Swayzak
Some Other Country
K7 (60m)
. . .

SWAYZAK don't know what to do. Stay with their techy dub house roots and get lost in time, or mature and replicate modern sounds they are well capable of capturing. What starts off as a deep and dark techno record quickly becomes fashionably minimal. The London pair have dropped their dub influence but the guilt becomes too much, leading them to indulge in throwback vocals that distract from a largely quality offering. At times it's confusing but there's so much emotion here that, after digesting the conflicts of interest, it portrays a strong link between deep and minimal.

Download: 'Quiet Life', 'Distress and Calling'

Una Mullally

June
Make It Blur
Victory Records (46m 20s)
. .

DAMN Fall Out Boy. Just when we thought Green Day and Blink 182 had stopped inspiring American bands to sing in a preposterous way, FOB come along and encourage others to sing like they have indigestion. And so come June, which is a pretty wussy name for a group of guys who claim to have cut their teeth on Chicago's punk scene. Then again, one man's punk is another's MTV cookie-cutter pop.

Exhibit A, on the sleeve notes: "June enjoys. . . C&C. . . Levis. . . Mountain Dew." The most un-punk statement of our time. The usual collection of poser-punk-emo draining the soul from American rock music.

UM

Newton Faulkner
Hand Built by Robots
Ugly Truth
. . . .

GINGER dreadhead Newton Faulkner is like the unfeasible lovechild of Jack Johnson and Jeb Loy Nichols on this album, with a strain of acoustic funk-folk powered by his distinctive, percussive, guitar style.

Mingling deft, rhythmic fingerpicking with stabs, taps and pats of strings and soundbox, it's a deceptively muscular sound. It's hard not to be won over by his charm and modesty, though his attempts at social commentary are less well-served by his naivety. He's better suited, so far, to lighthearted songs and the bread-and-butter of emotions, ambitions and desires.

Download: 'To The Light', 'Dream Catch Me'

Andy Gill

Amy Macdonald
This is the Life Vertigo
. . . .

AS a gifted young Scots singersongwriter with more than a touch of the troubadour about her, Amy Macdonald will inevitably be referred to as 'this year's KT Tunstall', though such comparisons fall far short of this 19-year-old's prodigious talent. Feisty and articulate, her first singles 'Poison Prince' and 'Mr Rock & Roll' offer infectious choruses swept along on jaunty arrangements best characterised as posh skiffle. Blessed with a clear, powerful voice and a confidence way beyond her years, there's no limit to what she might achieve.

Download: 'Mr Rock & Roll', 'This is the Life', 'Let's Start a Band', 'A Wish for Something More' AG

Jazz
Honor Heffernan
The Other Side
Own label
. . . .

SOBRIQUETS like 'the first lady of Irish jazz' can be a bit of a millstone for a singer like Heffernan. There are certainly few to touch her as a jazz vocalist . . . but her proclivities range further. Here, she explores her roots in blues and folk with a thoughtful set of tunes (JJ Cale, Joni Mitchell, etc) produced by guitarist Dick Farrelly with a firstrate band. There is all the craft and depth you would expect from the singer, as well as a feel for this more rootsy material that suggests Heffernan could be the first lady of anything she fancies.

Cormac Larkin

Classical
Vladimir Ashkenazy
A Personal Collection
Decca Classics
. . . . .

ANeight-CD collection such as this will not come cheap but it will be hard to resist nonetheless. In conjunction with the release of the Diabelli variations (reviewed here last week) to celebrate Ashkenazy's 70th birthday, this is a "performer's choice" collection . . . Ashkenazy's favourite works, as recorded by himself, whether he be at the piano or on the podium with the various orchestras included here. In place of a bizarre lack of notes, the final CD in the collection is an interview by Christopher Nupen with the great man himself, in which we can discover the reasons as to how the collection was compiled.

Karen Dervan