Adam Irving: Frisky

English multi-instrumentalist Adam Irving once again reinvents himself on his new album Frisky. The blues and electronics that were at the forefront on his previous one Old New Blue are still there, but now he has added jazz, progressive rock and avant-garde to the equation. Recorded between 2016 and 2026 he felt that this material fitted together nicely to make a cohesive collection that is tied together like a collection of short stories, with a few instrumentals acting as linking pieces.

He used a Yamaha Resurface CP synthesizer, Fender Jazz bass, Theremin, MC-101 groove box, Fender Strat, custom Telecaster, Korg Volca synthesizer, and Akai Mini MK3 keyboard. He is not a great drummer - he says so himself, but his limitations don't get in the way of the feel. His lo-fi DIY approach gives the tracks both an urgency and intimacy that would be lost in a "proper" recording studio.

HCTF's best of 2024 (20-16)

• 20-16
• |
• 15-11
• |
• 10-6
• |
• 5-1

» Best of playlist

» Listen here

HCTF's annual list of the 20 albums that will be in regular rotation for many years to come. As per usual many genres are represented. Here Comes The Flood covers a lot of ground and it shows in this eclectic, final tally.

Today: countdown from number 20 to 16.

Please shop at your local record store. Most of the stores have a pretty good website where you can order your stuff. It might even be cheaper than the big ones on the 'net. The folks who work there know their stuff and can recommend artists you might like.

Buy directly from the artist, attend live shows and stop by the merch table. And be sure to tell your friends about that great new act you discovered. Word-of-mouth can't be beat as the prime source to discover new music.

Adam Irving: Old New Blue

BEST OF 2024
20
HCTF

English multi-instrumentalist Adam Irving alternates between rough blues rock (New Machine), dreamy experimental electronics excursions (Astart, 6am Hobsonway) and acoustic musings (Bring It On) on his latest album Old New Blue, so getting a proper sequencing of the tracks that makes sense must have been an uphill battle. Recorded in fits and starts in Manchester, Vienna and Berlin over a five year period, it became a collection of songs about being independent and being a loner in a world that has little patience for outliers.

Finding peace with Yoga 4 after channeling Zappa in the harsh So Long shows the inner tension that makes Old New Blue a captivating listening experience. And lo and behold: there is even a happy ending of sorts with the gentle Wet Nose: "Overall its elapsing, a synapse perhaps in another encounter which perfectly fits. With a dry throat I’ll lay back, with no thought of payback, the image will play back, a satisfied me."

Adam Irving: Bespoken

Adam Irving never makes the same album twice. After the pop-rock record Tomorrow & Tomorrow and the piano-driven Baby Rhino, he now sets sail for a trip of fast-paced spoken word wrapped in minimal flourishes. Bespoken is a dense listening experience. His speed-story telling will require to repeated plays to make out all the words. Early buyers of the CD are in luck, because the first 500 come with a stapled zine with all the lyrics, but they will have some trouble with figuring out Never Repeat It that been typeset in a circle.

Irving used to distribute his books of poetry and short stories for free, calling it droplifting, inserting his works in newspapers and magazines. With this album he circles back to those days, foregoing rhymes, but letting the flow of his words to do the talking - DIY avant-garde celebrating the voice as the vessel for his music, while he talks about Sleater-Kinney and Friends in Days & Days, and walnuts to would require Peter Gabriel's Sledgehammer to crack in A Different Way. Where will he go next? Changes are that he doesn't know yet himself, but it will be interesting again for sure.

Adam Irving: Baby Rhino

English musician Adam Irving is known to rely on the guitar as his main instrument of choice, but for his new album Baby Rhino he switched to the piano. It makes quite a difference and there are quite a few instrumentals besides his usual pop rock idiom - the melancholy of An Ice Day is summoned with an only a handful of notes, but each of them counts.

He is a traveller (Venice Again, A Garden In Topanga) and a story teller, always on the move with an open eye for his surroundings and the characters he runs into. He is his own backing vocalist and he can turn himself into a one-man XTC-alike band with songs Not The End and jazzy lounge lizard during I Danced Sideways that will go down well with fans of Rufus Wainwright.

HCTF's best of 2016 (20-16)

Where's ...
David Bowie, Radiohead, Nick Cave? Or that album that you liked so much?

Simple. HCTF picked the 20 best albums that were actually reviewed on this blog.

HCTF lists the 20 albums that will be in regular rotation for many years to come.

2016 was a memorable year for music lovers.

• Vinyl is back.
• The majors are still running around in circles, trying to keep their cashflow alive.
• streaming is now big business (for the artist not so much).
• "Self-released" has become a regular tag. Even big time acts go for crowdfunding to cover the costs of making an album, sometimes aided by a small network of indie labels to carry the load of distribution.
• Software is catching up with the studio as a means of home recording - untrained ears will have a hard time to hear the difference.

One thing will never change: independent music is where it's at when you are on the look out for something interesting to listen to.

Sadly some of the greats are no longer with us - David Bowie, Prince, Leonard Cohen as well two of the finest sidemen - Scotty Moore and Bernie Worrell. As 2016 drew too a close underrated Status Quo rhythm guitarist Rick Parfitt and singer George Michael also checked out.

Today: countdown from number 20 to 16.

Go here for 5-1 | 10-6 | 15-11.

Adam Irving: Tomorrow & Tomorrow

BEST OF 2016
16
HCTF

By today's standards Adam Irving is doing it wrong. No social media, no singles, but building a discography of highly eclectic albums. Yes, albums. His latest, Tomorrow & Tomorrow, swings from pop to rock to jazz and dance and everything in between, with his leftfield approach of the guitar as an intermediate to keep it all together. It is a textbook DIY record, with instrumentals as breather tracks between the songs in which he dissects a subject to its bare essentials.

Irving is a sharp observer and an opinionated lyricist - Hipsters is vicious and funny, following the tradition of satirists like Ray Davies and Jarvis Cocker, but also a composer with a knack for austere explorations on his guitar (Matt Stevens comes to mind). Seven is a gnarly dance track, although ravers need to be chemically enhanced to pull off moves that will make sense to them. Quite the opposite is the title track Tomorrow & Tomorrow, a charming instrumental in the vein of late Sixties Pink Floyd.