I Hear a New World - June, 2009

Malcolm Middleton - Carry Me

Malcolm is back – and his latest solo album will be his last under his own name for a while. Here he alternates spoken word musings about Lycra and 'superpowers in the post' with heart-tugging choruses about death and that. It's lifted to the heights of a gospel hymn to heartache with the aid of backing vocals from King Creosote and The Pictish Trail doing what Malcy refers to as "their best Pepsi & Shirley impression." It's a cry for help that can't help but make you cry. I weep, and a single tear falls into my glass of Carlsberg, increasing the alcohol content by 100 per cent. Don't leave us Malcolm.

Ambulances - How Could You Leave Me

Get your tie-dye dress on and skip barefoot down to the river, light up a giant spliff and realise that retro-tinged isn't always a bad thing. Ambulances' new album The Future That Was is pure joy from start to finish and How Could You Leave Me is a laid-back love-in that will make dreamers out of over-achievers. Is it really possible for another excellent band to come frae Fife? Apparently so.

The Foundling Wheel - Mixed Minds and Missteps

Our own Billy Hamilton gave the Foundling Wheel's album a thumbs up last year. It took me this long to give it a listen. Once again, I need to take myself outside and have a word, and this is the perfect soundtrack for such self-flagellation. It's beepy, it's insane, it's shouty. It's angry but clever. It makes me want to drive a motorcycle the wrong way down the motorway. Naked.

Zoey Van Goey - We Don't Have That Kind of Bread

It was falsely claimed that Bobby McFerrin took his own life because no-one believed he was quite as happy as he made out. But if you could record Grammy award-winning, multi-million dollar earning tracks merely by slapping your own body parts you'd be just as bloody ecstatic. The Glasgow-based popsters Zoey Van Goey attempt just that with this cheery number, the lead single taken from their excellent debut The Cage Was Unlocked All Along.

I Hear a New World - June, 2009