SPLIT 7" EP RELEASED!

15 August 2025

What a day!

Upset The Rhythm releases UTR174 - a split 7” single between The Smashing Times and Linda Smith. United by DIY panache, Baltimore habitats and a charmed-pop delicacy, both acts showcase two new tracks on this record. Linda Smith conjures up some keyboard-warble anthems, whilst The Smashing Times encourage all to partake of their low-fidelity daytrips. It is a real meeting of minds. Available on all streaming platforms as of… now, and as an impressive black vinyl artefact from all the best shops (and our Bandcamp)

UTR x

LINDA SMITH & THE SMASHING TIMES

16 July 2025

Cor Blimey! On August 15th Upset The Rhythm will release a split 7” EP by Linda Smith and The Smashing Times. Both based in Baltimore and both best buds, this record celebrates that friendship sharing two new tracks by each act; united by DIY spirit, a bedroom-pop sensibility and now a puddle of black vinyl. Today you can witness their tea-based, umbrella-powered advertisement, listen to Linda’s track ‘So Long Ago’ (streaming through the digital ether) and even choose to pre-order the coveted disc yourself from our Bandcamp or UTR webshop.

THIS MATERIAL MOMENT - RELEASED!

27 June 2025

Today… Upset The Rhythm are proud to release Me Lost Me’s astonishing new album ‘This Material Moment’. MOJO recently described it as “a reassuringly complicated fusion of Björk and Richard Dawson with intense mid-’70s Virgin Records vibes”. It’s a miraculous exploration of the fabric of being and artistic motivation set in non-linear vistas of electronic folk idiom.

‘This Material Moment’ was written and woven by Jayne Dent, but performed with a core band of John Pope on electric/double bass, Faye MacCalman on clarinet, and for the first time Ewan Mackenzie (Dextro/Pigs x7) on live drums. The album was recorded by Sam Grant at Blank Studios in Newcastle, who also worked on its immense predecessor ‘RPG.’

You can hear the whole album streaming everywhere now, plus it is also available on CD and as a limited radiant red LP from all the best shops. We have copies available on Bandcamp and our own webshop too.

ANCIENT SUMMER

29 May 2025

'Ancient Summer' by Me Lost Me, is the final single taken from their forthcoming album 'This Material Moment', out June 27th on Upset The Rhythm. “It’s about stepping back to think on our connectedness, the things humans have made, our structures, our civilizations, our innovations, and also our rituals and beliefs, our relationships with one another - all in one overwhelming moment” Me Lost Me.

FOREFOWK, OUT NOW

23 May 2025

Upset The Rhythm are delighted to release Quinie’s superb album ‘Forefowk, Mind Me’ today! The Guardian have kindly made it their folk album of the month, describing it as “alive with ideas, holding the past like a cauldron, broiling bewitchingly”.

There’s also a brilliant interview just gone up on The Skinny too, well worth your time.

‘Forefowk, Mind Me’ is available now digitally and from all the best shops. You can also buy the LP from us directly through Bandcamp and our own webshop too. Limited edition black vinyl, with riso-graph insert + beautiful art-book option.

We have two launch shows coming up for the album too, next Thursday at Mono in Glasgow, and next Friday at St Pancras Old Church in London, see you there!

QUINIE - SALLOW BUCKTHORN

2 May 2025

It’s almost obligatory to release a folk song on May Day, but here we are on May 2nd still bringing in the May! Enjoy Quinie’s evocative new single ‘Sallow Buckthorn’ out now. It’s a mesmeric sea of swirling sound and Scots poetry.

“Ye micht o thought the sallow buckthorn, Ne’er a hairst could hain” ("You might have thought the buckthorn would be so pale, that no harvest could hold it.”)

‘Sallow Buckthorn’ is featured on Quinie’s forthcoming album ‘Forefowk, Mind Me’ out on Upset The Rhythm on May 23rd. Available to pre-order on LP with a risograph lyric print + magical book.

A PAINTING OF THE WIND

29 April 2025

Me Lost Me returns today with the second miraculous single from their forthcoming album ‘This Material Moment’ (out June 27th through Upset The Rhythm).

‘A Painting of the Wind’ is an astonishing song that we’ve loved in Jayne’s set for a while, it grapples with how artists try to express the inexpressible and how art is used as a means of escape and fantasy. The track is streaming everywhere now and is accompanied by this exquisite landscape portal of a video filmed at Raby Castle by Amelia Read.

