New music
Reissue CDs Weekly: B B King, Steve Winwood, The Doors, Loving on the FlipsideSunday, 07 October 2012![]() B B King: Ladies & Gentlemen…Mr B.B. KingKieron TylerOne of the stranger manifestations of U2’s Eighties fascination with the iconography of American music was “When Love Comes to Town", their collaboration with B B King. As a single, it... Read more... |
theartsdesk Q&A: Musician Matthew HerbertSaturday, 06 October 2012![]() Matthew Herbert (b 1972) is a leading experimental musician. His work is sometimes as much sonic exploration as music and mostly inhabits territory where the two realms meet. Recently made Creative Director of the newly resuscitated BBC Radiophonic... Read more... |
CD: Tame Impala – LonerismFriday, 05 October 2012![]() Despite the fact that this month marks the 50th anniversary of the release of The Beatles’ first single, the focus on the Fabs right now is as much on their 1967 psychedelic folly Magical Mystery Tour. The arrival of Tame Impala’s second album seems... Read more... |
Gallows, The Haunt, BrightonThursday, 04 October 2012![]() Midway through their set Gallows are expending a mass of energy, attacking their instruments and jerking about like possessed men in a jam-packed venue yet, unless you are one of their devotees, moshing like Bedlam or hanging from the rafters... Read more... |
CD: Mika - The Origin of LoveThursday, 04 October 2012![]() “Killer Queen” by Queen, “Rocket Man” by Elton John and “Laura” by the Scissor Sisters are all songs that reek of design. Their finest details have been engineered to their smallest component parts, yet the tone is light, almost throwaway. They’re... Read more... |
Christine Tobin embarks on autumn tourThursday, 04 October 2012![]() Christine Tobin’s latest CD Sailing to Byzantium brings to life the lyrical magic of W B Yeats’ poems and has been widely acclaimed. Reviewing the album earlier this year, I wrote that "Tobin has created an unqualified masterpiece. Setting poems... Read more... |
CD: Sera Cahoone - Deer Creek CanyonWednesday, 03 October 2012![]() There are, roughly speaking, two types of record. There are the ones that it is hard to consider as anything other than a complete unit - gimmicky concept records or complex themes, tracks that ebb and flow and blend together as if making a mockery... Read more... |
Manu Chao's La Ventura, Brixton Come Together FestivalTuesday, 02 October 2012![]() Manu Chao is “backstage” in a little makeshift tent on the green outside Brixton’s St Matthews Church (that’s the one opposite the Ritzy Cinema) and he’s certainly more at home than in some of the more conventional rock star places I’ve seen him in... Read more... |
DVD: Magical Mystery TourTuesday, 02 October 2012![]() A confession: though very fond of the Beatles, I'd never seen their self-directed Magical Mystery Tour before this DVD release. Not that I have anything against psychedelic follies, but I felt like I'd had my fill of this sort of thing a long time... Read more... |
Transcender Festival 2012, BarbicanMonday, 01 October 2012![]() The Barbican Centre’s Transcender Festival celebrated its fourth anniversary in 2012 and deserves to be recognised as one of the UK’s most culturally radical and engaging music events. Transcender grew out of the Barbican’s previous festival Ramadan... Read more... |
CD: Neil Sedaka – The Real NeilMonday, 01 October 2012![]() After 65 years in music, over 55 of them as a solo artist and songwriter, it’s a tad surprising that Neil Sedaka has taken until now to declare he’s revealing the real Neil. Even when his former girlfriend and Brill Building colleague Carole King... Read more... |
Reissue CDs Weekly: A.R. Kane, Crime and the City Solution, ABBA, Demis RoussosSunday, 30 September 2012![]() A.R. Kane: Complete Singles CollectionJoe MuggsIn my early teens, circa 1988, certain records would appear on The Chart Show indie chart countdown on a Saturday morning, records that hinted disquietingly at something far beyond the standard... Read more... |
