sat 17/05/2025

New Music Reviews

Three Tales, Ensemble BPM, IMAX Science Museum

David Nice

Poised vibrantly enough between the buried-alive monotony of Philip Glass and the dynamic flights of John Adams, Steve Reich’s Three Tales deserves a special place in music-theatre history ("opera" it is not).

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Laura Marling, QEH

Fisun Güner

There’s no doubting the precocious talent of Laura Marling. At just 25 she recently released her fifth album, Short Movie, which matched the spiky introspection of song-writing previously driven by folk melodies with a new rock-orientated sound.

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Wild Card, Jazz Café POSK

Matthew Wright

Jazz-funk organ trio Wild Card have been slowly building a reputation for smoking funk tunes and grooves you could lose a pantechnicon in for some years now. Led by French guitarist Clément Régert, with organist Andy Noble and drummer Sophie Alloway, they perform with quite a range of guests, both instrumentalists and singers, which keeps the atmosphere of their repertoire fresh and varied.

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Reissue CDs Weekly: Bert Jansch

Kieron Tyler

 

Bert Jansch debut LPBert Jansch: Bert Jansch

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The Necks, Village Underground

Matthew Wright

Novelty and rapture are rare commodities in Shoreditch these days, where everything has already been tried, and nothing surprises. But Australian post-jazz trio The Necks, ending their European tour at Village Underground last night, mesmerised the audience into dumbstruck awe with their slo-mo ambient improvisation.

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Paul Simon and Sting, O2 Arena

Fisun Güner

Put your hand up if you were in the audience last night, or indeed on any of the nights of this ambitious On Stage Together tour, and came only to see one man, and that man was Paul Simon. I’m sure you won’t need much nudging. After all, after almost six decades in the business, Simon’s star may have dipped – and endured the political controversy of the Graceland years – but has never faded. Sting’s meanwhile, certainly has.

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Reissue CDs Weekly: David Kauffman and Eric Caboor

Kieron Tyler

 

David Kauffman and Eric Caboor: Songs From Suicide BridgeDavid Kauffman and Eric Caboor: Songs From Suicide Bridge

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Drenge, Institute, Birmingham

Guy Oddy

Drenge made themselves known to the world some 18 months ago, surfing on the back of their abrasive self-titled debut album and some unexpected PR assistance from West Midlands MP Tom Watson. Back then, the Loveless brothers were a loud and lairy duo that took rock music by the scruff of the neck and knocked seven bells out of it with their stripped-down sound. With the recent release of their second album, Undertow, however, there have been some changes.

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A Place To Bury Strangers, Rainbow, Birmingham

Guy Oddy

Dry ice began billowing from the stage of the Rainbow even before the house lights had dimmed and the between-band PA had faded out, allowing New York noiseniks A Place To Bury Strangers to slip behind their instruments unnoticed and burst into set-opener “Straight”, emerging from the fog like mighty sea creatures breaking the waves.

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Reissue CDs Weekly: Fotheringay

Kieron Tyler

 

Nothing More – The Collected FotheringayFotheringay: Nothing More – The Collected Fotheringay

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