New Music Reviews
I'm With Her, Bush Hall review - folk supergroup debut album to treasureWednesday, 31 January 2018
Fresh from Celtic Connections in Glasgow, I’m With Her stepped out at Bush Hall in west London for their only England date before embarking on a major US tour. Sarah Jarosz, who plays guitar, banjo and mandolin, Aoife O’Donovan, guitar, and Sara Watkins, a mean fiddler, are being described as “a folk supergroup” – and seeing, and hearing, is indeed believing. Read more... |
theartsdesk on Vinyl 36: Gary Numan, Wes Montgomery, Trevor Jackson, Propaganda and moreMonday, 29 January 2018
|
Reissue CDs Weekly: How is the Air up There?Sunday, 28 January 2018
“I’ve been labelled as an angry young man / Because I don’t fit into the master plan / Under society’s microscope / I look funny but it’s no joke. I’m a social end product so don’t blame me / I’m a social end product of society / It’s not my fault that I don’t belong / It’s the world around me that’s gone all wrong.” Read more... |
Reissue CDs Weekly: Television PersonalitiesSunday, 21 January 2018
How much of someone else’s despair is it possible to take? What are the limits on putting a sense of desolation or isolation into a song? Can such naked expression be mediated by a glossy production or crowded instrumental arrangements which distract from the core essence of the song? Read more... |
Reissue CDs Weekly: Butterfly ChildSunday, 14 January 2018
The critic Simon Reynolds characterised Butterfly Child’s debut album Onomatopoeia as the sound of “vitrified everglades in J.G. Ballard’s The Illuminated Man, where some kind of entropy has slowed down time, so that living creatures are literally petrified, encrusted and crystal.” Read more... |
Joseph Houston, St John's Smith Square review - masterful MC in the theatre of pianoThursday, 11 January 2018
Joseph Houston’s recital gave us the piano exposed, sent up, psychoanalysed; in short, piano as theatre. And whether silently depressing keys or creating chords with an elbow, the young Berlin-based pianist brought formidable focus and unshowy mastery. Read more... |
Reissue CDs Weekly: To the Outside of EverythingSunday, 07 January 2018
Now that the 40th anniversaries of 1976 and 1977 as the years which birthed punk rock have themselves become history, surveyors of rock’s rich tapestry will inevitably turn to what came next. The year 1978 and what followed punk are easy targets and, in terms of labels, post-punk is accepted as a next wave out of the traps. Read more... |
Reissue CD of the Year: Lal & Mike WatersonSunday, 31 December 2017
In 1972, just 2000 copies of Bright Phoebus were pressed. Half were off-centre and unplayable. This year, the first conscientious reissue of the album hit 31 in the British album chart. Although it has been a cult favourite for the last couple of decades, the success was nonetheless surprising. Read more... |
Reissue CDs Weekly: The BeatlesSunday, 24 December 2017
The official reissue of The Beatles’ Christmas records is a major event. Since Live at the BBC was issued in 1994, archive Beatles’ releases have fallen into two categories. Read more... |
Reissue CDs Weekly: Northern Soul's Classiest Rarities Volume 6Sunday, 17 December 2017
The title Northern Soul's Classiest Rarities Volume 6 suggests this 24-track compilation might be a rag-bag; a collection of random musical floor-sweepings which couldn’t be collected under any other heading. Not a bit of it. Instead, every contribution is a gem. Anyone into soul – Northern, or any of its forms – will get a buzz from this collection. Read more... |
Vinyl matters. It matters to theartsdesk on Vinyl, clearly, as the name may hint. And it matters to many of you. But why? Why does it matter? We all have our own reasons for playing records, some practical, some sound-related, some personal, some ritualistic, some nostalgic, and many more that are harder to define.Pages
Subscribe to theartsdesk.com
Thank you for continuing to read our work on theartsdesk.com. For unlimited access to every article in its entirety, including our archive of more than 15,000 pieces, we're asking for £5 per month or £40 per year. We feel it's a very good deal, and hope you do too.
To take a subscription now simply click here.
And if you're looking for that extra gift for a friend or family member, why not treat them to a theartsdesk.com gift subscription?
latest in today
'We are bowled over!' Thank you for your messages...
