New music
james.woodall
In 1973 certain world events carved themselves, a bit like the faces on Mount Rushmore, deep into the landscape of the late 20th century. No sooner had Richard Nixon begun to end the Vietnam War than Watergate broke. In the autumn Allende was overthrown by Pinochet in Chile; Egypt and Syria’s attack on Israel ignited the Yom Kippur war. A global oil crisis was to leave western economies strapped.In Britain industrial unrest forced a tottering Heath government towards the Three Day Week. The IRA began bombing London. It wasn’t, really, a happy epoch; but young, mainly male, slightly self- Read more ...
Kieron Tyler
Crispy Ambulance: The Plateau Phase/The Durutti Column: LC/The Names: Swimming/The Wake: HarmonyPre-Madchester and before New Order’s breakout single “Blue Monday”, Manchester’s Factory Records was hard to penetrate. This quartet of reissues does a fine job in both dragging some great music out of the twilight and giving voice to the words subsequently written about the label. All are on the Factory Benelux imprint, resurrected to pay tribute to Factory’s Belgian counterpart which had been launched in 1980.The label’s early releases came in abstract sleeves, and most of those on Factory were Read more ...
Kieron Tyler
“Cut Copy me”, the opening track of Petula Clark’s first British studio album in six years, is beautiful. It could have been created by Saint Etienne at their most melancholy. Her voice almost a whisper, it’s the sound of shadows and uncertainty even with what sounds like a light touch of autotune. The title track follows. Similarly assured, it’s sparse and centred around a rippling piano. Then a by-rote, in-the-shadow-of-Adele version of Gnarls Barkley's "Crazy" breaks the spell.Accompanying “Crazy” are versions of “Imagine”, “Love me Tender”, Gershwin’s “He Loves and She Loves” and a Read more ...
joe.muggs
Croydon-born Coki – Dean Harris – is without question one of the most important musicians of modern times, but unless you are a close follower of underground club scenes it is unlikely you would have heard of him. He has never been interviewed at any length, and though over the last decade his records have been pivotal in at least two musical revolutions – the birth of dubstep itself, then its subsequent transformation into a fiercer and more belligerent version which has become a global phenomenon – he never sought adulation or took to the DJ lifestyle, instead working a 9-5 office job until Read more ...
theartsdesk
Quite possibly because the sun was shining, even if it wasn’t actually warm as such, this show presented by Joe Muggs and Peter Culshaw got its groove on. There was shuffling about the NTS studio, strangers started dancing. The featured albums, by which we mean more than one track were played were the new one from Bachar Mar Khalifé, who is clearly a major talent, the debut from Los Chinches, a Peruvian Amazon surf band, who started and closed the show and an irresistible new compilation of Latin Psychedelia.The sunny mood kept going through acid house and Forro, Kenyan 45s from the 1970s and Read more ...
bruce.dessau
Having excitedly put The Messenger on I thought my iPod was playing tricks and it had unearthed a previously unshuffled gem from Miles Kane. The opening track, "The Right Thing Right", is packed to the gills with the kind of well-coiffed mod-soul thwack that has helped Kane to make his mark. It's good, but it's terribly, terribly safe. If Marr wants to stop David Cameron listening to his new music as well as stop him from listening to The Smiths, as has been suggested in the press, he's going to have to come up with something less conservative than this.As it happens, The Messenger – Read more ...
Thomas H. Green
There’s currently a bemusing wave of bands that combine electronic dance with indie stylings. Acts such as Foals, Everything Everything and Delphic are increasingly successful but seem to my ears, at least on record, to be neither fish nor fowl. Whenever they hit a decent dance pulse, they douse the flames with jangle-pop that just doesn’t seem to fit. Clearly many disagree as these outfits are increasingly popular and it’s claimed the live arena is where they come into their own. Time to find out.Tonight Delphic have the odds stacked against them from the start. Their gig doesn’t suit the Read more ...
theartsdesk
Whenever the words English and whimsy come together in relation to rock, writes Mark Hudson, the name Kevin Ayers is invariably invoked – not least by Ayers himself. The notably erratic, but gifted singer-songwriter and Soft Machine founder was hardly on the face of it notably English, having spent much of his childhood in Malaysia and most of his adult life lounging by the Mediterranean. But he consciously incorporated the gently surreal nonsense tradition of Lewis Carroll and Edward Lear into his own brand of moon-gazing, slacker cool.The fact that the fetchingly tousled, psychedelic beat- Read more ...
Russ Coffey
These days not all sensitive folk-rockers with trembling voices can bank on easy audiences. Villagers main man Conor O’Brien is one who can – he’s been selling out concerts like nobody's business. This gig was no exception. O’Brien may be plaintive but he also has the reputation for being one of the smartest, artiest writers around. One critic has described his new LP {Awayland} as the first great album of 2013. Like its strange brackets, it can also be quite challenging.Almost every moment of gentle beauty on the record is matched by another of jarring electronica. Last night, although some Read more ...
Thomas H. Green
Dido Armstrong’s first two albums are at numbers 19 and 29 in the UK’s all time best-sellers. The 41-year-old singer became an emblem of post-millennial dinner parties, of Bridget Jones-era singleton moping, and of post-electronica easy listening. Her success was massive but with it she became an easy target, mainly because she emanates Mogadon melancholy without emotional depth.OK I admit I loathe everything she put her hand to although I confess a soft spot for the chorus of “White Flag” – “I will go down with this ship/I won’t put my hands up and surrender/There will be no white flag upon Read more ...
theartsdesk
The sound of a heartbeat. A metronomic ticking. Two men confessing that they’re mad (even if they’re not mad) as a cash register chings. Another man’s manic laughter. A harsh industrial grinding noise. Screams. And then some rock music, Olympian in its distance and instantly cinematic, but with a hint of the blues…If you don’t know by now you’re listening to “Speak to Me” and the start of “Breathe,” the combined sound collage/song that kicks off The Dark Side of the Moon, you’ve had your head under the sand for 40 years. Unless, of course, British prog rock was never your cup of patchouli oil Read more ...
theartsdesk
Mick Rock was the court photographer of glam. Among the (un)usual suspects found in his lens were Lou Reed, David Bowie and Freddie Mercury. But no one played up for his camera quite like Iggy Pop.The proof is in the six images released today as limited-edition art prints to celebrate the 40th anniversary of Raw Power. Each of the editions is overlaid with handwritten lyrics from "Raw Power" and "Death Trip", and are individually hand signed by both Rock and Pop.Jasper Rees on Mick RockThe photographs capture the feral intensity of Iggy as shaman showman. But from this distance they also Read more ...