sized megahit here. Instead, there’s the opening “Fresh!” a herky-jerky, infectious number with lead singer Mark Mothersbaugh stuttering as if he just created New Wave’s “My Generation.” The wicked highlight “Don’t Shoot (I’m a Man)” (“They’ll hunt you down/And tase you bro/For playing with the rules”) is the album’s other key track, thanks to Mothersbaugh’s perfect framing of de-evolution’s give (hybrid cars) and take, take, take (Beltway snipers, overzealous cops, etc.).

While it's not a repudiation of her blockbuster, Supposed Former Infatuation Junkie is a clear step forward, teeming with ambition and filled with new musical ideas and different sonic textures. Alanis Morissette's voice still sears, but she has more control over her singing, rarely reaching the piercing heights that occasionally made Jagged Little Pill jarring…

my bloody valentine, the quartet of Bilinda Butcher, Kevin Shields, Deb Googe and Colm Ó Cíosóig, are widely revered as one of the most ground-breaking and influential groups of the past forty years. During an era in which guitar bands denoted, at best, a retro-classicism, not only did my bloody valentine sound unlike any of their contemporaries, the band achieved the rare feat of sounding like the future.

The Cranberries‘ second album No Need to Argue has been remastered and expanded for a double CD and 2LP vinyl release in November. Originally released in 1994, the album was the band’s commercial peak, with global sales in excess of 17 million. No Need to Argue contains the single ‘Zombie’ which topped charts across Europe (although interestingly, only peaked at 14 in the UK) and was seemingly played endlessly on MTV at the time. The two-CD deluxe features, on the first disc, a 2020 remaster of the album (“from the original tapes”), three B-sides (‘Away’, ‘I Don’t Need’ and ‘So Cold In Ireland’), a previously unreleased song ‘Yesterday’s Gone’ (which was recorded unplugged for MTV in New York in 1995), a cover of the Carpenters’ ‘(They Long To Be) Close to You’ and a remix of ‘Zombie’. The second CD in this package features nine unreleased demos and eight live tracks.

Faithfull pegged her comeback to a brutal survivalist persona, but by this fourth album of her second career, she had mellowed at least to the extent of constructing flowing song structures with her collaborators, Barry Reynolds and Wally Badarou, that eased the bitterness still found in many of her lyrics…

Although it wasn't immediately apparent, Supposed Former Infatuation Junkie found Alanis Morissette floundering in her success, albeit ever so slightly. Like most arty collegiate types, she reacted to massive success with an instinct to experiment, and since she had sold so many records, she and producer/collaborator Glen Ballard were given free range to do pretty much whatever they wanted, resulting in a muted, fitfully intriguing album that had the feel of a sophomore slump even if it was her fourth record (but who counts those first two records as part of her discography, anyway?)…

The Fall were an English post-punk band, formed in Manchester in 1976. The band existed until 2018 and was essentially built around its founder and only constant member Mark E. Smith. Initially associated with the punk movement of the late 1970s, the group’s music went through several stylistic changes over the years, but is often characterised by an abrasive guitar-driven sound and frequent use of repetition, and is always underpinned by Smith’s distinctive vocals and often cryptic lyrics.

my bloody valentine, the quartet of Bilinda Butcher, Kevin Shields, Deb Googe and Colm Ó Cíosóig, are widely revered as one of the most groundbreaking and influential groups of the past forty years. During an era in which guitar bands denoted, at best, a retro-classicism, not only did my bloody valentine sound unlike any of their contemporaries, the band achieved the rare feat of sounding like the future.

Hula were founded in Sheffield in 1981. Three members (Mark Albrow, Alan Fish and Ron Wright) lived with Stephen Mallinder (Cabaret Voltaire) and Paul Widger (They must be Russians, Clock DVA, the Box) in a villa called Hula Kula. After trying the bass players Alan Watt, Chris Brain (Tense, NOS) and Mark Brydon (Chakk, Moloko), and after the replacement of Alan Fish by Nort (both drummed for the Cabs), Hula recorded the impressive album Murmur. Ingredients like cut ups, steady rhythms, and paranoia vocals were blended together into a unique white funky sound. Murmur was the band's second album and came out on Red Rhino in 1984. This was also the time of Hula's great singles - Fever Car, Get the Habit and Walk on Stalks of Shattered Glass were all released around that time. They are all added to the album as bonus tracks here making this CD about twice as long as the original vinyl album. Remastered by Attrition's Martin Bowes and the band's own Nort. First time ever on CD!