Recommended Albums: March 2013

March may be the month where album releases have really started to get tight. Most of these choices are either pretty odd or relentlessly heavy (or both), and all are memorable. Looking at April's release schedule it may cross your mind to look at March as the calm before the storm, but the albums and singles here are all top drawer stuff, so check them out if they appear interesting:

clipping - midcity
A name-your-price album/mixtape from an incredibly noisy hip-hop trio. I'm really enjoying the songwriting and tight lyricism clipping are bringing here, and admire the new ground they've found between the Death Grips, Shabazz Palaces and Jeremiah Jae influences.



David Bowie - The Next Day
A startlingly solid late-career album from one of popular music's most celebrated figures. Bowie may not be reinventing himself quite so freshly as he did during his astounding 70s run but draws from his many strengths already amassed to create the best kind of retrospective.



Hookworms - Pearl Mystic
The debut album from Leeds-based Hookworms is a nigh-on flawless foray into modern psychedelic rock, written and produced masterfully by key member MJ. If this doesn't break the top 10 albums of the year, 2013 will be especially rich in musical quality.



Gnod - Chauderlande
More of a compilation than a proper album, Chauderlande collects the six tracks that made up Gnod's two Chauderlande LPs and repackages them onto one CD. Still these tracks are absolute monsters. "Tron" and "Genocider" in particular are likely to be the heaviest psych rock opuses you'll ever have the pleasure of encountering.



Inga Copeland - Don't Look Back, That's Not Where You're Going (EP)
These are the first three solo tracks Inga Copeland has released, although they feature production from DVA and Martyn. They sound like highly twisted dance-pop tunes, with killer vocal hooks and squelchy basslines. If you want your brain scrambled, and for others to wonder why, choose this one.



Pete Swanson - Punk Authority (EP)
30 minutes of relentlessly harsh techno noise that doesn't forget the emphasis on rhythm and repetition. Each Pete Swanson release seems to be a honing of this formula, and with Punk Authority he may have produced his strongest results yet.



Next month expect new albums from the Knife, the Flaming Lips, James Blake, the Haxan Cloak, Phoenix and more. Tracks from some of these albums/EP's can be found on my latest monthly mix Culture Shock (check the channel from tomorrow).