Three years since The Long Blondes parted ways and left a gaping hole in the British indie scene, front woman Kate Jackson has returned. Following The Long Blondes split in 2008, Kate began work on a collection of songs with former Suede guitarist and producer Bernard Butler. Working from mutual influences such as Brian Eno, David Bowie, Patti Smith and Roxy Music as well as the distinctive guitar sounds of Neil Young and Mick Ronson and the lyrical narratives of 60s country pop acts like Bobbie Gentry, Jackson and Butler came up with a sound which fuses indie pop and glam with elements of country and 70's rock.

• http://soundcloud.com/thestaticjacks

Now, the fruits of the last two years have ripened into a full-length, If You're Young, due out August 30th on Fearless Records. Recorded and produced by Chris Shaw (Ted Leo, Bad Brains, Elvis Perkins in Dearland) at Stratosphere Sound in New York City, the album expands Laces' look at youthful trials and tribulations, from the peerless bliss of love found to the barren hell of heartbreak to fear of the ever-looming future, of growing old, of stagnation-topics at once personal and also deeply universal. Yet as the Jacks explain the record, "Even if now you're not young, you were once, so you'll get where these songs are coming from." And If You're Young is nothing if not wise, mature, and introspective, a hardwon product of experience rarely delivered by twenty-somethings. As well it marks the first time the band's had a full-on studio at its disposal for nearly a month, with the tools and freedom to build its songs into rich, dynamic beasts.

• http://www.myspace.com/finkmusic

"Fin "Fink" Greenall is an atypical singer-songwriter, inasmuch as he DJed for the dance label Ninja Tune in a previous life before radically changing direction in 2006. Since then, he and his self-titled band have crafted softly-spoken acoustica that makes a feature of his lulling voice it's in the same beguiling ballpark as Jose Gonzales and John Legend and contemplative guitar/drum/string arrangements. His fourth album often achieves such loveliness you don't want it to end. An organic warmth prevails on even the most emotionally chaotic songs delicate fingerpicking and squeaking guitar strings sweeten the scathing Honesty ("True colours/ You got so many, baby, you're like a fucking rainbow"), while his hungover rasp on Berlin Sunrise paints an oddly seductive picture of the new day. Even better, once his mumble is deciphered on the skeletal Delta blues ambler Wheels, it reveals his passion for his hometown, "old Bristol city". What a delight." The Guardian

• http://www.myspace.com/burncambridgeburn

"In a world where felt-tipping political statements on your hand is deemed a talking point, god only knows what the average man will make of this... Bomb Factory are battle-cry music for a disaffected youth. This band are essential." The Plastic Ashtray.

"Positively angry band rebelling against whatever you have for them to rebel against." Demo of the month, Organ Magazine, March 2008.

"Explicitly political and seething with anger... for those who look first and formost for integrity in their music, Bomb Factory may well fit the bill." Drowned In Sound.

"Thomas Truax's brand of folk bounds between noirish, Gothic (but not Goth) twists and pretty moments. Tonight, Truax -unquestionably the highlight on this bill- celebrates the release of his new CD, Full Moon Over Wowtown (Psycho Teddy), which injects new energy into the dark, carnivalesque sort of music that always gets compared to Tom Waits." -TIMEOUT New York

• http://www.kitsune.fr/journal/artists/citizens/

Citizens! is a fantastic new band freshly signed to Kitsuné. Five handsome London boys who pen songs with a panoramic view. Warm, welcoming, traditional, as classy as marble icing on cake they are produced by no one else than Alex Kapranos!

Composed by Martyn, Thom, Mike, Lawrence and Tom , Citizens! is a call to arms, a statement, a mark in the sand. Their bold statement is that they reclaim pop cause Pop is not a dirty word. It's a holy one. (Mike)
The melodious vocals and the catchy music are the ingredients of good pop. They treated recording like a game, an experiment. They thought that a band needed to come along with the guts to make imaginative pop music, but to do it with soul and integrity. They asked questions that other bands weren't asking, and mixed elements they hadn't heard mixed before. Most importantly they wouldn't allow themselves to mimic any particular moment from decades past.

