Diagonale des Yeux: Madeleine review – wacky multilingual outsider pop with winning quieter moments

Music boxes, miaows and strange melodies pepper the whimsical and charmingly lo-fi post-punk of Laurène Exposito and Théo Delaunay

James Blake: Trying Times review – platitudes about politics and Kanye can’t detract from an excellent album

Amid the stylistic shifts of Blake’s seventh record come samples of Dusty Springfield and Dizzee Rascal: gripping distractions from some preachy sentiments

Seven of the best music festivals to visit by train from the UK

From jazz in Rotterdam and hip-hop in Paris to brass bands on the beach in Blackpool, the Guardian’s music editor chooses the best European festivals that can be reached by rail

Simo Cell and Abdullah Miniawy: Dying Is the Internet review – a virtuosic voice cuts through digital noise

The latest collaboration between the French producer and Egyptian singer pairs soaring musicality with frenetic electronics to examine the age of AI

Musician and film-maker Flying Lotus: ‘The whole lo-fi beats thing has become like Starbucks music’

Ahead of a new EP, the creative polymath answers your questions on Thom Yorke, Kendrick Lamar and how a sci-fi epic ate up his whole life

‘Like an electrical gong bath!’ The Sheffield supermarket going viral for the symphonic sound of its freezers

Redditors are thrilled by the Co-op on Ecclesall Road, where a magnificent drone is reminiscent of Brian Eno’s ambient music. We take a visit to the back aisles

‘Stabbed in the Face soundtracked an incredibly joyous time’: the weirdest songs we find romantic

Declarations of undying affection, comparisons to a summer’s day? Who needs ‘em! Our writers recall the offbeat songs that capture their hearts

Fred Again review – guest-heavy homecoming for the golden boy of UK dance is an eclectic triumph

Following a six-night stint in NYC, Fred Gibson returns to London for a brilliant, five-hour melange of his own tracks and wildly energising guest-star mini-sets

Post your questions for Flying Lotus

As he prepares a new EP for release, the electronic musician and esoteric film-maker will answer your questions

‘The music could not stop for three days’: how Sirāt went on a road trip to the dark heart of rave

Club culture is notoriously hard to capture on film. Oscar-tipped director Oliver Laxe explains why he had to organise his own music festival in the Moroccan desert to find deeper meaning in dance-floor ecstasy

Winter Olympics 2026 opening ceremony review – disco-dancing opera masters upstage Mariah Carey

Carey was the big draw at Milan’s San Siro, but she was outweighed by pop-classical artists – and a sizeable dollop of kitsch

In an era of frictionless digital experiences, there’s something magical about obsolete technology

DVDs and CDs signalled the beginning of the end for physical media but now have pride of place among technologies that are forgotten but not quite gone

‘One moment it was a little blip. The next, our friends are dying’: the gay porn soundtrack composers lost to the Aids crisis

Gay porn in the 80s was home to beautifully moody synth music that is only now getting rediscovered – tragically too late for many of its creators

‘We get a lot of requests for it to be used in sex scenes’: how Goldfrapp made Ooh La La

‘I couldn’t think of a line for the chorus – but we had just been to France. I Baudelaire into the lyrics somewhere, too’

Triple J’s Hottest 100: more than 2m votes have been cast – but who will win?

The radio station keeps its countdown tightly guarded – but there are a few predictions that can safely be made