About Nathan Brooks

Last year, Britpop veteran Noel Gallagher shocked the music world with Who Built the Moon? his surprisingly unconventional third album under the High Flying Birds moniker. The album wasn’t that experimental, but Gallagher is so notoriously conservative that even something vaguely different was a pleasant surprise. Jack White, the former guitarist for garage rock icons The White Stripes, is not as conservative as Gallagher. However, since going solo, White has stayed relatively close to his comfort zone. His second album, 2014’s Lazaretto, lavished up the instrumentation a little, but it still retained White’s same old indie/blues-rock sound. This year, however, White is back with Boarding House Reach. Ever since he started recording his third solo album, White has hyped up its weirdness. Even so, no one was fully prepared for how wild it turned out.
Read More

In 1995, reluctant Britpop icons Pulp released Different Class, a disco deconstruction of the class divide propelled by the smash-hit lead single Common People. Soaring to the top of the charts and winning the 1996 Mercury Prize, Different Class firmly placed Pulp into the Britpop big league. Not long after, the movement fell apart. Genre pioneers Suede had already distanced themselves from Britpop with 1994’s expansive Dog Man Star and in 1997 Blur pursued more experimental sounds on their self-titled album.
Read More

The great irony of MGMT’s already greatly ironic single Time to Pretend is the success it brought them. Despite skewering the rockstar lifestyle and pop music itself, Time to Pretend was the first of three surprise hits from the American indie duo. Three hits they’ve been running away from ever since. Their debut album, 2007’s Oracular Spectacular, spent its second side immersed in freaky, jagged psychedelia.
Read More

With the advent of CDs and digital downloads, the significance of making a double album has diminished dramatically. Nowadays, artists can flippantly string together 90-minute projects and it’s no big deal. In fact, the reaction to an album that long is frequently an exhausted groan. Whilst there’s always been the risk of a double album running out of steam, it’s so easy to make one these days that artists regularly stretch out 40-minutes of content for the sake of it. Prolific American garage rocker Ty Segall is changing that.
Read More

They actually did it. King Gizzard & the Lizard Wizard – the famously mad Melbourne psych rockers – put out five studio albums in 2017. Released on New Year’s Eve, Gumboot Soup – the fifth and final record – made it into last year by the skin of its teeth. I’ll admit, I was sceptical about this one. Their previous album, the incredible Polygondwanaland, already felt like the year’s creative peak. As a result, I was concerned the final release was going to sound like a hastily tacked on extra.
Read More

I have to confess, I’m not the biggest Oasis fan. I like their first two albums Definitely Maybe and (What’s the Story) Morning Glory? for what they are, but I’ve always found Oasis the least inspired of the Britpop big four. Despite this, I do enjoy Noel Gallagher’s solo work under the High Flying Birds moniker.
Read More

It’s no secret I have a love/hate relationship with progressive rock. My most negative posts on The Rockhaq Community have targeted prog rock, such as my review of Yes’ bloated 1973 double album Tales From Topographic Oceans. Despite this, some of my all-time favourite music is prog. Pink Floyd’s Dark Side of the Moon and Yes’ Close to the Edge, for example, are both incredible progressive albums.
Read More

Pink Floyd are the beating heart of ’70s progressive rock. Easily the genre’s strongest songwriters and sincerest lyricists, Pink Floyd dialled down prog’s more pretentious tendencies to huge success. Iconic albums such as The Dark Side of the Moon, Wish You Were Here and The Wall secured the band a place in rock history rivalling The Beatles. This review, however, is set a little earlier. The year is 1967, long-time frontman David Gilmour won’t join the band until 1968 and experimental guitarist Syd Barrett – alongside bassist Roger Waters, keyboardist Richard Wright and drummer Nick Mason – is revolutionising rock music.
Read More

In 2014, American lo-fi musician Ariel Pink released pom pom, his first album without the ‘Haunted Graffiti’ moniker. The 21st Century’s answer to Todd Rundgren’s 1973 gem A Wizard, a True Star, pom pom was sprawling, inventive and very very weird. Pink’s follow-up, Dedicated to Bobby Jameson, reins in the scatterbrained madness. In its place, however, is something more consistent, sincere and refined.
Read More

I went into Arcade Fire’s fifth studio album not expecting much. Despite liking the singles, most reviews I read suggested this was an underwhelming effort from the Canadian art rock band. Admittedly, their 2013 release Reflektor received similarly mixed reviews and I love that album, but I was still lowering my expectations. As a result, I was pleasantly surprised. Everything Now may not be Arcade Fire’s best work, but it is still an undoubtedly excellent record.
Read More