She & Him - Volume 3

Yes! It's finally time for She & Him's third album, Volume 3, to hit the stands, and it couldn't come soon enough for us here.

Actually, Volume 3 was released last week, but we've only just had chance to review it. But as ever, it was worth waiting for.

Virals - Wax-Work

Picking up the pace slightly from our previous post, Wax-Work is another free download, this time from Virals, AKA Shaun Hencher.

As you can see from the SoundCloud waveform below, it's a noisy affair, with plenty of guitar and cymbals, so get ready to adjust your treble if you're not a fan of the hi-hat.



Hencher just got back from appearances in the US, and is scheduled for Field Day in Victoria Park, London this weekend, with a pre-party appearance at The Shacklewell Arms on Friday.

As far as we can tell, Wax-Work has been made available pretty much for the hell of it - there's no immediate album release coming up, although once Field Day is out of the way, Hencher's planning to start working on a full-length release, which we'll bring you more details about as we receive them.

Red Velvet Band - I'm Fine

As you may have noticed over the past couple of years, we're pretty big Katie Waissel fans at Popsiculture, and like many Waissel Warriors, we're hanging on every snatched glimpse of what to expect from Red Velvet Band, when they finally get around to releasing an album.

I'm Fine probably isn't typical of what to expect - a heartfelt ballad written and recorded by Katie herself, it's a moving demo recording* free from gimmicks, and free to download via the Red Velvet Band SoundCloud page.



There's a sense of real emotion - and of real pain - underpinning I'm Fine, which anyone who's followed Katie's life in recent months won't find surprising.

Her voice, though, is as distinctive as ever, and her natural delivery of her own heart-rending vocals comes almost as a whisper, a shared secret, a burden not unburdened, but perhaps at least eased through music.

I've always adored Katie's ballads, and allowing for the fact that this is, after all, a one-woman demo track, I think it stands up there with her best efforts from the past.

Truth be told, some fans are likely to be happy with any song that carries Katie's voice - and although I count myself among them, I feel truly blessed for that to be the case.

As always, more from Red Velvet as it becomes available.

*UPDATE: Katie uploaded an updated version of the track for download via the SoundCloud page after we published this review, which brings the track up to studio quality and offers a much richer sound in general.

Small Black - Limits of Desire

New this week, Limits of Desire is the new album from Small Black, and it's not easy to find the words to describe it, but I'll try.

If, like me, you're a fan of expansive soundscapes of music, of soaring synth, haunting vocals and pulse-like beats, Limits of Desire will transport your mind to a place it's likely never been to before.

Even if you're not so hooked on electronic instruments and 'big sound', there's enough here to drown out the world around you, if only for a while.

Who are Small Black?

Small Black have a distinctly northern European sound, but actually come from Brooklyn. You may have heard them several times over the years, with a self-titled EP released in 2009, studio album New Chain released in 2010, and their free mixtape download Moon Killer made available in 2011.

Little Mix ft. Missy Elliott - How Ya Doin'?

Good god this is bad. I can't imagine why Missy Elliott would put her name to this, unless she's secretly Jesy's mum or something.

I'm not gonna lie - I don't like Little Mix. I don't like the way they were forced on to an impressionable young voting audience on The X Factor.

I don't like that Jesy is continually treated as if she's the only one that matters, like some kind of propaganda bundle who exists purely to disguise any flaws in the group's musical capabilities by making it all about 'girl power' (this is not 1995, and Little Mix are definitely not The Spice Girls).

And I really don't like the ADHD-style video for How Ya Doin'?, which seems to work on the assumption that as long as everything keeps moving, and fast, nobody will notice that the song is terrible.

Really, it is - take a look:


I'm appalled. Then again, I've been appalled by everything else I've ever heard Little Mix produce, so there's little surprise there.

Thanks go to Sarah Linney for pointing out that How Ya Doin'? is actually a cover version of Curiosity Killed the Cat's 1989 hit Name and Number, which reached number 14 in the UK.


If curiosity really did kill the cat, then it must be turning in its grave at this abomination of a cover version.

I stand by my initial reply to Sarah on Twitter, that How Ya Doin'? is an "abysmal clatterbash of unnecessary noise", while Little Mix are "about as 'street' as an aqueduct".

Mixers, if you really feel the need to defend your idols on this one, comments are open below - anything unnecessarily abusive will be removed, but I'm definitely open to debate.

Torture yourself, if you must, by buying How Ya Doin'? on iTunes:

Or click the button below to educate yourself and check out some more Curiosity Killed the Cat:

Diana Vickers - Cinderella

Diana Vickers is BACK with Cinderella, a typically infectious and upbeat summer dancefloor track that shares all the hallmarks of her recent efforts.

OK, it's no My Wicked Heart - in fact, it has quite a lot in common with Music to Make Boys Cry - but it's still pretty good, and we can already imagine Vickers bopping around on stage while singing it.


