New Music Reviews
Rokia Traoré: Dream Mandé: Djata, Brighton Festival 2019 review – resonant griot wisdomThursday, 23 May 2019
Rokia Traoré’s passage through this year’s Brighton Festival has been central, binding it to her Malian identity in a series of gigs. This hands-on Guest Director’s pulsing Afro-rock Opening Night was followed by the first Dream Mandé show’s recasting of traditional sounds. A Malian Dance Night added FGM protest, Seventies s.f.-soundtracked myth and cheeky wit from young choreographers. Read more... |
Mark Knopfler, Royal Albert Hall review - the Sultan's returnWednesday, 22 May 2019
Prufrock might have measured his life in coffee spoons but for many of us it’s rock albums, the money to buy them way back when scrabbled together from Saturday jobs and student grants – remember them? Read more... |
Primal Scream, The Haunt, Brighton review - up-close, short, raucous and sweatyTuesday, 21 May 2019
Primal Scream have played in this city, in the recent past, at the 4,500 capacity Brighton Centre but tonight they’re in a venue which holds well under 400. A bananas atmosphere reigns when bands of their stature play intimate shows, and so it is tonight. Read more... |
Sting and Shaggy, Roundhouse review - wilfully uncool and irrepressibly good funMonday, 20 May 2019
Musical odd couples don't come much stranger than Sting and Shaggy. Read more... |
Rokia Traoré: Dream Mandé: Bamanan Djourou, Brighton Festival 2019 review – traditions soar freeMonday, 20 May 2019
Much of Rokia Traoré’s set on Saturday night comprised folk songs about Mali’s warrior kings, connecting with her country’s fabulously wealthy, proudly powerful past. They suit this diplomat’s daughter’s regal stature, which she has put at the service of a nation still enviably rich in musical resources, but battered by civil war, poverty and terrorist attack. Read more... |
Reissue CDs Weekly: Ronnie LaneSunday, 19 May 2019
It was inevitable that Rod Stewart’s distracting solo adventures would eventually kill off Faces, the band he fronted. Less predictable was the departure during their lifetime of another founder member, their bassist and key songwriter Ronnie Lane. Read more... |
Claire Martin, Ronnie Scott’s - swinging hard in SohoSaturday, 18 May 2019
While some vocalists build an entire career on a 'one-timbre-fits-all' approach, one of Claire Martin's greatest strengths is the way in which she brings all of the different colours of her voice into play such that each song is allowed to resonate in the most powerful way. Read more... |
theartsdesk on Vinyl 49 - Part 2: Prince, Johnny Cash, Sparks, Toyah, Adrian Sherwood and moreSaturday, 18 May 2019
We return, after only a week away, with Part 2 of Volume 49. Starting out with an amazing comeback from Adrian Sherwood’s Pay It All Back compilation series as Vinyl of the Month, this edition takes in everything from Prince to death metal to ambient classical. Read more... |
The Specials, Margate Winter Gardens review - ska legends passionate and on-pointWednesday, 15 May 2019
Here they come again – the band most adept at capturing the mood of an era in catchy, critical three-minute songs. Just at the very point we need them most, the original ska-punk popsters surface and their message is as deeply relevant as it was four decades ago. But is this a 40th anniversary or a number one album tour? Read more... |
Chilly Gonzales, Brighton Festival 2019 review - an intimate and exhilarating eveningTuesday, 14 May 2019
Chilly Gonzales sits for so long at the piano, in his smoking jacket and slippers, before commencing his first song that I wonder if this is a John Cage moment. It’s a stark contrast to his energy at the end of the gig, where Chilly (real name, Jason Beck) is stamping both feet in marching motion, his whole body hunched and rocking, hair flicking as he pounds the low keys with virtuosic intensity. Read more... |
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