Best Albums Of 2022

While there maybe some glaring omissions from the Postcards From The Underground end of year list, it serves more as a reflection to the albums that stuck with us on the show throughout the year with many of the acts featured below cropping up on multiple PFTU playlists across 2022.

Yumi And The Weather the Brighton-based project helmed by singer, songwriter, guitarist, producer & multi-instrumentalist Ruby Taylor 2nd album ‘It’s All In My Head’ treads post-punk, grunge, electro & shoegaze delving into the full spectrum of human emotions.

Commenting on the album Taylor explains: ”It’s All In My Head” is about conflicting thoughts, the battle between what is reality vs my own theories and perspectives. I was sectioned numerous times for psychosis since 2013, and I wrote this one time after coming out of hospital. I experienced many delusional thoughts due to sleep deprivation”.

Available via Bandcamp only Charlie Clark’s debut solo album Late Night Drinking recorded and produced by Jason Shaw and mastered by Mark Gardener from RIDE, the duo offer their expertise on an album studded with effervescent alternative-rock songs, shoegaze-tinted sonics, and vividly relatable lyricism.

“Once music becomes your job, you can lose the purity of music fandom. I spent the last two years trying to reconnect with that”. Explains Jacklin “I didn’’t play much, I just listened. Especially to a lot of big pop music like Celine Dion, Robyn and Luther Vandross – music that wasn’t so heavy, big feelings, big production. You lose sight of what putting on a big, beautiful song can do.”

Formed late 2014 in Chester university digs, Peaness write hook-saturated, fuzzy, harmony-driven indie-pop songs about love, friendship, and mid-twenties frustrations which in abundance on debut album World Full Of Worry.

Vocalist, songwriter, musician and producer Chan Marshall AKA Cat Power third album of cover versions produced entirely by Marshall features fully reimagined songs by Frank Ocean, Bob Seger, Lana Del Rey, Jackson Browne, Iggy Pop, The Pogues, Nick Cave and The Replacements and more, plus an updated rendition of her own song “Hate” from The Greatest (2006), retitled “Unhate” for this album.   

Kaleidoscope the second album from Rachael Dadd is a rich tapestry of upbeat folk-pop.

"The image of the sky appears many times on the album, representing boundless freedom from the mundanity and struggles of being human", says Rachael. "Music, too, provides escapism and freedom, and I like that while both music and the sky can be boundless, they are also containers to preserve all the very best things. Here on ‘Kaleidoscope’ they are vessels for truth and love." 

Recorded live in an old mill and featuring musicians who played on recordings on the Postcard label and in groups from that era - Aztec Camera, The Blue Nile, Bourgie Bourgie, Jazzateers, Love & Money, Paul Quinn & The Independent Group, among others. The album is a mix of original material and some covers (Orange Juice, Captain Beefheart, Gene Clark, The Velvet Underground). 

Edinburgh leftfield pop duo Slim Wrist (FKA Super Inuit comprised of Fern Morris and Brian Pokora) debut album Closer For Comforting merges assertive beats and organic tones which combine pop sensibilities with an understated poignancy

Brian comments: “We’ve developed quite a direct approach to writing and with Closer for Comforting we’ve really tried to hone that, stripping back on the sprawl of some of our earlier music.  All the songs have a purpose and the album feels quite concise, whilst still having room to breathe.”  

While Fern continues: “It’s a bit of a calm after the storm reflection, both musically and lyrically. If you're in the middle of a situation you’re not always able to lift your head and see things in perspective.  We wanted to have a sense of that and have that sense of space whilst maintaining that direct, poppy feel.”

Improvisation and experimentation are at the fore for latest album Living Isn’t Easy from Belfast’s Robocobra Quartet with all of the vocals on the album recorded in one sitting to give a sense of the same perspective and tone from the narrator across the album, featuring members with no musical training alongside members with music conservatoire pedigree. The result is a collective of musicians inspired by Stravinsky and Black Flag in equal measures.

