Darkstar - North

By drawing on the shadowy side of 1980s pop, Darkstar recall an era when musical futurism - then exhibited in stabs of now-redundant synthesisers - offered imaginative respite from conservatism, both political and artistic.

...[they] make sure you hear the words that matter. In one memorable line, Buttery sings: "When it's late there's only you." If anything encapsulates the album's character, it is this. It might not always be clear whether any optimism exists in these washed-out evocations of 21st-century love and loss, but the truth is that it's always there somewhere, drifting on ripples of crackling interference.

Darkstar's debut album is out, then...

Here's my interview for The Guardian.

And here's my review-essay for The National's Review section.

Inside The Radio 1 Playlist Meeting

A few weeks back I was lucky enough to be the first journalist to sit in on the Radio 1 Playlist Meeting in... well, as long as anyone at R1 could remember, anyway. The playlist process was shrouded in secrecy for so many years - and its consequences are still as influential as ever.

The resulting feature is in the November issue of Q Magazine, along with my full-page review of the Magnetic Man album.