There must be a beautiful world out there somewhere where film stars are always wonderfully interesting and where they make lovely pop records that are actually a pleasure to listening.

Whilst you carry on the search for this world BlackPlastic is happy to settle for one such star - the rather appealing Zooey Deschanel. So, fanboy yearning put to one side - Volume Two is Deschanel's second collaboration with musician M. Ward and, as She & Him, follows up on (you guessed it) 2008's Volume One.

So avert your eyes from the BlackPlastic "Alternative Electronic Music" masthead for a few minutes because Volume Two is gently crafted sixties-pop-cum-country music. And we can't help but go a bit doughy on it. What Deschanel lacks in vocal range she more than makes up for in the ability to pen a nice tune and M. Ward's backing does a perfect job of providing the perfect environment to make Zooey shine. The best examples, where the vocals and the music swell in unison as on 'Don't Look Back' and 'Lingering Still' ("And the world's like a science and I'm like a secret" Zooey sings convincingly on the latter), capture a wonderfully kitsch sparkle that transports BlackPlastic to a summer's day.

Compared to Volume One this outing is superior in all ways bar one. Since Volume Two is a more consistent yet more varied album, BlackPlastic can only be disappointed by the fact that there is nothing quite as joyfully edible and sumptuous as Volume One's 'Why Do You Let Me Stay Here'. It's an unfair, churlish criticism perhaps but it ensures that both albums still deserve a listen.

So ultimately Volume Two is the same joyful ye olde fashioned pop music as Volume One. It's warm, arms-open retro hugs.

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Volume Two is out now on Domino, available from Amazon.co.uk on CD, LP and MP3 [affiliate links].

Four Tet has long been one of electronic music's true pioneers. Not satisfied with the status quo each release from Kieran Hebden seems determined to push the envelope in a slightly different fashion.

It is an approach which has won him many fans. Especially when the experimental approach has come together with the right aesthetic and, importantly, tunes, as on the legendary 'folktronica' Rounds.

And to cut a long story short There Is Love In You doesn't disappoint. Finding a happy middle ground somewhere between the slow emotive tunes of Rounds and the more 'out there' sound of Everyhing Ecstatic, Four Tet's new album sounds like someone who has finally found their natural sound. Which means the focus can truly be on the detail.

As on the slowly evolving 'Love Cry'. With its casual but tight live rhythm section and bouncing bass it is a song that wraps itself around your cranium like melting ice around a cold drink.

There Is Love In You pushes Hebden's sound simultaneously towards the organic and the electronic. With the low-slung vibes of Flying Lotus, complete with twisted vocal samples, combined with meticulously detailed, tight rhythms this album sounds like a J Dilla experiment that fell from the heavens only to be reconstructed by someone with no idea which bit goes where. And that is a glorious thing.

So this is an album that evolves things, sure... But it hasn't lost sight of what made its predecessors great.  With melodies that carry emotion and production that makes you want to move this is electronic music for all. 

Last year we benefited from a number of bands who finally sounded like they were at the top of their game - comfortable in their own sound. This is another one of those albums. There Is A Love In You doesn't change the game in the same way Rounds did. Instead it just proves Four Tet is better at the bloody game.

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You can currently stream There Is Love In You in its entirety at Four Tet's SoundCloud page.

There Is Love In You is out on Domino on Monday, available for pre-order from Amazon.co.uk on CD now [affiliate link].

If BlackPlastic could do one thing to make the world a slightly better place it would make it illegal for smug bankers to use their BlackBerry on the train for anything other than calling the wife or accessing porn. Presented with countless opportunities however, an endless magic lamp if you will, then just one thing BlackPlastic would do is hide this début solo offering from Pavement's wayward Spiral Stairs inside the case for every single copy of the Arctic Monkeys last album.

Because whilst, predictably, this isn't a patch on any of Pavement's output, it does achieve a bluesy, melancholic, whisky-soaked sound that feels like the kind of album the Monkeys thought they we making.