Golden Mountain, Here I Come features the same razor-sharp songwriting, melodic intertwining guitars and close harmonies as the bands previous 2 albums. Re-emerging as a five-piece with Craig Angus (vocals, guitar), Andrew Macpherson (guitar), Beth Chalmers (keys), Jamie Dubber (bass) and Lewis Orr (drums), “It could be our first record as a band,” says Angus. “In many ways it is, to the extent that we toyed with changing the name of the band. But you forget it's a f*cking pain naming a band in the first place, so we stuck with it.”

With Angus continuing “It was the first record we made with Beth on keys, so there were five people actively having a say about musical direction, whereas in the past the songs were 80 to 90% fully formed before they got to rehearsal rooms. We reworked a lot of the songs beyond recognition this time. I had to let go of a lot of the expectations I had, and it’s a stronger body of work as a consequence, more adventurous.”

“It’s about love. Different kinds of love” explains Bryde going on to expand “So many love songs glorify the idea of throwing yourself at someone, the drama and pain of love, I wanted to explore healthier ways to think about love and start a conversation about it.”

Debut album, the future is here but it feels kinda like the past, from Eora/Sydney-based musician, visual artist and designer Annie Hamilton

“It’s about the passing of time,” explains Hamilton, “how sometimes it flies by and sometimes it drags on forever and we’re always looking ahead wanting something more or wallowing in nostalgia, stuck in a past that probably wasn’t as good at the time as we remember it… the sense that the grass is always greener. The sense that there is never enough time to do everything that we want to do, or the feeling that we should have done more with the time that has already passed.”  

I’ll Put You Where The Trombone Slides is the debut album from Norfolk born, Edinburgh based alt-folk/pop artist Hailey Beavis. Seven years in the making, the album is a celebration of resilience, determination and evidence of an artist who has overcome many obstacles to reach where they are today. 

The album’s title was inspired by a question that Beavis has found herself asking in more recent years. Where do you put the unresolved? Where do you put the memories of the people, the love and the pain? “I want to throw a rope around every feeling, every moment and haul it around with me just as much as I want to set it all on fire and be free”, she says. “Making an album seems like the perfect compromise. A place to put it all. I like the idea of all of this abstract emotion perpetually suspended in the act of the trombone being played. It’s quite a surreal thought, yet it’s comforting to me.”

“My first record, I made it without knowing I was making it,” explains Tomberlin. “I was writing songs to process stuff from my personal life as it was happening, and then suddenly everything was happening really fast. Record label, tour, press, all this momentum and a lot of advice about my career, which, you know, I never even expected to have. So I think when I started to write the second record, I felt a lot of pressure to make it sound collected and profound, almost like a book—chapters, a narrative, everything nicely wrapped up.”

Mat Davidson, Collaborator on Dragon New Warm Mountain I Believe In You comments: “The album is like Big Thief dreaming. chronologically it is their fifth album, but currently I like to think of it as one that has been growing and fermenting throughout the band's lifespan. a record from the subconscious. there is a dream-logic to it. in contrast to the past records, the environment is changing throughout every song, sometimes abruptly or even violently, akin to a sudden impossible shift of perspective, of time or place while dreaming, which is perfectly acceptable to the dreamer”.

“My partner came up with the [album’s] working title, 'Space,' almost as a joke as he knows I don’t like thinking about the vastness of the universe, just because it makes me so aware of the little time we have on Earth,” explains Boman. “But when I looked in my notebooks later, I realized how often the word space appeared, from the space in your mind, and the space in your body, to the space between people.”

“I wanted to be one of those women who are all sorted and put together some day but at 40, I kept getting messier and things just kept going wrong,” Orton explains. “This record explores all of that. I’m talking about my experiences possibly in a more personal way then I ever have but the important part will be how this music makes other people feel. It’s not a finished masterpiece, it is a collaboration with time, of someone struggling to make sense. And in that struggle, something beautiful got made.”