‘This Material Moment’ can be pre-ordered on Bandcamp and our very own webshop too. We all love to be carried away!

QUINIE - COL MY LOVE

9 April 2025

Today we’re sharing another soaring single from Quinie’s new album ‘Forefowk, Mind Me’ (out May 23rd). ‘Col My Love’ is the very first track on the album, and it’s a powerful song to sing, accompanied by some epic pipes too.

Quinie explains that the words “warn of the dangers of being close to the shoreline. I thought it would be a good fit with this footage of me and Maisie trying to navigate one of the challenges on one of our walks. Perhaps not quite as scary as being jailed on a cliff top, but nevertheless an adventure.”

PERFECT HIT! OUT NOW

4 April 2025

Buffet Lunch’s new album ‘Perfect Hit!’ is out now on Upset The Rhythm. This record positively zings in the sunlight, whilst its pleasingly imperfect pop songs dazzle to the same degree.

‘Perfect Hit!’ was recorded in the West Highlands, in the shadow of the UK’s Biggest Ben, during Leap Year week 2024. The lo-fi amblers built this album from bricks, ideas and plots, melodies and hooks, each stacked upon the other. It’s a proper expedition of curious turns and dizzy dimensions taking in parenthood, face tattoos, conkers and historical consciousness as subject matter.

This meandering masterpiece of observational charm and offbeat fancy is available to listen to digitally now, the stunning yolk-coloured 180g vinyl can be found in all the best shops and our very own website here.

Buffet Lunch will be performing for us in London next Friday (April 11th) for their album launch at The George Tavern, accompanied by Lerryn and Sassyhiya too. Can’t wait to hear these songs played live! Tour dates incoming:

09/04 - Delicious Clam, Sheffield

10/04 - JT Soar, Nottingham

11/04 - The George Tavern, London

12/04 - The Holloway, Norwich

03/05 - Settlement Projects, Edinburgh

24/05 - The Glad Cafe, Glasgow

ME LOST ME - 'THIS MATERIAL MOMENT'

28 March 2025

What a day to announce this breathtaking new album from Me Lost Me! ‘This Material Moment’, the fourth full-length from Newcastle-based artist Jayne Dent, delights in songwriting, creating a beguiling mix of soaring vocals and atmospheric electronics that playfully push the boundaries of genre. Today we’re sharing ‘Compromise!’, a stunning lead single concerned with the notion of ‘performing’ a life, rather than ‘living’ one.

Concerned with physicality, interpretations, and, yes, materiality, ‘This Material Moment’ is an album akin to rummaging through a box of long-forgotten trinkets. With each song, Me Lost Me unearths something and asks us to consider it from every angle.

‘This Material Moment’ will be released on June 27th through Upset The Rhythm, a limited 180g ‘brilliant red’ vinyl version is available to pre-order from all the best shops, and Bandcamp here.

WHITSUN SOUND

19 March 2025

'Whitsun Sound' by Buffet Lunch came out today! Another wizard single from the band's forthcoming album 'Perfect Hit!'. This track is all about hobbies, leisure-time, waiting and repetition.

Huge thanks to the fine people at Raven Sings The Blues for premiering the creeped-out video, made by the talented Joshua Roland.'Perfect Hit!' comes out on April 4th, we’re throwing an album launch in London on April 11th at The George Tavern too.

ACTUAL EARTH MUSIC

7 March 2025

Earth Ball just cracked the planet! ‘Actual Earth Music - Volume 1 & 2’ (out today on Upset The Rhythm) presents two caustic, zoned-out live sets from Canadian noise-rock entropy hunters Earth Ball.

Side A features Earth Ball live at The Fox Cabaret in Vancouver, supporting Wolf Eyes in 2023. Here Earth Ball whip up a vortex of thrashing wild energy, and the ecstatic release is off the charts. Volume 2 occupies Side B, showcasing a collaborative summit at London’s Café OTO last year. This recording features pivotal UK improv luminary Steve Beresford on piano and free-jazz phenomenon Chris Corsano on drums.

This is ‘Actual Earth Music’, sharing Earth Ball in their element as they conjure sound from the unknowing ether. ‘Actual Earth Music - Volume 1 & 2’ is out now digitally and as a limited 180g black vinyl pressing.

