Albums: Mastodon Marrow Deep
Mastodon has always had a knack for turning pain into something thunderous, but Marrow Deep feels different. This is an album born from grief, upheaval and profound change, yet rather than collapsing under that weight, the Atlanta metal giants use it as fuel
Albums: Alex Warren WILDCHILD
There is something about Alex Warren’s music that feels deeply personal while somehow remaining universally relatable. His songs have an unusual ability to sit beside you in the messier corners of life, offering neither easy answers nor polished clichés, but the comforting sense that somebody else understands. On WILDCHILD, that quality develops into something particularly affecting: an endearing, emotionally charged and remarkably honest pop record about surviving the past, finding connection in the present and learning to embrace the life that remains.
EPs: Appleton Side By Side
Appleton Side By Side Tracks: Ready To Begin, Falling Into You, Strange Kinda Paradise, Monster Label: Appleton Recordings Back in 2002, after the dissolution of All Saints, sisters Nicole and Natalie Appleton decided not to take the solo route. Instead, they paired up and released the driven anthem Fantasy.
Classical Music: Mahler's Symphony No. 3 in D minor
Mahler's Symphony No. 3 in D minor is a work that dares almost too much. Six movements, the best part of a hundred minutes, and a programme that runs from the awakening of Pan to a final movement of wordless, all-embracing love: it asks a conductor to hold together a vast orchestra, a mezzo-soprano soloist, a boys' choir and a women's chorus without the whole edifice splintering into episodes. I went into this recording expecting admiration. I came out with something closer to reappraisal as Petrenko unlocked Mahler's cosmic Third and the RPO, and Harmonia Mundi's engineers are on inspired form
Classical Music: Janáček The Excursions Of Mr Brouček
It would be easy to file Brouček away as a Janáček footnote, the one even his admirers tend to skip. Rattle and his forces make a compelling case that it shouldn't be. A comic opera, treated with real seriousness, and all the better for it.
Classical Music: Beethoven String Quartets Vol 3
It is, as they say, the gift that keeps on giving. The Doric String Quartet continue their sublime traversal of Beethoven's quartets with a third volume that ranges across the composer's early, middle and late periods – from the youthful high spirits of Op. 18 No. 3 to the visionary strangeness of the final works.
Classical Music: Elena Ruehr: Violin Concerto No. 1
Released by St7dio as a digital single rather than packaged within a fuller album, it stands entirely on its own merits.
From the opening bars, this concerto sings. Ruehr's writing is accessible without ever feeling slight, its lyrical lines unfolding with real confidence in what the violin can do. She understands the instrument intimately, and the orchestral accompaniment is judged with equal skill: nothing overwhelms the soloist, nothing sits idle. The woodwind, in particular, is excellent throughout.
Levina on Invincible Summer: finding her way back to connection, joy and herself
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For London-based alt-soul artist Levina, Invincible Summer is more than just a new album. Written over the course of two years, the record charts a deeply personal and musical journey through disconnection, self-discovery and, ultimately, a return to connection.
Lennie Gallant: Songs, Stories and a Little Bit of Laughter
With 16 albums, a Canadian Songwriters Hall of Fame induction and a career that has taken him from intimate venues to the International Space Station, Lennie Gallant has certainly accumulated a few stories along the way. The celebrated Canadian singer-songwriter is bringing those stories to the UK, with an appearance at the British Country Music Festival followed by a mini UK tour.
Albums: Natalie Imbruglia Algorithm
Having started to tease the release back in April with the impressive shimmer of Upside Down, it was immediately apparent that Natalie has not lost sight of the slight alternative pop leanings that produced her biggest hits to date, but that she is not afraid either of playing the pure pop game. Subsequent singles, Algorithm and Just Drive, both built on this. Natalie Imbruglia has not lost sight of who she is as an artist, it is clear from these singles that she is simply ready to fully embrace the pop label with all her heart.
Bon Jovi - Hanging On By A Wing And A Prayer
When Adele chose to hold a residency in Munich two years ago, the idea kickstarted the trend for holding huge multiple outdoor concerts where fans would travel from across the globe to see their favourite act: instead of the artist coming to your city, you had to go the distance to see them.
Fatboy Slim to headline Lytham Festival 2027
Superstar DJ and award-winning producer Fatboy Slim will head to the Lancashire coast next summer to headline the North West’s largest live music festival. It has been announced that The Rockafeller Skank and Right Here Right Now star will bring his big beats and incredible live show to Lytham Festival on Friday July 2.
Albums: Westside Cowboy It Goes On
Westside Cowboy’s It Goes On is the kind of album that makes you want to turn the volume up simply to hear where it might take you next. Across its nine tracks, the Manchester band have refined their scrappy, guitar-heavy sound into something that feels both unmistakably British and remarkably fresh.
There is a looseness to the record, but never a lack of purpose. Guitars jangle, grind and collide; melodies appear from the noise; and the songs find poetry in everyday observations without ever making them feel ordinary.
Albums: Mystery Jets A Hole To See The Sky Through
Mystery Jets has returned with A Hole To See The Sky Through, an album that feels like a genuine rediscovery of what makes them such an enduring proposition. Where their recent work sometimes felt weighed down by its own seriousness, this record finds a far more natural balance between reflection and exuberance, bringing back the melodic sparkle, wit and sense of adventure that first made the band so compelling.
