New: The Strokes - All The Time

Now this is more like it. No ridiculously cheesy synth sections, Casablancas staying within his vocal range and there's even an Is This It-esque guitar solo, All The Time is the comeback single that The Strokes should have gone with, as oppose to the horrendously garish One Way Trigger. Without meaning to crush any sense of innovation, this track is a true testimony to the 'if it is broken, don't try and fix it' cliche. Check it out below.

New: Pure X - Things in My Head

This year is shaping up to be a fantastic year for music, with brilliant albums from Unknown Mortal Orchestra, Youth Lagoon and Rhye already released / on their way, and now Austin's Pure X have announced details of their forthcoming sophomore record. Crawling Up The Stairs will be released 14 May via Acephale Records, with Things In My Head being the first single taken from the LP. Less shoegaze driven than previous releases, it's a bolder, more rounded sound, in truth not too far from the slick-rock temperament of UMO. Check it out underneath, and pre-order the record here.

New: Rips - Gone

With 2013 heralding the supposed long-awaited 'return of guitar music', newly formed Brooklyn outfit Rips go to show that making such predictions is an utterly pointless task, by tearing up the handbook, and exploding onto the scene with this fantastic debut track, despite not even having existed when those initial predictions were formed. The new musical outlet of Four Visions aka Daniel Abary, this debut track Gone is far more energetic and raw than anything he's done before, much more The Strokes meets Wavves than the dream-pop Abary has dappled in before. Check it out below.

New: Broken House - I Fell

With barely audible female vocals and a delicately plucked guitar, Adelaide's Broken House may only have two minutes of music to her name, but what a promising couple of minutes it is. I Fell may be minimal, vague and ambiguous, yet it's utterly enrapturing, a trait that so much music coming from Australia seems to be able to embody so elegantly. Check it out below.

New: The 1975 - Heads.Cars.Bending

Here's a bit of a curveball from Manchester outfit The 1975. Having rocketed up the Radio 1 playlists with last month's single Chocolate, this track taken from their forthcoming EP, Music For Cars, is quite a departure from the built for stadiums anthems that they'd previously unleashed. Heads.Cars.Bending sits somewhere between the disjointed, electronic click that's dominated blogs of late and the epic, synth pop of M83 that will undoubtedly open up them to a broader audience at numerous summer festivals. Check it out below, and pre-order Music For Cars here.

News: Muse Announce New Album The 2nd Law

In a bizarre two minute video posted on their Youtube channel, UK rock trio Muse have announced details of their sixth studio album, set to be released in September 2012. Titled The 2nd Law the short trailer showcases some awful acting, cliched stockfootage and a clip of what may or may not be new Muse material. Opening with a chorus of violins and an epic choir, the trailer soon descends into a Skrillex style dubstep number, possibly hinting at a future direction for the group.

The group began recording in September last year and have apparently been working with David Campbell, who has previously pulled the strings for Adele, Radiohead and Beck amongst others. It remains to be seen whether this 'Musestep' (as one fan affectionately titled it) will form the basis for The 2nd Law; but judging by the trailer, here's hoping it's not.

Introducing: Maggie Moon

Strolling onto the scene with a slightly ungainly youthful charisma and a twee take on riot grrrl, Maggie Moon may well have just invented bubblegumpunk (bubblegunk?). Armed with quirky, upbeat choruses (I Will Die) and an almost sleazy ability to write sexually frustrated pop gems (Shine), this three track EP from the Pomona quintet is chockablock with thrills, frills and an adorable sense of friendship. 'You're such a crazy loverboy' screeches the female lead singer on Boop Dap Beep Dap, coming across like an even more lo-fi Be Your Own Pet or even Metric without the outlandish production values. Check out their debut EP Werewolf Thumb below.

New: Parks - Dance Again

Pitch shifted vocals? Check. Floaty, vaguely dream-pop inspired synths? Check. An obscure, 'ungoogeable' name and very little information? You bet. So it's got all the makings of a future buzz track, but hey, it's great so I'm not going to pick any faults. The identity and whereabouts of Parks will undoubtedly be revealed at some point in the near future, but until then, enjoy Dance Again, available to stream below.

Stream: Friends - Manifest!

Manifest! the long awaited debut album from quirky Brooklyn pop outfit Friends is set to be released on Monday (4 June) and is now available to stream in it's entirety. With last years hit single I'm His Girl racking up hundreds of thousands of plays online, this nine track LP will seek to build on the hype accumulated in 2011. Manifest! is released on Fat Possum Records.Stream via The Guardian.

Introducing: An Blonds

Whatever you do, don't try and Google search the UK's An Blonds to see if anyone else has written about them, trust me, the results are far from pretty. Aside from scarring my eyes for life, their three debut tracks are inspired electro-pop numbers, drawing elements from both mainstream pop and early 80's synth hits. There's a bizarre disjointedness to their sound that's strangely appealing; they're not perfect, but quite frankly, they don't sound as if they want to be. The lovelorn Breathed You Outpirouettes wonderfully, dark and feverishly bewitching, recounting stories of controlling partners and forgotten friendships.

The group, who have very little information available online, aside from two tracks on their Soundcloud and three on their Bandcamp alongside Twin Peaks influenced imagery, embody the mysterious and enchanting that we're all to used to at the moment. All in all, these three debut tracks are luminously enticing, and hopefully, the start of a fruitful career. Check out Breathed You Out and This Is The Girl below, via Soundcloud and El Mudovia Bandcamp.