QUINIE - 'FOREFOWK, MIND ME'

4 March 2025

We’re so excited for you to hear Quinie's wondrous new album ‘Forefowk, Mind Me’ (out May 23rd on Upset The Rhythm)! The first song from the album, ‘Macaphee Turn the Cattle’ escaped into the wild this morning, thanks to Klof magazine for premiering the video.

A singer working from the Scots song tradition, Quinie brings an approach that is both reverent and radical—exploring authenticity not as an exercise in preservation, but as something lived, questioned, and continually reshaped.

'Forefowk, Mind Me' can be pre-ordered as a 180g black vinyl LP w/ risograph lyric print. There’s also an option to order the LP with a stunning accompanying art book too!

Also… for those of you in London, we’re hosting a special launch party on May 30th at St Pancras Old Church.

RATTLE RELEASED

28 February 2025

Rattle’s entrancing new album ‘Encircle’ is released today!

With this hypnotic third album, Rattle have emerged from the chrysalis with four mutable songs of drum and vocal patterns. They build-up and disintegrate, existing in two places at once, tracing the circle’s edge. What a stunning achievement!

‘Encircle’ can be streamed on all digital platforms now, it is also available on vinyl (pink, black versions) and CD from all the best shops, as well as our Bandcamp and webshop here.

PERFECT HIT

25 February 2025

Buffet Lunch’s new single ‘Perfect Hit!’ is released today! It’s a snappy anthem of clunky guitar, casio wobble and percussive clatter. Teaming up themes like relationships, limbs and an actual swordfish sighting off the Scottish coastline (yes really), Buffet Lunch pack a wonky punch and are not afraid to modulate through multiple key changes.

The accompanying video was filmed on location in Portobello Town Hall where the band also shot the album cover for ‘Perfect Hit!’ - the album (out April 4th on Upset The Rhythm). Is this the birth of Nu-Music Hall? Glimpsed between long Edwardian red curtains? Quite possibly so! Now let’s learn the dance moves.

GET TECTONIC!

4 February 2025

UTR172 has just erupted! ‘Actual Earth Music - Volume 1 & 2’ presents two caustic, yet alluringly unreal live sets from Canadian noise-rock entropy hunters Earth Ball. Following on from the group’s head-turn of an album ‘It’s Yours’ (Upset The Rhythm, 2024) this new LP captures the band at the peak of their powers, playing live, composing spontaneously.

These two live sets demonstrate how intuitive and inventive the group are when they keep cresting the moment. This is ‘Actual Earth Music’, sharing Earth Ball in their element as they conjure sound from the unknowing ether. ‘Actual Earth Music - Volume 1 & 2’ will be released on Upset The Rhythm on March 7th digitally and as a limited 180g black vinyl pressing.

BUFFET LUNCH'S 'PERFECT HIT!'

29 January 2025

Well, I never! Art-pop amblers Buffet Lunch have embarked on their blue period. Released today, new single ‘Blue Chairs, Blue Floors, Blue Folders’ is the first track to sally forth from their forthcoming album ‘Perfect Hit!’, out on April 4th through Upset The Rhythm.

‘Perfect Hit!' is built from bricks, ideas and plots, melodies and hooks, each stacked upon the other. It is available to pre-order now on 180g yellow vinyl from all the best shops and our very own website here.

RATTLE'S RITUAL!

22 January 2025

Rattle return today with their hypnotic cascade of a new single 'Ritual'! 'Ritual' is a song of summoning, a waltz pulled out of the earth, a swirling mist and a spell spoken into a mirror.

Available now digitally and featuring on the duo's forthcoming album 'Encircle', out Feb 28th on Upset The Rhythm. Pink vinyl, black vinyl and CDs all available to pre-order from UTR and all the best shops.

SIR RICHARD BISHOP is renowned for his mercurial guitar-playing for 26 years with Seattle ethno-delic legends Sun City Girls, but he has wrought a distinguished solo canon as well. He combines soulfulness and advanced technique with a panache that’s nearly unrivalled among today’s guitarists. Bishop strums spiritual with incantatory ragas, free-folk excursions, crystalline flamenco flourishes, ruddy Appalachian folk, Middle Eastern-tinged fantasias and gypsy arabesques. This is eclecticism done with respect and third-eye-dilating filigree; his compositions attain a sepia-toned wistfulness and a psychedelic complexity.