Indie-pop duo Poster Paints comprised of Carla J. Easton & Simon Liddell

“The project started as an accident before the pandemic kicked off” says Carla, “Si had sent me an instrumental for a piece he had scored for a short film and asked if I could put some vocals on it. I completely misunderstood what he was asking me to do and wrote an entire song to the piece of music and emailed it back to him. When harsh lockdowns kicked in, we both decided we would try and do some more songs like this - it was a way to keep collaborating when you couldn't even go for a walk outside with someone from another household never mind be in a rehearsal room with someone.”

Recorded over two weeks in November 2021 with Dan Carey at the helm, ‘Tired of Liberty’. Keen to uphold the manipulated elasticity of a recorded event, the majority of the eleven tracks that make up the record (with the exception of ‘Generation Game’, which saw its beginnings as part of the Speedy Wunderground 7” series, and was subsequently re-recorded), were written either just before, or throughout the duration of those fortnight session.

Combining spoken word, song and found sound, Mima Merrow’s debut album Almost Home is a unique blend of alternative folk characterised by longing, sudden changes in direction, and melodies that ache. Fascinated by the relationship between our environments and bodies, her thoughtful lyricism is held together by intimacy, honesty, and stories that challenge her listeners guided by the production of Igne Thomson. 

Georgia Gothic, the third full-length album from Mattiel, was shaped in the quiet seclusion of a woodland cabin in the north of the Atlanta duo’s mother-state; “Some faraway place that just Jonah and I could go where there would be no distractions, nothing else going on, and we could turn everything off and only focus on writing songs”, reflects Brown. Where 2017’s self-titled debut and its 2019 follow-up Satis Factory were written with what Swilley refers to as a “hands-off” approach — he arranging the music and Brown the lyrics and vocals, the two working largely separately — the making of Georgia Gothic was, for the first time, a truly collaborative undertaking. “This was the first time we made a point to just be together and work out ideas in the same room. That was the initial intention ... it was about learning what each other wanted to accomplish on a sonic level, and then just trying different things out” Swilley continues. “Everything happened backwards. Normally, you’d have friends that make a band ... with us, we started making music from the jump, and then became homies.”

Born in Glastonbury to a Brazilian father and a Greek mother, Naima Bock spent her early childhood in Brazil before eventually returning to England and various homes in South-East London. London-based artist debut album Giant Palm is infused with the Brazilian music of her youth and regular family visits. She found inspiration in “the percussion, the melodies, chords - and particularly the poetic juxtaposition of tragedy and beauty held within the lyrics”.
 

A sonic exploration of Alternative Dance and Nu-Disco, Confidence Man’s 2nd album Tilt is the sound of the band redefining their limits and making sure everyone has a good time while doing so.

“Wanting to push the boundaries of what Con Man could sound like” as Sugar puts it, “To take it to another dimension.”

Recipients of the Welsh Music Prize 2022 for 2nd album Bato Mato, Adwaith

“It was a life changing trip that really inspired us to write this album,” explains bassist Gwenllian Anthony. “The barren landscape and brutalist architecture really seeped into these songs and the use of world instruments was heavily inspired by this journey". “Our journey through the Siberian and Mongolian wilderness influenced the writing and sound of the album to be as open and big as the limitless sky around us there,” says vocalist Hollie Singer.

‘Campsite’ the second solo album from Anna Erhard, embraces a completely different way of working; once again produced by ex-Wir Sind Helden drummer Pola Roy, Campsite is filled with adventurous indie-pop grooves and dry humor.

For Warm Chris, Aldous Harding reunited with producer John Parish, continuing a professional
partnership that began in 2017, With all ten tracks recorded at Rockfield Studios and includes
contributions from H. Hawkline, Seb Rochford, Gavin Fitzjohn, John and Hopey Parish and
Jason Williamson (Sleaford Mods).