It's us against the world,' Lawrence says, 'we make our own rules and we take them very seriously. But it works because we don't take ourselves seriously while we do it.

• http://soundcloud.com/ellenandtheescapades

Ellen and the Escapades are an alternative folk quintet, picked by BBC Introducing in Leeds TTO Play at the Reading & Leeds festivals after they uploaded some cracking tracks. They released their first single Without You earlier this year on their homegrown record label, Branch Out Records. Having been played by Alan Raw on BBC Radio Leeds, it was picked up by Steve Lamacq on BBC Radio 2, and Tom Robinson on BBC 6 Music.

All five members of the band studied at Leeds College of Music. Fans of Bob Dylan and Carole King as well as modern acts like The Coral, their sound is nostalgic, but not old fasihoned.

"You'd have thought someone would have used the name before, but they haven't. We've had Prince, even a US funk musician called Prince Charles, not to mention all the royal female permutations you can imagine notably Queen and Princess but no King Charles. Until now. This one has never engaged in a power struggle with Parliament (neither the English governing body nor George Clinton's funk mob) but he is getting rave notices for his psychedelic acoustica, and his wild hair has been getting pretty good reactions too. The term "wigga" has been dusted down and brought out of storage. We prefer "wasta". He's from west London, you know, so some might say "trustafarian"...
...he also discovered at a young age the collected works of Donovan, Marc Bolan circa Tyrannosaurus Rex, and Syd Barrett because he is part of that tradition of uniquely English, psych-inflected pastoral whimsy (well, not completely uniquely Devendra Banhart operates in a similar area). Not surprisingly, it's catching on with the same sort of people who last year loved Noah and the Whale and this year seem to have switched allegiances to Mumford and Sons.

...he spent some time gigging in girls' schools across England and apparently "rescued a baby giraffe from the jaws of a jackal" according to his press release, neither of which experiences inform the lyrics of his debut single, Time of Eternity, which appeares to address the apocalypse and death, in that order, over frazzled electric folk. On the follow-up, Love Lust, he compares and contrasts the relative merits of sex and the other thing over pounding piano and what sounds like a washboard. Elsewhere he uses ancient shanties, a cappella operatics, skiffle and raunch rock to enhance his idiosyncratic visions. Well, someone's got to do it, and it might as well be this dandy in the underworld." The Guardian

• http://www.myspace.com/theapplesmusic

Under 14s welcome with an accompanying adult

"The Apples formed in 2002 with the express intention of combining performance-based funk motion with live sample-tricknology, topped off with a jazz-based front-line of improvising horns. Their first sessions and shows featured non-stop - no, not erotic cabaret, that was Soft Cell - spontaneous, ever-mutating compositions. Over the next two years of constant gigging in dives barely visible to the naked eye as well as proper big outdoor festivals and medium-sized dancehalls, Apples songs took shape. These jazz-funktronic stews were peppered with all manner of riffs lifted from whatever tasty (actually dusty) vinyl they could find on Israel's second-hand-record circuit, with aggressive horn blasts, RTA (Rapid Turntable Action - we just made that up. Like it?), a sprinkling of middle-eastern beats and anything from Ray Charles samples to traditional Jewish klezmer melodies chucked into the mix. He said, finishing the food metaphor he started 70 words ago. Today, the band are making a name for themselves with their high-tensile version of Rage Against The Machine's Killing In The Name and the furious energy of their live performances across Europe, not to mention the nurses' uniforms, Star Wars masks and Village People gear they tend to wear onstage, especially during the boisterous annual beano that is Purim, our favourite of all the Jewish festivals." The Guardian

"Across nine albums, Misty's Big Adventure have always been happy to glide across the dancehall floor in a series of styles; be it in a tuxedo to lounge piano or hi-tops to a rock steady beat. Over the years, frontman Grandmaster Gareth has led this Birmingham seven-piece with a dour voice, a quick wit and the heart of a hopeless romantic. Like the album's cover of a kid and mother looking petrified by a costumed entertainer, Misty's are indeed both scary and loving." www.DrownedinSound.com