The Real Feel is a slow and thoughtful album that shines due to it's space and timing. Opener 'True Love' may feel a bit too formulaic (if at least authentic) but there is much more elsewhere - 'Call The Ceasefire' is morose, wounded and self-pitying yet compellingly so. 'Cold Change' manages to convey a nervous optimism in its join-in "bup-bup-bup-bup-bup-ba-ba" chorus, like the audio equivalent of dusting yourself off after a fall that only one other person saw. Forthcoming single 'Stole Pills' changes things up nicely mid-album with a flick-knife jangly punk vibe.

But The Real Feel hasn't really got any new ideas. And that isn't necessarily a criticism, yet more of an observation. There are moments of delicacy here delivered in such a gimmick-free fashion that the fact that you may as well have heard it all before feels unimportant. It's not the slacker-gold soundz of Pavement, but it's not bad.

The Real Feel is out now on Domino, available on CD from Amazon.co.uk [affiliate link].

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BlackPlastic has listened to the Wild Beasts' new album Two Dancers many, many times already and yet is still a little at odds with what to think. Listening to this album is a bit like trying to make love to fish - it's difficult to get a purchase on what you like about it but once you have reached its climax it generally feels like it was worth the effort.

Singer Hayden Thorpe's falsetto vocals do occasionally stray a little close to pretentious pomp but for every slight miss-step (the ponderous 'When I'm Sleepy') there are moments of sheer fantasy - the tenor intro to 'All The Kings Men' followed by a superb lead vocal delivery.

Wild Beasts also have a wonderfully delicate sound at times - as the gentle muted guitar of album opener 'The Fun Powder Plot' comes in it captures a tremendous amount of feeling before a single word is even laid down. And despite having a sound that at times feels a little self-consciously arty there are still hooks you can get behind, as on lead single 'Hooting & Howling'.

What Wild Beasts have created in Two Dancers is an album of magnificent depth. It may occasionally boil over but when it delivers it manages to evoke the curious feeling of what it is to be a you Britain in our age. This is an album that undoubtedly looks forward yet at the same time it could only exist given Britain's musical heritage.

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Two Dancers is released on 3 August on Domino, available for pre-order at Amazon.co.uk on CD and LP [affiliate links].

BlackPlastic fully admits that it knows jack about Cass McCombs and further admits that we haven't had time to go digging around either.  What we DO know however:

1. This song is pretty Goddamn beautiful, similar in feel if not genre to year's startling fragile Bon Iver.
2. The video to this song is directed by Eric Fensler, and like the song it is strangely affecting.
3. 'You Saved My Life' is taken from Cass McCombs' album Catacombs, which is out on Domino on CD, LP (with MP3 code) and MP3 now.

James Yorkston is already somewhat of a critics' darling. As such this stop-gap album consisting of selection of traditionally arranged folk-songs, which sees Yorkston divorced of usual band The Athletes and is instead created in collaboration with The Big Eyes Family Players, probably inspired audible drooling from some guy with a beard that writes for Mojo.

Over at BlackPlastic we may be slightly more youthful and, dare we say it, suspicious of somebody doing something quite so honest and understated. But one thing is for sure: we still know a bloody good tune when we hear one.

And there are definitely some here. Folk Songs is a meandering, wistful body of work but it never feels anything less than heartfelt. Whilst an album full of traditional folk music undoubtedly risks feeling downtrodden and lacking in excitement Yorkston has seemingly pitched things just right here. On 'Martinmas Time', for example, a penny whistle is combined with a fiddle to create a piece of music that sounds so real and honest and it's this feeling that Yorkston has managed to nail several times throughout the record's length.

Listening to 'Thorneymoor Woods' you cannot help but rue the trappings of modern life as Yorkston describes the walking of dogs and other countryside pastimes. It's enough to make BlackPlastic want to pack up and head off home for a sit beside the fire with a mug of scotch. Probably best of all is 'I Went To Visit The Roses'. It's a warm, worldly wander of a song that smacks of charm and character like a well-loved rascal that troubles the regulars at the local pub.

