pop music
Peter Culshaw
The political tectonic plates were re-aligning, the economic indicators were jittery, but the cultural kaleidoscope also shifted a bit last night with the unveiling of Susheela Raman’s new material from her yet untitled new album, which on this evidence and some unfinished masters floating around could be one of the albums of the year. Names for the album being talked of include Vel, the Tamil for spear, Tamil Voodoo and Incantation (don’t do that one, guys, people will expect Andean pan-pipers, one of the few global influences you won’t be getting here).Raman, born in London from Tamil Read more ...
Adam Sweeting
It's probably a bit early to start picking the best albums of 2010, but I would seriously consider a legal challenge if Diane Birch's Bible Belt isn't there or thereabouts when the votes are counted. Like a long-lost singer-songwriter classic, it accomplishes the trick of sounding instantly familiar, yet Birch herself doesn't sound quite like any other artist you've heard before. Her voice can be soft and supple, but it also has a raw, rasping quality that can saw through a song like "Choo Choo", with its vamping organ and garage-band guitars. By contrast, in the hymn-like "Forgiveness" she Read more ...
theartsdesk
This month's most intriguing and fabulous CDs are headed up by the strange and beautiful electronica of Scuba and a magnum opus from Natalie Merchant. Highlights include music from the offspring of the famous from Jakob Dylan and Harper Simon, maverick country from Willie Nelson and superior offerings from David Byrne and Fatboy Slim, "hearfelt and hopping mad" music from John Grant, gypsy punk from Gogol Bordello, ethereal jazz from Food and a brace from South Africa. Stinker of the Month is the latest from the overrated Paul Weller. theartsdesk's reviewers are Robert Sandall, Joe Muggs, Read more ...
Veronica Lee
The first time I saw Katy Brand was at the Edinburgh Fringe in 2005, where she was performing Celebrities Are Gods in a tiny, windowless basement late at night. Hers was the last show in the room, which by now was a fetid sweatbox, and only a few hardy souls had turned up. But it was a memorable evening, not only because Brand’s talent was plain to see, but also because, undaunted by the circs, she performed with the confidence of an old pro even though she was only 26.And a trouper she was again when I saw her perform her latest show, Katy Brand’s Big Ass Tour, in what might have been Read more ...
joe.muggs
Welcome to the grown-up rock mothership. I've seen bands play in TV studios plenty of times over the years, but walking into the Later... With Jools Holland recording at BBC Television Centre for the first time, as I did last night, is something else. Studios generally have a disappointing feeling of smallness, or of looking behind the curtain to reveal artifice, but this genuinely was like stepping into the TV screen: the circle of bands and punters exactly as you see it when the camera spins around in the show's intro.For full disclosure, I should say here that I have never been a fan of Read more ...
Thomas H. Green
Ben Drew, who records as Plan B, is busy on the promotional rounds. He has spent the day at the BBC's Maida Vale Studios being interviewed by Fearne Cotton and others for TV and radio, and performed his new single "She Said" as well as an ebullient cover of Charles & Eddie's "Would I Lie to You?" He's accompanied by a nine-piece band, including three gospel backing singers, and is as sharp-suited as the promo photos you see here.Drew, 26, grew up in Forest Gate, East London, one of two children in a single-parent family. He never fitted in at school, was often in trouble and was expelled Read more ...
Peter Culshaw
This week’s birthdays of musicians include a couple of disturbed geniuses, Billie Holiday and Joe Meek, underrated rock’n‘roller Carl Perkins, country legend Merle Haggard, as well as Doris Day, Pharrell Williams and bluesman Muddy Waters, whose mojo is working overtime. Videos below.9 April 1932: Carl Perkins was never the most famous rock’n’roller, but among aficionados is one of the best. Shot on a fuzzy Canadian TV show from 1956. 7 April 1915: Billie Holiday, one of the greatest singers of the 20th century, sings “My Man”, about an abusive relationship that was all too Read more ...
Adam Sweeting
To be born into the extraordinary Wainwright dynasty is to be born onstage, and Rufus has seized his birthright in a giant bear-hug. Mere weeks after the death of his mother, Kate McGarrigle, from cancer in January, the lanky, somewhat Heathcliff-like Rufus was back on the campaign trail with throttles wide open. In the pipeline for early April are his new album, All Days Are Nights: Songs for Lulu, and a new production of his opera Prima Donna at Sadler's Wells.Rufus has grown up in public, and that's where he feels most comfortable. More retiring personalities might have locked themselves Read more ...
howard.male
Standing in the black-walled gloom of the Bar Fly in Camden, I suddenly realise that I’m one of only a couple of dozen people completely transfixed by the band on the stage. Perhaps this is because, to most of the audience, they are just the third act in a kind of three-for-the-price-of-one night, and they simply don’t have the necessary party vibe that’s required to bring Saturday night to a satisfactory end. But as I find this Copenhagen outfit’s sublime, intense and obliquely romantic brand of indie rock one of the most compelling sounds I’ve heard in the past few months, I can’t help but Read more ...
Peter Culshaw
This week's birthdays include the impeccably funky Sly Stone and Wilson Pickett, manic Chopin played by the great pianist Sviatoslav Richter, lush orientalism from Rimsky-Korsakov, classic jazz from Bix Beiderbecke, and annoying pop from Clare Grogan.
15 March 1944: One of the funkiest beings ever to strut his stuff, Sly Stone (born Sylvester Stewart) and the Family Stone perform “Dance to the Music”. For the last 20 years he has been a virtual recluse, there are persistent rumours of a new album for 2010.18 March 1941: Wilson Pickett performs “Mustang Sally” in a classic clip from the Read more ...
Peter Culshaw
Our ongoing series celebrating musicians’ birthdays. This week’s include Lou Reed, in action in a stupendous version of "Venus in Furs" with the Velvet Underground, Chopin played by the wonderful Martha Argerich, archive footage of Miriam Makeba, Brian Jones and bottle-neck blues maestro, Furry Lewis. Videos below.2 March 1942: Lou Reed and the Velvet Underground, performing "Venus in Furs". Definitive proof that, contrary to speculation elsewhere on the site, you don't need more than three chords to make great music?
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Here' s Lou being contrary as ever, and Read more ...
Jasper Rees
Over the past couple of years, maverick photographer Gavin Bond has built up a contacts book that would be the envy of Rankin or Annie Leibovitz. He’s been shooting everyone who is anyone: subjects range from godfathers of rock such as Bono and AC/DC, through familiar acts like The Killers and Gwen Stefani, to fresh faces and emerging starts like Katy Perry and Vampire Weekend. Borrowing a vocabulary from the highly imagined and stylised world of the pop video, Bond’s photography largely concentrates on the impact of the artists as performers. However, "behind-the-scenes" shots of bands on Read more ...