Albums: Sam Smith Hazel Eyes
There is plenty to admire here. Hazel Eyes is richly produced and, at its best, allows Smith’s extraordinary voice to breathe rather than simply serve as another component in a maximalist pop production. Everlasting Love opens with a gently fingerpicked guitar and sultry minor chords before Smith’s nimble head voice glides over restrained strings and horns. It is sleek and sophisticated, recalling the understated elegance of Sade without feeling like mere pastiche.
Albums: Jorja Smith- What Are The Odds
Smith's voice remains the star attraction. There is a smoky warmth to it, but also a remarkable precision. She knows when to hold back and when to let a phrase hang in the air, giving even the sparsest moments real weight. Crucially, she never sounds as though she is trying to prove anything.
Albums: Sara Bareilles Good Grief
Written and recording during COVID-19, Bareilles is in a very reflective mood as she tries to understand the world that surrounds her. As she explores the notion of loss, grief, heartbreak and personal breakdowns, she delivers what many may see as an introspective record but in reality is based on the stories of those she knows and those she has read. And the real beauty of this record is that she showcases such deep empathy that they feel so true to her that it is impossible not to connect with the depth of emotion showcased.
Albums: Stella Lefty Long Way Home
Stella Lefty has had a massive 2026. The breakout success of her Noah Kahan-interpolating single, Boston, has seen her achieve the longest-running ever #1 single on the UK country radio charts, but it has also seen her included on the prestigious Country Mount Rushmore for 20
Classical Music: Missy Mazzoli Breaking The Waves
Mazzoli's score is nothing short of genius. The music paints pictures with real creativity and power, and her use of instrumentation to depict particular scenes is marvellous, not least the deployment of melodica, piano, synthesiser and electric guitar alongside the more conventional orchestral palette.
Albums: Steve Hackett & Steve Rothery - The Roaring Waves
Most importantly, The Roaring Waves never feels like a competition between two legendary guitarists. There is no sense of Hackett and Rothery trying to prove who can shred hardest. Instead, the emphasis is on atmosphere, melody and storytelling. That makes the album considerably more involving than a mere virtuoso showcase.
Albums: Cruz Beckham Wear & Tear
Having cited The Beatles, The Stone Roses and David Bowie as key influences, it is clear that Beckham is happy to wear these sounds within his own context, but at one stage does this EP try to simply emulate those artists? He rather marries his key influences with his own Britpop leanings to craft an EP that feels very much his own.
Classical Music: Paganini Violin Concerto
A reviewer who spends years moving between genres and recordings risks a kind of critical fatigue, where superlatives are handed out too readily and end up meaning very little. That's why I keep a mental scorecard, weighing tone, technique, ensemble and interpretation against one another before I let an adjective like 'outstanding' anywhere near a review. Most of the time this keeps me honest.
Albums: Jungle - Sunshine
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With Sunshine, their fifth studio album, they lean further into that identity, delivering a record that feels less interested in reinvention than in perfecting the atmosphere they have made unmistakably their own.
Classical Music: Stephen Hough's Piano Postcards
He opens with his own arrangement of three songs from Sherman's score for Mary Poppins, and the charm is immediate and disarming. Chim Chim Cher-ee is simply delightful — an earworm, yes, but 'bug' feels the wrong word for something arranged with such loving craft. Feed the Birds unfolds in a long, languorous line that carries the listener somewhere else entirely, its trills and decorations enchanting, every phrase touched with real charisma. Then Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious arrives in staccato flurries and glissandos, tying the suite together with something close to genius. One can only think: I wish I were there.
Turnstile Turn The Energy On In Style
Listening to the last Turnstile album, NEVER ENOUGH the record isn’t the best introduction to the band live. The record mixes the ferocity of Rage Against The Machine, the melody of The Offspring and, although they probably would not admit to it, the pop perfection of The Police.
Sparks Fly In York
There are very few bands who could walk onto a stage more than half a century into their career and still make the word conventional feel completely irrelevant. Sparks are one of them. In 2026, Ron and Russell Mael remained gloriously out of step with the rest of the musical world.
When The Orchestra Comes To You: Birmingham's Week Of Music In The Wild
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As the CBSO swaps Symphony Hall for shopping centres, tram loops and the Bullring, chief executive Emma Stenning tells Andrew Palmer why a great orchestra's real stage might be the platform at New Street. There is a particular kind of chaos that only a symphony orchestra can cause in a shopping centre, and Birmingham has had rather a lot of practice at it lat…
Hollywood Vampires Loose None Of Their Bite In Halifax
The Damned arrived on the punk scene fifty years ago when it was seen as rebellious upstarts with songs such as Smash It Up and New Rose. As they took to the stage at the Piece Hall in Halifax, supporting Hollywood Vampires, the original punk rockers appeared to have lost none of their ferocity.
Saltaire Festival To Shine Spotlight On The Mighty Wurlitzer
There can't be many instruments that come with their own lift, but the Mighty Wurlitzer at Victoria Hall, Saltaire, is not many instruments. On Thursday 17th September the theatre pipe organ will take centre stage for a free open day, part of this year's Saltaire Festival.
RIP Queen Dolly: What A Life, What A Woman, What A Legacy
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Today feels like the end of an era. Dolly Parton wasn't simply a singer I loved. She became part of the soundtrack to my life — and, in so many ways, the lives of the people around me. I fell in love with Dolly's music years ago. I was lucky enough to see her in concert, and her songs became woven into some incredibly special memories.