CDs/DVDs
Album: Dolly Parton - A Dolly Holly ChristmasFriday, 11 December 2020
Think hard. How much schmaltz do you think there is in this album? OK, double that. Now double it again. Nope, you’re still nowhere close. This is the world schmaltz lake with the entire EU cheese mountain forming an island in the middle, all... Read more... |
Album: Calexico - Seasonal ShiftThursday, 10 December 2020
Christmas albums are traditionally, pretty cheesy affairs and Seasonal Shift sees Tex-Mex rockers Calexico join in with the spirit of things, invite a disparate group of friends into the studio and lay the Panela on seriously thick. As well as some... Read more... |
DVD/Blu-ray: Le Cercle RougeTuesday, 08 December 2020
Misdirection is at the heart of Le Cercle Rouge. The Buddhist quote that opens Jean-Pierre Melville’s 1970 thriller – "when men, even unknowingly, are to meet one day… they will inevitably come together in the red circle” – is fake, written by... Read more... |
Album: Chris Kamara - ...And a Happy New YearMonday, 07 December 2020
Now this is exactly what I want for Christmas: a beloved fixture of Saturday afternoon TV putting a lounge jazz spin on some festive classics, backed by an 18-piece swing band. …And a Happy New Year is, somewhat implausibly, the second holiday... Read more... |
Blu-ray: The IrishmanSunday, 06 December 2020
The big talking points of Martin Scorsese’s lauded return to the gangster genre, 2019’s The Irishman, were his reunion after 25 years with Robert De Niro and Joe Pesci, and the state-of the-art “de-aging” process that enabled that pair and Al... Read more... |
Album: The Avalanches - We Will Always Love YouSaturday, 05 December 2020
After a 16-year wait for the second album from Australian sample-stitchers The Avalanches, their third, a mere four years later, feels like a rush release by comparison. We Will Always Love You has been preceded by no fewer than four singles which,... Read more... |
Album: Yungblud - Weird!Friday, 04 December 2020
Doncaster musician Dominic Harrison – Yungblud – appeared a couple of years ago, a self-proclaimed punk, alive with vim and righteousness, touting music that, loosely speaking, fused the snarling northern outrage of Arctic Monkeys with hip hop-... Read more... |
Album: High Contrast - Notes From the UndergroundThursday, 03 December 2020
Dance music has a notably different relationship to its past than other kinds of music. This has a real, material basis: because its core experience is that of the mixed DJ set, in principle nothing is ever the same twice, elements are constantly... Read more... |
Album: Nick Cave & Nicholas Lens - L.I.T.A.N.I.E.S.Wednesday, 02 December 2020
The Covid pandemic has meant, with both performance and recording opportunities at a minimum, that many musicians have had to apply a bit of lateral thinking to keep their creative juices flowing. Nick Cave, of course, is not renowned for running... Read more... |
Blu-ray: Goodbye, Dragon InnTuesday, 01 December 2020
In his exclusive half-hour-plus interview for distributor Second Run, the affable Tsai Ming-Liang makes a striking admission: “I make very uncommercial films.” Viewers of the extra will most likely have just finished Goodbye, Dragon Inn (Bú sàn) (... Read more... |
Album: Sigur Rós - Odin's Raven MagicMonday, 30 November 2020
Odin’s ravens Huginn (thought) and Muninn (memory) are the great Norse god’s messengers, at the heart of a myth that was borrowed in watered-down form for Game of Thrones. The myth inspired a suite of pieces by Sigur Rós and a star-studded... Read more... |
Blu-Ray: La HaineSunday, 29 November 2020
The BFI has done an excellent job of giving La Haine the 4k restoration treatment under the vigilant eye of the film’s cinematographer, Pierre Aïm. From the opening image of planet earth being torched by a slo-mo Molotov cocktail to the... Read more... |
