cassettes’ latest is a defiantly cohesive selection of demos from 1998-2004. Acoustic and largely unadorned electric guitar feature prominently, but this is no exercise in strum-drum solipsism. Here are shards of brittle poetry, tiny revelations of the everyday romantic. Keyboards and drum machines lend texture and depth, at once leaning into and transcending the lo-fi origin of the recordings. Comparisons with US alt-rock acts are obvious, though inadequate. ‘Slender Novels’ has a cracked majesty all its own. CK

Out now on Planet Of The Tapes