January is barely ending, and here we already have one of the finest albums of 2024. The triumvirate formed by the two geniuses of Radiohead, Thom Yorke and Jonny Greenwood, and Sons Of Kemet's drummer, Tom Skinner, under the banner of The Smile, wastes no time. Exactly one year after their surprise revelation on the Glastonbury livestream (thanks to the pandemic) in 2021, the trio released their first full-length album, A Light For Attracting Attention. With it, the complex and fascinating universe of the Oxford quintet is finally revisited—minus Colin Greenwood, Ed O’Brien, and Phil Selway—while gaining grandeur through the strings of the London Contemporary Orchestra, already at work in 2016 on Radiohead's A Moon Shaped Pool, as well as the most prominent brass and winds from the London jazz scene (including Chelsea Charmichael and Robert Stillman).More compact, Wall Of Eyes lets warmth in. Opening the way with only seven other tracks, the title track teleports us to the tropics with its bossa acoustic guitar and Yorke's reverberating vocals. The smooth synths of a nearly R&B "Teleharmonic" follow, leading to the riffs of "Read The Room" and "Under The Pillows," creating a trippy rock passage. We then enter the dreamy piano ballad "Friend Of A Friend" and almost drown in the synthetic layers of "I Quit" before the deluge of distortions in the eight-minute "Bendic Hectic" explodes after an anxiety-inducing violin ascent. "You Know Me!" draws the curtain with the gentle piano, providing a final that's as cinematic as ever. Recorded at the legendary Abbey Road studios, with Sam Petts-Davies taking the place of the faithful producer Nigel Godrich, this second album showcases a trio in full alchemy, increasingly inspired by Can rather than the Beatles, and completely seasoned by their live shows. A masterpiece. © Charlotte Saintoin/Qobuz

« I forgot that you existed, And I thought that it would kill me, but it didn't. » Does Taylor Swift still hold a grudge ? From the opening moments of Lover, you’d be hard pressed to think otherwise. At a first glance, it would seem that the venomous tongue so prominent on Reputation (2017) is on the warpath again, feuding against Kanye West, Katy Perry or her ex… But the superstar has more tact and good sense than to needlessly prolong any in-fighting. Maintaining a mostly indifferent stance to the much-publicised conflicts, her seventh album blends romantic pop, deep introspection and socio-political commentary on the United States as a whole, whilst never straying too far without reminding us of her country singer-songwriter roots. The first and foremost example is the acoustic gem Lover, where she pays tribute to her partner of three years, Joe Alwyn. Far from being sirupy, she has a few humorous notes: « Swear to be overdramatic and true to my lover / And you'll save all your dirtiest jokes for me ». The waltz’s light-hearted tone is follow by t The Man’s activist synth-pop. She jokes: « If I was flashing my dollars I’d be a bitch not a baller ». The title itself is a clear explicitation of her feminist message – how would she have been portrayed by the media if she had been a man ? – her questioning stance verges on disillusion, albeit with some nuance, with Miss Americana & The Heartbreak Prince. American high schools are reinterpreted as a symbol of the United States’ decline: « American glory faded before me / Now I'm feeling hopeless, ripped up my prom dress / Running through rose thorns, I saw the scoreboard / And ran for my life ». Swift also dedicates You Need To Calm Down to all the homophobic haters, as a way of telling them that their outrage and agitation are in vain.  The best moments of Lover are those where the 29-year old reduces the cotton-candy production to a minimum, letting the listener get a glimpse of her private life – outside of any real-life-fantasy boyfriend. Soon You’ll Get Better could have just been acoustic filler – a simple, calm moment intended to make these 18 tracks more digestible. However,  by tackling her mother’s cancer, the ensuing chaos and panic, and her own feelings about that traumatic time, Swift centers the focus of the album on the diverse experiences of love, with a newfound maturity. Lover might be a pop record, by one of the biggest superstars in the past decade, but it’s also the proof that in 2019, the genre doesn’t necessarily rhyme with empty or tasteless. © Alexis Renaudat/Qobuz

This is a Barbiere "di qualità, di qualità": in fact, of very great quality indeed, from Deutsche Grammophon. Recorded in London in the summer of 1971, it is one of the first meetings of Claudio Abbado and the London Symphony Orchestra. It is also the first of Alberto Zedda's philological editions of Rossini's works, whose scores have been covered over by inherited errors for over a century. Getting rid of the additions which have, quite wrongly, become traditional, means restoring certain interruptions and the fine instrumentation of the period; and above all, singing and playing without exaggerations, thanks to an innate sense for the theatre. It's a spot of spring cleaning which has restored the youth of the 24-year-old composer's masterpiece. Bravo, signor barbiere, ma bravo! It is a dream record, with singers who are well-versed in the repertoire. Everyone is right where they need to be, from Teresa Berganza's wiley and cheeky Rosina, to the refined and hard-working Figaro played by Hermann Prey, via Luigi Alva's frivolous Count and the utterly ridiculous Basilio played by the outrageous Paolo Montarsolo. We're amused by their antics, as we admire the well-oiled and unstoppable machine of Rossini's theatre, under the unceasingly inventive and thrilling baton of Claudio Abbado. © François Hudry/Qobuz

