We first met Paul Adams when we were riding bikes from San Francisco to Los Angeles with the Pablove Foundation to raise money for pediatric cancer. He was full of life, full of love for Manchester United and raising money for children. We’ve kept up with Paul over the years including, a few months ago, coffee at the Chelsea Market, where he masterfully guided my son and me to the best pub in New York City to watch football on a Saturday morning. We will hand it over to Paul now….
Me: Paul Adams
Hello everyone, Paul here. Born in the northwest of England, live in the northeast of the United States. The U.S. northwest is pretty and full of great riding—hello, Bend, Oregon—but it’s too far from my beloved Manchester. I manage songwriters, record producers and artists for a living. I used to think that makes me cool; it does not. Cool-adjacent at best. Reality is, I’m paid to have conversations the actual cool people don’t want to have. I love my job though. It’s taken me all over the world and I’ve worked with some of the biggest artists in the world, from Jay-Z to Radiohead and Duran Duran to Justin Timberlake and tons more. I’m mainly on the recorded side of the business but go to an unholy number of gigs.
Oh, and I like to ride bikes; it’s my therapy. Usually, my riding is limited to a 100-mile radius of New York City, but I’ve had great cycling adventures in Colorado, Utah, Oregon and California, mainly on the annual Pablove Across America that benefits the great work of the Pablove Foundation. When not riding bikes, I DJ from time to time, I like a pint of Guinness, and I follow Manchester United Football Club and Phoenix Rising Football Club.
Cameron Winter: “Heavy Metal” and Geese: “Getting Killed”
Not to go off topic, but pretty much the first thing anybody asks me when they find out I work in music are for my thoughts on music and AI. And I generally give a canned response about any art being about communicating emotion, ya-da, ya-da ya-da. What I should actually do is tell people to listen to these two amazing records, released nine months apart: the Cameron Winger record in December 2024, followed by Geese in September ’25. The fundamental should always be the song, and these two records are full of them.
Westerman: “A Jackal’s Wedding”
I was sat at Nashville airport waiting for my flight back to NYC talking on the phone with a colleague who finished the call by asking me if I’d heard of Westerman (I had) before telling me there was an unreleased completed album and did I want to hear it (of course I did). So he sent it to me and when I got to the office the following morning I basically rinsed it all day. I focused pretty quickly in on the track “Mosquito” as a standout on a record full of great tunes and was shocked when my colleague told me he couldn’t put his finger on a favorite track. What is he on about?, I thought, but then realized that maybe “Spring” was my favorite, or “Nevermind.” The fact is, This is about as complete an album of great songs as you’d hope to hear and rarely do I listen to just one of the songs.
Tame Impala: “Deadbeat”
For some reason and one I can’t put my finger on, longtime fans of Tame Impala have decried this record. I love it. And maybe it’s because I was never that big a Tame fan to begin with. Yeah, I enjoyed them and would go to the gig if they were local, but I wasn’t a diehard, which all of their fans seemed to be. The world’s largest cult band. This album sounds fresh to me and if “My Old Ways” isn’t the best album opener you’ve heard this year then I don’t know what is; and if you do, then holler and let me know. It sets the table.
There’s tension here, groove, melody, just an absolute fucking vibe.
Automatic: “Is It Now?”
This isn’t a new record, it’s actually a great lost album from a Manchester band that came out on Factory Records in the early ’80s, right around the time of “Power, Corruption and Lies” by New Order, with the same love of synths but a bit more bpm in the rhythm. Except, that’s all bollocks.
Dijon: “Baby”
Unless you’re already in on Dijon, chances are you don’t really know what he’s about. Maybe you’ve never even heard of him. Or, if you have, but you’re not in, maybe you think of him as the guy who “did something with Mk.gee, right?” An-y-way…. The first few albums I’ve listed here were easy, the fifth was not, only because there have been a lot of great albums this year. And, yes, I know I cheated with the whole Cameron/Geese thing so actually backed six new records and not five.
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