Mark Peters 2nd solo album Red Sunset Dreams, features vocals from former One Dove singer and songwriter Dot Allison.

‘Sundowning’ is the track that defined the whole project,” explains Mark. “Every element I added cried out to be rootsy and when Dot added her beautiful vocals it was obvious the piece would provide the album with a climactic feeling of resolution.”

“The first album was mostly personal lyrically, this is a blur between personal and a third-person perspective of what was going on. I like the contrast of it being happy, uplifting music and really dark lyrics. It’s not a minimal record, certainly compared to the first one. That’s because there’s been a lot more going on that needed to be said.” explains singer and songwriter Syd Minsky-Sargeant.

“This is a first person plural album,” Furman says. “It's a queer album for the stage of life when you start to understand that you are not a lone wolf, but depend on finding your family, your people, how you work as part of a larger whole. I wanted to make songs for use by threatened communities, and particularly the ones I belong to: trans people and Jews.”

The fifth album from Isle-of-Eigg dwelling electro-acoustic psych-pop wonder Pictish Trail, AKA Johnny Lynch.

A strange, unpredictable, sardonic and yet deeply personal record inspired by all from Fever Ray to The Flaming Lips, Liars, Mercury Rev and Beck, Island Family is Pictish Trail’s contrarian view of arcadia; a search for the euphoric in the bucolic, bound up in sometimes conflicting ideas and feelings around nature and environment, sincerity and artifice, escapism and belonging. It’s an album about how no man can remain an island, however hard he might try.

“Baby U Know marks a consolidation of Bas Jan as a four piece,” says vocalist and multi-instrumentalist Serafina Steer. “It was recorded at Cafe OTO in London over three days and then finished with Capitol K at the Total Refreshment Centre in London in September 2020. Getting the Arts Council Funding and making the album represented a coming together out of the solitudes of 2020, carving out the possibility of a future for the band at a time when Brexit and Everything cast all those things very much into doubt or, at best, made them a very low priority. The time constraints of having to finish the record before one of the band entered third trimester of pregnancy, and with a winter lockdown pending, probably added a rawness to these recordings. It’s kind of a pragmatically hopeful record.”

Album Club are a band of creatives that initially gathered to discuss music in The Laurieston, an iconic Glasgow bar in 2019. The group was started by MJ McCarthy who brought friends together to dissect albums, track by track over drinks. This gathering then morphed into something more, and the band was born over lockdown in 2020. Although not all the members were musicians, an album emerged, something beautiful created in defiance of adversity. It is an album of friendship and community crafted by a group of people brought together by a love of music. 

LA-based, non-binary Korean-American guitarist NoSo (real name Abby Hwong) debut album Stay Proud Of Me, recorded mostly alone during quarantine in their bedroom, studying any non-guitar instruments they weren’t as proficient in along the way. The result is a deeply earnest coming-of-age story, and a nuanced introduction to NoSo’s universe. Their stage name is shorthand for North/South: a nod to their Korean heritage, and the inane origin question ("Which Korea are you from?") that so many Korean Americans inevitably face. Throughout ‘Stay Proud Of Me,’ NoSo indirectly confronts the insecurities and frustrations that can arise from the Asian-American experience, ending up feeling like a balm for the alienated.

I seek out reflection and resolve in my songs”. explains Jesca Hoop “I find out who I am in a sense. For a few minutes, I can exist in nature at my full potential, saying just what I mean, in balance, in awe, in wonder and in full force. As a moral agent, a mode I can’t seem to avoid, my writing is time taken to observe and ask questions. I find humour in our predicament. I find danger in the reckoning. I find faith despite our sorry state and I feel connection when I draw it through my voice. I stand my ground and through the music and point inevitably towards compassion”.

