The Hot Five – My favourite new tracks of the week, usually rounded off with a classic, obscure or alternate track from my music collection.

Track of the week: Southern – ‘Where The Wild Are’

As with a number of fantastic tracks that I’ve reviewed in my time with Muso’s Guide, ‘Where The Wild Are’ took my by surprise when it came on randomly after the Ting Tings’ track you’ll hear below. The Belfast trio, who are based in Liverpool, consists of brother and sister Thom and Lucy Southern, and drummer Eoghan Clifford. The bluesy slide guitar riff that you hear in the track is fantastic, and the arrangement and sound of the song is absolutely spot on as it stomps its way into your life. The southern style blues that these guys are creating is mature and clever; this is exciting new music from an exciting new band. Southern are currently touring, and you can see them across the UK and Ireland this month.

Note: If you like this track, check out ‘World Don’t Shine’ here.

The Ting Tings – ‘Do It Again’

The Ting Tings – one of those bands that you either love or hate. The duo are set to release their third album, Super Critical, at the end of the month and have released the track ‘Do It Again’ in the run up to the album release. ‘Do It Again’ contains the funky guitar rhythms that featured in some of the more successful tracks in The Ting Tings’ back catalogue (I’m thinking ‘Shut Up and Let Me Go’), whilst the vocals of Katie White and great work from producer Andy Taylor also help to make the track a captivating listen. You can catch The Ting Tings live in the UK at the end of November.

New Build – ‘Look In Vain’

A Fantastically catchy dance track, ‘Look In Vain’ is taken from Hot Chip offshoot New Build’s new album Pour It On, which is set to be released on October 20 via Sunday Best. Directed by Jason Bradbury, the unsettling new video for New Build's second single explores themes of religion, retribution and idolatry worship. 'I’m an extremely lapsed Catholic and a literature student, so inevitably a lot of the King James Bible gets mixed into my socialist-secularist thinking' explains vocalist Al Doyle.

Bass Drum of Death – ‘Left For Dead’

Any band that calls themselves Bass Drum of Death deserves three minutes of my time to listen to their latest track. It turns out that the attitude-filled garage rock of John Barrett’s project was well worth investing time in. Yes, the video is a little weird, but the track itself is filled with great guitar riffs and a great, punky vocal performance. ‘Left For Dead’ is taken from the new album, Rip This, which was released on Monday.

Hidden track of the week: Thom Yorke – ‘House of Cards’

It’s Tuesday as I’m sat here, so here’s my happy birthday to Thom Yorke: ‘House of Cards’ taken from the band’s fantastic 2007 album In Rainbows. The video for ‘House of Cards’ was filmed with no lights or cameras, but instead utilised 3D plotting technologies to collect information about the shapes and relative distances of objects. The video was created entirely from visualisations of that data.

Any excuse to play a bit of Radiohead.

You can follow Tom on twitter @tom_fake.

The Hot Five – My favourite new tracks of the week, usually rounded off with a classic, obscure or alternate track from my music collection.

Track of the week: Saint Agnes – ‘Old Bone Rattle’

It is widely acknowledged that guitar music is having a bit of a tough time of it at present. Saint Agnes’ rock n roll style trippy Western inspired psychedelic-rock certainly reminds us of what we’re missing. ‘Old Bone Rattle’ is raw, it’s bold, and it’s seriously fucking cool. Saint Agnes, aka Jon Tufnell and Kitty Austen, initially bonded over a mutual love of Nick Cave and Jack White, and those influences are as strong as the dual vocal line that erupts from the tracks first hook. This is an instant classic.

Black Rivers – ‘The Ship’

Just the other day I was listening to a couple of tracks from Doves’ 2009 album Kingdom Of Rust, and I wondered what had happened to them. It turns out that Doves announced a hiatus in 2010, but recently twin brothers Jez and Andy Williams have announced the formation of a new band, Black Rivers. The two-piece’s first single starts with a sparse intro, before developing the track with electronic synth sound that build ‘The Ship’ into an atmospheric piece typical of Doves at their best. The song is available as a free download from this link.

Bruno Merz – ‘Into The Air’

Sit back, relax, and take in ‘Into The Air’, the first track to be shared from New Zealand folk artist Bruno Merz’s new album Highways. As a track, ‘Into The Air’ is tranquil, and if you take the time to listen to this song in the right settings you will definitely be rewarded. The quality of the fragile vocal gives such character to the song, and the minimal arrangement works perfectly to create a relaxing atmosphere. If this track isn’t fitting for a Muso, I don’t know what is.

You can download this track for free via Bruno Merz’s official website

William Fitzsimmons – ‘Fortune (Acoustic)’

Liked the last track, yeah? Definitely press play on this one then. William Fitzsimmons is known for his cleverly emotive songwriting, and his raw talent really shines through when you strip the arrangement down to its bare essentials. In this acoustic arrangement the focus is on the delicate vocal line, which is simply mesmerizing. New EP The Acoustic Sessions is available now, with four new stripped down arrangements of previous recordings.

Hidden track of the week: Radiohead – ‘Staircase’

Radiohead were voted the most influential band on the planet this week…. Like I really need an excuse to share a Radiohead song. ‘Staircase’ was recorded in the TKOL From The Basement session alongside ‘The Daily Mail’, and was released in 2011. Radiohead are set to regroup in the near future to begin work on a potential ninth studio album.

You can follow Tom on twitter @tom_fake