New music
Lives in Music #2: How Music Works by David ByrneWednesday, 19 December 2012
Reading How Music Works feels a bit like breaking into David Byrne’s house and randomly nosing around the Word files on his computer. First there’s some stuff about whether specific types of music were subconsciously written with certain acoustic... Read more... |
CD of the Year: Two Fingers - Stunt RhythmsTuesday, 18 December 2012
First off, if you want to read a proper review of Two Fingers’ album just head here where I reviewed it a few months back. Instead, starting today and for the rest of the year, the musical side of Disc of the Day will be devoting itself more... Read more... |
Thank You for the Days: Remembering Kirsty MacCollTuesday, 18 December 2012
On December 18, 2000, Kirsty MacColl was killed after being struck by a motorboat while scuba diving with her two sons in Cozumel, Mexico. The tragic, criminal circumstances of her death – the boat was speeding in a restricted area – and subsequent... Read more... |
Lives in Music #1: Rod the AutobiographyTuesday, 18 December 2012
What makes a good rock biography? Sex, naturally. Drugs, frequently. Rock’n’roll, obviously. None of the above are in short supply in Rod Stewart’s account of a long life spent howling into microphones and knocking up blondes. He came, he snorted,... Read more... |
New Music Exclusive: KanZeOnMonday, 17 December 2012
Joe Muggs writes: “KanZeOn is one of my favourite films – not just music films, but in any genre – of the past year. Not quite documentary, not quite art film, not quite music video, it's a slow, abstract audiovisual love poem to Japan and its... Read more... |
CD: Katherine Jenkins - This Is ChristmasMonday, 17 December 2012
Does this disc succeed in doing what it sets out to do? Yes, it does, which makes my minor carpings irrelevant. It’s already selling in industrial quantities. But, to quote a review of another Christmas album on this site, “an album full of tunes... Read more... |
Reissue CDs Weekly: The Prodigy, Man Chest Hair, Jackie Ross, Del ShannonSunday, 16 December 2012
The Prodigy: The Fat of the Land 15th Anniversary Expanded EditionThomas H GreenAlmost a decade after acid house changed the landscape of British music, it seemed rave culture was finally about to take over pop. The Chemical Brothers hit the top of... Read more... |
CD: Rod Stewart - Merry Christmas BabySunday, 16 December 2012
The best Christmas songs are a bit like the best decorations: more glittery than tasteful. Merry Christmas Baby's tracks may have a jazzy sheen but deep down they fit that bill. Its cover photo – Rod dressed in a white pimp-suit in front of a snowy... Read more... |
CD: Cee Lo Green - Cee Lo's Magic MomentSaturday, 15 December 2012
“I think the Muppets hit a new low.” “Yeah, and his first name’s Cee!” In the hierarchy of Statler and Waldorf’s cutting put-downs it’s more of a turkey than a Christmas cracker, but Cee Lo’s Magic Moment was never supposed to be subtle. The album’s... Read more... |
Beth Orton, Oran Mor, GlasgowFriday, 14 December 2012
With a hollered “hello Glasgow” and immediate launch into “Magpie”, the emotionally ragged song that opens this year’s Sugaring Season, it was as if Beth Orton had never been away. On this last date of her UK tour, the night before her 42nd birthday... Read more... |
Viva Forever!, Piccadilly TheatreThursday, 13 December 2012
Viva Forever! isn’t the clunker it’s been labelled. It’s also not the thin gruel of the standard West End jukebox musical. The real problem is that it can never be Mamma Mia!, the globe-conquering, ABBA-derived franchise previously devised by its... Read more... |
Remembering Ravi Shankar, 1920-2012Thursday, 13 December 2012
While living in Bombay in the late 1940s, betrayed by a business partner and his first marriage in the midst of painful implosion, Ravi Shankar decided to commit suicide. At the eleventh hour, a holy man, who happened to be passing by, knocked on... Read more... |
