Lacking a little oomph, but some very nice touches

It’s assemblage of polite, contemporary pop would make an ideal dinner party backdrop. But the playlist, featuring Tom Odell and Alt-J, was a gift given by David Cameron to his fellow G8 leaders as a “Best of British” soundtrack to their Northern Ireland gathering.

It's rather hard to describe the sound of Forest Swords, as evinced by the new track from the Liverpool producer (aka Matthew Barnes). The piece, “The Weight of Gold”, comes from his August released album Engravings and is streaming through his Soundcloud and at forestswords.tumblr.com. It's a murky, dark and experimental affair, with snippets of guitar tones, beats rolling through, fragments of vocals and various sonic and electronic effects. Whatever which way one describes the thing, it's probably best to say it sounds great and is worth attention.

The songs that are hot on our playlist this week

Their numbers have been decimated by the digital revolution but independent record stores have reported their first sales uplift in a decade boosted by a vinyl revival.

Mazzy Star release their first album in 17 years this September. Seasons of Your Day, co-written by Hope Sandoval (pictured) and David Roback, features performances by all the band's original members, including guests Colm O'Ciosoig of My Bloody Valentine and the late Bert Jansch. This week the band posted “California” on YouTube at tinyurl.com/os96qro. It's a gorgeous, affecting song, sure to please fans of their shoegaze dream-pop.

A new generation of indie artists is taking inspiration from 17th-century witch trials, war-time propaganda and other intriguing corners of British history. By Chris Mugan

Half Moon Run are playing the i Arena at this year's Latitude festival at Henham Park, Suffolk

'Built for muddy trails, perfect for tackling potholes'

Is this the new Neneh Cherry? Gilles Peterson snapped up her soulful pop song “'Bout You” which she had posted online for his compilation CD.

Glyndebourne Festival Opera, East Sussex

Week four in my adventures in using every single pan in any given kitchen and, on a cartoon high after re-reading some old Calvin and Hobbes, aka my Ulysses, I plump to road-test a comic-book cookbook.

Don’t let the hipster hype scare you away.

Editors shed a key band member and a producer as they struggled to make their new record. They tell James McNair that it was worth it