The Heavy - Hurt & The Merciless - COMPACT DISCS [CD]

The Heavy return in 2023 with their sixth album Amen, an exhilarating maelstrom of '60s R&B riffs, horns, and gospel harmonies, which is set to be the freshest and most revitalised record in their canon yet. Their corrupted R&B power is unstoppable and, revived to full blast from the pandemic lull, they're hurtling into 2023, whipping and writhing with seditious blues drama, soul and gospel passion, the crunch of prime hip-hop and garage punk's visceral electricity pulsating through AMEN. The album was recorded at Rockfield Studios, produced with Tchad Blake (The Black Keys, U2) and engineered with Real World Studios' Joe Jones. The songs were written during sessions in Florida at the end of their 2019 US tour and demoed when Kelvin visited the UK in February 2020.

When Yodit Tekle was diagnosed with stomach cancer in late 2014, her partner, Martin Anderson, who runs Toccata Classics, asked a few composer friends to write some music for strings to bring her comfort in her illness. As her life slipped away, he had the idea that she might be remembered in music and so he began to commission other pieces for string orchestra in her memory. To his surprise, almost everyone he asked generously agreed, and so the project snowballed there are now over 100 composers who have now written or agreed to write for it - in an undertaking that is probably unique in the history of music. This third volume presents eleven more pieces in an initiative which, in effect, transforms love into something you can hear. Under the guidance of Paul Mann, who is coordinating this project as well as conducting it, the young players of the Ukrainian Festival really took this music to their hearts and produced performances of real intensity. Another point of interest Yodit was from Eritrea, and so in these days when the classical world is worried that it might be appealing largely to a white, middle-class elderly male audience, here is a sequence of new classical works composed for a young black woman from north-east Africa.

Following a period of transition at the end of 2024, The Howlers entered a new phase, with frontman Adam Young rebuilding the project as a two-piece alongside drummer Toby Richards - a shift that redefined both the band's sound and creative direction, bringing a renewed sense of focus and identity. That reset came off the back of a breakthrough year. Their self-funded debut album What You've Got To Lose To Win It All landed to widespread European acclaim, breaking into the UK Independent Breakers Charts Top 10 while securing multiple positions across independent, vinyl and physical sales charts. Radio support followed from BBC Radio 1, BBC 6 Music, Radio X and Absolute Radio, alongside international backing and editorial playlisting across Apple Music and Spotify. That momentum translated directly to the stage. A sold-out 18-date UK headline tour established the band as one of the country's most exciting live acts, followed by a European run that saw them sell out shows across eight countries - road-testing new material that would ultimately shape what came next. Where that debut was defined by grief and personal loss, Heavy emerges from a very different place. Driven by the tension between desire and consequence, recklessness and reality, it's an album lit by the pull of the night, the thrill of impulse and the cold clarity that follows. Written and produced alongside long-time collaborator Chris Ostler (Black Honey), the record deliberately sidesteps traditional studio methods. Instead, it was built remotely - with demos, ideas and reworked compositions exchanged across digital platforms - stripping everything back while pushing each track to it's strongest form. Only in the final stages did the band enter rehearsal spaces to capture live drums, grounding it's more experimental edges with a raw, physical energy. Young adds InchThis album is those late night experie