As breakout album Supper turns 20, we chart the lo-fi legend’s best tracks – from mournful meditations to witty country tales
January 2023
Gena Rose Bruce: Deep is the Way review – compelling and complex with moments of brilliance
With a feature from Bill Callahan, the Melbourne artist’s second album showcases her evolution as a sharp, honest songwriter
December 2022
Observer critics' review of 2022
Music: Kitty Empire’s 10 best albums of 2022
Non-stop dance parties, retro beats and dreamy vignettes vied with slacker rock, flamenco-inflected R&B and no end of heartbreakThe Observer critics’ review of 2022 in full
November 2022
Bill Callahan review – gritty guitars and sharp-toothed Smog revival
The US songwriter beautifully combines the bright indie-folk of new album Reality with the unruly energy of his earlier days
October 2022
Bill Callahan: YTI⅃AƎЯ review – sunny, painterly poetics
Alexis Petridis's album of the week
Bill Callahan: Reality review – rousing love and kindness from an unexpected source
September 2022
Discovery channels
Bill Callahan’s listening diary: ‘My daughter makes me listen to Harry Styles 20 times in a row’
The US songwriter guides us through a few days in sounds, from his son’s love of the Hamster Dance to Texas’s local Mexican radio stations and Traxman
January 2022
‘Art is appropriation’: folklorist Jake Xerxes Fussell connects forgotten tunes to our times
Once hesitant to put his own stamp on archival music, the Georgia singer-guitarist found the freedom to reinterpret folk songs in his new album
December 2021
Bill Callahan & Bonnie Prince Billy: Blind Date Party review – revelatory fun with old favourites
The left-field giants are full of surprises on an electrifying set of covers of everyone from Steely Dan to Silver Jews
December 2020
Observer critics' review of 2020
Music: Kitty Empire's 10 best of 2020
Best music of 2020
The 50 best albums of 2020: the full list
August 2020
Kitty Empire's album of the week
Bill Callahan: Gold Record review – time to join the pantheon of great American singer-songwriters
The one-time misanthrope releases an album abundant in warmth bordering on empathy
December 2019
Best music of 2019
The 50 best albums of 2019: the full list
Our pick of the year’s finest albums brings American dreaming, teenage dynamism, heartbreak, barbed rap, impetuous indie and beautiful soundscapes
June 2019
Bill Callahan: Shepherd in a Sheepskin Vest review – a sweet and sly return
Bill Callahan: Shepherd in a Sheepskin Vest review – brilliantly sly celebration of family and the infinite
Bill Callahan: 'I can't die – life is too good, it can't end'
The month's best music
50 great tracks for June from Jarvis Cocker, Lady Lykez, Employed to Serve and more
September 2017
End of the Road review – irony versus revolution in majestic musical battle
Father John Misty’s show-stealing stagecraft crowned a brilliantly curated weekend of rock-adjacent acts – from Parquet Courts’ prickly postpunk to Slowdive’s shoegaze – under Dorset’s starry skies
June 2017
Bill Callahan review – intense, spellbinding singer at his deadpan best
Singer-songwriter’s pared-back blues makes a ferocious impact in show that celebrates his classics and dry sense of humour
May 2017
Bill Callahan review – from cult figure to force of nature
The hypnotic singer-songwriter formerly known as Smog strips his mainly old songs back to their bare bones
