the last dinner party
From The Pyre via Island Records
Reviewed by Anya Weston-Shaw
Album released 17th Oct 25
The Last Dinner Party return with From The Pyre, a record that burns brighter and darker than their debut. From the storming opener Agnus Dei, the band immediately reclaim their flair for the theatrical, lush, urgent, and steeped in myth.
There’s a strong thread of wicca and pagan imagery woven throughout, with an earthy and rather raw emotional landscape being carved, giving the album a sense of ritual and mysticism. It’s a natural progression from the baroque opulence of Prelude to Ecstasy, but here the drama feels more grounded, more earth and fire, than velvet and lace which feels like a progression from their debut.
The band’s charismatic vocals shine across the record, carrying an almost choral resonance at times. Tracks like Second Best show off intricate song structures and layered harmonies that nod to both classical influences and modern pop ambition.
Elsewhere, The Last Dinner Party lean into their glam rock instincts, particularly on This Is The Killer Speaking. With its dramatic piano intro and incredibly catchy hook, it feels both cinematic and slyly tongue-in-cheek, a nod to their flair for storytelling and self-aware performance.
From The Pyre captures a band unafraid to evolve. It’s confident, charismatic, and occasionally chaotic a record that proves their fire wasn’t a spark of debut hype, but something much more enduring.
electric litany
Desires via Flying Hearts
Reviewed by Levi Tubman
Album released 17th Oct 25
Electric Litany are a London based alternative synth pop group who describe their latest album as Emerging at a time when the line between truth and illusion is increasingly blurred and “if reality is a construct, does it even matter what’s real?” that’s putting a lot of weight and expectation on an album, let’s see if it holds up.
Opening up the album, Falcon’s intro brings a Japanese feel to it, with what sounds like, an unfortunately short lived, synth bass Koto. When the drums and vocals come in, they’re slow and distant, opting for a clean sounding process and less recording a drum kit down the other end of the hall, giving it such an ethereal sound you feel you might float away just from listening to it.
In case you needed bringing back down to earth, this is followed up with Opia, which might have been better titled dystopia. From the start its angular and angrier, with synths sounding more like alarms and thumping kick drums, with a darker bleak vocal tone. It’s a post-apocalyptic soundscape punctuated with bright piano chords that feel like bursts of hope.
After the juxtaposition of the opening tracks the album settles down to what might be called more traditional songs, or traditional for Electric Litany anyway. Reciprocate and Diamonds are pulled straight from 1980, perfectly capturing the energy and sound of new wave. They really help move the album along and help give it direction.
The themes of ethereal dream pop and Dark Wave are wound all throughout the album, with parts sounding like they’re played down a well with sparse and light vocals backed against angry synths where saw tooth is king. Luckily, it’s held together and doesn’t lose its identity by having sounds so at odds with each other.
The latter half of the record unfortunately seems have sections that drift a little and lack focus, where you don’t quite get the ending, you're expecting remaining a little flat, although this is a band that doesn’t conform to the standard pop rock norms and could quite easily be put down to personal taste.
This is brought back in touch though with the last track Bless, its sporadic cymbals build to bring in the rest of the drum kit, with building synths, they gradual layering of sounds it reads like a story, with the anticipation building to the culmination of delayed strings just slightly echoing off into nothingness.
This album is definitely a slow burn, you can see the time and creativity that’s gone into it, but you need the right setting and time to listen to it, if you're someone who listens to the first 10 seconds of a track and if it doesn’t grab you, skips to the next, you're going to miss a lot.
It’s interesting and creative, I just wish, for my personal taste, there was more structure in some of the songs.
Track Listing:
1. Falcon
2. Opia
3. Reciprocate
4. Diamonds
5. Prism
6. Itor
7. For Another
8. Crumpets
9. Junkie
10. Bless
coldrain
Optimize (EP) - via Century Media Records
Reviewed by Levi Tubman
EP released 24th Oct
The Japanese post-hardcore/metalcore quintet Coldrain, with seven studio albums already to their name, don’t seem to be showing any signs of slowing down with this five-track EP. Known for their intense, hard-hitting sound, they’ve also gained recognition for releasing music in English broadening their reach to a global audience.