Bishop’s first solo record, Salvador Kali, was released by John Fahey’s esteemed Revenant Records label in 1998. Locust Music issued his second record, Improvika (2004), which consisted of nine extemporaneous pieces for solo acoustic guitar. More recently Tangier Sessions, was released by Drag City in 2015. It consists of a series of improvisations recorded in Tangier, Morocco in 2014 using a 19th century parlour guitar of mysterious origin. Bishop's latest album, Oneiric Formulary, was released by Drag City in 2020, whilst a new LP is expected later this year.

C JOYNES has ploughed a singular furrow through solo guitar over the last decade, with a body of work incorporating English folk-tunes alongside North & West African music, and lifting proto-minimalist and improvised techniques from the European classical and avant-garde traditions. Joynes has released 10 albums to date, including ‘Poor Boy On The Wire’ (2021), his first solo album dedicated wholly to the electric guitar; ‘The Borametz Tree’ (2019), recorded with long-term fellow travellers Dead Rat Orchestra; and ‘The Wild Wild Berry’, a collaboration with singer Stephanie Hladowski. He has recorded a number of sessions for BBC Radio 3. He has also played extensively across the UK, Europe and the USA, sharing bills with a broad range of performers including Shirley Collins, Martin Carthy, Marc Ribot, Richard Dawson, Alasdair Roberts, Jack Rose, Josephine Foster, Six Organs Of Admittance and 75 Dollar Bill.

Shifting away from the electric guitar of his most recent solo activities, Joynes is currently exploring the uses of an amplified archtop guitar, exploiting the instrument’s potential by placing intricate parlour music alongside overdriven garage blues throw-downs and the brittle ringing tones of free improvisation.

LANDE HEKT’s music is born out of self-reflection, social and political awareness, and her capacity for evocative storytelling. Having explored this personal song-writing approach with her former band, Muncie Girls, with their punchy yet tender punk-flecked songs, Lande released her debut solo record Going To Hell in 2021 via queer and trans run independent label Get Better Records. Going To Hell presents its raw honesty amongst understatedly luminous melodies and candid, unpretentious lyrics which contemplate, among other things, her experience coming out as gay. Lande’s music sits beautifully alongside such essential artists as The Wedding Present, The Sundays, The Replacements, Sleeper and Sharon Van Etten.

With her debut album barely a year old, 2022 saw Lande armed with a whole new collection of song-form vignettes and musings on her life and experiences with second album House Without a View (partnering again with Get Better Records and Prize Sunflower Records in the UK). Kicking off where the last record left off, House Without a View continues to explore ideas of queer identity, as well as her changing relationship with gender, dealing with childhood trauma, and confronting the isolation and period of adjustment brought by the pandemic. Lead single ‘Gay Space Cadets’ daydreams about a life of excitement and adventure instead of being “forced to buy into capitalism and become a pathetic, losing player in a game that you hate.” Although there’s darkness and sadness within the record, there’s also some shining beacons of positivity and a lighthearted side, albeit with a side of frustration.

Lande has toured in the UK, Europe, Canada and Australia supporting the likes of Alvvays, Laura Jane Grace, The Beths, Throwing Muses and the legend that is Tricky. She has also played at Glastonbury festival, as well as events for The Big Issue and Corbyn’s Labour Party.

STEVE GUNN is a New York-based guitarist and songwriter. With a career spanning nearly fifteen years, Steve has produced volumes of critically acclaimed solo, duo, and ensemble recordings on labels such as Matador Records, Three Lobed Recordings, Paradise of Bachelors, and RVNG. His albums represent milestones of contemporary guitar-driven material, and forward thinking songwriting. Steve has steadily processed his inspirations into a singular, virtuosic stream. Close listening reveals the influence of blues, folk, ecstatic free jazz, and psych in his continually unfolding output.

'Music for Writers', the first Gunn album under only his name since 2021, takes those influences to a new level. It is an instrumental album (released this August by Three Lobed Recordings), based around guitar, synths and more, it leads the listener to tightly and deeply focus on minute changes and variations in style. It is a masterpiece in fragile, small-scale world-building that occupies a unique space within Gunn's wider discography.

