Are you looking? This week at South Records

This week’s new releases are headed up by The Cramps' Gravest Gravy, a long-lost collection recorded with Alex Chilton at Ardent Studios in Memphis in 1977. Lux Interior and Poison Ivy selected and mixed the tracks for release in the late ’80s, but the album was shelved and remained unheard until now. Finally released through the revived Vengeance Records, it features early versions of Cramps favourites alongside covers including Hungry, Problem Child and Rocket In My Pocket, with Chilton playing organ on two tracks.

Also new this week, YHWH Nailgun return with Magazine, their first release for 4AD, packing ten tracks of experimental punk into just eleven frantic minutes. The Hobknobs, featuring Yaël Dekker of The Klittens and Arie van Vliet, formerly of Lewsberg, make their debut with the sparse, intimate Helmets Off, while Félicia Atkinson & Christina Vantzou combine spoken word, electro-acoustic instrumentation and environmental sound on the atmospheric Water Poems. The Afghan Whigs return with ten new songs on Soft Control as they celebrate their 40th year, Julia Holter’s Materia is a seven-track companion to 2024’s Something in the Room She Moves, and Mystery Jets return with A Hole To See The Sky Through, an introspective counterpart to Curve of the Earth inspired by the work of Yoko Ono. As always, you'll find all of this week's new releases in the shop and online now.

→ Recommended

PJ Harvey’s brilliant 1992 debut Dry remains one of the most striking British guitar records of the ’90s. Recorded with the original trio of Harvey, Rob Ellis and Steve Vaughan, it’s raw, tense and economical, with Harvey’s songwriting already fully formed on tracks including Sheela-Na-Gig, Dress and Oh My Lover. Abrasive one moment and surprisingly vulnerable the next, it’s an extraordinary debut and still one of her essential records. UK first pressing right here.