New music
CD: Sweet Billy Pilgrim – Crown and TreatyWednesday, 11 April 2012
I first encountered Sweet Billy Pilgrim via the sitcom The IT Crowd. In an episode in the fourth series shouty departmental boss Jen somehow ended up dating the keyboard player. The keyboard player lost his job and subsequently lost shouty Jen, but... Read more... |
Gavin Bryars on The Sinking of the TitanicWednesday, 11 April 2012
You may be feeling Titanic fatigue by now, the last straw being the so-so Julian Fellowes TV romp which heads, as Adam Sweeting points out elsewhere, “an epidemic of TV programmes” this week. Rather than seeing any of them, or the Cameron film epic... Read more... |
More festivals added to our guideTuesday, 10 April 2012New additions constantly coming in for our all-singing-all-dancing festivals guides. Check out Dublin and Croatia in the European guide here.theartsdesk European Festivals Guide 2012theartsdesk UK Festivals Guide 2012 Read more... |
Sufjan Stevens, Bryce Dessner & Nico Muhly, BarbicanTuesday, 10 April 2012
Sufjan Stevens is a singer-songwriter of startling scope, one minute releasing a record dedicated to the state of Illinois, the next a five-disc Christmas box set or an album for the animals of the Chinese Zodiac. Bryce Dessner is the guitarist in... Read more... |
Cher Lloyd, IndigO2Monday, 09 April 2012
Cher Lloyd first appeared aged 16 on The X Factor with a storming cover of an unofficial bootleg version of “Turn My Swag On” - a song that peaked at just number 48 on the UK singles charts. Knowing so much about music at such a young age set her... Read more... |
European Festivals Guide 2012Monday, 09 April 2012
Once again theartsdesk brings you its unmatched annual guide to Europe's music, film and arts festivals, complementing the UK festivals guide. With musicians and bands hunting out picturesque places to play in summertime, you can find an alternative... Read more... |
CD: Sennen – Lost HarmonyMonday, 09 April 2012
Lost Harmony is the third album from Norwich to London transplants Sennen. Although they’re pretty much an under the radar band, it’s been made with David M Allen, The Cure’s long-term producer. Their songs have been heard on the soundtracks of One... Read more... |
Reissue CDs Weekly: The Human League, The Leopard Lounge, Eastern Bloc Funk ExperienceSunday, 08 April 2012
The Human League: Dare (Deluxe Edition)Thomas H GreenLast year, when I interviewed The Human League for theartsdesk, singer Susan Sulley said of Leonard Cohen, “He’s got a personality voice. It’s not a voice that’s going to pass the auditions... Read more... |
France Remembers Claude FrançoisSunday, 08 April 2012
If you’re not French, there are probably two things you know about Claude François: that he wrote “My Way” and that he died from electrocution when fiddling with a lighting fixture while in the bath. In France, however, he’s been part of pop-... Read more... |
theASHtray: modern spies, Rwanda, and how to get ahead through shameless self-promotionSaturday, 07 April 2012
“If James Bond actually worked in MI6 today,” said “Anna”, “he’d spend a large amount of time behind a desk.” Fair enough, since he’d also be about 110. And besides, the days of the Oxbridge “tap” having gone the way of Bernard Lee, most of 007’s... Read more... |
Jim Marshall, the Amplifier KingFriday, 06 April 2012
If there was a holy trinity of rock'n'roll iconography, it would be guitars by Fender and Gibson, plugged into amplifiers bearing the unmistakeable Marshall logo. Merely to be seen using Marshall amps and loudspeakers became an obligatory badge of... Read more... |
Youssou N'Dour made Minister of Culture in SenegalThursday, 05 April 2012Senegalese musician Youssou N'Dour has been appointed tourism and culture minister in the cabinet of new President Macky Sall.One of Africa's most successful singers, Mr N'Dour, 52, threw his weight behind Mr Sall in elections earlier this year... Read more... |