Hubert Parry's Scenes from Shelley's Prometheus Unbound, from 1880, here receives its world-recorded premiere. Perhaps recording companies thought there wouldn't be much of a market for a heavy 19th century choral work with, it must be said, a ponderous text by Percy Bysshe Shelley (Prometheus was a play intended to be read, not performed, just to give an idea). How wrong they were. This release made classical best-seller lists in the summer of 2023, and it is altogether enjoyable. At the time, Parry was under the spell of Wagner, whom he traveled to Bayreuth to meet. That influence certainly shows up in Scenes from Shelley's Prometheus Unbound, with its basically declamatory text, partly through-composed music, wind-and-brass-heavy orchestration, and splashes of chromaticism. Yet what is remarkable is that the music does not come off as an imitation of Wagner at all. Rather, it uses elements of his style to match a specific kind of English literary text. The work gradually disappeared, but it would be surprising if Elgar, whom it clearly prefigures, did not know it well. The performances here are luminous, with William Vann using the lighter-than-expected London Mozart Players to create transparent textures against which he can set the substantial voices of Sarah Fox, Sarah Connolly, and other soloists. Parry did write some shorter pieces that remain in the repertory; one of these, Blest Pair of Sirens, is included here as a finale. However, the Scenes from Shelley's Prometheus Unbound are the main news here, and this performance, showing how this kind of thing should be done, may generate a new life for the work. © James Manheim /TiVo

Black metal with the happiest keyboards the genre has ever seen, yet still uncompromisingly brutal. "Children of Decadence" could be Emerson, Lake & Palmer, for the love of Beelzebub; such is the level of complexity and prominence of synthesizers. The frightening Finnish fivesome does a nice job of mixing up tempos on this, the band's third studio disc, and manages to keep up the intensity in spite of (or maybe because of) the aural auditory mood swings. You won't even recognize the bonus track cover "Hellion," and it doesn't even matter.© Brian O'Neill /TiVo

1996's Skywards marked the last time Norwegian electric guitarist Terje Rypdal cut a studio album for ECM. Since then, he's issued recordings that range from classically focused works (Lux Aeterna, Double Concerto: 5th Symphony) and a cinematic concept offering (Crime Scene) to jazz rock (Vossabrygg) and integrations of them all (Melodic Warrior), exclusively in live settings. His accompanists on this date include old friends Ståle Storløkken on keyboards, Pål Thowsen on drums, and young electric bassist Endre Hareide Hallre.Conspiracy is a striking portrait of Rypdal's three musical personas: guitarist, composer, and improviser. His trademark Stratocaster and its skyward reach are everywhere amid his love of dynamically controlled environments. Unlike his more rock-oriented outings, Rypdal continues to employ the electric guitar as lead instrument in exploratory compositions that rely heavily on sonic resonance and architecture. He defies listeners to find the seam between composition and improvisation. Opener "As If the Ghost … Was Me?" commences with ticking ride cymbals, muted, wafting keys, tympani, and Rypdal's rounded tones in a melodic frame. After Hallre's nebulous entry crisscrossing the fretless influences of Jaco Pastorius and Mark Egan, Storløkken's organ paints the backdrop as Thowsen picks up the tempo and intensity. Rypdal's sharp, edgy, yet warm tone bleeds across them all with a few notes and sustained tones. "What Was I Thinking" is an abstract rubato ballad. Rypdal examines the outer reaches of its melody in economic terms while still playing with a simmering passion as the ensemble traces sound itself around him, framing his lyricism in warmth and poignancy. The title track commences as a slow, processional rocker with middle-register harmonic lines played on guitar in a repetitive pattern. A syncopated snare and a floor tom un-fetter Rypdal's tone amid throbbing bass and squalling organ. The band gets mean, traversing a path that bridges Miles Davis' Tribute to Jack Johnson and Emergency by Tony Williams Lifetime with Larry Young. Rypdal guides it with a razored tone, distorted vamps, and elegant lyricism. "By His Lonesome" is an intriguing ballad with Hallre as principal soloist with gorgeous impressionistic drumming. Most of the eight-minute "Baby Beautiful" is delivered in gloriously abstract ambience with silvery guitar, tinkling bells, hovering keys, and restrained bass before erupting volcanically behind Thowsen's freewheeling drums while Rypdal asserts a tender, aggressive, blues-drenched melody. Storløkken's sensitive organ offers a knotty, percussive, solo amid driving, syncopated drums and a humming bassline. It is among the set's most satisfying selections. The two-minute closer "Dawn" is a coda offered by Storløkken's low, moaning pipe organ that sounds like a lonely foghorn in a midnight sea, adorned only by occasional cymbal washes. As a whole, Conspiracy is a compelling set of musical environments brought forth by Rypdal's gifts for lyricism and improvisation as his band reflect textural imagination and consummate musicality.© Thom Jurek /TiVo