"The artful dodgers that make up the Chap spend their time advocating a kind of listless dandy lifestyle, mixing rock riffs, beats, and one-liners that bemusedly rap on the state of pop culture. Extremely high-minded and arty, their very name comes from the Gustav Temple-edited British periodical and series of books satirically advocating a return to a "civilized" lifestyle. Here's the catch: von Weiszacker sings like he's never oozed (or anythinged else for that matter) an ounce of emotion in his life. The wonderful side effect of this superbly fake pop-rock is that it is it is also superb pop-rock." Pitchfork

• http://www.facebook.com/maxraptor
• http://www.facebook.com/hildamay

"On their debut mini-album Midlands rockers Max Raptor have put together a set of confident, visceral and vital sounding punk-drenched alternative rock tunes that drip youthful exuberance and showcase huge potential. At their best on 'The King Is Dead', 'Beasts' and 'Patron Saint (Of Nothing)' the fiery riffage, measured aggression and boundless energy offers enough to suggest that, by the time their debut album proper drops, we could well have a UK answer to someone like Billy Talent on our hands. If that's a lot of pressure to heap on a band this young, it's only because we're sure they can handle it. " Rocksound



"Now here's a UK troupe that shows promise in spades. Hildamay's
gruff and powerful delivery is rather reminiscent of mighty Gainesville punk stalwarts Hot Water Music, while there are healthy nods towards Glassjaw and Thrice here too. With promising influences, 'We Loved, We Lost' improves as it progresses, with gravelly vocals sailing over power guitar lines and soaring melodies, providing would-be anthems for a potential wall of fists raised skyward. Despite getting off to a shaky start, it serves as an impressive debut in terms of this Sidcup quintet's future. " Rocksound

"Summer Camp are one of those bands who could go pretty much wherever they wanted to tunes huge enough to polish into coffee table-collapsingly successful parent-pop, but also possessed of a scratchy indie sensibility that could ensure a life measured out by collectable seven-inches. But what route will rock's cutest couple, guitarist Jeremy Warmsley and singer Elizabeth Sankey, take?

Er, who knows they're still unsigned but this debut EP, as well as being a rollicking listen itself, is giving us hope that they'll simply stick to the vision that Jez's impeccable geek-chic spectacles are giving him so far.

These six songs have been birthed in the bedroom of J and E, which has managed to snare their hazy romantic headspace perfectly. The choruses are sweet and enormous the girl group-y 'Ghost Train' verging on the anthemic and opener 'Round The Moon' not far behind while the concept they're wrapped around characters from '80s cult teen films Heathers and Sixteen Candles crop up in 'Veronica Sawyer' and 'Jake Ryan' respectively never feels overbearingly twee.

We've heard mutterings about characters behind the band contriving to turn them into a dinner-dress up-front act, presumably with Jez and the live band in black rollnecks and slacks. And thank God they've refused to go the anonymous backing band route, because, bless her, Liz isn't exactly Marina in the lungs department. This is a good thing here, washed with bedroom production, her croons may be a touch shaky, but it just adds to build a sense of screwy romance lacking in their live show. It's a gust of chillwave-fresh air. Just wonder what these two will roll out of bed and make tomorrow. 8/10" NME

• http://aidanmoffat.co.uk/

Former Arab Strap frontman makes a welcome return with more bitter, funny, filthy and lurid tales of the underside of life.



"Dressed in khaki shorts and loose white shirt, streaks of silver in his beard, Aidan Moffat's feeling his age tonight. "I've got a sair back from touring, years of bending down picking up bottles," grumbles Falkirk's vulgar versifier with the dry wit of a wisecracking club singer.

The Mercury prize panel should look no further for its outsider pick this year than Everything's Getting Older, the former Arab Strap frontman's collaboration with Bill Wells, a skilful jazz multi-instrumentalist who has made his home amid the Scottish indie community, working with the likes of Isobel Campbell and the Pastels. Setting Moffat's half-spoken, half-sung laments to mournful piano and muted trumpet, their songs are a revelation realised here with a tumbledown grace that not even the double-bass player snapping a string can thwart. "One less fee to pay," quips Moffat.