JAMES ELKINGTON moved to the United States in the late ’90s from his native England with the intention of making himself absolutely essential to the Chicago music scene. Twenty years later he’s contributed to a staggering volume of records and shows and projects both in Chicagoland (see Jeff Tweedy; Tortoise; Eleventh Dream Day; Brokeback) and far from it (see Richard Thompson; Laetitia Sadier; Michael Chapman, Steve Gunn, Nap Eyes). The 2017 release of the wonderful ‘Wintres Woma’, his first so-called solo album, seemed to be a logical, healthy respite from assisting with the creative needs of others that would allow him to serve his own. The record certainly sounded as though James found in it every reason to be satisfied - among much else, it effectively reconciled his personal and musical mongreltude as a child of Britain and a man of America, and thus could return his focus to bettering other folks’ records. James has since released several albums on Paradise of Bachelors and No Quarter, including last year’s triumphant collab with Nathan Salsburg entitled ‘All Gist’.

LUNG LEG formed in Glasgow in 1994 and were part of the city’s vibrant DIY underground scene. They blended elements of post-punk, C86, and riot grrrl, creating a sound described as indie rock, pop-punk, and garage rock. The original lineup included Jane McKeown ("Jane Egypt"), Annie Spandex, Amanda "Jade Green" Doorbar, and Maureen "MoMo" Quinn. They released two EPs in the mid-1990s: ‘The Negative Delinquent Autopsy’ and ‘Shagg the Tiger’. The band's debut album, "Maid to Minx," was released in 1997. Lung Leg’s songs are soaked in hedonistic tales of Glasgow nights out, living life on the central Scottish edge between the dole and the pub, the music pumped full of adrenalin. Seriously, if you tune your mind into just the guitars you’ll be doing mental somersaults. But you’d also be missing the vocal interplay, call-and-response work, lyrics that read like surrealist, grimy narratives. At the turn of the century Lung Leg imploded, scattering their component members to different parts of the country or to other groups. After a reissue of the singular ‘Maid To Minx’ album in 2022, the band reformed with new members Paul Thompson, Simone Antigone and Hando Morice, playing a reunion gig in Glasgow that December. They have since featured in the documentary ‘Since Yesterday: The Untold Story’. Lung Leg will be releasing their first new record in October. A limited edition split 7" with Unmarry Me! is also coming out soon on Second City Static.

UNMARRY ME! is a triangular shaped group, comprising of Lise Frances, Jon Slade and Chris Rowley. London to Brighton and back again. Unmarry Me! are a group that have been together for about 6 months in a world at war and in trouble. Unmarry me! are therefore a group trying to carve out some joy and light as form of resistance, no small feat, and maybe grandiose but worth the stating. Unmarry me! Is comprised of personnel who have all had time or continue to have time in other groups who did not take easy routes or money and didn't make many friends, so it goes. These groups respectively or chronologically were and are Huggy Bear, Comet Gain, I’m Being Good, Help She Can’t Swim, Snoozers and Adulkt Life. Bands that time will record as being on the right sides of history and her story. Unmarry Me! are of a completely different stripe or ilk but comprise the antagonist and peculiar DNA that honour this. Unmarry Me! play and record and create and make do in a DIY syncretism that's useful to themselves, distinct and not worth talking about. Unmarry Me! are about bending, queering, breaking and resetting rules, smudging boundaries and in the main having a lot of excellent fun!!

THE PLAN breeze in from Southend, keeping the flame burning for the kind of askew provincial pop captured on all those Messthetics compilations. Featuring folks formerly of Wetdog, The Ghosts and Vic Godard & The Subway Sect, the group ply a combination clattering beats, clanging guitars and conversational tunes. Their songs often move in unexpected directions and are pinned together by Rebecca Gillieron's sometimes defiant/sometimes soft vocal melodies. New album, ‘Mountain View’, to be released on Divine Schism in September.

PROLAPSE formed in Leicester in the early 90s and are now spread across the UK and Scandinavia. Still pursuing their own path of repetition and twisted melodies, they merge influences from post punk to krautrock and even folk. Their previous releases have included numerous singles and four albums on various labels, including Cherry Red and Radar. They feature vocalists Mick Derrick and Linda Steelyard, whose intense dueling vocals combine with ferocious triple guitar assault and pummeling rhythms.