On the 16th of June 2018, one year after his death, XXXTENTACION’s management announced the release of a documentary dedicated to the rapper. Due to the health crisis and various other delays, it ended up being released nearly four years later on the 26th of May 2022, an unusually long time considering how quickly the rapper’s team were able to pump his music out during his lifetime. This album is the original soundtrack that accompanies the documentary, which is entitled Look at Me: XXXTentacion. The tracklist features a series of recordings that were produced in a hurry. Even so, the record is laiden with a beautiful nostalgia, particularly in Vice City, a surprising opening track, however, the dark and distorted aspect of XXX’s music quickly takes over. This darkness can be heard on tracks like FUXK, featuring his good friend Ski Mask The Slump God. There are a few unreleased tracks here too. This is an album that draws attention to XXX’s extensive and varied talents, revealing a broad posthumous discography despite the rapper being just 20-years-old when he died. © Brice Miclet/Qobuz

Semele is a masterpiece. For what else can one call a drama in which the perfect symbiosis of text and music conjures up such suggestive power? "To hold the mind, the ears and the eyes equally spellbound": this recommendation by La Bruyère (Les Caractères: Les ouvrages de l'esprit) refers to the "machine plays" so adored by the public in the Baroque period. But even without machinery or indeed without sets or real staging, Handel’s oratorio involves us in the tragic fate of his heroine with supreme skill. © Ricercar

Continuing his award-winning Mendelssohn cycle, John Eliot Gardiner leads the London Symphony Orchestra, his Monteverdi Choir and three aspiring actors from the Guildhall School in a landmark performance of A Midsummer Night’s Dream, which was performed and recorded live as part of the 400th anniversary of Shakespeare’s death. Gardiner produces a personal version of the work featuring some cuts to the original melodrama movements (of course, nothing gets cut in the main movements, or those purely musical with no spoken text), in his words, ‘removing all of the music relating to the Mechanicals and thus focusing on the world of the fairies and the human lovers.’ Mendelssohn composed his concert overture based on A Midsummer Night’s Dream in 1827 at the young age of 17. The overture was immediately acclaimed as a masterpiece and quickly became a popular favourite throughout Europe. Years later, namely in 1843, he was asked by the King of Prussia to provide a score as the incidental music to an entire production. It’s made of fourteen short numbers based on themes and moods from the original overture, with a broadly romantic sound although classical in style and structure. According to the Evening Standard'Gardiner’s Mendelssohn with the LSO packs a surprisingly hefty punch', while Classic FM reports thats 'as you might expect, Gardiner brings his love of authentic performance into his approach – the LSO strings sound bright and breezy as they evoke Mendelssohn's Scotland.' © SM/Qobuz

January is barely ending, and here we already have one of the finest albums of 2024. The triumvirate formed by the two geniuses of Radiohead, Thom Yorke and Jonny Greenwood, and Sons Of Kemet's drummer, Tom Skinner, under the banner of The Smile, wastes no time. Exactly one year after their surprise revelation on the Glastonbury livestream (thanks to the pandemic) in 2021, the trio released their first full-length album, A Light For Attracting Attention. With it, the complex and fascinating universe of the Oxford quintet is finally revisited—minus Colin Greenwood, Ed O’Brien, and Phil Selway—while gaining grandeur through the strings of the London Contemporary Orchestra, already at work in 2016 on Radiohead's A Moon Shaped Pool, as well as the most prominent brass and winds from the London jazz scene (including Chelsea Charmichael and Robert Stillman).More compact, Wall Of Eyes lets warmth in. Opening the way with only seven other tracks, the title track teleports us to the tropics with its bossa acoustic guitar and Yorke's reverberating vocals. The smooth synths of a nearly R&B "Teleharmonic" follow, leading to the riffs of "Read The Room" and "Under The Pillows," creating a trippy rock passage. We then enter the dreamy piano ballad "Friend Of A Friend" and almost drown in the synthetic layers of "I Quit" before the deluge of distortions in the eight-minute "Bendic Hectic" explodes after an anxiety-inducing violin ascent. "You Know Me!" draws the curtain with the gentle piano, providing a final that's as cinematic as ever. Recorded at the legendary Abbey Road studios, with Sam Petts-Davies taking the place of the faithful producer Nigel Godrich, this second album showcases a trio in full alchemy, increasingly inspired by Can rather than the Beatles, and completely seasoned by their live shows. A masterpiece. © Charlotte Saintoin/Qobuz