Author: Jan Kobal


  • Preview: Sziget Festival, Budapest

    Sziget is quite possibly one of the most attractive festival getaways Europe has to offer, and this year’s Island festival in Danube promises to be nothing short of spectacular. Not only does Sziget play host to a myriad of fantastic musical acts, it has a plethora of cultural bedazzlements to occupy your time with. So […]

  • Todd Terje – Strandbar

    With the summer having officially arrived (at least where I am currently) it seems quite fitting that the Norwegian retro futuristic dance wunderkind Todd Terje has released an absolutely stellar single to complement any and all of our sun soaked endeavours. The genesis of this track is part in jest to the fact that allegedly a […]

  • Daft Punk – Random Access Memories

    Jan Kobal reviews Daft Punk’s much-anticipated number 1 album.

  • Vampire Weekend – Modern Vampires of the City

    Have the quartet crafted another Baroque pop masterpiece?

  • My Bloody Valentine – mbv

    I came into reviewing this album at what one might consider either an advantage or disadvantage. This ambiguous vantage lies in the fact that I was not present on this earth when the predecessor to this LP came out. This LP isn’t just a follow up to an album that was released 22 years ago, […]

  • Local Natives – Hummingbird

    With a denser and more polished sound, do the LA quartet expand their sonic palette laterally or horizontally?

  • Gary Numan: Down In The Guildhall

    Gary Numan is a rare alumnus of the 80’s new wave era. Not only did he inadvertently invent it, he showed everyone how to not do it approximately 6 years later. Famously stating once that upon arriving at a studio to record a punk record, he glanced at a Moog monophonic synthesizer and decidedly thought: […]

  • Terraneo: Cute As A Button And A Beach To Boot

    This summer the Dalmatian region of Croatia was graced with quite possibly the cutest festival I’ve ever attended. Cute in the sense that you never felt threatened and for me that’s a sign of a festival succeeding. In order for good vibes one has to feel comfortable in their surroundings and the folks over at […]

  • Dirty Projectors – Swing Lo Magellan

    Dirty Projectors are an outfit that have a reputation for experimentation and polarization but will whatever direction they’ve chosen this year be worth your while? Dirty Projectors never were my cup of tea/coffee (to all you fellow tea abhorrers, alas in England we might be a small group), not because I despise experimentation but because […]

  • Twin Shadow – Confess

    George Lewis Jr. (AKA Twin Shadow) is most certainly very confident. That being said does this trait allow for the enigmatic front man/multi-instrumentalist/producer/badass to dazzle and entertain us for a full 40 minutes once again? If there’s one thing 2010’s Forget did is entertain. I always felt as if a sumptuous hook was waiting for […]

  • Cloud Nothings – Attack on Memory

    Like music? Good. Like listening to music that makes you feel like a badass? You’ve come to the right album review. You might be able to tell I’m sort of excited about this album; two rigorously raw pre-release tracks in the form of ‘Stay Useless’ and ‘No Future/No Past’, and the knowledge that the whole album […]

  • The Shins – Port of Morrow

    Well, they’re back; or, more specifically, he’s back. It’s been five years since The Shins came out with anything new, and a staggering nine years since the release of the magnificent Chutes Too Narrow. So, has the frontman of this outstanding pop-rock outfit come up with anything fresh this time around? In case you don’t know, James Mercer – […]

  • Grimes – Visions

    Dazzling synths, confusing hooks, Canada, 20-foot houseboats called the “Velvet Glove Cast in Iron” floating down the Mississippi in lieu of just reading the book? Count me in! Claire Boucher is most definitely one quirky character; one just has to listen to a few of her cuts from her latest LP Visions to quickly come […]

  • The Rapture – Sail Away

    Does house still work in the context of art rock on In the Grace of Your Love?