It must be nice to be a man and make boring music just because you can

Continuing my trip forward in time through the album charts

07/11/25 : Everybody Scream - Florence + The Machine

Our fourth visit with Florence and her machine (although I'm sure they claim they're their own machine) and they're a funny lot - they burst on to the scene with Lungs and nothing they've done since has been quite as good, but it's still always been good enough, with a very decent quality bar throughout their career. So let's hope that continues...

Yeah, no dip in quality here. She's still got a great voice and the songs are strong both lyrically (it sounds like she's been having some trouble with the men - although I didn't get the impression it was any one man in particular, just all of them) and musically. Nothing particularly stood out from the pack on first listen, but that's a compliment really and I'm going to make an effort to revisit this.

We're at #1 in the charts with a new entry this week - their fifth album to do so, with only their '18 offering High As Hope failing to make it to the top, "only" debuting at #2. The rest of the top five are Lily Allen (rising from #4 last week, which just goes to show how much it's been talked about), Taylor Swift, Olivia Dean and Cat Burns (a new entry), making it a clean sweep for the ladies in the top five. And once again we have quite a few new entries to consider

Cat Burns (#5)
Here's someone who's done wonders for their profile in the last month - and I think she's come across as a very nice traitor indeed. I knew her from "Go" but didn't have high expectations for this, but it's actually a really mature offering and done really well - they're decent songs which hang together well as an album and she's got a lovely voice. She really reminds me of someone but I can't quite decide who it is - maybe a young Joan Armatrading? Amusingly, the BBC review of the album kicks off by saying it "finds the star grappling with grief and heartbreak, instead of murdering celebrities".

The Charlatans (#8)
I've got a soft spot for The Charlatans - they've been plugging away for years (this is their fourteenth album) and trying various things, some of which work better than others (but that's true for all of us). And there's nothing wrong with this - I enjoyed it.

Radiohead (#12)
This is apparently live versions of most of Hail To The Thief - I suspect I wouldn't mind it if I listened to it, but I'm also perfectly happy never doing so.

Rock Orchestra (#14)
This is a peculiar one - it's a perfectly adequate set of classic rock covers done in a "orchestral" style (I suspect very few people are actually involved). But, perfectly adequate is as far as I'd go and I've no idea who it's supposed to appeal to, so I have absolutely no idea what it's doing at #14.

Bob Dylan (#28)
This is yet another Dylan bootleg album - he's released 25 or so over the years and I'm pleased to say I've never listened to any of them.

Luvcat (#31)
I quite liked this - it's like Sabrina Carpenter but British and slightly more indie. All in all, it's well put together.

Knucks (#41)
I guessed we've got hippy-hop from the name - and yeah, he's a British hippy-hop dude who's nicely understandable and uses some interesting backing tracks. But still not for me, I'm afraid.

Creeper (#42)
I guessed from the band name I wasn't going to like this and when I saw the album was called Sanguivore II: Mistress of Death, my expectations didn't exactly rise. But it's certainly not dreadful, if somewhat over the top - it feels like a musical goth pantomime. Interestingly odd.

We also have some very peculiar re-entries this week Tyler, The Creator (#19), The Who's Who Are You (#34 - this was originally released in '78). KT Tunstall (#35 - originally out in '04) and Frankie Goes To Hollywood's Welcome To The Pleasuredome (#70 - originally '84) - I have absolutely no idea what any of them are doing back. Last week I said that Dave would be at #7 - and, go on, guess where he is?!? (believe me, I'm just as surprised as you to see him there). I don't think Florence are going to do quite so well, but not far off so let's go for #13. And this week's Taylor stats are one in the top ten with five in the entire chart, but Lover is at #100 so I think we'll be losing it next week. 

Wikipedia tells us this is their sixth album and that Florence has had quite the time of it since the last album having required some life-saving surgery after an ectopic pregnancy. Some of the themes of the album are (apparently) "witchcraft, folk horror, mysticism, magic, poetry and insanity" but I have to admit I missed most of them. I was interested to see that Aaron Dessner (from The National) is involved - he's popped up on a few things recently and he does loads on here playing guitars, keyboards and percussion. I also learned there were chamber music versions of four of the tracks - I can't say they're an improvement on the originals, but they're certainly interesting. Critically, the reviews were very positive (even if I'm not convinced that any of them knew what it was all about) and commercially it's done well in a random selection of countries, getting to #4 in Australia and #3 in The Netherlands and Ireland.

discogs.com tells us you can pick up a CD for £20 or you can go down the interesting vinyl route, with the option of translucent red, transparent turquoise or picture disc which will cost you somewhere in the region of £40-£90 - for some strange reason it's a double album despite it not actually being that long. I liked this and will make an effort to revisit it, so I think it's get the album of the week award but Cat Burns's offering was way better than I was expecting it to be, The Charlatans deserve some points for continuing to plug away and Creeper are getting a mention for making something most peculiar indeed. 

31/10/25 - Well done but it didn't grab me