The title of this song says it all: “We’re Going to Make It in a Man’s World.” It’s from the first new album by Scottish band Camera Obscura for more than ten years.

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It’s one of life’s great musical pleasures that at the age of 70 Kim Gordon is still making loud abrasive music that’s every bit as antisocial as she was back in downtown NYC in 1981.

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Those who know me will probably guess I’m not a big Eurovision fan. I can’t remember the last time I watched it – but this is our 2024 entry by Olly Alexander.

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Here is hopefully a final winter warmer, with cuts ranging from the return of Underworld and vintage Aphex Twin to deep cuts by Michael Jackson and Modern English, tributes to lost members of Can and MC5 and some dub reggae to warm the cockles of the ear. 

Five years ago one of my colleagues at Louder Than War told anyone who was willing to listen that The Courettes would become their new favourite band if they would only listen to them.

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This is such a joyful earworm, exuberantly performed by an all-female African supergroup of six vocalists celebrating self-love and acceptance. Female warriordom has never sounded so fierce, or danceable, or catchy.

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I’m not a big fan of nostalgia but I do have a natural inclination towards the melancholy, and even the maudlin, and this ticks both those boxes.

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I’m a sucker for most things to do with Louisiana – crawfish and alligators, bayous and paddleboats, zydeco and cajun music, gumbo and jambalaya, Dr John and Fats Domino, voodoo and Mardi Gras. So I’m loving this song by Waxahatchee.

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Here’s a winter warmer of new and not-so-new tunes spanning a century of popular music. As ever there’s country and folk, blues and soul and plenty of rock’n’roll, from the debuts of Hendrix and Grace Slick to some minimal techno and brand new Afro-rap but, unusually for me, no reggae.

This tune is fan-fucking-tastic. It took me about ten seconds to realise it’s Underworld, and a few more to realise it wasn’t a new remix of Born Slippy – arguably the greatest dance tune of all time.

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