New music
Kendal Calling, Lowther Deer Park review - a mini-Glastonbury of the border landsTuesday, 01 August 2017
Kendal Calling is a lovely festival. Charmingly misnamed – it’s set 30 miles from Kendal in Lowther Deer Park, a couple of miles from Penrith, in the northern Lakes – it takes place over four days in spectacularly beautiful Cumbrian countryside. It... Read more... |
Indigo Girls, Islington Assembly Hall review - exhilarating and generousMonday, 31 July 2017
For an act that hasn't visited the UK since 2009, the Indigo Girls might have been surprised at the audience's familiarity with their work. It’s now a given that artists have to tour to sell records, but judging by the vigour with which the audience... Read more... |
WOMAD 2017, Charlton Park review - multicultural nirvana transcends mud-bath conditionsMonday, 31 July 2017
Now in its 35 year, Womad is embedded into British festival culture, flying the flags of a musical multiculturalism that is about breaking down barriers and building new relationships. It’s not something you want to lose.Aside from pleasurable... Read more... |
Silver Birch, Garsington Opera review - gritty drama in the ChilternsMonday, 31 July 2017
"Everyone suddenly burst out singing"’ wrote Siegfried Sassoon in his paean to humanity amidst the horror of war, "Everyone Sang". And sing they did, all 180 of them, crammed onto Garsington’s modest stage for its new community opera Silver Birch by... Read more... |
CD: Girl Ray - Earl GreyMonday, 31 July 2017
Girl Ray. Man Ray. Geddit? Earl Grey, the debut album from London female three-piece Girl Ray isn’t as freewheeling as the art of the man whose name they rework, but it is strikingly reminiscent of a particular strand of introspective 1980’s British... Read more... |
Ladysmith Black Mambazo, Cadogan Hall review - peace, love and harmoniesSunday, 30 July 2017
On a dreary evening in what passes for summer, the news unutterably grim, an evening in the company of South Africa’s greatest export can’t help but lift the spirits. The nine singers that comprise Ladysmith Black Mambazo are mostly blood family,... Read more... |
Reissue CDs Weekly: Marylebone Beat Girls, Milk of the TreeSunday, 30 July 2017
Between them, Marylebone Beat Girls and Milk of the Tree cover the years 1964 to 1973. Each collects tracks recorded by female singers: whether credited as solo acts, fronting a band or singer-songwriters performing self-penned material. That the... Read more... |
CD: Randy Newman - Dark MatterSunday, 30 July 2017
Think of Randy Newman and the image conjured up may be of a lugubrious piano man with a sardonic streak. Or perhaps the composer responsible for countless Pixar soundtracks. But there is more to the bespectacled songsmith than just his witty... Read more... |
theartsdesk at Førdefestivalen - fado, tango and desert blues among the Norwegian fjordsSaturday, 29 July 2017
This year’s Førdefestivalen was gabled by an opening Nordic Sound Folk Orchestra showcase and a spectacular closing gala, live-streamed and broadcast Europe-wide. It featured a dizzyingly eclectic range of world and Nordic folk bands, as well as the... Read more... |
CD: Black Grape - Pop VoodooSaturday, 29 July 2017
It’s a rather shocking 20 years since the somewhat unfairly maligned second Black Grape album Stupid Stupid Stupid was released, after which the band went into freefall before imploding. To celebrate this anniversary, or more likely because it might... Read more... |
CD: Ben Lukas Boysen & Sebastian Plano - EverythingThursday, 27 July 2017
The orchestral-electronic sounds which the Erased Tapes label epitomises exist balanced on a knife-edge of extreme tastefulness. Not quite fitting into either the classical or the club-electronica worlds, the style is closest to film composition –... Read more... |
CD: The Isley Brothers & Santana - Power of PeaceWednesday, 26 July 2017
In media coverage of Woodstock, Santana always seems to be overshadowed by the oft-mentioned cultural significance of Hendrix’s “Star-Spangled Banner”. However, go check their performances, side by side, for pure visceral thrills, and it’s Santana’s... Read more... |