Penned as he approaches 40, the career inebriate's words unfold like short stories reflecting wistfully and humorously on mid-life as a pint glass half-full. Binges, brawls and bonking are familiar subjects for Moffat, but he approaches them with a sharpened tongue set to a sampled lounge-funk groove, Glasgow Jubilee unflinchingly describes an interlinking stream of sad sexual trysts in which Moffat's "lonely solipsist" is cast aside just like every other character. Life's great immutabilities are newer themes. Set after a funeral, the twinkling The Copper Top could draw a tear from a corpse with its bittersweet observation "birth, love and death: the only reasons to get dressed up", while The Greatest Story Ever Told's gentle invitation to not be overwhelmed by our inherent insignificance in the universe is shrewdly uplifting.

If there's a message, it's to embrace life in its totality while you still can: its triumphs, its tragedies, its ribald idiosyncrasies. "This one," says Moffat as he introduces a new song come the encore, "is about dressing up as a vicar and shagging someone at a party."

The Guardian

• http://theminutes.bandcamp.com/

"The background: If you like your pop music primitive and primeval which would, on reflection, make it rock music you'll love the Minutes. A Dublin three-piece, what they do is so unreconstructed and unrefined they make Black Sabbath sound like the White Stripes. No, that doesn't quite work. No, they sound like Black Sabbath doing the White Stripes playing their songs, that is, as opposed to enjoying them physically, a horrible image (Ozzy in a clinch with Jack White? Yuk) that has no place in this column. Friends for years, they formed a few years ago and have been selling records and winning awards back home but have only now begun drawing wider attention, perhaps because there is a gap in the market for this kind of pounding, pummelling noise." The Guardian

• http://www.myspace.com/zeladaband

"Who needs Tiffany's when you can have east London? Lovely summery guitars and the newbie Spaniard's pleasant vocal make you feel you've started the day with smoked salmon and champagne." Metro

• http://www.myspace.com/snuffbandUK
• http://www.myspace.com/vanillapodrock

The term legends gets bandied about a lot, especially in punk circles, where anyone who's lasted more than 5 years can get the title. In Snuff's case this term is well and truly deserved. Punk-pop pioneers and blessed with a gift for the well timed cover, they can win over a wide range of audiences outside punk circles.

• http://www.myspace.com/tylaandthedogsdamour

Despite their association with many glam metal bands in the 1980s, Dogs D'Amour's arrangements and composition saw them rise above their peers, leaning more towards Roots Rock and Blues. The band went on hiatus in 2002, but lead singer Tyla has kept the Dogs alive, working as a soloist writing and releasing new material. He'll be playing solo for a special intimate show.

"Say hello to Allo Darlin': a welcome reminder that any aversion to cutesy music in recent years may have been due not to the aesthetic, but the quality. The London-based foursome are firmly in the tradition of classic indie pop: Australian-born, ukulele-strumming singer Elizabeth Morris also plays in Tender Trap, the current band of Amelia Fletcher, an icon since her years in Talulah Gosh, Heavenly, and Marine Research, while bassist Bill Botting has backed former Hefner frontman Darren Hayman. The 10 songs on Allo Darlin's self-titled debut album, out in the UK on Fortuna Pop!, don't rewrite the formula for wistful bedsit charm as much as show that it can still be carried out masterfully.

Rather than the cloying infantilism of some twee bands, Allo Darlin' focuses its tunefulness on the simple pleasures and modest melancholies of young adulthood." Pitchfork

• http://www.rorymcleod.com

Rory Mcleod - ex-circus clown and fire eater. A one man soulband, poet and storyteller, singing his own unique upbeat dance stories. A modern travelling troubadour using tap shoes, acappella, harmonica, guitar, trombone, spoons, finger cymbals, bandorea, djembe and various percussion instruments!

Rory has travelled the globe for different reasons at different times, from Asia to the middle East from Gambia to Cuba, Central America, Australia, North America, Canada, Europe and other nooks and crannies of the earth.

