Battle For Prague - We Could Be Anywhere
- Melodic indie-pop goodness from part-London/part-Birmingham based fourtet. Opener Hundred Feet Below is a pacy, uplifting number that successfully manages to raise neck hairs, whilst pulling on emotional tendons with Greg Milner's cracked vocals, like a timid Caleb Followill. I See A Ghost is a slow-build song that earns them inevitable comparisons to the likes of Arcade Fire, it shares a strident marching percussion and defiantly wailed calls of 'This old house.' When it erupts it does so gloriously, guitars rage over a doppler of strings; it's a successfully spine-tingling track that manages to capture the optimistic, defiant energy

OK - Under the Weather But Over the Moon
- Coined by Andrew Harrison the term ‘landfill indie' lazily summarizes a lot of bands, and they keep coming, crawling out from the tip with a copy of Up the Bracket stuck under their arm and the rotten smell of Brut and Stella emanating from their filthy chequered rags. OK fall under the landfill umbrella, well 80% of this album does. There are two songs that are quite catchy and deserve a little attention, but we shall get to them later. Firstly let's sharpen the knives and get stuck in to the rest of this bloated carcass of an album. A great deal of this album is powered by a sub-Libertines jangle; if you hated The View then you will absolutely despise O

Desolation Wilderness - New Universe
- Music usually fits moods; in the case of Desolation Wilderness their optimistic shoegaze seems to fit weather. As I listen to New Universe on a bleak, cloudy November morning I am able to take myself far away into the hazy Californian sun. Understandably this band of daydreamers from Olympia, Washington wanted to make music that could take them to warmer climbs. For this is pure escapism. Signed to Calvin Johnson's K Records Desolation Wilderness are now at the stage of their career where they can be identified as having a particular sound. Everything is hazy, noncommittal and strangely engrossing. Of course when you are creating soundscapes, whether it is

We Fell To Earth - Deaf
- We Fell To Earth move on from their fairly well received self-titled debut album with “Deaf”, an entirely new song that didn't feature on the long-player. The single differs wildly in style from the album too, perhaps indicating a firm break from the past for the duo. Whereas the album was largely based around brooding trip-hop, seeming to follow in the path of UNKLE (band member/producer Richard File was part of the “Psyence Fiction” outfit from 1999-2008), this new single shows a complete departure from downbeat electronica, with a radical shift of style. Wendy Rae Fowler's dramatic, ghostly wailings are backed with sweeping, delicate Si

Passion Pit - Little Secrets
- “Little Secrets” is the most overtly ‘pop' and fun release yet by US electro-geek outfit, Passion Pit. Beginning with a synth-driven fuzz that sounds like something from a Sega Mega Drive game, and featuring a children's choir in a rousing “higher and higher” chorus, the song is a catchy, danceable slice of pure electro pop. Though not as exciting a release as the former single “Sleepyhead” - the bizarre yet charming sample-heavy song, also lifted from debut album “Manners” - “Little Secrets” nevertheless warrants the continued attention the band has been getting of late, following a successful summer of festivals. Bound to become