thu 28/03/2024

2013

CD: Tove Lo - Sunshine Kitty

Swedish singer Tove Lo appeared at a time when female physical sexuality was being used as a raw, blunt weapon in pop, when porno chic reached an apex in music videos. Half a decade ago was the time of Nicki Minaj’s “Anaconda” and Miley Cyrus’s “...

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Album of the Year: David Bowie - The Next Day

It was almost exactly a year ago (January 8, 2013, to be precise) that we awoke to the news that David Bowie, far from dying, retiring, or living the half-life of a rock and roll renunciant in his Riverside apartment, had blindsided us all by sneak-...

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theartsdesk's Top 13 Films of 2013: 5 - 1

With the end of 2013 nearly upon us it's time for a last look back before we step forward into the unknown. Yesterday our rundown of the year's finest films took you from a radiant romance to a bristling biopic, but the nature of such lists means...

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World Music 2013: A Quiet Storm

Not a year in which big names came through, and many on the list below are actually quite introverted and low-key, but none the worse for that. Among numerous global musical gems this year were the following:The Fes Festival of World Sacred Music...

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theartsdesk's Top 13 Films of 2013: 13 - 6

There are some that will tell you that they don't make movies like they used to. But even if that's true, film is an art-form that continues to thrive by moving with the times - reflecting change, reinventing itself and each year we're supplied with...

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2013, where big budget games went to die

Like some kind of slow-witted zombie, mainstream games (on console, mainly) have been decapitated, disemboweled and run flat over, but don't quite know it yet.The year that saw the establishing of a new wave of game-specific hardware including home...

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Album of the Year: Georgia Ruth - Week of Pines

There aren't a lot of harpists in pop. Transatlantic migrations took all sorts of instruments away from their European place of origin to become the building blocks of American music. But there was no sizeable Welsh diaspora so the harp stayed at...

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Theatre: Top 10 of 2013

Playgoers could be forgiven for thinking that they were seeing double during much of 2013. No sooner had you sat through Ian Rickson's dazzling revival of Old Times once before you returned again to watch its peerless pair of actresses, Kristin...

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Album of the Year: Eminem - The Marshall Mathers LP 2

“Maybe I needed to grow up a little first/ Well it looks like I hit a growth spurt”. So goes MMLP2’s opening track and over the course of the next hour it becomes apparent this is no idle brag. The album’s dizzying mix of melody, syllables-per-...

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Reissue CDs Weekly: The Best of 2013

Despite his nickname and habit of doing a bunk, George “Shadow” Morton was one of America’s highest-profile and most distinctive producers and songwriters. He was responsible for shaping the sound and style of The Shangri-Las, Janis Ian, Vanilla...

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Classical and Opera 2013: A Year of Anniversaries

Which musical calendar year isn’t laden down with composer commemorations, too often a pretext for lazy and unimaginative planning? The last 12 months, with Verdi, Wagner and Britten as the birthday boys (in case you failed to hear), have raised the...

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Album of the Year: Arctic Monkeys – AM

2013  was yet another year when hip hop added a bit of punch to old rockers. Elvis Costello had a crack at his own distinctive version of rap on Wise Up Ghost, while Arctic Monkeys' fifth album successfully fused Alex Turner's recent...

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