New Music Reviews
Aimee Mann, Royal Festival HallTuesday, 29 January 2013
Aimee Mann must surely be one of the most unstarry of stars. While most of her fans were still in the bar thinking about what they might have as a pre-gig aperitif, she strolled onstage to join support act Ted Leo for a couple of new songs they have written together. No grand diva entrance here, she just strapped on a bass guitar and stood next to the Costello-ish Leo pulling at those strings. Moral? Never ignore the support act, it might feature the person you've paid to see. Read more... |
Sahara Soul, Barbican HallSunday, 27 January 2013
Bassekou Kouyaté’s ngoni looks like a real bugger to play. Its hollow body is the size and shape of a child’s cricket bat and its rounded fretless neck is thinner than that of a broomstick. It’s a mystery how anyone gets a note out of this ancestor of the banjo's four strings, never mind play the kind of galloping, coruscating solos that this Malian virtuoso gets out of it. Read more... |
Reissue CDs Weekly: 94 Baker Street Revisited, Buzzcocks, Tim Hardin, Julian CopeSunday, 27 January 2013
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Matthew Halsall/Zara McFarlane, Ronnie Scott'sFriday, 25 January 2013
Fronting her four piece band - pianist Peter Edwards and saxophonist Binker Golding among them - the young jazz/soul singer Zara McFarlane performs a mix of new songs and tunes from her album, Until Tomorrow. Among the former, “Woman in the Olive Groves” is inspired by a midnight taxi ride through southern Italy, passing an African woman by the highway, among the olive groves, trading her sex. Read more... |
Hammer & Tongue + Slipjam:B - 10th Annual Poets vs MCs, Concorde 2, BrightonFriday, 25 January 2013
For a decade these two outfits, the Hammer & Tongue poetry collective and the Slipjam:B crew of hip hop MCs, have been taking each other on. They both run their own successful nights but this evening is their yearly face-off. As it reaches its climax, after a series of rounds, the two units are onstage together, MCs stage right, poets stage left, taking turns to front up, laying into each other, riding a thin line between affable digs and bawdy insult. Read more... |
RBMA presents LFO, XOYOMonday, 21 January 2013
Of all the major acts from the the acid house/rave explosion, Leeds's LFO seem least interested in becoming a “heritage act”. Perhaps it's because Mark Bell (the sole member of LFO since the early departure of Gez Varley) has no need to cash in on the brand, thanks to his lucrative “day job” as producer of choice for the likes of Björk and Depeche Mode. Read more... |
Reissue CDs Weekly: Hawkwind, Dual Form, The Children’s Hour, Buddy GuySunday, 20 January 2013
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Glen Campbell: The Rhinestone Cowboy, BBC FourSaturday, 19 January 2013
Although there was no shortage of interview clips with Glen Campbell [who has died at the age of 81] in this fine overview of his career, the tragedy was that archives were so heavily drawn on. Tragic because pop-country stylist Campbell has Alzheimer’s and is limited in what he can contribute. Read more... |
Sinéad O'Connor, LSO St Lukes, LondonFriday, 18 January 2013
The manner and the speed with which Sinéad O’Connor veers between impishly poking fun at herself and her material, and delivering it with scorching force, is bewildering. Read more... |
Dropkick Murphys, Barrowlands, GlasgowThursday, 17 January 2013
Was there ever a band to generate such passionate fan adulation as Dropkick Murphys? Keeping up a chant of "Let's Go Murphys" for a good 10 minutes before there was any sign of the Boston seven-piece on the city's most famous stage, the Glasgow punks were in fine voice even before the raucous singalongs began. Read more... |
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