thu 24/07/2025

New Music Reviews

Theatre at Glastonbury Festival 2023 - so big and wild a hallucination, you're always left wanting more

Anya Ryan

And that’s it again for another year. Oh Glastonbury. A fever dream where the time of reality stops as you hop on a ride to a land of magic.

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Music Reissues Weekly: Blossom Dearie - Discover Who I Am

Kieron Tyler

Had Blossom Dearie overtly embraced pop, her vocal style could be characterised as along the lines of Priscilla Paris, Jane Birkin or Saint Etienne’s Sarah Cracknell – intimate, a little breathy, oxygenated. However, jazz was her bag and June Christy, Peggy Lee and Norway’s Karin Krog are the closest reference points.

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Peter Gabriel, OVO Hydro, Glasgow review - beaming with optimism and creativity

Jonathan Geddes

Even when Peter Gabriel is bleak, he has reasons to be cheerful. Early on in his set he opined that soon enough “none of us will have jobs anymore”, referring to the ongoing rise of artificial intelligence, although this was followed by him stressing the positives that can be found in such new technology. It seemed fitting, because Gabriel himself, now 73, showed on this evening that optimistic possibilities of the future occupy his thoughts as much as ever.

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Album: Brigid Mae Power - Dream From The Deep Well

Kieron Tyler

The cover versions on Dream From The Deep Well include “I Know Who is Sick,” most familiar from the Clancy Brothers and Tommy Maken interpretation, and “Down by the Glenside,” which The Dubliners incorporated into their repertoire. The first opens the album, the second closes it. Between, amongst the original compositions, there is also an adaptation of Tim Buckley’s “I Must Have Been Blind.”

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Siouxsie, The Halls, Wolverhampton review - former Banshee brings the house down

Guy Oddy

When the Queen of the Goths comes down from her castle to tour the UK, given that she hasn’t played here at all in the last 10 years, people take notice.

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The War On Drugs, OVO Hydro, Glasgow review - impressive musicianship but a lack of excitement

Jonathan Geddes

War might be good for absolutely nothing, but it does provide bands with some easy names. Before the War on Drugs headline set, Warpaint took to the stage, and despite a muted reaction to the quartet they were on enjoyable form. They’re unlikely to ever be topping the bill in arenas in their own right, but maybe that’s a good thing, and the funky closing double header of “New Song” and “Disco//Very” whipped by with pace and verve.

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Pete Fij / Terry Bickers, Worthing Festival 2023 review - lyricism, amusing anecdotes and gorgeous guitar playing

Thomas H Green

Pete Fij and Terry Bickers are bathed in muted red light. They are sat side-by-side, Fij with an acoustic guitar, Bickers with a vintage 1970s CMI hollow-bodied electric. Behind them, oil wheel lighting gloops and bubbles gently, bespattered with glowing green circles cast by the stationary disco ball hanging high above them. “It’s surprising to see how much life you can fit into the back of a van,” sings Fij, dolefully, then adds, “It only took two trips.”

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Arctic Monkeys, Arsenal Emirates Stadium review - the masters of indie pop excel

Kathryn Reilly

“I hope they do Mardy Bum,” a small boy squeaks longingly to his mother. She was probably his age when Whatever People Say I Am, That's What I’m Not came out almost two decades ago. This is very much a multi-generational affair incorporating those of us who were too old to like them when they started, their peers now also in their mid-30s, and lots and lots of kids.

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Music Reissues Weekly: Tribal Rites of the New Saturday Night

Kieron Tyler

“It all started with a June 7, 1976 article in New York magazine about Queens, New York working-class young adults who flocked to a local disco in platform shoes and outlandish clothes to perform organized dances. [Bee Gees manager] Stigwood read Tribal Rites of Saturday Night, and immediately bought the rights from the author, seminal rock critic Nik Cohn.”

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Chvrches, Barrowland Ballroom, Glasgow review - homecoming provides only intermittent thrills

Jonathan Geddes

Of all the Scottish bands to be name dropped at a Chvrches gig, the Bay City Rollers would be far down the list. Thankfully singer Lauren Mayberry was only citing the 70s group in reference to her tartan outfit, and not a surprise cover of “Shang-A-Lang”, but the Glasgow trio do share another similarity, in that they’ve proved to have considerable staying power in the pop world.

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