Folk Songs is what it says then - folk songs about folk doing folky things. There is no real innovation here as such but it's an interesting and accessible entry-point both into James Yorkton's work and into folk music generally. Folk Songs just demonstrates how much love and joy there is down here in the dirt.

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Folk Songs is released on Domino on 10 August 2009 - available for pre-order on Amazon.co.uk on CD, Deluxe CD & DVD and LP[Affiliate Links].

The Dirty Projectors at their best create music that feels so completely their own that they are always unmistakably them. Even when they are collaborating with others, as they did with David Byrne on this year's Dark Was The Night compilation, or covering another band's material, as on last album Rise Above (albeit re-imagined, from the memory of Black Flag records) they lose none of their individuality.

Bitte Orca perfectly retains this over-worldly, unique feeling. With all of the human sexuality that Dave Longstreth's falsetto vocals managed to capture on the sublime Rise Above this is an album from a band that can both see and realise their own potential. Streamlined yet playfully creative, Bitta Orca manages to deliver an album that focuses Longstreth's experimentalism into something coherent and unashamedly "pop".

But it's still by no means conventional - it's just that the songs themselves are now calling the shots. The chorus of 'Useful Chamber' for example, with quick and punchy shouts of "Bitte Orca, Bitte Orca!", gives way to a fret wig-out on the guitar before dissolving into a dreamlike vocal that sounds like a kid spinning around until they fall down dizzy into the arms of love.  It's experimental and interesting and yet still completely immediate and catchy.

Lead single 'Stillness Is The Move' boasts a snappy solo vocal from Amber Coffman that sounds like getting up and stepping over the root cause of your problems, no longer being held back by the daily grind. The strings that kick in halfway through turn it into what is probably the Dirty Projectors finest track to date - an organic, fresh R&B anthem.

Along with bands like TV On The Radio, the Dirty Projectors are forging a new pop-centric future for art-rock. The charm of Bitte Orca is that it sounds totally without time and without classification - taking the best elements from 50 years of pop music and rock without sacrificing any inventiveness. The result is one of the most beautiful records BlackPlastic has heard in a long time.

Bitte Orca is released on Monday on Domino Records on CD, MP3, LP and cassette.  No, BlackPlastic isn't joking. Both the cassette and LP come with codes to download the album as an MP3.  Available to order now on Amazon.co.uk on CD and LP, although obviously everyone knows cassette is the format to go for [Affiliate Links].

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Animal Collective are releasing the next single from their rather glorious Merriweather Post Pavillion album on June 29.  The sunny psychedelia of 'Summertime Clothes' is undoubtably a highlight from an already pretty damn awesome album so if, for whatever reason, you are yet to check out the album then make sure you have a listen.  The band recently performed the song live on Letterman, check it out:

The single comes backed with a collection of remixes (one of which is by current retro whizz kid Zomby).  If you can't wait or just fancy a free download then the band's label Domino are giving away one of the mixes for free (well, in exchange for the usual personal data) over at the Domino website.  You'll get the Dam-Funk Remix there - is a warm, dubby affair - BlackPlastic has a temptation to feel that remixes of material this good are kind of pointless but this mix does a pretty good job of putting a nice spin on the original.

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Some exciting news from Domino records - Franz Ferdinand are to re-release the dub version of Tonight, entitled Blood, on 1 June.

Originally packaged with the limited edition CD release of Franz Ferdinand's latest album, BlackPlastic's review of Tonight praised the dub version of the album for its experimental approach.  Given the disc was only available in limited quantities the re-release represents a great opportunity to pick up what is easily Franz Ferdinand's best material in years.  They have also added a couple of extra tracks to the original release and it will be available on LP and as a download for the first time.  It's well worth checking out so look out for it.

Franz Ferdinand also release their next single, 'Can't Stop Feeling', on July 6.  Again this represents a great opportunity to pick up something you may have missed before as it comes packaged with their cover version of LCD Soundsystem's 'All My Friends', which was originally included with LCD Soundsystem's release of their single for that track.

The band are also touring in October - check the website for more details.

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