Alt-J: This Is All Yours (2LP) [ATLANTIC]

Why you'll love it

This 2LP set comes in a gatefold jacket with the lyrics printed inside and two printed inner sleeves. The album went to No. 1 in the UK, reached No. 2 in Canada and earned a Grammy nomination for Best Alternative Music Album.

This edition

• 2LP set
• Gatefold jacket
• Lyrics printed in gatefold
• Printed inner sleeves
• Download card included
• Pressed in Canada

About the album

Following a Mercury Prize-winning debut is a tall order, so Alt-J went back to the same place they made An Awesome Wave: Iguana Studios, which Gus Unger-Hamilton described as a tiny little room behind a second-hand tyre shop.

Most of the songs were written on the road, with a few newer ones finished in a converted warehouse in Hackney. At the centre sits a song cycle about the Japanese city of Nara, running from "Arrival In Nara" to "Nara" and "Leaving Nara." Around it, "Left Hand Free" is a swaggering, bluesy stomp, "Every Other Freckle" is playful and strange, "Warm Foothills" passes the vocal between several singers line by line, and "Hunger Of The Pine" is built on drummer Thom Green's own remix sample of Miley Cyrus. Charlie Andrew produced again, keeping their folk, electronic and art-rock pieces in careful balance, and the band's three-part vocal blend runs through every side.

Stay to the end of side D for a hidden cover of Bill Withers' "Lovely Day," uncredited on the sleeve and labels. It's the musical equivalent of finding a tenner in last winter's coat.

Also at Kops: more Alt-J on vinyl · browse Alternative

Tracklist

Listen

On Infectious / Atlantic (cat# 544594-1), a reissue of the 2014 album.