South London based, haiku-loving trio Honeyglaze comprised of vocalist and guitarist Anouska Sokolow, bassist Tim Curtis, and Yuri Shibuichion drums, self titled debut album produced by Dan Carey

Self described as “the opposite of a concept album” Honeyglaze the album is a picturesque documentation of soul-searching, Taking in themes varying from jealousy to inadequacy, codependent companionships to the smell of coffee on clothes. Or as Honeyglaze put it “Hi we are Honeyglaze, and there’s no time to explain”.

Recorded at home in Helensburgh C Duncan worked on the album in his home studio, writing, recording and producing himself along with the albums artwork. “It’s a very inspiring place to work,” he says, “and I wanted to return to recording from home as it gives me time and space to develop songs without any outside pressure. I feel very comfortable working alone.”  

Having split with her long-time husband, her long-time producer, Found Light is about what comes after, questioning her identity as an artist: had that part of her, which seemed intractably intertwined with her partner for so long also ended. Historically, Veirs handled her song’s most fundamental elements — the writing and the singing — but she always left arrangement and production decisions to her partner, Despite having put out a dozen albums, she wondered if she actually had the know-how to make one without him. The answer to that is of course laid out in the enchanting Found Light.

Green Dream in F# packs in 14 tracks
covering favourite The Bug Club topics including space, small town life, love and swearing. Sam and
Tilly’s playing could be virtuosic if they were in any way arrogant, but they’re not, and so well-crafted and at times complex guitar work sits neatly within the sharp song structures that never stick around too long, and backs engaging and, at times, laugh-out-loud funny lyrical storytelling.

“We wanted to surprise people and do something more than just get across how we sound at a gig,” explains PVA drummer Satchell. “It’s quite an anxious record sometimes that is relating to mental health issues and carries within it the anxiety of making an album. It’s been a rocky ride but we always pick ourselves up.” 

"Writing and recording this album was a spiritual experience. I experienced love for my family on a level I didn’t know existed, while slowly putting myself back together and watching the "protector" in me grow much bigger. 'Protector' acknowledges the part of myself that steers me towards a brighter path." Explains Frances.

Featuring Jill O’Sullivan (Sparrow And The Workshop, Three Queen in Mourning) in collaboration with Andy Monaghan (Frightened Rabbit) and drummer Peter Kelly, the band is a unique beast inhabiting its own world, incorporating elements of many genres from folk and lo-fi to post-punk and underground rock.

“I like to feel surprised, I want people listening to it to feel alive and awake. And a lot of music feels a bit stale and gentle. And now you can say, Alexa, I would like some exercise music or I'm in a sad mood play me sad mood music. And I feel like, I just want to shake Alexa and be like, Alexa, fuck off. I just want people to listen to the music and feel a little bit stirred or slightly disturbed by it.

“’It’s quite simply a desire to spend more time in nature and appreciate how amazing it is. I grew up in a concrete jungle, Chicago is so urban. And even Glasgow with all the big tenements, there's not many trees. So in a way, I'm trying to imagine something a little bit different. Like, stop and look at the flowers, stop and reflect.

“It all comes back to effectively talking about motherhood, memory, human nature and grief to some degree. And This Rock, it's slightly this tongue in cheek idea of this kind of music, but also, the rock we live on, quite simply this rock.”

At the end of 2020, the Orielles - vocalist and bassist Esmé Hand-Halford, drummer Sidonie Hand-Halfordand guitarist Henry Carlyle-Wade - regrouped to rehearse in Manchester, the city that the band have made their home across the last five years. When all of the band’s live dates to promote their second album were scrapped due to the pandemic, the group instead spent 2020 creating La Vita Olistica, a high-concept art film directed and written by the Hand-Halford sisters which they toured in cinemas across the following year, something which was the beginning of a series of creative breakthroughs that would result in Tableau.

One such breakthrough came when the Orielles were booked to host a monthly show on Soho Radio. Broadcasts quickly became impromptu research and development sessions for the ideas that would feed into the album.

“Doing that monthly meant we had a reason to meet up and bring two hours of music between us which we’d play, discuss, hold physically and share” says Henry. “We were listening to much more contemporary music than before” adds Esmé.

