Features

1240: By the entrance to Somerset House on Waterloo Bridge, there is a shop called Knytta, where one can "create your own unique jumper and see it made in front of you."

March 2013, Richmond, Virginia. Matthew E White's Big Inner album has become a minor word-of-mouth sensation: a country-soul fantasia, saturated with lavish horn and string arrangements, mostly recorded in the attic of his Richmond house (You can read my 2013 interview with Matthew E White here).

Some fantastic new additions here, though it's been tough these past couple of days to navigate away from the playlist that Caribou posted on Youtube: 1,000 tracks that you're advised to play on shuffle. I keep getting Wire and J Dilla every time I dig in, but it's really a constant source of familiar pleasures and usefully contextualised new discoveries.

Landlocked sailors, Loyalist death squads and REM homages…

Uncut heads west to encounter Polly Jean Harvey on her Dorset home turf

First off, a quick announcement that our latest Uncut Ultimate Music Guide will be out next week, dedicated this time to Radiohead. I'll write more about that soon, but in the meantime, while I'm finishing the next issue of Uncut itself, please dig in to the assembled tunes below.

2015 has already got off to a good start, with Foxcatcher and Whiplash coming later this month (although I’m afraid I really didn’t like either Birdman or American Sniper).

A belated happy new year, everyone; I trust the new issue of Uncut, with David Bowie on the cover, is easing you into 2015 in a relatively optimistic way. Not least, of course, because there's a hefty preview of some of the next 12 months' key albums, with plenty of quotes from the artists involved; Paul Weller, New Order, Laura Marling, My Morning Jacket, Matt White, Alabama Shakes, The Pop Group, Giorgio Moroder and so on.

Here, for your consideration, is Uncut's list of the 20 Best Films Of 2014. If you're interested in the administrative aspect of this list, it was voted for by a shadowy cabal of Uncut staffers, writers and a few trusted confidants. It broadly dovetails with my own personal Top 20, though I think the film that's stuck with me most throughout the year is the wonderfully strange Under The Skin. But I won't detain you further. Have a great Christmas and New Year, by the way: see you in 2015.

Sorry I didn't manage to post a playlist last week; a combination of germs, deadlines and various other professional/seasonal distractions meant that I ran out of time.