New music
CD: Angel Olsen - PhasesMonday, 06 November 2017
An underground American star since 2010’s Strange Cacti EP, Angel Olsen’s distinctive brand of indie folk-rock was propelled to new heights in both Burn Your Fire For No Witness (2014) and then last year with MY WOMAN. After years of touring,... Read more... |
Reissue CDs Weekly: Serge Gainsbourg & Jean-Claude VannierSunday, 05 November 2017
In terms of cinema history, 1969’s Les Chemins de Katmandou is a footnote. Directed by André Cayatte, whose most interesting films were 1963’s interrelated marital dramas Jean-Marc ou la Vie Conjugale and Françoise ou la Vie Conjugale, it was a... Read more... |
CD: Oli Rockberger - SovereignSunday, 05 November 2017
This fourth studio album from pianist, vocalist, songwriter and producer Oli Rockberger highlights his remarkable knack of marrying instantly memorable chorus hooks with captivating harmonies steeped in jazz, soul, gospel and R&B.Consisting of... Read more... |
Queen: Rock the World, BBC Four review - we won't rock youSaturday, 04 November 2017
Forty years ago Whispering Bob Harris made a documentary about Queen. He eavesdropped on them as they recorded the album News of the World and then followed them around America on tour. The film was never broadcast but the footage was exhumed for... Read more... |
theartsdesk Radio Show 21Saturday, 04 November 2017
The latest of Peter Culshaw’s global music round-up of new and re-released sounds features new albums from veteran Afro-beat pioneer Tony Allen, an astonishing collaboration between revered string quartet Kronos and Malian traditionalists Trio Da... Read more... |
CD: Sam Smith - The Thrill of It AllSaturday, 04 November 2017
In a sense, the air of tedium that surrounds Sam Smith is a wonderful thing. This is a person who can talk about having fluid gender identity and make it sound as if he's simply unsure whether he prefers boiled or mashed potatoes: that is, he's... Read more... |
CD: The Burning Hell - Revival BeachThursday, 02 November 2017
“The Babysitter” tells the story of a Scottish spy embedded with the Nazis during World War Two who has come home. His sister tells him that Unity Mitford is convalescing at a nearby cottage. Visiting, he finds that it’s a maternity home. The... Read more... |
CD Special: Bob Dylan's Trouble No More review - he’d never sound betterWednesday, 01 November 2017
After more than 35 years of subterranean bootleg life, Bob Dylan’s incendiary gospel shows and sessions from 1979 to 1981 are seeing the light of day as volume 13 of the Official Bootleg Series. Trouble No More comes as a regular two-CD and deluxe... Read more... |
CD: TootArd - Laisser PasserWednesday, 01 November 2017
It’s impossible to discuss TootArd without digging into the history of their region. They’re a funky desert blues outfit but they don’t derive from Saharan Africa; they were born and raised in the village of Majdal Shams in the Golan Heights. This... Read more... |
Steely Dan / The Doobie Brothers, Bluesfest 2017 review - brilliant Dan, delicious DoobiesMonday, 30 October 2017
Following the recent death of the band's co-founder Walter Becker, it seemed faintly remarkable that Steely Dan went ahead with this O2 show at all – it was the closing night event of Bluesfest 2017 – but Becker’s absence wasn’t allowed to detract... Read more... |
CD: Mélanie De Biasio - LilliesMonday, 30 October 2017
Mélanie De Biasio is a Belgian jazz singer, an album-charting artist in her home country, and rising star elsewhere. She is not a woman who takes the straightforward path. No album of Nat King Cole covers for her. No Jamie Cullum guest appearances... Read more... |
Reissue CDs Weekly: Paul Major’s Feel the MusicSunday, 29 October 2017
Dave Porter has a question. He wants to know where clouds go. “After they pass by, are they just like people, that go on and then die?” The figurative bit between his teeth, he wonders if small clouds “are lonely, like you and I? Do they just go to... Read more... |
