This month’s album digest is a mixture of comparisons. First we compare the fortunes of old hands Underworld to even older hands the Pet Shop Boys. After that I’ve found two dance albums, one that I liked and one that I didn’t. I find it quite hard to write about dance music and so the comparison is quite useful. Sometimes it helps to work out why you like one thing and not another.

Some great albums this month! The Flaming Lips The Terror Wire Change Becomes Us James Blake Overgrown The Knife Shaking The Habitual The Flaming Lips The Terror How you view The Terror pretty much depends on how much you have kept up with The Flips output since their last official album, the clanking double behemoth in Merkin packaging that was Embryonic. The irony being that I used Embryonic to deal with a break-up and The Terror is pretty much about… a break-up.

A mostly instrumental month with a comeback from Orbital, an excellent remix collection from Battles, an amazing movie documenting a live performance by the Chemical Brothers and Austin Wintory’s soundtrack to the game Journey. Orbital Wonky Battles Dross Glop The Chemical Brothers Don’t Think Austin Wintory Journey (Original Soundtrack) Orbital Wonky I am quite keen on Orbital, though perhaps not as keen as I am on the similarly named Orb. I think I have got all the Orbital albums, mostly bought on eBay after the fact.

A hefty reading list that should keep me occupied into the summer. A friend on facebook asked “What course is that for?”, to which I replied “It’s for one of the modules I am doing at the university of life.” This response was quite popular.

Album of the month: Mirrorwriting by Jamie Woon Jamie Woon was brought to my attention late last year by Pitchfork who wrote an article about the video for lead single Night Air. I’ve put that video down below because I think that it is very good, a simple well executed and the tune itself is brilliant, probably my favourite individual track of 2010. It’s a downtempo tune full of dark spaces and empty beats, full of nocturnal promise and mystery.