Stumpwork was made in the aftermath of the death of two very important people to the band; bassist Lewis Maynard’s mother, and guitarist Tom Dowse’s grandfather. Both were instrumental in the band’s development, both in encouragement and, in the case of Maynard’s mother, literally providing the band with a place to rehearse. Shaw’s lyrics explore not only loss and detachment but all the twists and turns, simple joys and minor gripes of human experience too. Ultimately, what emerges from it all is a subtle but assertive optimism, and a lesson in the value of curiosity. Stumpwork is a heady mix that is entirely the band’s own, distinguishing it from anything produced by their contemporaries,

Pi Ja Ma aka Pauline de Tarragon first album showed her to be a true fan of the iconic British bands of the past, for follow up album Seule sous ma frange (Alone under my fringe) she allows herself to wander into unknown territory, she gives her voice to flourishes of electro and disco. With growing confidence and creativity, the singer comes equipped with ethereal melodies and this hint of letting go. Her artistic affinity with producer and co-composer Axel Concato makes everything feel casual and easy, highlighting talent mastered and feeling somewhat comforting, something needed now more than ever.

Art Moore, the new project from Taylor Vick (best known as the songwriter behind Boy Scouts) as well as Ezra Furman collaborators Sam Durkes and Trevor Brooks. “We all met up at the studio, and it was never even like, ‘Let’s be a band’, that was never a thing,” recalls Durkes. “It was more like, ‘Let’s write for movies and art projects’ — let’s think of a movie scene or a photograph or still image and see if we can write some shit around it to see if we can pitch it.”

“Four songs in, I think, after the first recording session, we realized it was going well, and it was pretty efficient,” says Brooks. “Making music with both Sam and Taylor has always been so easy. I record other artists, and it’s pretty rare to be so quickly on the same page with people. We don't have to say much — we kind of get where each other is coming from. It happens way too easily.”

Chloë and the Next 20th Century was written and recorded August through December 2020 and features arrangements by Drew Erickson. The album sees Tillman and producer/multi-instrumentalist Jonathan Wilson resume their long-time collaboration, as well as Dave Cerminara’s return as engineer and mixer. Basic tracks were recorded at Wilson’s Five Star Studios with strings, brass, and woodwinds recorded at United Recordings in a session featuring Dan Higgins and Wayne Bergeron, among others.   

Skinty Fia is an Irish phrase which translates to English as “the damnation of the deer” and the album’s cover art features a deer, plucked from its natural habitat and deposited in the hallway of a home, illuminated by an artificial red glow. The Irish giant deer is an extinct species and the band’s thoughts on Irish identity are central to Skinty Fia. While Dogrel was littered with snapshots of the Dublin characters - like the cabbie in “Boys In The Better Land” - and A Hero’s Death documented the dislocation and disconnection the band felt as they travelled the globe on tour, on Skinty Fia Fontaines D.C. are addressing their Irishness from afar as they recreate new lives for themselves elsewhere. For a band whose hometown courses through their veins - “D.C.” stands for “Dublin City” - the album finds them trying to resolve the need to broaden their horizons with the affection they still feel for the land and people they’ve left behind.

Previously performing under the moniker Dog in the Snow, Ganya’s 2017 album Consume Me (Battle Worldwide) introduced a meticulous and elegant voice, while 2019 album Vanishing Lands (Bella Union) - inspired by the striking imagery in a period of vivid dreams - utilised swirling dream-pop and haunting post-punk to present an eerie, unflinching look at the often nightmarish reality of the present world. polish the machine leans further into Ganya’s interiority, but refuses to succumb to despondency, instead pursuing a platform for community and tentative optimism. Here, the constraints of societal roles are loosened to encourage a different route: a wandering, ever-evolving path. “I’ve always slightly feared the ordinary,” Ganya explains. “It never really represented how I feel and how many people feel.”