News: Bloc Party Announce Details Of New LP

Having spent the majority of the day counting down to the release of some news via their Twitter page, Bloc Party have now officially announced that their fourth record will be released 20 August via Frenchkiss Records. The news of the album, entitled Four, was accompanied by a short trailer (available below), featuring footage of the band in the studio, as well as snippets of previously unheard material.

The four piece, who formed in 1999 and are comprised of Kele Okereke, Russell Lissack, Gordon Moakes and Matthew Tong, have been at Stratosphere Studios, New York recording for the past couple of months with Alex Newport (At The Drive In, The Mars Volta) on production duties. Four will be Bloc Party's first new material since 2009's single One More Chance.

Four is available to pre-order from Bloc Party's official website, in a variety of different formats.

New: Friends - Home

Several months back I wrote Friends off as a one trick pony, but now it seems I'm having to revise my opinion on the Brooklyn group, with their new track Home being arguably their best release to date. A far shot from the god awful drivel that was last years hit single I'm His Girl, the quirky Talking Heads-esque percussion and addictive vocals combine perfectly to form a late 80's inspired number, destined to pack out sweaty dancefloors at the trendiest indie venues. Home is taken from their upcoming debut LP Manifest! out 4 June, which you can pre-order here.

Introducing: 記號士 THE SIGN OF HUMAN

I'm going to be honest with you here, my Taiwanese is rubbish, some might even describe it as non-existent. Thankfully the language of music is universal, and Taiwan's 記號士 THE SIGN OF HUMAN exploit this to it's core. With their dark yet somehow alluring imagery and unfathomable name, they're intriguing from the get go, and it's an aesthetic that perfectly suits their melancholic shoegaze sound. Taking inspiration from the likes of Ride and Slowdive, the guitars are languid and drowned in distortion whilst the vocals are poignant and distinctively clear, even if they are sung in a foreign language (excuse my ignorance). Check out the full EP below, and keep up with 記號士 THE SIGN OF HUMAN via their Facebook page.

<a href="http://thesignofhuman.bandcamp.com/album/-" data-mce-href="http://thesignofhuman.bandcamp.com/album/-">記號士 樂隊 by 記號士 THE SIGN OF HUMAN</a>

New: Disclosure - Control (Feat. Ria Ritchie)

Disclosure have a knack of persuading extremely attractive female singers to provide guest vocals on their tracks. This new cut, co-written with the gorgeous Ria Ritchie is taken from their upcoming EP The Face and was made Zane Lowe's hottest record earlier this evening. It's insanely danceable whilst bringing their music to a new level of terms of the emotional connection with the listener, sure it's not going to have you breaking down in tears, but it contains far more depth to it than previous outings. Check out Control below.

News: S Club 7 Perform On Australian TV

S Club 7 in their prime.

The years have not been kind to 90's 'bubblegum' pop group S Club 7. Amidst rumours of a full reformation and UK arena tours, the group, who had four number one singles, appeared on Australia TV on The Morning Show to talk about their short jaunt with Big Brovaz as well as to perform hit single Reach For The Stars. The only catch being that there's only three of them....

Bradley McIntosh, Jo O'Meara and Paul Cattermole, now almost ten years on since they last performed together, helped to soundtrack numerous childhoods, selling over fourteen million records between 1998-2003. The decidedly camp performance has become an internet sensation already, most notably for the appearance of the trio, who all seem to have piled on the pounds, struggling to do their infamous 'jump'. Perhaps they could do with retitling some of their biggest hits, for example: Reach For The Pies, Don't Stop Eatin' and S Club-sandwich ...

New: M O N E Y - I'll Be The Night

Photo by Julien Bourgeois

With The Stone Roses reunion dominating the headlines, it's worthwhile putting their much applauded 'legacy' into perspective, and the current crop of exciting young acts from Manchester certainly do. With PINS, The Louche and G R E A T W A V E S dominating music blogs around the world, it's rather telling that none of them particularly draw inspiration from Ian Brown & Co, in fact, they're almost the antithesis of everything The Stone Roses now stand for - that being dollar driven, passionless and utterly washed up, a stark contrast to the bubbling, energetic scene found slightly deeper in the hear of Manchester.

Of the aforementioned 'scene' (an awful word, so I apologise for it's use) one band in particular stand head and shoulders above the rest, grasping the ferociously burning beacon that is new music in Manchester. Now I've waffled on in the past about just how refreshing M O N E Y are to UK music, desperate to pull the one dimensional guitar acts out of the early 00's and allow the creative spirit inside each of us to truly be let loose. With the poignant SOLONG(GODISDEAD) proving one of this years highlights, they've now unleashed the B-side; I'll Be The Night another fragile, ever so melancholic number, that reeks of unfiltered honesty and an admirable level of personal indulgence. Check it out below. (Via lovers No Fear Of Pop.)

New: The Vaccines - No Hope

Sounding like the unwanted lovechild of The Paddingtons and The Holloways, The Vaccines are without a doubt, the most boring British band to emerge from the post-05 'guitar-indie' scene. Underneath their Strokes-inspired (read: plagiarized) veil and years of experience gained by strumming Wonderwall to a crowd of 40-something, pint-swilling slapheads, there's a stifling void where charisma should be, instead replaced by the sole intention of creating music for the sake of financial reward. Trundling along with almost as much gusto as England's European Championship squad and emanating a similar level of intelligence, a few lines about closing doors on social commentary and being labelled the voice of a generation, and thankfully, it's over. "Get off the bandwagon and put down the handbook" springs to mind...