Alpha Maid: Is This a Queue review – Mica Levi collaborator pairs scuffed production with superb songwriting

(AD 93)
Hook-laden tracks are woven through wandering instrumentals, ritualistic drum workouts and scrappy guitar jams

Alpha Maid has been quietly honing her smoggy DIY sound since 2019, when she released her first EP via Curl Recordings, the collective and label founded by Mica Levi, Coby Sey and Brother May. Six years and seven releases on (including a few collaborations with Levi), the sound of that scene continues to resonate in the experimental London guitarist’s music: the scuffed-up production; the dub influences; the disaffected, barely discernible murmurs and groans. Her new album balances those brilliant scuzzy elements with songwriting that stands on its own two feet.

Though little is given away, Is This a Queue was supposedly written across several years and different locations. It checks out: the record is a cluster of heady, rough-around-the-edges tracks, assembling a motley crew of previous collaborators to document the people and places she has encountered along the way.