CDs/DVDs
Tom Birchenough
The phrase “improbable life” crops up more than once in Greg Olliver’s highly engaging documentary Turned Towards the Sun about the poet Micky Burn (its title is that of the writer’s autobiography). It’s a contradiction in terms, perhaps, but as a way of expressing the sheer richness of a life-story, one that overlapped with some of the notable events of the 20th century, encounters with Fascism and Communism, participation in one of the most daring World War II commando raids, imprisonment in Colditz, a complicated sexuality, and 50 years as a writer, it works rather well.It reminded me Read more ...
Matthew Wright
For someone apparently so suave, Joe Stilgoe feels uncomfortable in the modern world. His third album is an express journey - in an exquisitely furnished, authentic carriage - back to a pre-bebop era of bronzed, big-band swing, and witty pianist-singers. If the album title doesn’t sum things up clearly enough, there are songs like “I Just Wasn’t Made for These Times”. Nothing Stilgoe does is crude enough to hammer a point home, but songs like this one and “Nothing’s Changed”, on which Stilgoe poignantly sings “Did we know jazz would all get rearranged?” make the point unambiguously.Music so Read more ...
Kieron Tyler
Various Artists: Building Bridges - Eurovision Song Contest Vienna 2015Mind-bogglingly, Australia is a first-time entrant in Eurovision 2015. The nature of Europe may be a concern for some backwards-looking British voters in next week’s election, but the inclusion of Australia in a competition organised by the European Broadcasting Union extends the remit of being European beyond even the wildest imaginings of foolish fringe politicians. The competition may be seen on Australia’s TV screens, but is that any reason for them to perform? Apparently, it is.The booklet with the double CD of Read more ...
Russ Coffey
Mumford and Sons, world conquering as they are, still fall victim to various accusations. Some, for instance, loathe their blandness. Others detect a whiff of smug middle class about them. Perhaps a more interesting observation, though, is how the band takes an intimate, personal musical form – folk – and turns it into something anthemic. Well, not any more. There’s nothing folk about Wilder Mind. Not a single banjo.The anthems are fewer in number too. Like Noah and the Whale before them, the Mumfords have wholeheartedly waved goodbye to nu-folk and moved their sound Stateside. So, how Read more ...
Jasper Rees
In a quirk of film scheduling, The Duke of Burgundy was out in cinemas the week after Fifty Shades of Grey. While it’s doubtful there will have been much audience overlap, the bigger beast gobbled up every single one of the S&M column inches that season. Now out on DVD, Peter Strickland’s infinitely more nuanced portrait of sub-dom co-dependency - and the concept of the safe word - has a clearer claim on all our attention.Domiciled in an autumnal Euroscape blessedly free of men (actually rural Hungary), Sidse Babett Knudsen and Chiara d’Anna play Cynthia and Evelyn, a mistress and servant Read more ...
Thomas H. Green
“A lot of bands want to over-complicate their second album,” says Palma Violets bassist Chilli Jesson in the press release. “We know that we didn’t.” This is a manifesto they adhere to with results that are mixed. On the one hand, at a time when pop music is mired by utterly clinical precision, he’s right that it’s pleasing to hear music with the messiness left in. On the other, there are plenty of occasions when Danger in the Club emanates a lack of ambition.To get the negative out of the way first, the worst of it mingles the 1970s Clash at their laziest with dreadful lads’ sing-along Read more ...
Barney Harsent
So, what I’m probably supposed to do when reviewing Django Django’s new album, Born Under Saturn, is mention the sleeper-hit success of their 2012 self-titled debut. I’m then definitely supposed to do a funny and find some suitable similes before summing up with something pithy and sage. The trouble is, I’m stuck here grinning like an idiot while thoughts flit in and out without ever finding room to land. Melodies can do that to you – stop you thinking and drag you into the moment, where meaningful reflection is all but impossible. Like being really pissed, but without the hangover. What Read more ...
Nick Hasted
Ridley Scott’s Biblical epic is dark in every way; couched in shadows, even before the hand of God rolls blackness over Egypt as He slays its first-born. Christian Bale’s Moses is indeed baleful, typically for this often wearisome star, a brooding, barking warrior-prophet. And the Old Testament’s huge capacity for slaughter is rightly seen by Pharaoh Ramesses (Joel Edgerton) as a contest to find whose deity is “better at killing”. It’s a long way from Chuck Heston, as Scott attempts a realist religious film, except when God speaks to Moses in the form of a sinister, petulant child with more Read more ...
Matthew Wright
Andreya Triana’s second solo album has been five years in the making, and with a title like Giants, it’s presumably intended to make an impression. As you’d expect from the time it’s spent gestating, this is a mature and nuanced release, certainly worth the wait, but it’s too diverse to pigeon-hole into an instant marketing hit. Its strengths – fine lyrics with a social conscience, a diversity of styles all executed successfully, and above all, Triana’s bronzed and supple dynamic vocals – repay repeated listening, and it takes some time for the album’s quality to sink in.You need listen Read more ...
Kieron Tyler
Dion: Recorded Live at the Bitter End August 1971By 1971, when he was playing the Bitter End in New York’s Greenwich Village, Dion DiMucci had already experienced the equivalent of two separate stints as a pop star. In 1961, he began a run of hits with the swaggering “Runaround Sue”. From then and into 1963 he racked up other classics such as “The Wanderer”, “Ruby Baby”, Donna the Prima Donna” and “Drip Drop”. The arrival of The Beatles in the US charts in early 1964 put paid to his run of hits. Times had changed. But in late 1968 he was back in the Top Ten with a heartfelt version of Read more ...
Tim Cumming
Olivia Chaney’s reputation as a singular folk singer and songwriter has been bubbling on and off the radar for some years now. There were EPs in 2010 and 2013, and she featured on the excellent Peter Bellamy tribute, 2011’s Oak Ash and Thorn, and she has toured solo, as well as worked with Alasdair Roberts. She was part of a beautiful and impromptu vocal trio with Lisa Knapp and Nancy Wallace for the recent Bobstock celebrations for Bob Copper, and in 2013 was nominated for the Horizon Award and Best Original Song in the BBC Folk Awards, for the title track to her long-awaited debut album on Read more ...
joe.muggs
Few would have predicted it back when they were gooning around in over-tight Adidas t-shirts, but with the benefit of hindsight it makes sense that Blur should have the most convincing longevity of the Britpop generation. Why? Because more than any of their contemporaries, and despite all the personality clashes and narcotic breakdowns, they were genuinely a band. Yes, Damon Albarn was the leader, but he never eclipsed the other three in the way that Jarvis or the Gallaghers did. Even the raging bellend Alex James, though musically more or less pointless, was gravitationally part of the Blur Read more ...