"You don't listen to McLeod you travel with him"
City Hub, Sydney (Australia)

"I've travelled to look for work, to mend a broken heart, to be with someone I longed for. I'd travel to visit friends and on the way I'd make new ones, I'd roam because I was curious to see what was around the next corner, sometimes I travelled to follow the warmer weather and migrate... like the birds and the big whales and fishes do".
Rory

• http://christt.com/

"Soapbox preachers such as Frank Turner and Jon McClure might seem to be saturating the protest song market, but Chris T-T has something extra to offer. When he's not championing the cause of social justice in familiar fashion, he's exploring relationship dynamics with warmth and intelligence (see: 'Love Is Not Rescue', 'Tall Woman'). Still, it's when Chris goes back to his ranty roots that he's most inspiring. 'Elephant In The Room' is a case in point, with its stirring rallying cry: I remembered the previous centuries before the word freedom replaced just being free/A sleight of hand to steal our democracy/We can still win. Fighting talk, just when we need it." NME

• http://www.boblog111.com/

"Should you never have had the joy of seeing Bob Log III play, let me attempt to describe it for you: picture a man in a shiny blue jumpsuit and a pilot's helmet wired to a telephone receiver, playing slide guitar with all the dirty, scuzzy joy in his heart. Add to that a kick drum and foot cymbal, the myth of a monkey paw in place of a right hand, and a setlist that includes songs named Boob Scotch, Bubble Strut and My Shit Is Perfect, and you'll begin to get the gist. It is loud and strange and electrifying, and how ecstatic it all sounds, that guitar glazed with a kind of sublime and honey-dipped happiness." The Guardian

• http://www.gallondrunk.com

GALLON DRUNK, formed by James Johnston, Michael Delanian, and Joe Byfield, first erupted onto the London gig circuit in 1990 and wasted little time becoming one of the capital's most essential live propositions,with a succession of startling and abrasive singles, including the classic SOME FOOL'S MESS, all reaching the top of the independent charts.

Throughout their entire career, every single GALLON DRUNK have released has achieved Single Of The Week in either the NME or MELODY MAKER. A trio of unique and pioneering albums, YOU, THE NIGHT...AND THE MUSIC (1992), TONITE, THE SINGLES BAR(1992) and the Mercury Prize-nominated FROM THE HEART OF TOWN (1993) followed, cementing GALLON DRUNK'S burgeoning reputation as one of Britain's truly uncompromising bands.

In spring 1994, JOHNSTON was approached by NICK CAVE to play guitar for the BAD SEEDS during their Lollapalooza tour. Johnston's continuing links with Cave have saw him contribute to several songs and eventually join NICK CAVE THE BAD SEEDS in 2003.

1995 ended with the release of the TRAITOR'S GATE EP on their own GALLON DRUNK RECORDS. GALLON DRUNK commenced recording a fourth album for their new label CITY SLANG. Without tempering their incendiary approach towards creating music which first forged their reputation as a unique and daring band, IN THE LONG STILL NIGHT (1997) was their most accessible and fully realised album. Figuring highly in many music press end-of-year polls, IN THE LONG STILL NIGHT led Q's David Roberts to suggest that "the band's collision of funk, punk and skewiff jazz emerge as the perfect soundtrack for the committing of terrible crimes of passion" GALLON DRUNK'S latest album"FIRE MUSIC" was released in 2003, and 2005 saw the release of the brilliant collection "Bear Me Away", a double cd set. The band are currently recording a new LP to be released in Autumn 2011.

The current lineup is James Johnston, Terry Edwards, and Ian White.

• http://www.martinsimpson.com

There is no doubt that after 35 years as a professional musician Martin is, right now, better than ever. Widely acknowledged as one of the finest acoustic and slide guitar players in the world, his interpretations of traditional songs are masterpieces of storytelling. His solo shows are intense, eclectic, spellbinding and deeply moving.

There is no-one who has more successfully combined the diverse elements of British, Afro-American and old-timey music than Simpson. His 15 years living in the US were well spent. In addition his own songwriting has produced some real gems, from the truck-stop epic, Love Never Dies to the profoundly moving Never Any Good and "One Day".

