Canada
19-2, SpikeThursday, 07 July 2016
Canada has been Uncle Sam’s body-double in countless drama productions. Shooting on location is easier and cheaper north of the border. One twinkly city skyline looks very much like another. 19-2 is set in and around car number two as it patrols the... Read more... |
Betroffenheit, Sadler's Wells/Ballet BC, Birmingham HippodromeThursday, 02 June 2016
I could tell you what the German word "Betroffenheit" means by giving a dictionary definition, etymology and connotations and so on. But I won't, because this dance-drama hybrid by Jonathan Young and Crystal Pite is precisely not about pinning down... Read more... |
The Burning Hell, OsloWednesday, 25 May 2016
“We’ve been visiting libraries on this tour and it’s a lot of fun learning people still read.” The words of The Burning Hell’s main man Mathias Kom before launching into “Give Up” stress he and his band are not typical rock‘n’rollers. “Give Up”... Read more... |
Basia Bulat, Hoxton Square Bar & KitchenThursday, 14 April 2016
The cape is not an everyday item of clothing. Worn by magicians, it brings an air of the extraordinary. It billows in the path of superheroes. The cloak of invisibility confirms the cape’s singularity. Basia Bulat was first seen in a sparkly gold... Read more... |
Right Now, Bush TheatreWednesday, 30 March 2016
Poor Alice. She’s alone all day, with a six-month baby boy, while her husband Ben – a doctor – is out at work. Working all hours. She sleeps at odd times of the day, and at first seems to have just suffered some kind of catastrophic loss. Ben seems... Read more... |
Stewart Francis, Pavilion Theatre, WorthingMonday, 22 February 2016
Before Canadian comedian and British TV panel show regular Stewart Francis arrives on stage his audience are entertained with his one-panel cartoons. These, Sharpie-penned in black, are projected as a slideshow (sample: in a fishbowl, one fish says... Read more... |
CD: El Guincho - HiperasiaMonday, 15 February 2016
The career of the Gran Canaria-born musician Pablo Díaz-Reixa seems to work in an accelerated time-frame, speeding through decades and eras as he develops his sound. Though he has always worked with digital technology, his early work sounded archaic... Read more... |
CD: Basia Bulat - Good AdviceSunday, 07 February 2016
Canadian singer-songwriter Basia Bulat’s first three albums were recognisably folky. Her main instrument was the autoharp. Good Advice is different. With its more upfront songwriting and verve, her fourth album is a giant leap. It is also Bulat’s... Read more... |
CD: The Besnard Lakes - A Coliseum Complex MuseumMonday, 18 January 2016
A Coliseum Complex Museum is defined by its density. The Montréal band’s fifth album begins with a flurry of percussion which gives way to treated guitar and frontman Jace Lasek’s almost-falsetto vocal. Opening cut “The Bray Road Beast” is initially... Read more... |
Corb Lund, Bleach, BrightonFriday, 15 January 2016
It seems incongruous that this fine country-rockin’ band should come all the way from Canada to play a half-empty room above a pub on a chilly, January midweek night on the British south coast. That they do so with such gusto and aplomb is hugely... Read more... |
CD: Astrocolor – Lit Up: Music for ChristmasMonday, 14 December 2015
Any Christmas album worth its salt draws from the classics. Versions of, say, “We Three Kings”, “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer”, “Silent Night”, “Let it Snow! Let it Snow! Let it Snow!” and “The Little Drummer boy” are compulsory. What is not so... Read more... |
CD: Emilie & Ogden - 10,000Monday, 16 November 2015
Names can be deceiving: take Emilie & Ogden. Once you know that the name is not that of a traditional duo, but rather describes Canadian musician Emilie Kahn and her Ogden harp, it’s hard to escape the thought that the music will be syrupy-sweet... Read more... |
