New music
Nick Hasted
“But when did you become an object of pity?” Nick Cave asks himself. Brighton’s streets have become an obstacle course of concerned strangers and acquaintances, in the arms of whom he may find himself collapsed, crying. Such indignity was his grief’s smallest cost, after his 15-year-old son Arthur fatally fell from a cliff in 2015.One More Time with Feeling was released in cinemas last year, in a complex 3D process. Watched at Cave’s favourite cinema in his adopted hometown Brighton on its muggy opening night, it felt oppressively intense and increasingly raw, with the 3D adding hallucinatory Read more ...
Liz Thomson
One thing was very clear at Wednesday night’s BBC Radio 2 Folk Awards, held at the Royal Albert Hall – at the moment at least, Scotland has something of a monopoly when it comes to folk music talent. While Desert Island Discs suggests the current First Minister’s tastes are rather more commercial than those of her predecessor in the post, if push comes to shove, maybe folk music will be a bargaining chip in the discussions over independence.That’s not to say there wasn’t talent also from south of the border, or from across the Irish Sea (Daoirí Farrell picked up two baubles), or from America Read more ...
Liz Thomson
It’s a while since John Mayall last played Ronnie Scott’s, and the six shows this week didn’t begin to accommodate his many fans. The line to get in on Tuesday started a long while before show-time, and those who turned up hoping for returns will be pleased to know the British blues legend will be heading back to Britain in the autumn. Those lucky enough to possess tickets were treated to an excellent opening show, much of it drawn from his recent album Talk About That.Just as he did when Mayall celebrated his eightieth birthday at Ronnie’s, Nigel Price opened the proceedings with a great Read more ...
Thomas H. Green
The Brighton Festival, which takes place every May, is renowned for its plethora of free events. The 2017 Festival is curated by Guest Director Kate Tempest, the poet, writer and performer, alongside Festival CEO Andrew Comben who’s been the event's overall manager since 2008 (also overseeing the Brighton Dome venues all year round). This year the Festival’s theme is “Everyday Epic”.“Kate has this sense of the arts being important through the everyday of our lives,” Comben explains, “at the same time as acknowledging that, for everyone, things can take on epic proportions, whether that’s Read more ...
Liz Thomson
As Imelda May releases her fifth CD, it can’t but help that Bob Dylan has come out as a fan – it was, she wrote, "like being kissed by Apollo himself". No doubt his buddy T Bone Burnett passed him a copy of the album, for he produced it in Los Angeles, where it was recorded over seven days, with guest appearances from guitarist Jeff Beck and pianist and band leader Jools Holland, on whose TV shows May has guested several times.Life. Love. Flesh. Blood is the fifth studio outing for the girl from Dublin’s Liberties, and it's full of emotion, polished and stylised. May has performed with Read more ...
Javi Fedrick
Fujiya & Miyagi are greater than the sum of their parts. Singer David Best recently explaned that he "sees it as an album rather than a compilation", but Fujiya & Miyagi’s sixth album is, essentially, a collection of three EPs, combining 2016’s EP1 and EP2 with three sparkling new tracks.Despite all the songs being written, recorded and released at different points over the last year, the album is pleasingly coherent. As with all Fujiya & Miyagi’s work, bleeps, pulses, and closed hi-hats provide the building blocks for the music, yet Best has ventured that this album is “more Read more ...
Guy Oddy
After a career that initially came to an abrupt end amid sibling fisticuffs on a stage in Canada during the dying embers of the Twentieth Century, the Jesus & Mary Chain have taken some time to ease themselves back into being a real going concern. Reforming a decade ago to tour their old material, it has taken until now for them to take the plunge and release Damage & Joy, their first new album in 19 years.Nevertheless, the wait has been worthwhile, as the reaction to tunes old and new from the crowd at Birmingham’s Institute duly confirmed. While the Reid brothers may have found a Read more ...
Kieron Tyler
It’s been suggested that New Order’s “Blue Monday” borrowed from Gerry & The Holograms’ eponymous 1979 A-side. In July 2015, The Guardian ran an article saying “if ‘Blue Monday’ had a starting point, it was ‘Gerry & The Holograms’ by a group of the same name, an obscure Mancunian slice of electronica, released on Absurd Records.” Although the piece noted that members of New Order acknowledged their 1983 single drew on tracks by Kraftwerk, Ennio Morricone, Donna Summer and Sylvester, nothing was quoted from the band to acknowledge the apparent debt to “Gerry & The Holograms”.Yet, Read more ...
Peter Culshaw
Latest intercontinental sounds from theartsdesk’s resident world music freak Peter Culshaw include a dose of hot Cuban strains old and new, extracts from excellent new albums from Malian diva Oumou Sangare and Yasmin Hamdan (see photo above) from Lebanon, now based in Paris. Other treats include Portuguese fado updates from Lula Pena, passionate Sufi singing from Abida Parveen, cosmic grooves from Space Captain and gorgeous gloom from Grazyna Becewicz. TO LISTEN TO TO THE SHOW CLICK HERE Playlist: 1. Los Zafiros “Bossa Cubana” 2. Adolfo Echverria “Sabroso Read more ...
howard.male
Because so many African albums that get an international release feature tastefully neutered acoustic guitar, pretty scatterings of kora notes, and lyrics centred on some imagined ideal Africa, it is a blessed relief to hear something as punchy, confrontational and insistent as this explosion of beats and hollering from Ghana’s King Ayisoba. What’s also incredibly canny about this record is how the producer Arnold de Boer (of the excellent Dutch post punk outfit the EX) manages to throw in electronica atmospherics and hip hop bottom-end without it for one moment sounding forced or Read more ...
Katie Colombus
Olly Murs seems to have monopolised the market on teenage girls and their middle-aged mums - the ultimate X-Factor audience that's followed his journey from the show eight years ago. Doe-eyed kids and their over-zealous chaperones at the O2 are equally doolally when it comes to whooping in response to Olly's laddish flirtation, waving their arms in the air, crooning along, or boogying when invited to "party like it's a Saturday night".Ever the showman, Olly brings an abundance of energy to his set, which is a great mix of his popular chart toppers like "Heart Skips A Beat", "Dear Darling", " Read more ...
Guy Oddy
Emperor of Sand is Mastodon’s eighth album and showcases a band that exhibits absolutely no sign of letting up on the epic riffing and thunderous beat or of edging towards the mainstream. Make no mistake, Mastodon remain resolutely heavy in both their sound and their lyrics.A concept album which tells the tale of a man sentenced to death in a never-ending desert, Emperor of Sand also doubles as an allegory for human mortality and the passing of the sands of time. If this sounds all a bit too heavy on the Game of Thrones-type sword and sorcery imagery, Mastodon have certainly earned the right Read more ...