I’m not sure if any of this can be described as “rock”, but these are 7 of the guitar generated / centric sounds that stood out for me this year.
Andy Bell’s fantastic fourth album for Sonic Cathedral, Pinball Wanderer, was a marvellous mix of kosmische and motorik, Manuel Gottsching and Michael Rother, The Cocteaus, shoegaze and Screamdelica. For the more open minded dance floor there were baggy beat moments like Musique Concrete and Apple Green UFO. There was a really cool cover of The Passions’ 80s pop hit, I’m In Love With A German Film Star, which also received some stellar remixes.
I started 2024 with the idea that I would slow down on the new reviews, write bigger articles and start with something that joined the dots between the Beach Boys’ Feel Flows and Seefeel. That never happened. Similarly as 2025 began my first purchase was Cindy Lee’s Diamond Jubilee. Six sides of very special vinyl that, while it’s been a constant, default listen, in the end I never put pen to paper about.
Cindy Lee’s 32 tracks shape a self-contained world, whose auteur is clearly totally schooled in mid-20th Century pop. A sublime selection of tender, tortured, tremolo’d, thoroughly romantic torch songs, of love and loss, sung surrounded by Sun Studios echo, it’s `50s R&B jive remembered. Ghostly and haunted.
The Lo-Fi, intimate production, warm with reverb – you can picture an orange, vintage, valve amp glow – harks after the Shangri-Las’ otherworldly harmonies and the fragile genius / weirdness of The Wilson Brothers. Rocking ’n’ rolling to Marc Bolan’s fuzzboxed boogie, and steeped in `60s Northern soul tearjerkers. Taking in black & white kids TV themes and little twists of Southern “Night Of The Hunter” gothic, it’s the sort of funky outsider thing that you might expect Light In The Attic to discover, dust off and reissue, to crop up on a Numero Group collection, or be plundered, perhaps, for a Tarantino soundtrack.
The OG of Deeply Armed’s The Healing is a kosmische folk epic. Slow strung out psyche rock, that’s, given the title, appropriately, less a song, and more a mantra. A diverse range of remixes took the track from deep, machined meditation (Keith Tenniswood), to hypnotic, banging techno (Richard Fearless). Stopping off for some old fashioned glam guitar boogie (Brendan Lynch & Andrew Innes) along the way.
I happened to bump into bass player Kenny Whaley in Carcassonne’s magic castle and had one of my more coherent conversations of this year’s Convenanza Festival. There was a big, friendly Belfast contingent present.
Initially active in the late `80s, Loop, this year, reissued their collected 12” singles. Going, flashing, back and listening to the triple album, in retrospect, the influence I hear most is The Stooges. The band’s short, sharp debut, 16 Dreams, vamps on No Fun, while its flip side, Head On, is begging to be someone’s dog. The longer tracks, such as Burning World, featuring plenty of pedals, wah-wah and backwards bits, tap into We Will Fall’s stoned “O-Mind”. Iggy’s horny, teen angst, however, is swapped for transcendence and inner space exploration.
Other overt references include The MC5, The 13th Floor Elevators’ Easter Everywhere, and the early Velvet Underground. The experimental, trance-y, trippy, stuff from when John Cale was still around. The drums are Mo Tucker via Bobby Gillespie and The Jesus & Mary Chain. There’s a mad, manic cover of Bristol post-punk provocateurs The Pop Group’s Thief Of Fire, and the space-rock raga of I’ll Take You There can’t help but pull in comparisons to contemporaries Spacemen 3.
The set as a whole has a strong sense of psychedelic ceremony. A potent mix of speed and LSD driven, strobe and lava lamp lit soundtracks for freak-outs, and Warhol’s Exploding Plastic Inevitable whip cracking go-go dancers. All the while Ron Ashton Raw Power riffing.
Created in Croydon, back in the day, inebriated local lads, Bobby & Davey, soaked up Spinning’s hymn to heroic intoxication. A big thank you to White Rabbit Books’ Lee Brackstone for the heads up.
Loveliescrushing / Bloweyelashwish
Originally released on cassette in 1992 by Michigan duo Scott Cortez and Melissa Arpin-Duimstra, Numero Group pressed this singular shoegaze-adjacent treasure onto double vinyl. Loveliescrushing’s Bloweyelashwish clearly takes its cues from My Bloody Valentine and the Cocteau Twins, but is far, far more abrasive than most of the music inspired by those 2.* As if heard from a distance, through dense fog. The prettiness masked by a pea-souper.
For the first 9 or 10 ten tracks – out of 20 odd – melody is all but destroyed by distortion. The vocals are ethereal. Treated guitar creating layers like burning, crackling flame, surrounding the siren. Sung by an angel, but one situated at the heart of a raging inferno.
The set’s something you need to submit to, one long dream pop trip, rather than dip in and out of. Having surrendered, the beauty does appear, and once the hooks break through they remain, are sustained. sugared glows’ filtered and phased strumming, for example. Supplying moments of surreal, psychedelic R.E.M. lucidity.
Many of the tracks are short, textures and tones, the album building toward longer standouts, such as the shearing sheet noise of Feathermouth, the roaring, cathartic Spidervelvet, and the muted, symphonic, swooning, romantic lips to kiss.
Beatless, bass-less, one minute it’s twisted, tortured metal, 6-string arcs, the next it’s choral kosmische, and wonky, children’s music box chimes. The calmer bits, though, wouldn’t be nearly so wonderful without the contrasting chaos. It’s the record’s wilfulness, its refusal to comply, pander, that’s a big part of what makes it shine.
*Except, perhaps, for Japanese aural auteur Xlinisupreme.
Other cracking MBV / Cocteaus-influenced creations, this year, came from Naemi and Slowvves, and the reissued LSD & The Search For God.
Project Gemini & Wendy Martinez / Time Stands Still
I don’t know how much love this mini-LP picked up generally, but it was a biggie for me. Project Gemini and Wendy Martinez joining forces for a funky blend of Francophile folk and psyche rock that paid authentic homage to the cult 60s and 70s recordings of Jane Brikin, Brigette Fontaine, Serge Gainsbourg, Valerie Lagrange and Jean Claude Vannier.
Thought Leadership / III Of Pentacles
Straight outta Edgeley, Stockport, this is divine Durutti Column-esque business from Thought Leadership. Guitar generated genius that slots perfectly into Be With Records’ catalogue, alongside sublime 6-string sides by Steve Hiett and Tommy Guerrero. A selection of shorter sketches, complimented by longer works – as glacial as Robin Guthrie – that stretch out into some Dave Gilmour, Shine On You Crazy Diamond soloing. The ever erudite Adam Turner provided an evocative, in-depth review, where he elegantly wove the tracks around Manchester’s geography and musical history. Split between a sunnier A-side and a more sombre B, when Adam likened the epic VIII to A Certain Ratio’s Winter Hill, he convinced me to take a second listen, and then cough up my cash.
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