Their releases have included numerous singles and four albums on various labels, including Cherry Red and Radar, as well as recording four Peel sessions. The band has received critical acclaim, including singles of the week on the Radio 1 evening session and NME. They have also toured and shared bills with a diverse array of bands, including Stereolab, Sebadoh, Arab Strap and Sonic Youth.

The fifth Prolapse album “I Wonder When They’re Going to Destroy Your Face” will be released on Tapete Records at the end of August and marks the bands first new recordings since their last album, “Ghosts of Dead Aeroplanes”, released 26 years ago, but in some ways it feels like there hasn’t a break at all. From the opening incessant riff of ”The Fall of Cashline”, Prolapse set their stall out, hammering the message that they’re back, over and over again.

MODERATE REBELS are an ever changing 'anti music' London based collective, who value expressing their ideas and feelings simply & directly, sometimes uber minimally, over any flash displays of musical skills. There have been Scottish, English, Australian and Irish members at various points, and have performed live with as many as 8 members, or as little as 3. Moderate Rebels released their debut single in late 2016 and picked instant up radio support from the likes of BBC 6Music's Steve Lamacq, Lauren Laverne, Mary Anne Hobbs and Radio X's John Kennedy. They have to date released 3 EPs and 4 studio albums (2017, 2018, 2021 and 2023), including a 30 song triple album. With two new studio albums currently in process and a string of releases planned for 2025 - 2026, Moderate Rebels have plenty more to say and do.

100 FLOWERS are a post-punk band from Los Angeles, California, active primarily in the early 1980s. The group evolved from the politically charged punk outfit The Urinals, who were known for their raw, minimalist sound and radical brevity, many of their songs clocked in under a minute. As their musical interests expanded and matured, the trio mutated into 100 Flowers in 1981, taking their name from Mao Zedong’s “Hundred Flowers Campaign,” a brief period in Chinese history encouraging open expression. The new moniker reflected their increasingly sophisticated and experimental approach to music, while maintaining a subversive, critical edge.

The band consisted of the same core lineup from the Urinals: John Talley-Jones (vocals, bass), Kjehl Johansen (guitar, vocals), and Kevin Barrett (drums). Under the 100 Flowers name, they moved beyond the stark minimalism of their previous incarnation, embracing more complex song structures, abstract lyrics, and an eclectic mix of influences ranging from Wire and Gang of Four to Captain Beefheart and Pere Ubu. Their sound retained punk’s urgency and DIY ethos but integrated funk, avant-garde noise, and jarring time signatures, all hallmarks of the emerging post-punk genre. In 1983, 100 Flowers released their self-titled LP on the independent label Happy Squid Records, which they co-founded. The album was critically well-regarded within underground circles, praised for its angular guitar work, sharp lyrical content, and inventive rhythms. Songs like “Sensible Virgins” and “Motorboat to Hell” showcased their unique fusion of intelligence, irony, and punk rebellion. The group disbanded in 1983, but their influence endured. Both 100 Flowers and the Urinals became cult favorites, especially among later generations of punk, indie rock, and lo-fi musicians. Their music was rediscovered and reissued over the years, including a retrospective compilation, 100 Years of Pulchritude, which brought renewed attention to their groundbreaking work.

JOHN MAUS is a truly enigmatic musician. Broadly cut from the synth pop cloth, he’s fashioned the frosty minimalism of its fabric into a cloak of infinite meaning, genuine grace and absurdist humor over the course of four defining albums since 2006. His music is a highly mutable affair, whilst often described as retro-futurist on behalf of the 80’s drum machines and synth sounds employed, John’s music is more personal than the nostalgic re-tread implied. There’s a cinematic quality to his songs, with pathos conjured through propelling bass-lines, trailing arpeggios and of course his deeply resonant vocal. Moroder helped map out the territory but Maus is more interested in seeking cadence through his love of Renaissance polyphony and the experimentation behind post punk. It’s an amalgamation of musical ideas as radical as its intent.

Maus is a ‘man out of time’ trying to make sense of the inhumanity of our world through his mobilisation of the language of punk rock. His aim is true as he reaches for the seemingly impossible. It’s a want to emerge as part of greater multiplicity, to appear, to become, to connect that powers his songs and the man himself. It’s now been 14 years since the widely lauded album 'We Must Become The Pitiless Censors Of Ourselves' (2011) appeared like a thunderbolt of maniacal energy and turned everyone’s heads. Now regarded as an experimental pop classic, Pitiless Censors was a huge breakthrough for Maus as a recognised artist and led to a vast reappraisal of his past work.

