HORSEBEACH Vinilo y CD

Review: Following on from 2019's The Unforgiving Current, Horsebeach's Ryan Kennedy returns with his fifth record Things To Keep Alive. With The Unforgiving Current exploring the themes of isolation whilst living in Tokyo, Kennedy has since returned to the perpetual grey of Mancunia. But rather than viewing his return to Manchester as a step back, Kennedy has used Horsebeach as a catalyst to explore and make positive strides within his mental health. From Beatles-esque balladry, fuzzed out shoegaze and a lavish cover of a 00s pop classic, Things To Keep Alive still importantly retains the Horsebeach DNA and even has moments that will take fans all the way back to Kennedy's C86 inspired debut LP. In turn, this results in Horsebeach's most varied and rewarding album to date. A record that inspires and shows growth; a record that makes you appreciate the things you help to keep alive.

Review: Anyone perturbed by the lack of creativity in much modern indie rock, with stylistic tropes frozen in aspic and creativity usurped by classicism, will find much to love in 'Beauty And Sadness', an album which does much to live up to its audaciously grandstanding title. Herein Manchester-based musician Ryan Kennedy manages to pay lip service to his love of '80s indie whilst also expanding his sound in different directions - thus in these richly textured and warmly melancholic ditties, one can hear the guitar curlicues of The Smiths and Durutti Column sitting alongside hazy synths and ambient interludes, with delicacy or arrangement balanced against yearning romanticism. Drawing the dots between C-86 and the 2020s, the result is a record for the ages.

Review: Anyone perturbed by the lack of creativity in much modern indie rock, with stylistic tropes frozen in aspic and creativity usurped by classicism, will find much to love in 'Beauty And Sadness', an album which does much to live up to its audaciously grandstanding title. Herein Manchester-based musician Ryan Kennedy manages to pay lip service to his love of '80s indie whilst also expanding his sound in different directions - thus in these richly textured and warmly melancholic ditties, one can hear the guitar curlicues of The Smiths and Durutti Column sitting alongside hazy synths and ambient interludes, with delicacy or arrangement balanced against yearning romanticism. Drawing the dots between C-86 and the 2020s, the result is a record for the ages.

Review: Manchester's Horsebeach are a prolific bunch, having delivered two albums of sun-kissed psych-pop splendour a little over a year apart. Moreover, this second effort shows that they've only become still more adept at their chosen metier - in this case deploying their trademark pop nous and tasteful approach to summon a carefree Californian dreampop allure to the gloomily autumnal realm of the UK. Equally in thrall to the poppy artistry of Aztec Camera, the melodious melancholy of New Order and the hazy atmospheres of Tame Impala, Horsebeach are mapping out a pathway from the '80s to the future in characterful style.

Review: Manchester's Horsebeach are a prolific bunch, having delivered two albums of sun-kissed psych-pop splendour a little over a year apart. Moreover, this second effort shows that they've only become still more adept at their chosen metier - in this case deploying their trademark pop nous and tasteful approach to summon a carefree Californian dreampop allure to the gloomily autumnal realm of the UK. Equally in thrall to the poppy artistry of Aztec Camera, the melodious melancholy of New Order and the hazy atmospheres of Tame Impala, Horsebeach are mapping out a pathway from the '80s to the future in characterful style.

Review: The Manchester-based Horsebeach are purveyors of a starry-eyed and skyward-staring brand of indie rock that can't help but summon thoughts of John Hughes soundtracks and '80s-tinged melancholy via its jangling guitar tones and winsome aura, even whilst filtered through a kosmische prism. Lead track "Disappear" exists where New Order meet Tame Impala, yet with an indelible melody to match its sense of hazy abstraction and sun-kissed abandon. The quasi-ballad "Let You Down", meanwhile, sees a slow-dance between glacial dreampop and sullen '50s stylings. As adept with pop glamour as they are with psychedelic dreamstates, Horsebeach are just the tonic for this fast-encroaching spring.

Review: Following a clutch of promising Horsebeach 7"s, ascendant singer songwriter Ryan Kennedy delivers a debut album for the Alone Together label. Kennedy's been making music in form or another since his teenage years and it shows on this confident ten track set, with the Horsebeach sound taking shape as dreamy, languid bedroom introspection of the highest order. Apparently written over the course of a year and committed straight to tape in Kennedy's central Manchester flat in the space of two weeks, Horsebeach is brimming with lo fi jangly charm and will find favour with the Real Estate fans out there.