His career includes collaborations on stage and record with Richard Thompson, June Tabor, Kelly Joe Phelps, Jackson Browne, Danny Thompson, Danú, Martin Carthy, Cara Dillon, David Lindley, Roy Bailey, Martin Taylor, David Hidalgo, Steve Miller, Dick Gaughan and many more.

Robin Williamson is a pioneering and defining force in music worldwide, Robin has played just about everywhere. Founder of the hugely influential Incredible String Band in the 1960's and The Merry Band in the 1970's. In the 1980's he was at the forefront of the storytelling revival and the first to restore Celtic harp to its ancient role as spontaneous accompaniment to spoken word as well as song.

Robin and Bina Williamson This incredible duo makes a unique Indo Celtic sound, performing a variety of original, traditional, mystical and spiritual folk music from many roots. Their acoustic concerts of song story and music feature the East West harmonies of Robin and Bina's voices with harp, bowed psaltery and many other instruments.

'Pure beauty through simplicity' Robert Plant

• http://www.facebook.com/pages/Wish-You-Were-Here-festival-Cambridge/114366681941816
• http://twitter.com/#!/wywhcambridge

Wish You Were Here is a multi-venue festival that so far has featured the likes of Pulled Apart By Horses, Tellison, Alessi's Ark, Johnny Foreigner, Thomas Tantrum, Big Deal, John Vanderslice and local heroes likc Pete Um and Lonely The Brave.

One wristband, all those bands and one ticket price. Win.

• http://www.roddywoomble.com/

"The adjustment to pipe'n'slippers family life and a settled existence away from the city's ripped backside can be a damaging one for a successful recording artist. No longer burning with the need to prove yourself or put the world to rights, no longer unhinged by a chaotic rock'n'roll lifestyle nor surrounded by ne'er-do-wells full of wild ideas, you find the music you produce has its edges smoothed off and a good part of its charm neutralised.

But family man syndrome seems to have served Roddy Woomble rather well. Sure, this second solo collection is mellow, folky and acoustic all the way, showing how far he's come from the urchinous indie-rock his band Idlewild started out playing. But the songs he's written with new acolyte Sorren Maclean and Idlewild bandmate Rod Jones are more assured than ever.

A New Day Has Begun sets the upbeat, softly celebratory theme. It's an arms-outstretched sniff of freedom's sweet air, underpinned by an insistent bass motif and tastefully decorated with mandolin and accordion. The sense of bucolic inner peace is probably no accident this record was recorded after he and his family moved from Glasgow to the Isle of Mull in 2008. These are understated songs which don't immediately promise to be lodged in your head for the next six months, but after a few listens the melodies have bedded in nicely and you find yourself playing it on repeat.

Other notable highlights include Work Like You Can, lit up by Jill O'Sullivan's beautiful swooping backing vocal, which sometimes sounds like an unidentifiable folk instrument in its own right. Elsewhere, Tangled Wire is string-tickling acoustic folk with soul-swelling harmonies, then Leaving Without Gold throws up a windswept whiff of Fleetwood Mac's seductive MOR. He even gets away with including a sax break as fat as Van Morrison on the boogie-ish Roll Along. And penultimate offering Gather the Day is another jaunty folk-pop tune full of joie de vivre, reinforcing the infectious feeling of a man thoroughly enjoying life and the music he's making." BBC Music

Kris Drever arrives as a solo artist with an impeccable folk pedigree and his first album 'Blackwater' is a significant addition to the current phase of the never ending folk revival.

Unlike others, some also scions of folk families, Kris has not burst upon the scene but has developed his talents through a process which ensures a solid foundation for a long career. His journey has taken him from Orkney where, the son of Ivan Drever of Wolfstone fame, he first began to play and sing, to the folk clubs of Edinburgh where he plied his trade as a teenager, to touring and recording with many of the brightest and best of the new folk generation.

Now it's his turn to take centre stage and he does it with a voice full of resonance and character and a judicious selection of old and new songs that, once heard, won't leave you alone.