Two decades and seven albums into his career, Sept 26th sees John Maus release his most transcendent album yet: 'Later Than You Think'. Arriving via his new label YOUNG, the album explores themes of grief, justice, rebirth, transformation, and spiritual warfare - coalescing into a work of confession and confrontation: an aural metaphysics where affect, intellect, and spirit converge in search of the beautiful, the truth and the real.

PHEW is a legendary figure in Japanese underground music. Phew was a founding member of the legendary Japanese punk band Aunt Sally. After the band’s breakup in 1979, she continued her career as a solo artist, releasing a collaborative single with Ryuichi Sakamoto in 1980, and her first solo album, ‘Phew’, with Conny Plank, Holger Czukay of CAN, and Jaki Liebezeit in 1981. In 1992, her third album, ‘Our Likeness’, was released on MUTE (recently reissued), again at Conny’s studio, with Jaki Liebezeit of CAN, Alexander Hacke of Einstürzende Neubauten, and Chrislo Haas of DAF. Since the beginning of the 2010s, she has released a series of works that combine voice and electronic music, and has gained international recognition as a forward facing electronic artist. She has also released collaborative works with Ana da Silva (Raincoats), Yoshimi (Boredoms, OOIOO) and others. Phew's expansive ‘Vertical Jamming’ was released on vinyl for the first time via Disciples last year, whilst Mute recently released her stunning record ‘New Decade’; a stark, haunted album, populated by voices that intone empty pleasantries in English and Japanese, against a backdrop of fractured, dubbed-out electronics.

FREDDIE MURPHY is a sound artist and curator based in Torino, Italy. His sonic research has shifted from cathartic performances to express the Catholic sense of guilt to an intimate investigation on feelings of loss and acceptance connected with grief, using an approach to composition that is bound to visual imagery and concepts linked to rituality. His musical practice involves experimenting on the duality of natural/synthetic, using acoustic recordings processed into synthetic sounds, as well as mimicking natural sounds using analogue tools. As a founding member of the seminal experimental outfit Father Murphy he released a series of concept albums on labels such as Joyful Noise, The Flenser, Avant! and performed extensively across the world. Appearances include Venice Biennale and Santarcangelo Festival (IT), Dark Mofo Festival (Australia), Le Guess Who!? Festival (NL).

PROTOMARTYR’s taut, austere rock was incubated in a freezing Detroit warehouse littered with beer cans and cigarette butts and warmed, feebly, by space heaters. Short songs made for short practices, and the band learned quickly not to waste time. Despite the cold, Protomartyr emerged with a sound that is idiosyncratic but relatable, hooky but off-kilter.

There’s a temptation to call it garage rock, but that doesn’t quite fit. With respect to the local predecessors, this isn’t the primitive stomp of The Dirtbombs or The Stooges’ greasy roar. Punk works, kind of, even if it leaves the hardcore kids confused. Post-punk suggests something too retro; indie rock, something too precious. What Protomartyr is, is “stuck between the cracks.” If that’s the case, though, they aren’t alone. Protomartyr’s economical rock elicits comparisons to possible antecedents like Pere Ubu or The Fall as well as local contemporaries like Frustrations or Tyvek. Singer Joe Casey’s dry declarative snarl serves as a reliable anchor, granting his bandmates — guitarist Greg Ahee, drummer Alex Leonard and bassist Scott Davidson — the opportunity to explore textures and reinforce the rhythm section.

Post-punk’s biggest inspiration, it seems, was its eagerness to demolish punk’s orthodoxy, to push against the arbitrary boundaries of genre — at least until it became one itself. For Protomartyr, inspiration usually arrives in the form of ideas or feelings, more than explicit musical references. By the time the band has shaped it to its needs, the source material is almost unrecognizable.

Protomartyr have released six studio albums since 2012, including albums on Hardly Art and Domino. This very special pair of shows at the ICA are taking place in celebration of the band’s 10th anniversary of their astonishing, landmark album ‘The Agent Intellect’.