This sentiment introduces the album, as Ganya utters “I had a fear of the ordinary” on the glistening electro-pop opener “I will hold that hand for you.” Inspired by sculptor Harriet Hosmer and her piece Clasped Hands of Robert and Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Ganya strives for community in an ever-isolated existence. “What we aspire to is to have human connection,” she explains. “I was drawn to this idea of setting the truth of something before it collapses. Setting this connection in stone.” Through staccato percussion and fluttering electronica, “I will hold that hand for you” pierces through the veil of societal stagnation. Elsewhere, “afterparty” further advocates vulnerability, while brooding horns and a climactic sonic crescendo imitate the overwhelming feelings that often overtake us during those moments of in-between, of unknowing. “I envisioned this actual space of disappointment,” she adds. “But I’m here, still hoping for something better.”

On the propulsive “young girls never die” hammering synths and haunting electronic strums create a canvas for an aggrieved Ganya who delivers a biting declaration towards the patriarchal norms of today: “Young girls never die, we just rot inside.” “The individual girl is often not allowed to grow,” she explains. “Instead there’s this sort of festering.” Later, the album’s title track delves deeper into the idea of lost autonomy, as all-encompassing, repetitive melodies mimic the hands of a puppeteer. The track features a looping bass line, fed through a Roland MC-202, that was created after the bass became stuck. Rather than trying to fix it, Ganya and her co-producer Rob Flynn decided to lean into the mistake. “It’s this idea of not being precious and counteracting the puppetry of what we’re supposed to be doing with our lives” she says. 

This open-minded approach offers much of the foundation for polish the machine. By loosening the grip of perfection, Helen Ganya makes room for the unexpected, where our different selves can be explored. Here, she surrenders to all there is to feel, crafting a window into a world where the universal existential pull is acknowledged but not permitted to overwhelm. polish the machinecreates connection by offering an evocative, electronically-charged deliverance, where we can aim to liberate ourselves from the fear, anger and anxiety that so often isolates us through a kind of cathartic communion.

Tresor (Treasure) is Gwenno Saunders’ third full length solo album and the second almost entirely in Cornish (Kernewek). Written in St. Ives, Cornwall, just prior to the Covid lockdowns of 2020 and completed in Cardiff during the pandemic along with her producer and musical collaborator, Rhys Edwards, Tresor reveals an introspective focus on home and self, a prescient work echoing the isolation and retreat that has been a central, global shared experience over the past two years.  The wider project also includes a companion film, written and directed by Gwenno in collaboration with Anglesey based filmmaker and photographer Clare Marie Bailey. 

‘The Line Is A Curve’ the new album from writer and musician Kae Tempest, the fourth album from the Lewisham based artist and produced by long term collaborator Dan Carey.

Discussing the album Tempest explains “The Line Is A Curve is about letting go. Of shame, anxiety, isolation and falling instead into surrender. Embracing the cyclical nature of time, growth, love. This letting go can hopefully be felt across the record. In the musicality, the instrumentation, the lyricism, the delivery, the cover art. In the way it ends where it begins and begins where it ends.I knew I wanted my face on the sleeve. Throughout the duration of my creative life, I have been hungry for the spotlight and desperately uncomfortable in it. For the last couple of records I wanted to disappear completely from the album covers, the videos, the front-facing aspects of this industry. A lot of that was about my shame but I masked it behind a genuine desire for my work to speak for itself, without me up front, commodifying what felt so rare to me and sacred. I was, at times, annoyed that in order to put the work out, I had to put myself out. But this time around, I understand it differently. I want people to feel welcomed into this record, by me, the person who made it, and I have let go of some of my airier concerns. I feel more grounded in what I’m trying to do, who I am as an artist and as a person and what I have to offer. I feel less shame in my body because I am not hiding from the world anymore. I wanted to show my face and I dreamed of it being Wolfgang Tillmans who took the portrait.”