Left by Hope of the States

Hope Of The States seem to be running twice as fast as other bands. Skipping straight past the barely-refined-demos stage, the Chichester combo revealed a fully-formed post-rock landscape on 2004's debut ‘The Lost Riots’. Two years on, and in keeping with HOTS’ stated desire to “shrink everything down". ’Left’ is a leaner work then its predecessor and one in which the wide-eyed enchantment is restricted to just a handful of tracks. The fact they've taken their foot off the accelerator is understandable given guitarist Jimmi Lawrence's suicide just before the release of ’...Riots’, but as ’This Is A Question’ rushes along and ‘Bonfires’ bludgeons home its point, the band are left sounding like their wings have been clipped.

Popaganda by Head Automatica

What happens to emo boys when they nudge 30 and have to hang up their big shorts? In the case of Daryl Palumbo, one time primal screamer with Glassjaw, life beyond ‘downtuned’ has involved loading up on the British, '80s new wave music of his youth like Costello and Squeeze. Relocating his mojo to that of a surly teenager wishing he was a cool British rakish type allows him to still be a bit emo, just with gigantic elasticated choruses like ‘Lying Through Your Teeth' and 'Graduation Day': the sugar coated first single that features Gerard Way of My Chemical Romance on backing vox. All of which rather fabulously adds up to the fantasy soundtrack to any rite of passage teen movie you could possibly name.

Best of 1996 - 2002 by Hefner

Formed in 1996, Hefner were always a band out of time. The London trio had an old school indie sound that made Belle & Sebastian sound like Motorhead. And they sang about things cinema, wine, politics, awkward sex. unknowable girls - that had gone out of fashion ten years earlier. Yet, still, Britain's “largest small band" were loved by Steve Lamacq and managed to amass a substantial cult following. Their ridkety songs - part Jonathan Ridiman, part Arctic Monkeys buzzed with choppy, poppy energy. while Darren Hayman’s lyrics were often painful and frequently hilarious. It's a timeless formula and the likes of ‘The Day That Thatcher Dies’ (“ We will dance and sing all night”), ‘I Took Her Love For Granted’ and ‘Hymn ForThe Cigarettes’ still
sound like minor classics.