New music
Guy Oddy
Andrew Eldritch, vocalist and convent leader of the Sisters of Mercy, is a famously obtuse character. This may have made him seem somewhat mysterious over the years, but it has also meant that he has missed a few open goals too.The Sisters haven’t put out an album of original material in 30 years, but they still keep writing and performing new material. This means that their set now consists of about 50% familiar tunes and 50% of material that has never seen the inside of a recording studio. So, if you want to keep up with the new stuff, live recordings of varying sound quality on YouTube is Read more ...
Kathryn Reilly
I usually find it useful to listen to the music before I tackle the often bile-inducing press release that generally taints each launch. Admittedly, it's a hard job to sell music without veering into hyperbole and very few achieve it. Why am I telling you this? Because, if I had have read the accompanying notes, rather than thinking "this is very good but it does sound like background music", I would have known it was, in actual fact, background music.Written as a collaboration with the library music label KPM, these 11 tracks (each coming in at the three-minute mark or thereabouts) Read more ...
mark.kidel
Combine four super-talents, masters of their instrument, and you might well expect a battle of egos or a clash of modi operandi. Not least, as in the case of Les Égarés, a quartet made up from two seasoned duos – the virtuoso jazzers Vincent Peirani (accordeon) and Émile Parisien (soprano sax) on the one hand, and the entrancing creative partnership of Ballaké Sissoko (kora) and Vincent Ségal (cello) on the other. And yet…In a glorious show, part of the London Jazz Festival, these four engage in the most captivating conversation – sometimes with humour, at other times with Read more ...
Liz Thomson
When Dolly Parton was nominated for induction into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, she requested that her name be withdrawn.She was "flattered and grateful" for the honour but "I don't feel I have earned that right," she wrote. "It kind of would be like putting AC/DC in the Country Music Hall of Fame. That just felt a little out of place for me.” Officials responded, saying they respected the star's "thoughtful note” and saying that "in addition to her incredible talent as an artist, her humility is another reason Dolly is a beloved icon by millions of fans around the world." A few weeks Read more ...
Guy Oddy
The Cult may have only really hit paydirt in the late Eighties when they started worshipping at the altar of the Rawk Gods of more than a decade before and welcomed Rick Rubin and Bob Rock to toughen up their sound on albums like Electric and Sonic Temple. However, there are clearly many people who still look back wistfully on their post-punk years – to the Dreamtime album, to Death Cult and even further, to vocalist Ian Astbury’s first band, Southern Death Cult.Sure, Astbury and Duffy still play “She Sells Sanctuary” and “Rain” in their live set, but they are mere morsels of a time long gone Read more ...
Cheri Amour
On a Friday morning under the Dom Tower, the tallest church spire in the Netherlands, our enthusiastic guide explains that we’re standing on 2000 years of history. Formed on the frontier of the Roman Empire, Utrecht originally bordered the river Rhine. But forward-thinking festival Le Guess Who?’s quarter-century rein proves that the city is no longer fenced in. The longstanding Dutch weekender consistently champions a far-flung programme affording you time and space to explore and discover. In a world that’s bowing under the weight of political and social conflict, LGW? happily boasts Read more ...
Kieron Tyler
That's What Remained is the aural equivalent of being pulled into a maelstrom and then surrendering to this powerful natural force. Initially, it does not seem safe. But it soon becomes apparent that submission isn’t a problem. It will be fine. Emerging from this experience is accompanied by a shakiness. But that’s OK too.It’s not necessary to know anything about Lucidvox to be knocked for six by That's What Remained, their second album. Over its eight tracks and 33 minutes it effortlessly accommodates the hard edge of shoegazing – the sensibility sustaining My Bloody Valentine’s “You Made me Read more ...
Bernard Hughes
When Ben Folds emerged in the mid-90s he was like Billy Joel’s snot-nosed little brother: another virtuoso pianist and songwriter but one whose style was sarcastic, subversive and a little bit punky.He has now mellowed into something of an elder statesman, still able to get the room jumping, but also capable of meditation on the state of the world, on getting older, on human relationships, all wrapped up in the catchiest tunes around.Folds has only released two albums in the last 11 years, but What Matters Most, which came out in June, sees him back to his best after the underwhelming So Read more ...
Thomas H. Green
Madness are an English institution due to deathless, jolly hits such as “House of Fun”, “Baggy Trousers” and “One Step Beyond”, but there’s always been another side to them.The London band are often at their best when bittersweet. Lesser-known songs such as “Grey Day”, “Madness (is All in the Mind)” and “One Better Day” showcased a downbeat poignance. Their new album, their 13th, is a case in point. It’s a response to the disturbing times we live in, and to “a disparate couple of years which saw the band at their most polarised and fragmented”. I can’t stop playing it.Ignore the iffy Read more ...
Rachel Halliburton
To watch virtuoso jazz pianist Hiromi perform is to experience a vast weather system of sound; at some moments exuberant hailstorms of notes alternate with thunderous chords, at others, sombre atonal passages resolve into a burst of sunshine.By any standards she’s a remarkable stage presence; at the same time as segueing effortlessly between three keyboards, she laughs, stands up and sits down, conducts the other performers and sometimes claps along. Whatever you think of this party, she’s certainly having a ball.It’s the complete lack of self-consciousness that contributes to what – from Read more ...
Thomas H. Green
VINYL OF THE MONTH Being Dead When Horses Would Run (Bayonet)Being Dead are ostensibly an indie trio from Austin, Texas, but that description doesn’t really do justice to their smörgåsbord sound. Their default setting seems to be Trashmen “Surfin’ Bird” (just check “Come On”) but they also enjoying fooling around with synths. They’re not easily categorizable. What they are is catchy, whether combining sing-along choruses with flamenco and dream-pop on “Daydream”, or inventing narcotic underwater country’n’western on the mournful, murky and bizarre “Livin’easy”. Three more comparisons (faint) Read more ...
Thomas H. Green
The KLF are endlessly fascinating. There’s never been a “pop group” like them. From the late Eighties into the early Nineties, they treated music, especially electronic dance music, as a laboratory for lunatic experiment. Unlike most avant-garde thinkers in pop, though, they made a glorious and highly unlikely commercial success of it, via a series of globally successful singles (and, to some degree, the album, The White Room).From their beginnings to demise, filmmaker Bill Butt was an accomplice, creating films and videos as asked. The BFI's 23 Seconds to Eternity gathers these together Read more ...