The big hitters are back

Arcade Fire's latest LP Everything Now may have met with much bafflement, disappointment and outright hostility (I still haven't been able to bring myself to listen to it), but at least there's the consolation of knowing that two more of my favourite bands are gearing up for new releases.

First up there's Spiritualized, whose Jason Pierce has been talking to Elizabeth Aubrey of the Quietus. The band's new LP sounds like another intense labour of love for Jason Pierce, something that he's been recording (and re-recording) painstakingly over more than a year, to the point of obsession and to the detriment of his health. He's promising "a big record" that really makes a statement - but then that's pretty much par for the course with Spiritualized. Here's hoping that the cover artwork is rather better than that of the album's predecessor, 2012's Sweet Heart Sweet Light...

And then there's Godspeed! You Black Emperor, who've announced that a new LP, Luciferian Towers, will be released on 22nd September. The artwork and accompanying text, songtitles and press release all suggest it will be very much business as usual: resolute left-wingers soundtracking the apocalypse. On the one hand, you could see it as treading old ground - but on the other, with Trump in power, expressing sympathy with those on a neo-Nazi march and making belligerent threats to North Korea, the apocalypse seems particularly close at hand, and Godspeed! are arguably more relevant than ever.