New music
Reissue CDs Weekly: Losing Touch With My MindSunday, 07 April 2019
It begins with The Stone Roses’ “Don’t Stop”, the fourth track from their 1989 debut long player. A backwards though thoroughly remixed version of “Waterfall”, the album’s preceding track, it enthusiastically pushes the button labelled “psychedelic... Read more... |
CD: Norah Jones - Begin AgainSaturday, 06 April 2019
There's a remarkable lightness to the way Norah Jones has glid through her career. She once told theartsdesk that even in her early 20s, faced with the global hyper success of Come Away With Me, “I think I was smart enough to know at the... Read more... |
CD: Circa Waves - What It's Like Over ThereThursday, 04 April 2019
Circa Waves, the guitar-band from Liverpool, go over a storm at festivals and large venues. With simplicity, tightness and concentrated energy, they know how to play with the tension that can build between soft and hard, the yin and the yang of rock... Read more... |
theartsdesk in Lisbon: Aga Khan Music AwardsWednesday, 03 April 2019
The inaugural Aga Khan Music Awards, a three-day event held last weekend in Lisbon, celebrated nearly 20 years of wide-ranging work dedicated to the preservation of ancient and threatened cultures, an impressive programme of educational initiatives... Read more... |
theartsdesk on Vinyl 48: Curtis Mayfield, Rudimental, Ozric Tentacles, Prince, Girl Unit and moreWednesday, 03 April 2019
Every month we start theartsdesk on Vinyl with the Vinyl of the Month, however, the truth is that, depending on your taste, many of the records reviewed below may be your own vinyl of the month. Whether reissues or new material or compilations,... Read more... |
CD: Ruby Rushton - IronsideWednesday, 03 April 2019
It's kind of vertiginous to realise that the revivalism of acid jazz was way closer to its 1960s and '70s source material than we are to it now. But the patterns that were laid down by the DJ sessions of Gilles Peterson and people like him back in... Read more... |
Drake, O2 Arena review - stadium hip-hop has a sincerity problemTuesday, 02 April 2019
Drake walked on water at times in his opening show at the O2 Arena. Sadly this was solely down to the impressive video projection that filled the giant screens beneath his feet. The 32-year-old Canadian rapper is one of the biggest-selling stars in... Read more... |
Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs, Hare and Hounds, Birmingham review – Matt Baty’s crew make ears ring like church bellsMonday, 01 April 2019
Support bands rarely get a mention in live reviews but Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs’ opening act for their present jaunt around the UK, Cattle are no bog-standard fare, designed to make the headliners look good. Comprising two drummers,... Read more... |
CD: The Drums - BrutalismMonday, 01 April 2019
The Drums appeared a decade ago out of New York, riding a media froth about indie music to critical acclaim and, at least for their debut album, some degree of commercial success. They were a four-piece who owed a large debt to New Order but had... Read more... |
Reissue CDs Weekly: Three Day Week - When the Lights Went Out 1972-1975Sunday, 31 March 2019
This new collection, compiled by Bob Stanley and Pete Wiggs of Saint Etienne, aurally delineates a period when much that was British had an edge of bleakness. Accordingly, Three Day Week – When the Lights Went Out 1972–1975 ought to be a grim listen... Read more... |
Tallinn Music Week 2019 review: 'We All Value Being European'Sunday, 31 March 2019
“We like people here in Estonia. I think we all here very much value being European. To all our British friends, we know that the offer of e-residency has been ticking-up constantly. You can find a sure foothold for your business here in Estonia.... Read more... |
CD: Thee Telepaths – The Velvet NightSunday, 31 March 2019
Kettering might not be the first place you’d associate with spaced-out psych-rock, but neither are Croydon or Rugby and they gave us Loop and Spacemen 3 respectively. Maybe it’s something to do with the need for escape that can make such prosaic... Read more... |
