New Music Buzz
Birthdays on the Tube: 14-20 MarchMonday, 15 March 2010
This week's birthdays include the impeccably funky Sly Stone and Wilson Pickett, manic Chopin played by the great pianist Sviatoslav Richter, lush orientalism from Rimsky-Korsakov, classic jazz from Bix Beiderbecke, and annoying pop from Clare Grogan. Read more... |
Birthdays on the Tube: 28 February-6 MarchSunday, 28 February 2010
Our ongoing series celebrating musicians’ birthdays. This week’s include Lou Reed, in action in a stupendous version of "Venus in Furs" with the Velvet Underground, Chopin played by the wonderful Martha Argerich, archive footage of Miriam Makeba, Brian Jones and bottle-neck blues maestro, Furry Lewis. Videos below. Read more... |
The name of this band is Atoms For PeaceThursday, 25 February 2010
The blogs are alive with the sound of Thom Yorke of Radiohead's new band, which he told us today had the name Atoms For Peace. "It seemed bleedin' obvious," said Yorke of the name on the Radiohead website Dead Air Space. Nerdy, pacifist, retro, ironical: the name ticks all the boxes. An antique phrase of "super-group", once used to describe bands like Blind Faith, has been dusted down to...
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Plastic People vs the MinistryMonday, 22 February 2010
Two London clubs currently appear to be under threat. The Ministry of Sound, one of the most successful brands in club music's history, is kicking up a fuss because new housing block planned opposite it may make it vulnerable to noise complaints. Meanwhile, rumours have flown around over the last 48 hours that police are lobbying Hackney Council against Plastic People in... Read more... |
Headbanging against repressive regimesSunday, 21 February 2010
A new report from Freemuse, the organisation which campaigns against music censorship, describes the oppression of heavy metal musicians in numerous countries. From the underground to the mainstream, heavy metal is a global phenomenon attracting millions of fans – but along the way it has gained many enemies too. “Long-haired music”, as it has been described in Malaysia and China, has been banned by both governments. Read more... |
Birthdays on the Tube: 21-27 FebruarySunday, 21 February 2010
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Brit Awards 2010, Earls CourtWednesday, 17 February 2010
And so to the windswept hangar of Earls Court, and the 30th Anniversary Brit Awards. Except it wasn’t, because as any pedant knows the very first Brits (then mystifyingly entitled the British Record Industry Britannia Centenary Awards) occurred in 1977. No matter. |
Double standards for music blogs?Thursday, 11 February 2010It has been reported today that Google - via its Blogger and Blogspot services - has been closing down popular music blogs and wiping their archives without warning, citing copyright violation by those blogs who post downloadable mp3s of the tracks they review. While hosting copyright material may not by the letter of the law be legal, it seems that this heavy handed approach completely ignores the subtlety of the "grey economy" that exists between bloggers and a music industry which knows full... Read more... |
Alex Ross gives RPS lecture on re-inventing the concertWednesday, 10 February 2010
Should we be silent in classical concerts? Alex Ross, the classical critic of the New Yorker and writer of the superb panorama of 20th Century music The Rest Is Noise: Listening to the Twentieth Century, an “unlikely mass-market proposition” which has been a bestseller on both sides of the Atlantic will be giving this year’s Royal Philharmonic Society Lecture. His talk is entitled Inventing and Reinventing the Classical Concert and will be given on 8 March at the Wigmore... Read more... |
Music for Seven Ice Cream VansTuesday, 09 February 2010
Mine's a Strawberry Mivvi, if you are buying, thanks. Suburban Counterpoint: Music for Seven Ice Cream Vans is a deliciously intriguing work by composer Dan Jones that does what it says on the tin. It will be performed as part of this year's Norfolk and Norwich Festival in May, before being reprised in London. Read more... |
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