The EP opens with its title track, Optimize. True to the genre, the driving opening guitar riff, is quickly joined by frenetic drumming and layered harsh vocals that deliver raw, gritty aggression grounded by deep growls This brings our first taste of the clean vocals and Masato’s range. Higher pitched clean vocals are not new, but these are reaching heights a lot of other metalcore bands can’t helping set them apart from the crowd. Crisp and punchy, it’s a fantastic start to the EP full of energy and hooks it draws you in.
Despite its short runtime, the EP delivers plenty of variety across its tracks. Chasing Shadows leans heavily into electronic elements and processing, giving it an industrial edge with vocals that take on an almost mechanical quality. Next comes a lighter, more melodic track, though it still carries its share of growls and shouts, bringing a refreshing contrast and proving the band refuses to be boxed in. The EP’s catchiest song flips the usual formula, featuring predominantly clean vocals punctuated by heavier bursts. Paired with hooky riffs, it’s the kind of track that lodges itself in your head long after it ends.
Rounding off the EP, Free Fall leans into a more traditional and heavier metalcore sound. It’s powerful without descending into noise, maintaining both clarity and creativity while delivering full-force energy. The track highlights some of the EP’s strongest vocal work, blending layered growls with choral style backing for added depth. It’s a bold, satisfying closer, exactly how a record should end.
In a genre that’s getting all too flooded and tired, this truly stands out. Its creative and varied, with catchy sections from the very start. With solid production really filling every frequency. The guitars are clear and crisp, the bass providing a rumbling foundation, with thick solid drums, snare slightly high and proud, with every word clear and present.
This is a solid 10/10 for me and they’re on tour in the UK soon, get the EP and get down to see them!
Tracklist:
1. Optimize
2. Chasing Shadows
3. DIigitoll
4. Incomplete
5. Free Fall
witch fever
Feavereaten
Reviewed by Neil Milner
Album released 31st Oct 25
Witch Fever’s second album Fevereaten arrives as an obvious attempt to widen the abrasive template they sketched on 2022’s Congregation. The Manchester four-piece, Amy Walpole (vocals), Alex Thompson, Alisha Yarwood and Annabelle Joyce, have traded some of their ragged immediacy for studio polish and a taste for drama, and the result is a record that frequently wants to be larger than its material.
Produced with a firm hand by Chris W. Ryan, Fevereaten is meticulously mapped: click-locked rhythms, bass-led song skeletons and a clear appetite for texture. The band add new timbres, notably an electric cello drenched in pedals, and push drums and guitar toward a heavier, more theatrical register. At its best the album generates a nervy, cinematic gloom; the swelling of “The Garden” and the slow-bloom of “Amber” show an ear for atmosphere and arrangement.
Thematic focus is one of the album’s strengths. Walpole reframes religious trauma through gothic tropes, hagstones, poltergeists and the sensation of being watched, and the record’s foregrounding of personal perspective gives the songs an honest, reclamatory logic. There is purpose behind the fury.
Where Fevereaten falls short is its central human instrument: the voice. Walpole’s delivery is intense and confessional, but too often it inhabits a single mode of perpetual escalation. Performances that might have benefitted from restraint instead tip into shouty catharsis, leaving little room for melody, nuance or dynamic shading. Lines that aim for terrifying intimacy repeatedly circle back on themselves, which turns urgency into self-absorption rather than revelation. It’s probably my age, but I quickly tired of it. Several tracks feel top-heavy with intent but undernourished by tunefulness, which makes sustained listening more of a test of stamina than an invitation.
The album also struggles with consistency. Promising openings, guitar figures that flirt with shimmery like textures or moments that recall the early sweep of The Joy Formidable, too often fail to develop, dissolving into forgettable chaos, illustrated by opening track ‘Dead to me’. ‘Safe’ briefly suggests a brighter, more controlled path before ending with relief rather than resolution. The title track offers the most sustained respite, but even it relies on volume and passion where a clearer melodic through line would have helped.
There are notable musical ideas here, inventive production touches, occasional intricate guitar work and bold textural choices, yet they are repeatedly undermined by a vocal approach that refuses to sit. For listeners seeking melodic development, subtlety and restraint, Fevereaten will feel like an exercise in amplification over form. Fans who prize feral energy and gothic theatricality will find material to admire, but the record rarely translates ambition into grace.
