Category: Music

  • Top music from August 2022

    Top music from August 2022

    I’ve been a Last.fm user since about 2004 and each month they generate a listening report for you to see an overview of what you’ve been listening to.

    As an excuse to have more content for my blog, I’m going to share a few highlights each month from the listening report – so I get a bit more reflection of what I’ve been listening to, and you get some listening recommendations.


    Panic! At The Disco

    Emo-pop outfit Panic! At The Disco topped the artist charts. With the release of their new album Viva Las Vengeance – which was also my most-listened to album of the month too.

    Definitely not a favourite Panic! album for me. A grower? Well, time will tell. But when an artist I like puts out a new release, I like to keep an open mind and give it a listen.

    Listen to Viva Las Vengeance

    Apple Music · Spotify · More options on Songlink

    Album artwork for Panic! At The Disco - Viva Las Vengeance

    The Mountain Goats

    Indie-folk The Mountain Goats released a new album titled Bleed Out and I gave it a listen-or-two, placing it second in the album chart for August.

    The Mountain Goats style doesn’t really change too much from one album to the next, but John Darnielle writes some lovely songs and has a trademark voice, meaning almost any album by The Mountain Goats scratches an itch.

    Listen to Bleed Out

    Apple Music · Bandcamp · Spotify · More options

    The album artwork for Bleed Out by The Mountain Goats. It pictures a murder scene, illustrated, with several bleeding bodies covered with sheets.

    Dry Cleaning

    My most-listened to track for the month was Scratchcard Lanyard and comes from London-based post-punk band Dry Cleaning.

    It’s one of the bands that I discovered through a playlist I compiled inspired by Manchester’s leading independent record store; Top Albums of 2021.

    A good song on a good album. Songs from this album keep creeping into my top tracks and curated playlists, so they’re clearly one of the bands I keep coming back to.

    Listen to New Long Leg

    Apple Music · Bandcamp · Spotify · More options

    The album artwork for New Long Leg by Dry Cleaning.

    And that’s the big-three from the month.

    As an aside and important footnote to this post, my ex-colleague Bruce Lawson released an album which topped my New Artists chart. This is available on Bandcamp for just £2 and other streaming services to stream for free.

    For more music-related posts, curated playlists and recommendations, check out the Music category on my blog.

  • Top 100 albums of 2021

    Top 100 albums of 2021

    We are mid-way through 2022 and I came into the office, opened Apple Music and started playing a playlist; 🎙️ Piccadilly Records: Top 100 Albums of 2021

    And that’s when I realised that I usually post these yearly compilations to my blog – but had forgotten to do this one. So here we are — better late than never!

    Come the end of 2021, 99 of Piccadilly Records’ carefully selected 100 albums were available on Apple Music and I’ve compiled one track from each release to the 6hr 43m long playlist.

    Add it to your library, play it on shuffle, and when you find a track you like be sure to check out the full album on Piccadilly Records’ website. This independent record store has been delivering music to Manchester since 1978 and the rest of the world since it made it possible to order from the website.

    Previously:

    🎙️ Piccadilly Records: Top 100 Albums of 2019
    🎙️ Piccadilly Records: Top 100 Albums of 2020

  • Charlie Goes Skiing

    Charlie Goes Skiing

    One of my favourite bands, Cassels, have released this super music video for their single ‘Charlie Goes Skiing‘.

    It’s a track from their upcoming album A Gut Feeling which is due for release some time in 2022. Soon.

    Anyway, watch the video. Enjoy.

  • A Gut Feeling 🎶

    A Gut Feeling 🎶

    One of my favourite bands, Cassels, have pushed their upcoming release to their Bandcamp page, available as a digital download, on CD and vinyl.

    With a release date of 1st January 2022, it’s a pre-order listing – but you should jump over to Bandcamp and give the available tracks a listen and support the band by hitting that BUY button.

    That’s all.

  • New music playlist

    New music playlist

    For the longest time, I’ve leafed through the digital pages of DIY Magazine — a great site for music news, reviews, etc.

    Whenever they rated an album or EP a score of 4 stars or more, I’ve added a track from that release to an Apple Music playlist; 🎧 DIY ★★★★☆ or more

    Now, that playlist has 478 songs* – which is around 1.2 days of non-stop listening – and makes it the perfect way to discover some new, top quality music, as verified by DIY Mag.

    Hit play, listen on shuffle — enjoy!

    * Apple Music seems to bug out and say there’s only 100 songs in the published version, but I sure see 400+ songs when I’m editing.