wed 28/05/2025

New Music Reviews

theartsdesk on Vinyl 90: Small Faces, ESKA, Luvcat, Dope Lemon, Celia Cruz, Monolake and more

Thomas H Green

VINYL OF THE MONTH

Emily Saunders Moon Shifts Oceans (The Mix Sounds)

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Album: Sally Shapiro - Ready to Live a Lie

Kieron Tyler

Ready to Live a Lie is so sonically vaporous it almost isn’t there. While the album’s 11 tracks draw from continental European musical archetypes – specifically Italian disco and Eurovision-styled balladry – there is little solidity which can be grasped. The wispy clouds in the album’s cover image are emblematic.

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Music Reissues Weekly: Johnnie Taylor - Who's Making Love The Stax Singles 1966-1970

Kieron Tyler

Johnnie Taylor’s big break came with the ever-fabulous September 1968 single “Who's Making Love.” His ninth 45 for the Stax label, it went Top Ten on the Billboard Hot 100. Up to this point, the Arkansas-born singer had been on the R&B charts only. Hitting the mainstream countdown had taken a while: Taylor’s first solo single had been issued in April 1961.

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Pixies, O2 Academy, Birmingham review - indie veterans pack the house

Guy Oddy

Pixies might just be the ultimate Radio 6 Dad band. They’ve been around (on-and-off) for around 40 years; they’ve got a fine back catalogue of slightly weird, guitar-driven scuzzy rock music and they have absolutely no pretentions to being flash at all.

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The Great Escape Festival 2025, Brighton review - a feast of music from across the world

Caspar Gomez

Photographer Finetime and I have our first pints outside Dalton’s, a bar on Brighton seafront, at almost exactly midday. They are Beavertown Neck Oil IPA at 4.3%. The sun is out, glinting off the sea. Feels like the calm before the storm.

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Music Reissues Weekly: Chapterhouse - White House Demos

Kieron Tyler

Quoted in an early music press article on his band Chapterhouse, singer-guitarist Stephen Patman said their ambition was “to have our records on sale in 20 years’ time. To leave something behind when we die." That was September 1990, in a piece tied-in to their soon-to-be-issued debut single.

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Songlines Encounters, Kings Place review - West African and Anatolian magic

Tim Cumming

Songlines Encounters is your round-the-world ticket to great world music and performances, a chance to travel widely in music and culture without the burden of check-ins, passport control, flight delays, or transfers. 

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The Great Escape Festival 2025, Brighton review - a dip into Thursday

Thomas H Green

As every social space in Brighton once again transforms into a mire of self-important music biz sorts loudly bellowing about “waterfalling on Spotify”, it’s also a great time for those who relish gigs by new talent from all over the world. For three days (four, if you count warm-up Wednesday), every nook and cranny has half-hour showcases running from lunchtime until close. And on top of that are the freebie Alternative Escape fringe events.

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Lucy Farrell, Catherine MacLellan, The Green Note review - sublime frequencies

Tim Cumming

Lucy Farrell, one quarter of the brilliant, award-winning Anglo-Scots band Furrow Collective, and a solo artist whose stunning debut album, We Are Only Sound, was released in 2023, divides her time between the UK – she’s a native of Kent – and Prince Edward Island, a musically rich parcel of land off Canada’s eastern seaboard. The island is home to the other half of this sublime folk-acoustic double bill, Juno Award-winning songwriter Catherine MacLellan.

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PUP, SWG3, Glasgow review - controlled chaos from Canadian punks

Jonathan Geddes

According to PUP lead singer Stefan Babcock, the Toronto foursome practiced together a grand total of twice before embarking on their current UK and European tour.

Given the band’s well-known habit for disagreements and teetering on the edge of imploding, that might have been a wise decision. It didn’t affect the show itself, for while the group’s history is littered with chaos, this was a lively but controlled display. 

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It all started on 09/09/09. That memorable date, September 9 2009, marked the debut of theartsdesk.com.

It followed some...

Album: Sally Shapiro - Ready to Live a Lie

Ready to Live a Lie is so sonically vaporous it almost isn’t there. While the album’s 11 tracks draw from continental European musical...

Il Trittico, Opéra de Paris review - reordered Puccini works...

So here in Paris, as at Salzburg in 2022, it’s no longer “Puccini’s Trittico” but “the Asmik Grigorian Trittico”. Which would be...

When the Light Breaks review - only lovers left alive

Grief takes unexpected turns over the course of a long Icelandic...

Marwood, Crabb, Wigmore Hall review - tangos, laments and an...

James Crabb is a musical magician, taking the ever-unfashionable accordion into new and unlikely places, through bespoke arrangements of a...

Dennis, RSNO, Dunedin Consort, Søndergård, Usher Hall, Edinb...

"How long is Wagner’s Ring Cycle?" That’s not the opening to a joke, it’s a genuine question asked by a friend who I’d met up with before heading...

Dara Ó Briain, Soho Theatre Walthamstow review - master stor...

Dara Ó Briain’s  has described his previous show So… Where Were We? – in which he describes his search for his birth...

Album: Anna Lapwood - Firedove

This album Firedove (Sony Classical), surely, has to be seen as part of a bigger story: that of organist, choir director and...