If It's Too Loud...: First Listen for 1 November 2024

Artist: The Cure
Album: Songs of a Lost World
Quick Thoughts: Listen, I don't need to explain how The Cure are legendary, how so many of their songs are modern classics, and so on. This is also their first album in 16 years, and could very well be their last. You'd never know it, though, as this is an epic, soaring piece of musical art that both feels like a Cure album while also feeling like an evolution of their sound in a way you'd expect from a band 30 years earlier in their trajectory. This album has no business being as good as it is, and if it's the final hurrah for the band, what a way to go out.
Songs of Note: "Alone," "A Fragile Thing," "Warsong," "Drone:Nodrone," "Endsong"

Artist: Gossip Collar
Album: Spinning Silk for Parasites
Quick Thoughts: This was an enjoyable surprise. Especially in a week with a new Cure album, a gothy new wave-adjacent listen is welcome, especially one as good as this. "Midnight Ride" is a true favorite of the week, and the whole album was just so much fun. Really, really loved this, it's a nice retro listen.
Songs of Note: "Breakfast (for the baby)," "Midnight Ride," "Walk in Threes," "Dead Flies," "Hiding Place,"

Artist: Haley Heynderickx
Album: Seed of a Seed
Quick Thoughts: We love Haley Heynderickx, and I Need to Start a Garden was a favorite for both of us back in 2018. It's been a while since we've heard from her outside of a reissue of a collaborative record, and Seed of a Seed not only builds on what she planted in her debut, but shows a songwriter both stronger in her abilities and with a broader sonic palate. Such a welcome return, and such a great album.
Songs of Note: "Foxglove," "Mouth of a Flower," "Spit in the Sink," "Redwoods (Anxious God)"

Of note:

* Olivia O - No Bones, Sickly Sweet (I get early PJ Harvey vibes from this.)
* October Drift - Blame the Young
* Mount Eerie - Night Palace
* White Poppy - Paradise Regained
* The Sheila Divine - I Am the Darkness. We Are the Light
* Annie Hamilton - Stop and Smell the Lightning
* Dialup Ghost - May You Live Forever in Cowboy Heaven
* Roland Faunte - Cloth
* Glitch Gum - Movie Star
* Japandroids - Fate & Alcohol
* Hildegard - Jour 1596
* mxmtoon - liminal space
* Derek Smith and the Cosmic Vultures
* Qlowski - The Wound
* Planes Mistaken for Stars - Do You Still Love Me?
* Able Noise - High Tide
* Destroyyyyer - No Solace
* Night Court - $hit Machine
* The Ghost Wolves - Consumer Waste
* Coffin Salesman - Dream of Fire
* Sapphire - Lucky Star
* Covey - Middle Ground
* Chris Hyson / Rupert Cox / Alex Haines - Love Like Flowers
* Astrocolor - Stargazing - AstroJazz, Vol. 2
* Brigitte Fontaine - Pick-up
* The Last Days of Our Past - FOG
* Chad Crouch - Rentenaar Road Soundwalk
* Bubble Tea and Cigarettes - we should've killed each other
* Oliver Palfreyman - Double Vision
* Sarah Blasko - I Just Need to Conquer This Mountain
* Autre Ne Veut - Love, Guess Who?? (XXOOXX)
* Paul Spring - Kind of Heaven
* Red Ribbon - Red Ribbon
* Joy Shannon - An Chailleach
* Bill Laurance and Michael League - Keeping Company
* Tangering - You're Still the Only One