Hot off the press for new albums

We review this week's lastest releases in music.

Underworld – Barbara Barbara, We Face a Shining Future: Electronic duo Underworld’s ninth album, their first in six years, sees them mostly slip away from the dance floor in search of more eclectic, atmospheric offerings. There’s still plenty that’s familiar in opener I Exhale with its pounding beats, chanted chorus and Hyde’s laddish non sequiturs. If Rah also pushes the pace with Hyde’s sardonic spoken vocals and a minimalist Casiotone-crunch of music. However, the rest of the album is far more reflective and adventurous. The meditative Santiago Cuatro is led by the liquid plucks of an acoustic guitar, mimicking the sound of raindrops during a tropical storm. It’s mesmeric. While Ova Nova and Nylon Strung roffer a smoother, sexier sound. This is a grown-up, multi-layered and beautifully crafted album. Mark Edwards

Christine and the Queens – Chaleur Humaine: Heloise Letissier conceived the idea of Christine And The Queens as a student in London five years ago. Harnessing the capital’s most celebrated drag acts, she then took her art back across the Channel and become a fully-fledged pop artist. This, her debut record – its title translates as Human Warmth – is repackaged from its Francophone original for an Anglophone audience tackling gender identity, cultural inclusion and chequered romance. It’s a glimmering, glitchy, scene-setter of an album, stacked with electro-pop excellence. Thematically audacious and uninhibited, France might have embraced Chaleur Humaine, but it was inspired by the sights and sounds of London. This is Britpop with a Tricolore twist, and quite marvellous. John Skilbeck

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Explosions in the Sky – The Wilderness: Explosions In The Sky are an instrumental band from Texas who are probably best known on these shores for providing the atmospheric music that permeates the Netflix sleeper-hit, Friday Night Lights. Though not as anthemic as some of their earlier albums, The Wilderness is a dark, melancholy record with plenty of little guitar riffs to get you humming along. If you like your songs with lyrics, this is not for you, but in opening tracks Wilderness and The Ecstatics there are plenty of catchy hooks that will keep you playing them again. I’ve found it’s particularly good to work along to, and, if you shut your eyes, you can almost imagine you’re in the wide plains of Texas, wearing a sheepskin-collared jacket and sipping a beer sitting in the back of your tow truck... Sam Priddy

Woodpigeon –Trouble: Woodpigeon is, in effect, a one-man band fronted by Canadian Mark Hamilton. Hailing from Calgary, Hamilton’s fledgling musical career actually first blossomed in Edinburgh before he flew home to record Woodpigeon’s debut album, Songbook, a decade ago. Four further albums have followed. Woodpigeon’s music certainly bears comparison with the likes of Bon Iver and Sufjan Stevens, that is, quirky and understated yet at the same time curiously compelling. Trouble was recorded in Vancouver and Toronto with the sparse songs marking this out as Hamilton’s best record so far. Notable highlights include the lovely meandering Fence and closing track, Rooftops. Esoteric it most certainly is, yet undeniably charming too. Kim Mayo

Schumann – Violin Concerto/First Symphony/Phantasy:Though technically demanding for the soloist, Schumann’s Violin Concerto offers little in the way of audience pleasing virtuosity. Yet place it in the hands of Thomas Zehetmair, and its mix of lyric beauty and zestful brilliance becomes irresistable, his silvery tone delighting in the mercurial finale. Having spent twelve years as Principal Conductor of the Royal Northern Sinfonia, he here takes up the baton to direct the Orchestre de chambre de Paris in a wonderfully fresh reading of Schumann’s ‘Spring’ Symphony, his sensitivity to inner detail and clarity of texture unveiling so many subtle nuances. As an ‘encore’ he returns to the violin in a very pleasing and lighthearted Phantasy. The downside is a slightly boxy sound quality (ECM New Series 481 1369). David Denton

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