MARCEL WAVE write eulogies for tragic actresses, ancient riverbeds and concrete obscenity. Their inaugural sonic instalment ‘Something Looming’ (Upset The Rhythm) is part trades club symphony, part itchy serenade, and part wistful lament. As their heady concoction of ‘Meades meets Pat-E-Smith meets Kirklees Borough Council’ gets prepped to be formally baptised on a dank stage near you. Featuring Flora Watters of Es, Christopher Murphy of Sauna Youth and brethren Oliver and Patrick Fisher of Cold Pumas, Marcel Wave are spearheaded by northern ink-slinger Maike Hale-Jones on vocals. Marcel Wave’s debut offering is a walk through a smoke-filled pub with yellowing wallpaper and all eyes on you. It’s a chronicle of the death of the docklands, the decline of industry, of the high street, of civic pride, of civilisations, of hopes and dreams.

PROTOMARTYR’s taut, austere rock was incubated in a freezing Detroit warehouse littered with beer cans and cigarette butts and warmed, feebly, by space heaters. Short songs made for short practices, and the band learned quickly not to waste time. Despite the cold, Protomartyr emerged with a sound that is idiosyncratic but relatable, hooky but off-kilter.

There’s a temptation to call it garage rock, but that doesn’t quite fit. With respect to the local predecessors, this isn’t the primitive stomp of The Dirtbombs or The Stooges’ greasy roar. Punk works, kind of, even if it leaves the hardcore kids confused. Post-punk suggests something too retro; indie rock, something too precious. What Protomartyr is, is “stuck between the cracks.” If that’s the case, though, they aren’t alone. Protomartyr’s economical rock elicits comparisons to possible antecedents like Pere Ubu or The Fall as well as local contemporaries like Frustrations or Tyvek. Singer Joe Casey’s dry declarative snarl serves as a reliable anchor, granting his bandmates — guitarist Greg Ahee, drummer Alex Leonard and bassist Scott Davidson — the opportunity to explore textures and reinforce the rhythm section.

Post-punk’s biggest inspiration, it seems, was its eagerness to demolish punk’s orthodoxy, to push against the arbitrary boundaries of genre — at least until it became one itself. For Protomartyr, inspiration usually arrives in the form of ideas or feelings, more than explicit musical references. By the time the band has shaped it to its needs, the source material is almost unrecognizable.

Protomartyr have released six studio albums since 2012, including albums on Hardly Art and Domino. This very special pair of shows at the ICA are taking place in celebration of the band’s 10th anniversary of their astonishing, landmark album ‘The Agent Intellect’.

HONESTY is not a band in the traditional sense. With four core members - George Mitchell, Matt Peel, Josh Lewis and Imi Marston – and a rotating cast of collaborators which have included musicians and visual artists like Kosi Tides, Softlizard, Rarelyalways, Florence Shaw, and Liam Bailey, the Leeds-based collective emerged as an exercise in doing things differently on a journey towards self-acceptance. HONESTY’s vital debut album U R HERE, released back in February, melds influences that range from Mount Kimbie and My Bloody Valentine to Björk and Burial. The result is a subtly exhilarating take on club music that's become HONESTY's signature and the reason they're one of the most essential dance acts coming out of the UK.

TRISTWCH Y FENYWOD is a band of three queer women who play avant garde gothic music using dual-zither, bass and electronic drums. Their lyrics are sung entirely in the Welsh language (Cymraeg), and flicker in the moon-glow. Tristwch y Fenywod (translated as… The Sadness of Women) are Gwretsien Ferch Lisbeth (Guttersnipe, Petronn Sphene), Leila Lygad (Hawthonn) and Sidni Sarffwraig (Slaylor Moon, The Courtneys). Formed in 2022 in Leeds, where the band are primarily based, Tristwch y Fenywod sounds like an early 4AD group dredged from the waters of an Anglesey swamp. Sapphic love and desire, existential darkness, political and environmental anguish/celebration, psychogeographic romance, pagan mysticism, imaginal explorations of Celtic history and myth, psychedelia, and myriad other variations of reverie are fantasised through their songs.

In August 2024 they released their self-titled debut album through Night School Records to critical acclaim, and have since performed at various UK festivals such as Supernormal and Supersonic, including two memorable nights with Upset The Rhythm at St Pancras Old Church back in January this year.

ANNA PEAKER is an artist based in Leeds, West Yorkshire, who began experimenting with sound in 2016. Her work centers around quiet electronics, amplified objects, and processed autoharp. She has released music with Longform Editions, Alter, Infant Tree, Chocolate Monk, and Regional Bears.