Five Albums Out Today Worth Hearing: Elbow, Porcelain Raft, Sampha, Surfer Blood, and More

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Five Albums Out Today Worth Hearing: Elbow, Porcelain Raft, Sampha, Surfer Blood, and More

Also Check Out the Best Releases of the Last Month

Feb 03, 2017 Sampha By Christopher Roberts

Here we highlight five albums due out today that we feel are most worth hearing. There’s also a longer list of albums released in the last month that are also worth checking out. We have also included Amazon links for each album. If you click through those links and buy the album (or anything else on Amazon once you’ve clicked through) then Amazon rewards us with a sales percentage. So buy that album you were likely going to purchase anyway, but also help support one of America’s last truly independent print music magazines.

Five Albums Out Today:

Elbow: Little Fictions (Conchord)

Elbow, the Manchester, England band led by Guy Garvey, are releasing Little Fictions today, their first album without drummer and founding member Richard Jupp, who left the band last year to focus on other creative projects, including his drum school. Read our review of Little Fictions here. Below check out the videos for “Magnificent (She Says)” and “Gentle Storm,” the latter featuring actor Benedict Cumberbatch. Buy the album here.

Moon Duo: Occult Architecture Vol. 1 (Sacred Bones)

Moon Duo features Ripley Johnson (guitar) and Sanae Yamada (keyboards). Today the Portland-based band releases Occult Architecture Vol. 1 via Sacred Bones. It’s part one in a “two-part psychedelic opus.” Below is a video for “Cold Fear.” Buy the album here.

Porcelain Raft: Microclimate (Volcanic Field)

Italian-born but Los Angeles-based musician Porcelain Raft (aka Mauro Remiddi) is releasing his third full-length album, Microclimate, today via his own label, Volcanic Field. Remiddi recorded Microclimate in his studio in East LA’s Highland Park neighborhood. Chris Coady (Future Islands, Beach House), Remiddi’s longtime collaborator, mixed the album at the Sunset Sounds Studios. A press release describes Microclimate as “his biggest sounding and most expansive collection of songs to date.” Read our review of the album here. Below are the album’s first two singles, “Distant Shore” and “Big Sur.” Buy the album here.

Sampha: Process (Young Turks)

British singer Sampha Sisay (or just Sampha) is best known for his vocal and production contributions to the likes of SBTRKT (where many listeners likely first discovered him), Kanye West, Drake, SBTRKT, and Solange. Today he finally releases Process, his debut solo album, via Young Turks. Read our review here. Below is the video for “(No One Knows Me) Like the Piano.” Buy the album here.

Surfer Blood: Snowdonia (Joyful Noise)

Surfer Blood are releasing a new album, Snowdonia, today via Joyful Noise. Snowdonia is the band’s first album since the death of guitarist Thomas Fekete, who passed away last May after a hard fought battle with cancer. Understandably, the band now has a new lineup, with frontman John Paul Pitts and drummer Tyler Schwarz remaining and being joined by their high school friends Michael McCleary on guitar and Lindsey Mills on bass. Former bassist Kevin Williams previously left the band in October 2015. Snowdonia is the first album since the Florida band’s 2010-released debut, Astro Coast, that Pitts has written and mixed alone. A press release says “Snowdonia was written shortly after the band’s first long tour without Fekete, as lead singer struggled with Fekete’s absence and the weight of getting older.” Below is the video for “Matter of Time” and the audio for “Six Flags in F or G” and “Frozen” (which we premiered). Buy the album here.