New music
Tim Cumming
Linda Thompson, one of Britain's great living singers, has just released her third solo album since her return to recording with 2001's Fashionably Late.Talking in her London home before travelling to the US, she opens up about her latest record, It Won't Be Long Now, working with ex-husband Richard and her children Teddy, Kami and Muna, coping with the dysphonia that has afflicted her voice since 1973, and her enduring love for traditional music and the work of Martin Carthy, Dave Swarbrick and other old friends. Also today, exclusive to theartsdesk, she runs through her top 10 all-time Read more ...
Tim Cumming
"I’m up to my ass in traditional songs," Linda Thompson says in the extensive Q&A published today on theartsdesk. When she talked to me she also discussed her early adventures in traditional folk music. "I was already interested in folk singing in Glasgow," she said. "Great people like Archie Fisher. When I came to London I got friendly with Sandy Denny, who was singing at The Troubadour. I’d been singing seriously since I was 18, in folk clubs, with Martin Carthy, Norma Waterson, all those people. I really liked the music. I’d grown up with American music, so had never heard Read more ...
Kieron Tyler
Madness: Take it or Leave itIn 1981, Madness followed The Beatles, Slade and The Sex Pistols by playing versions of themselves in a film. Take it or Leave it is no masterpiece, but it is hugely entertaining. At the time, surprisingly, a soundtrack album wasn’t issued and its belated appearance on CD plugs a gap in the story of Madness.This smart, two-disc set teams a DVD of the film with the shelved album, for which a master tape was assembled. The CD is not a live set though, collecting the rough-and-ready performances seen in the film, but assembles familiar studio recordings and Fats Read more ...
James Williams
"We got 42 years of music to lay on you" is an audacious opening statement for any live band, but when the speaker is Phillip Bailey, lead singer in the current reincarnation of the legendary Earth, Wind & Fire, it is a statement of intent. Playing at the palatial Albert Hall in support of their new album Now, Then & Forever, the current line-up of young session players, complementing the core trio of Bailey, bassist Verdine White and drummer Ralph Johnson, proved without a shadow of a doubt that they still have the energy and skill to hold a crowd enraptured.This is one of the first Read more ...
Russ Coffey
Few artists make critics wince like James Blunt. One described his biggest hit, “You’re Beautiful”, for instance, as being like “Japanese water torture”. Another said Blunt made him want to “rip his ears off”. Still, the erstwhile army officer doesn’t seem to care what critics say. And why should he? Not only have his songs brought him platinum discs, they’ve also helped pay for houses in Ibiza and Switzerland. So, with such a big audience what exactly are the critics' issues? And is Moon Landing going to change their minds?Not a chance. Blunt's mother once opined that some people are simply Read more ...
Serena Kutchinsky
It’s official. The Saturdays are the nation’s number one girl group. Well, these days they’re more of a yummy mummy collective, with two of their members having recently popped out sprogs. Since Girls Aloud bowed out last year amid the usual round of back-stabbing and bitch fighting, this overly made-up fivesome have elbowed their way to the top of the charts.With Little Mix battling to overcome both second album syndrome and the X Factor curse, The Saturdays have little competition. No longer a cheap alternative to the glossier girl groups, their sound and style has matured since they first Read more ...
Guy Oddy
Without doubt, 2013 has been the year of Rudimental on Planet Pop: a second number one single with “Waiting All Night”; a number one debut album with Home, hugely successful festival appearances, and plenty of TV coverage. It’s no wonder that the youth of the West Midlands (and some of their mums and dads, by the look of things) turned up to see the band in their droves at this O2 Academy show that’s been sold out for weeks. “Eagerly anticipated” doesn’t cover it.Things kicked off early with plenty of warm-up action from Joel Compass and then Shakka’s laid-back grooves and finally DJ Gorgon Read more ...
Adam Sweeting
This is studio album number 10 for the seasoned Seattle-ites, and on a first listening you might feel inclined to flip it into the bin marked "solid but unexciting". Give it a bit of time to breathe though and it starts to reveal its strengths.Among these are the lead guitar playing of Mike McCready, something of an unsung hero in the annals of axemanship but a chap eminently capable of blowing the bloody doors off in a variety of styles. For instance in "Mind Your Manners", one of the disc's standouts, he unleashes a blistering riff-and-chord barrage in a bring-back-the-Dead-Kennedys style, Read more ...
Russ Coffey
You couldn’t help marvelling at how good Alison Moyet looked. It wasn’t just her dramatically slimmed-down physique, but also the sense of her being truly comfortable in her own skin. Partly, that may have just been a result of an increasingly optimistic outlook. But also it seemed to emanate from Moyet's confidence in her new material. Since its release in May, her new album, The Minutes, has been well received. Could the songbird from Billericay also work that synth-heavy magic, live?Certainly there were no complaints from the audience. Indeed, at times, it appeared as if Alf could have Read more ...
Guy Oddy
Read anything about rock music in the Seventies - about British hard rock music in particular - and three bands are pushed forward as titans: Black Sabbath, Led Zeppelin and Deep Purple. However, while both Black Sabbath and Led Zeppelin have gone on to receive widespread critical acclaim and massive sales since their glory days, Deep Purple have assumed the position of a guilty pleasure – at best. How is it that the band who produced songs such as “Black Night”, “Highway Star” and “Smoke on the Water” have not been subject to a whole Friday night’s coverage on BBC Four?The line-up fronted by Read more ...
Thomas H. Green
There has been conjecture that Motörhead’s latest album is titled in honour of frontman Lemmy Kilmister’s recent health problems, notably the insertion of an ICD (Implantable Cardioverter-Defibrillator) in his chest after he suffered cardiac arrhythmia and other circulatory issues. However, one listen to Aftershock gives the finger to any notion that his band is slowing down. It may not be a match for 2010’s The World is Yours, a beast of an album whose fearless Götterdämmerung defiance was startling, but there’s enough solid Motörhead jolt to satisfy.Boasting the ramped-up amphetamine blues- Read more ...
Lisa-Marie Ferla
If Glasgow was to find a little corner for the traditional spirit of vaudeville to live on, it would make sense if it was this one: set the basement of a 19th century church with an audience sitting in lines on gold-painted seats; and two highly accomplished songwriters introducing each other with the sense of ceremony you so rarely find at concerts these days. This was one of the first stops on Emily Barker and the Red Clay Halo’s epic tour of every corner of the UK - there are over 20 of these shows still to go - and if the band and tour-mate Chris T-T can succeed in making every night feel Read more ...