CDs/DVDs
DVD: Post Tenebras LuxTuesday, 23 July 2013
Post Tenebras Lux is a hard film to love, but it is one which engrosses. Although riveting, its appeal is akin to the fascination exerted by catastrophes and car pile-ups. Fittingly, the taste it leaves is bitter. It’s also hard to digest. Contrary... Read more... |
CD: E.m.m.a. - Blue GardensMonday, 22 July 2013
“Formulaic” is all too frequently used pejoratively in reviews – but from minuets to minimalism, Bo Diddley to drum'n'bass, finding a formula that works and sticking to it has produced some of the finest music in human history. Liverpool-born... Read more... |
Reissue CDs Weekly: Michael Hurley, James Govan, Dan Penn, 14 Iced BearsSunday, 21 July 2013
Michael Hurley: Armchair Boogie / Hi Fi Snock UptownWith songs about werewolves, penguins, the English upper classes, trains, the police and more werewolves, these albums from surrealist folk maverick Michael Hurley are charming and occasionally... Read more... |
CD: Guy Clark - My Favorite Picture of YouSunday, 21 July 2013
Nashville’s singer, songwriter, luthier and hard liver Guy Clark delivered one of the best country albums of the Noughties, 2009’s Somedays the Song Writes You. Sporting the likes of "Hemingway’s Whiskey", "The Guitar" and "Maybe I Can Paint Over... Read more... |
CD: Gogol Bordello - Pura Vida ConspiracySaturday, 20 July 2013
It’s bemusing that Gogol Bordello are not a mainstream success story. Shouldn’t they be a new Green Day or a 21st century Pogues? When Rick Rubin signed them to his American Recordings for their last album, 2010’s Trans-Continental Hustle, which he... Read more... |
DVD: A London Trilogy – The Films of Saint Etienne 2003-2007Friday, 19 July 2013
The default word for these films, made by the band Saint Etienne with their collaborator and former guitarist Paul Kelly, is "poignant". As elegiac visual poems which capture the always-evolving environment of London, they certainly are expressive.... Read more... |
CD: Selena Gomez - Stars DanceThursday, 18 July 2013
At the risk of coming over a bit Daily Mail, my, hasn’t she grown up? I refer not to the career management decisions that have seen the former Disney Channel star turned head Belieber handed dubious photoshoots and sexed-up roles in Harmony Korine... Read more... |
CD: Fuck Buttons - Slow FocusWednesday, 17 July 2013
Drawing connections between the far margins and the relative mainstream always leaves you in a difficult position, as it invites judgement from different groups with very different criteria. And the duo of Andrew Hung and Benjamin John Power put... Read more... |
DVD: The Birth of a NationTuesday, 16 July 2013
How do you solve a problem like The Birth of a Nation? Do you admire the first part and turn away from the second (after all, the Germans screened The Sound of Music for years in a Nazi-free version ending with the marriage of Maria and Captain von... Read more... |
CD: Cüneyt Sepetçi and Orchestra Dolapdere- Bahriye ÇiftetellisiMonday, 15 July 2013
The Roma have always existed on the margins: by choice, as they are nomads, but also through prejudice, as they and their outsider status evokes the threat of the unfamiliar. The brilliant gypsy clarinet players of Istanbul, cousins of the virtuosi... Read more... |
Reissue CDs Weekly: Shadow Morton, Motorama, Rob Jo Star Band, Souad MassiSunday, 14 July 2013
Various Artists: Sophisticated Boom Boom!! – The Shadow Morton StoryWithout Shadow Morton, Amy Winehouse could not have made Back to Black. The songs the enigmatic sonic wizard wrote and produced for The Shangri-Las in the mid Sixties were... Read more... |
CD: Snow Ghosts - A Small MurmurationSunday, 14 July 2013
Somewhere round about 10 years ago the concept of “folktronica” settled down to become a relatively stable area of music. Fringe its appeal may have generally been, but it incubated some major talents who are still making great music, and for better... Read more... |
