The latest releases reviewed
BATTLES Mirrored Warp ***
Battles have considerable form in the post-rock steeplechase, what with former members of Don Caballero and Helmet in their ranks and a live reputation for mind- bending performances that rattle all the right experimental cages. As their first full-length album shows, Battles also know much about how to harness collective power and panache and unleash it at the right moment. On Atlas, the album's centrepiece, this means throwing down a pulsating tribal clatter around drummer John Stanier's fluid rhythms and maintaining that dynamism for the full seven minutes of the track's considerable ebb and flow. While it's not possible to keep up that kind of breathtaking gumption for the entire album, Mirrored has plenty of moments which do pique your interest. Odd flashes of showboating aside, it's the simple dexterity of Leyedecker, the tightly spun Tonto and the crackle of Race In that make a mark. www.myspace.com/battlestheband JIM CARROLL
Download tracks: Race In, Atlas
1990s Cookies Rough Trade ****
1990s (no "the" and no apostrophe, insist the band) have all the right components of the classic power-pop trio: clean, lean riffs; simple, anthemic songs; and a big, brash sound that dwarfs bands with twice the personnel. Don't be fooled by the name: these guys are closer in spirit to The Jam than Green Day. Featuring two former members of Yummy Fur, Alex Kapranos's old band, the Glasgow trio eschew artiness in favour of arsiness. Risque Pictures, Enjoying Myself and Weed reveal their blokeish obsession with getting loaded and getting your rocks off. There's also a wicked, sometimes cruel sense of humour in songs such as You're Supposed to Be My Friend ("You're never at my place/well, that makes two of us") and Cult Status ("My cult status keeps me f***ing your wife"). But, while there's a marked absence of sensitive, Keanesque songs (thank god!), 1990s strut their stuff with impressive efficiency. www.1990s.tv KEVIN COURTNEY
Download tracks: You're Supposed to Be My Friend, Arcade Precinct, Switch
MEGADETH United Abominations Roadrunner *
Occasionally - not too often, mind, just now and again - it would be great if metal music behemoths such as Megadeth actually did something surprising. United Abominations is so old-school it might as well as have Mr Chips lecturing the band members on the merits of Euclidean geometry. It starts off with a cliche (classically tinged acoustic guitar ripple leading into an unmistakable chug-chug, disembowelling metal wail) and ends with another one (a slime trail of guitar solos underpinning a mediocre melody). In between we have all the scrap speed metal anyone needs: weighty rhythms, relentless double-time riffing, pulp fiction thriller/gore/ fantasy lyrics (serial-killing sleepwalker, myth and mystery, snipers), squalling guitar solos and screeching vocals. Everything sticks to the blueprint so much it fits to the identikit profile of a band thinking they're engaged in something groundbreaking, yet which is actually so banal it's almost insulting. www.megadeth.com TONY CLAYTON-LEA
THE CRIBS Men's Needs, Women's Needs, Whatever Wichita ***
A band that releases a single called Hey Scenesters is acutely aware of the dangers of tumbling into a trend-based pothole. While The Cribs preceded fellow northerners Maximo Park and Kaiser Chiefs, they have resisted the urge to grow up, revelling in giddy teenage pop-rock. MNWNW tends not to put a Converse-clad foot out of place, sticking to rabid riffs spilled over shouty choruses, and it's all the better for the unexpected diversions it takes. Sonic Youth's Lee Ranaldo guests on Be Safe, an apocalyptic spoken word worthy of Allen Ginsberg, and closer Shoot the Poets is an unfussy ballad of much charm. With Alex Kapranos twiddling the production knobs, there's a dominance of guitars, which often eclipse everything else and create a by-numbers effect. But those who likes their guitar indie with a poppy post-punk inflection will be suitably impressed. www.thecribs.com SINÉAD GLEESON
Download tracks: Be Safe. Shoot the Poets
G LOVE Lemonade Brushfire Records ***
Lying somewhere in the middle ground between blues, funk and hip-hop, Philadelphia-based G Love and his band Special Sauce have been making records for the past 15 years. They're now on Jack Johnson's Brushfire Records, and their seventh album features a plethora of guests including Johnson himself, Ben Harper, Jasper and Blackalicious. Don't expect any protest songs or rants on the state of modern society here; this is all about the love. The heady mix of genres don't always make good bedfellows, and several of the songs fade into forgettable lessons in blandness before being allowed come to life. Despite the faults, it's such surfer-friendly, white-rap cuts as Ain't That Right and Can't Go Back to Jersey, and the funk-driven suaveness of Banger that make Lemonade a sure sign that summer has arrived. www.philadelphonic.com BRIAN KEANE
Download tracks: Ride, Banger, Breakin' Up
THE CRIMEA Secrets of the Witching Hour Free Two One ****
As publicity-grabbing measures go, giving away your album for free, as The Crimea have just done, is a winner. But a free album doesn't mean a dip in quality. Secrets of the Witching Hour is one of the most majestic and dramatic albums you'll encounter this year. While the band's Tragedy Rocks debut had similar ambitions, it didn't house this amount of truly killer songs, which are perfectly shaped by Dave Allen's (Cure, Psychedelic Furs) sympathetic production. From the Springsteen- like profile of a character "currently residing in the where-are-they-now files" which singer Davy McManus builds on Raining Planets to how Regina Spektor's spoken-word intros on All Conquering and Light Brigade gives way to the ragged splendour of McManus's voice and his observations, this is an album with a hefty share of striking hooks and choruses. www.thecrimea.net JIM CARROLL
Download tracks: Raining Planets. The 48a Waiting Steps
Dusty Springfield would surely smile. Maria Doyle Kennedy's back with a second humdinger of a solo album, reeking of tales of ordinary madness against a soundtrack of blood and guts, hearts and bones. Doyle wears her living lightly, and yet there's a roundedness about her music that speaks of hard-won experience and a musical sensibility that embraces songs big, small and funked-up. The title track isn't so much a paean as a cool- headed meditation on the schizoid demands of motherhood, countered viscerally by the ecstatic and gloriously primal sigh that is Fuckability. Co-produced by Kieran Kennedy, MDK yet again proves that she's the elastagirl of rock music: agile enough to turn obstacles into bridges, both musically and emotionally. www.mariadoylekennedy.com SIOBHÁN LONG
Download tracks: Mütter, Seven More Times