Fevereaten is earnest and occasionally brilliant, but its flaws are persistent and structural. The band have broadened their palette and taken risks; they simply haven’t found the balance between spectacle and craft on this record.
Track listing:
01. Dead To Me!
02. Final Girl
03. The Garden
04. Northstar
05. Drank The Sap
06. Safe
07. Fevereaten
08. Burn To Hit
09. See Ya Next Tuesday
10. Reprise
11. Amber
12. I See It
The boojums
The Boojums - via Having Fun records
Reviewed by Chris Morley
Album released 31st Oct 25
There's definitely something to be said for simplicity, & if it's possible, the Boojums manage to sound like Nick Cave fronting the Ramones- buzzsaw riffing meets the Bad Seeds, if you will.
It's intense, its immediate & its genuinely refreshing, twelve songs in what feels like as many minutes minus any mucking about, a genuine antidote to much of the overproduced artifice masquerading as music now.
This feels genuinely alive, sermons from the garage floor succinct enough to remind us there's living to do after a listen, Wings Of Fire, Stick Together & Meet Me In The Middle particularly affirming if you're looking for something to lift the spirits in tough times- guitar, bass & drums enough to make a righteous racket.
Hopefully coming to a pit near you soon enough- whether that's “pul” or “mosh”.........
luvcats
Vicious Delicious - via AWAL
Reviewed by Andi Bridges
Album released 31st Oct 25
Luvcat has recently been tipped as one to watch by several high-profile magazines and media. And certainly over 35 million streams suggests that the wider public tend to agree. And on the strength of this album I can see why.
The album opens with – Lipstick, one of seven songs from this 15-song set already released into the wild. It’s based around a slow seductive groove, drums and bass locked in nice and tight whilst a simple piano motif dances across the rhythm. The opening lyrical couplet, “All dolled up in stats, no nice place to go, because no fucker asked me to the rodeo”, pretty much sets the tone for the collection of songs. This is a new next generation of girl power making it presence felt in the game of romance. Luvcat knows what she wants and isn’t afraid to say so. During the chorus, when she sings “Come kiss off all my lipstick” the brass section reinforces the yearning.
Matador, the track that was the first to drop and kick started this whole process for Lurcat just over a year ago. Her voice has just the right tone for words such as “You know I tried my best to turn your black eyes hazel and kiss away your cruelty. I’m glad we got undressed and put all our cards on the table and by cards, I mean me, apple in mouth when you left town”. There is a darkly poetic wit in the lyrics. It’s the same noir glamour that The Last Dinner Party utilised to great effect on their debut album.
Dinner @ Brasserie Zedel has a 1930s Berlin Cabaret feel, due to the presence of some bierkeller oompah brass patterns and a plucked guitar. It also has the dirtiest trumpet solo ever committed to tape. The staccato intro to album title track - Vicious Delicious gives no clue to where it’s going to end up. “You’re so cruel and you’re so vicious but oh my goodness you’re so delicious”. This is sophisticated dance pop; Sabrina Carpenter will probably sound like this when she grows up.
One of the quieter moments on the album is – Spider, which utilises a string section to fine effect. The intro nods towards an old music box which fits in with the lyrical theme. The song builds to a crescendo at the three-minute mark before falling away to just voice and strings only to build once again to an even bigger finale. Laurie evokes thoughts of Yorkshire due to its colliery brass band sounding pulse.
Current single – Blushing, is the most up-tempo song on the album although the honour for the most riotous track belongs to set closer – Bad Books, with goes all out swing with a sublime piano solo. “I am an alley cat, skulking in the black”.
And as Luvcat says“Making this album happened accidentally. Amongst the madness of the last year, I decided I didn’t wanna fuck around with EPs or mixtapes. I really wanted to make my first proper statement and when I found out Halloween fell on a Friday, I knew we had to be fast to get it together. Its lipsticks a little smudged and its stockings are a little torn, but I am so proud of how we’ve captured this strange, magical story and all the lovers and libertines I’ve met along the way. I think the record is old school romance slightly off its hinges. A swinging pendulum between love and addiction, ecstasy and melancholy, eroticism and innocence, the deliciously vicious and the viciously delicious.”
