thu 28/03/2024

singer-songwriters

Album: Meshell Ndegeocello - The Omnichord Real Book

From the celestial vocal harmonies of “Call The Tune” and insistent looped rhythms of “Omnipuss” (in which you feel the spirit of Miles’s On The Corner), to the Sly Stone-esque “Clear Water” and intensely vital “Vuma” (featuring South African...

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Album: Yusuf/Cat Stevens - King of a Land

Yusuf/Cat Stevens’ latest combines his apparently effortless immediacy at acoustic guitar songwriting with an orchestrated opulence that sometimes pushes the sound towards the realms of musical theatre. Lyrically, he’s in fine form too, but what...

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theartsdesk on Vinyl 77: Scuba, Dannii Minogue, Tito Puente, ABBA, The Undertones, Oracle Sisters and more

VINYL OF THE MONTHRahill Flowers at Your Feet (Big Dada)Rahill Jamalifard’s debut solo album somehow transmutes autobiography into gorgeous slow-pop. Of Iranian-American origin and best-known as singer of the band Habibi, she and FKA Twigs producer...

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Album: Paul Simon - Seven Psalms

Paul Simon is an ornery bugger. Full of awkwardness and perversity as a person, seemingly hugely detached, but as an artist capable of as much tenderness and directness as just about anyone out there. Capable of making world-changing artistic...

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Album: BC Camplight - The Last Rotation of Earth

On Brian Christinzio’s sixth album as BC Camplight, he wants listeners to know about his recent experiences and their effect on him. Herewith, a mostly unembroidered account of how he sees things. When allusiveness arrives, the metaphors are easy to...

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theartsdesk Q&A: musician Susanne Sundfør - ‘Blómi is a message of hope for whoever might need it’

With the release this week of Blómi, her sixth studio album, Norway’s Susanne Sundfør discloses more about herself than she previously has through her music – but nothing is made obvious. As she says during this interview, the driving concept...

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Album: Josienne Clarke - Onliness

If you key in "Josienne Clarke" on Google, you’ll hit on the "About" section of her website, and the following declaration sets up her stall: "No label, no musical partner, no producer. Clarke is in complete control of her songwriting, arranging,...

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Album: Josephine Foster - Domestic Sphere

On Domestic Sphere, Josephine Foster’s guitar and voice are joined by clacking crickets, a flock of sheep and wailing cats recorded in La Janda in southern Spain. There are also Colorado and Tennessee's birds and frogs. Foster’s great-...

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Nick Mulvey, Chalk, Brighton review - cult star shines bright

Welcome to the church of Mulvey. The sold-out venue is packed with a svelte crowd, mostly ranging in age between about 30 and 45. Nick Mulvey is playing a new number which has an air of lockdown-inspiration about it, with its lines about “missing...

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Robert Forster, Lafayette review - élan, spontaneity and thoughtfulness from the former Go-Between

“Learn to Burn” generates the loudest and most sustained applause. As it was originally the opening track of Robert Forster’s 2015 album Songs to Play, the response is unexpected. It’s preceded by a version of his old band The Go-Betweens’ “Spring...

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theartsdesk on Vinyl 75: The Beach Boys, The Residents, Danny Goffey, Jean-Michel Jarre, black metal and Sixties psych

Welcome to the first theartsdesk on Vinyl of 2023 and it’s another whopper, over 8000 words and a range of musical styles that defies genre or categorization, from the most cutting edge sounds to boxsets of golden vintage pop. Dive in!VINYL OF THE...

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Marina Allen, Cafe Oto Review - east London substitutes for 1970s Los Angeles

When Marina Allen’s second album Centrifics came out last autumn, the Los Angeles singer-songwriter said her voice was the only instrument on the record. She writes on guitar and piano but beyond what she sang, everything else was played by...

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