The 'lyric video' above is just a preview, so expect a full video featuring Vickers herself before the single is officially released on July 21st (the current expected release date, according to iTunes).

Until then, this is the first time the full-length audio of the song has been published, and the video should help you learn the words if you're keen to sing along.

As always, we'll be keeping an eye out for more from Diana, who's rumoured to be working on her next album.

We're not sure whether Cinderella will be on it, or if it's just a single release to tide fans over until the album is ready, but either way it's good to see a Popsiculture favourite back in action.

Click the button below to preorder Cinderella now on iTunes.

She & Him - I Could've Been Your Girl

If you're eagerly awaiting next month's release date for She & Him's Volume 3, you're not alone - we can't wait either.

Thankfully, we're now into the realm of preview tracks, and I Could've Been Your Girl is the latest to make it on to the web for your irregular dose of Deschanel and Ward.

For a change, I'm not going to patronise the pair as being little more than a hobby of Deschanel's; too often, She & Him write-ups are dominated by talk of her TV and film career, and overlook just how good their music together really is.


I have a particular reason to love She & Him, and it's this: they sound like Christmas. Upbeat, bordering on cheesy, but without feeling the need to apologise for it.

They're a glimpse at the festive season at any time of year, without having it hammered home 24/7. In fact, that might make them better than Christmas.

I Could've Been Your Girl is no different, with plenty of similarity to She & Him's Christmas album, A Very She & Him Christmas. But again, it doesn't matter if little has changed in the general style of their 'sound' - we love She & Him just as they are.

For those of you who feel the same, I Could've Been Your Girl is a tantalising taste of what to expect in a few weeks' time, and we'll bring you more previews as and when they drop into our inbox.


Buy I Could've Been Your Girl on .

Volume 3 is due for release on May 6th; preorder it now on iTunes.

Fall Out Boy - Save Rock and Roll

Fall Out Boy have described Save Rock and Roll - an album they say was "recorded in secret from the music industry, critics, and even our fans" - as "the first record in a new chapter of Fall Out Boy".

"An artist's first record sound the way it does because it is often made without expectations," they explain on their official website.

"This is not our first record, but ... we made this music for ourselves and no-one else, at the end of the day."

You can draw your own conclusions about the outcome below, as the full album has been made available to preview via SoundCloud; it's an energetic composition with plenty of positives, even if Fall Out Boy are not normally one of your favourites.



Album opener The Phoenix has actually been available on SoundCloud for a couple of weeks, but at the time of writing, most of the other tracks from Save Rock and Roll had only been uploaded for 13 hours.

The title of this album is actually very apt - it's not soft rock, by any means, but the tracks are complex and carefully layered, with a wealth of vocals, instrumentals and effects combining to deliver an epic soundscape that is truly unique to each song.

As is so often the case - particularly with music at this kind of pace - the individual track lengths are not as long as you might first think, with most hovering around the radio-friendly four-minute mark.

However, there's enough going on at any instant to make those four minutes deliver easily as much of an audio experience as you might get with an entire mainstream pop album, making Save Rock and Roll well worth the cover price.

If this is what happens when Fall Out Boy go into hiding, let's hope we don't hear them mentioned again for another 18 months or so.

Rating: 86%

Pre-order on iTunes via the button below.

Retro Stefson - Retro Stefson

Retro Stefson's self-titled debut album hit the stands in the UK on March 25th, and it's well worth a listen, if only so you can name an Icelandic music act besides Bjork.

It's pretty funky stuff, probably best suited to have on in the background at your trendy cocktail party or, if you're cool, at your house party.

There's a decent chance of hearing it on a dancefloor too, although again it's more of a city centre sound than a cheesy suburban late-bar.

Decide for yourself with a preview of Glow below, which gives a pretty good indication of what you can expect from the album as a whole.

Dear Reader - Down Under, Mining

If you're a fan of beautiful things, the new video from Dear Reader should be just your thing. Down Under, Mining has been given a gorgeous shadow-puppet video to tell its story, which is every bit as evocative as the song itself.

The video also gives a glimpse ahead to Rivonia, the new album due out on April 8th and the third to come from Dear Reader, also known as Cheri MacNeil.


South African-born MacNeil was educated just round the corner from where, on July 11th 1963, 19 members of the African National Congress were arrested - and her third album pays tribute to that period of her life.

The arrests were largely a matter of chance - police had been told of meetings between black and white individuals at a location named Ivon; in fact, the meetings were happening at Rivonia, but several letters of its sign had faded.

MacNeil says: "That sign, with its faded lettering, makes me think about history as a whole, and how the versions we have must all have bits that have weathered away and gone missing, and how we'll never know the whole truth about anything.

"There are so many different realities overlaid on top of one another, but each of us only has the version we know."

If you're not afraid to incorporate issues like apartheid and slavery into your music collection, you can pre-order Rivonia by clicking the button below, and download it from April.