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MANY years ago, I read a piece by NME rock critic Nick Kent in which he described driving through the American south in 1972.

A song came on the radio which he assumed to be from the forthcoming Byrds reunion album, and so glorious was this song that he was forced to pull over because he was overcome with emotion, his eyes blurry with tears. "They've done it," he said to himself, "they've pulled it off; they've actually done it."

Sadly, of course, they hadn't. The Byrds' reunion album has gone down in history as a lacklustre and uninspired dog, and the song Kent actually heard was the lambent, supernatural and eternal Ballad Of El Goodo by Big Star.

I only mention this here because I had something of a similar epiphany the other week, driving along listening to daytime radio when a song came on which sounded so atypically fresh and brilliant among the habitual makeweight fodder that I was forced to pull over to find out who was responsible.

My first thought, bizarrely, was that it was Bruce Springsteen. "This must be from that new album that everyone's raving about", I thought. "He hasn't sounded this good since... ever" was my next thought, which led me to realise that it wasn't The Boss that I was listening to, despite what on reflection was the slightest of passing resemblances in the vocal department.

Of course - of course - when the song finished the DJ segued it with another one then neglected to mention what the first one was, something which they invariably only ever do on those rare occasions when they play something that you actually want to find out about. So impressed and determined was I, however, that I actually located the radio station website and looked it up.

The song I heard was Mykonos from the Sun Giant EP (Bella Union) by Seattle quintet Fleet Foxes, and it's a Jim Dandy if ever I've heard one - a song you can plunge into and allow to close over your head, secure in the knowledge that there is enough buoyancy in its swirling depths to bear you aloft again.

In case you were worrying that it sounds like Bruce Springsteen - not that I have anything of significance against the man, but that's another debate for another time - it really doesn't, and taken in tandem with the remainder of the EP it paints a picture of a band who genuinely travel to the beat of a different drum.

Those ghostly, keening, unusual harmonies, and songs such as the title track and English House which sound as though they grew organically out of the ground as opposed to having been written, speak of an assiduous but entirely natural avoidance of rock cliche. Go well out of your way to hear them, and watch this space for news of their forthcoming debut album as and when it materialises.

Also currently hitting the spot all over the place in the sonic ambience of the old homestead is We Go Hunting (Beggars Banquet) by iLiKETRAiNS, long-standing faves on this page.

These Leeds-based odd fish excel in generating a hefty sense of solemn foreboding, and their ancient, dusty lyric concerns contribute in no small measure to the pleasing sense of weightiness their music engenders. Simultaneously released with the single is the DVD film Elegies To Lessons Learnt, a mesmerisingly unsettling visualisation of the songs from the album of the same name, calling to mind the work of Czech animator Jan Svankmajer in the dark, swarming unease of its stop-motion techniques.

Elsewhere in the pile, Keep An Open Mind (EMI) by Captain should appeal mightily to fans of The Feeling and Athlete because it sounds like a direct and unadorned cross between The Feeling and Athlete. This needn't be a bad thing, of course: "radio-friendly" isn't necessarily a term of abuse, and Captain seem to know enough about the waters they're sailing in to avoid running aground on the shoals of banality - if you'll pardon the tortuous extended similie.

Duty compels me to report the existence of a new Chris De Burgh compilation, Now And Then (UMTV), which won't go away until I mention it. Now, there is no way on God's brown earth that I can possibly condone this stuff - although I should at least admire him for his almost heroic pursuit of naffness - but I realise that there's a vast audience out there hungry for fresh produce from the man, so here it is.

Be warned, however, that there is only one new track on here - Live For The Day, helped considerably by the presence of Lebanese singer Tina Yamout. Otherwise, it's business as usual, a greatest hits set which will delight or appal depending upon which side of the sanity divide one has pitched one's camp upon.

Finally, please be upstanding and form your fingers into devil horns at the news that a new Whitesnake album is heading your way, namely Good To Be Bad (Steamhammer/SPV). Even though I'd rather pull masonry nails out of a factory gable end using my sphincter rather than have to listen to this again, I still feel kindly disposed towards David Coverdale, a genuinely fine vocalist whose wobble-throated work with Deep Purple is often unfairly overlooked.

An oft-repeated trusim is the phrase "if it ain't broke, don't fix it": Whether or not Whitesnake's todger-swinging stock-in-trade was ever "broke" is entirely a question of personal taste, but rest assured that it hasn't been fixed in the interim. Cue power ballads, squalling guitars and more chest beating than the entire Johnny Weismuller back catalogue.

9:59am Friday 25th April 2008

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