New Music Reviews
Elton John’s iHeart Living Room Concert for America, YouTube review - the real star was a Mayo Clinic doctor named ElvisTuesday, 31 March 2020
Available in Britain now on YouTube for only a couple of days, Elton John’s iHeart Living Room Concert for America was put together in less than a week and was broadcast in the US on Sunday evening. In normal circumstances, the slot would have been occupied by the iHeart Radio Music Awards, which were to have been carried live from the Shrine Auditorium in LA. Read more... |
Christine and the Queens/Instagram review - musical missives during lockdownTuesday, 31 March 2020
Since she burst onto the global scene in 2014 with her debut album, Chaleur humaine, Christine and the Queens' (aka Chris, real name Héloïse Letissier) work has been difficult to pin down. Is the French pansexual singer-songwriter-performance artist's music synth-pop, alt-pop or, as she describes it, “freakpop”? Read more... |
Reissue CDs Weekly: Recording Is The Trip - The Karen Dalton ArchivesSunday, 29 March 2020
“My favorite in the place was Karen Dalton. She was a tall white blues singer and guitar player, funky, lanky and sultry. Karen had a voice like Billie Holiday’s and played the guitar like Jimmy Reed and went all the way with it. I sang with her a couple of times.” Read more... |
Single: Bob Dylan - Murder Most FoulSaturday, 28 March 2020
A combination of chopped-up newsreel and fever dream, “Murder Most Foul” is Bob Dylan’s most striking piece of work in years. This is the author of “Desolation Row” populating a 17-minute song with a lifetime of remembered cultural fragments, zooming out and panning back and forth from the single pivotal event of the Kennedy assassination, plucking references out of the heavy air. Read more... |
ReMastered: Devil at the Crossroads, Netflix review - a story well told but marred by clichéd styleSaturday, 28 March 2020
Mississippi bluesman Robert Johnson’s reputation was much enhanced by the story – never substantiated – that he’d met with the devil one night at a crossroads, and was miraculously taught exquisite guitar licks that astounded his juke-joint audiences and later the world. Read more... |
Miles Davis: Birth of the Cool, BBC iPlayer - an intimate, insider's account of his life and musicFriday, 27 March 2020
Miles – where to begin? Some 21st century revisionists find his art fatally tainted by his personal life, and his violent behaviour in relationships. Read more... |
Sinatra: All Or Nothing At All, Netflix review - epic two-parter on pop's first superstarThursday, 26 March 2020
Coming in at around four hours, in two parts, this 2015 documentary is ostensibly about Ol’ Blue Eyes, Frank Sinatra, but really, via the prism of his existence, it’s as much about America’s journey through the first two thirds of the 20th century. Read more... |
Slipknot Unmasked: All Out Life, BBC iPlayer – masked metalheads reveal allMonday, 23 March 2020
There aren’t many metal bands like Slipknot. For a start, the nine-piece line-up consists of the standard vocalist, two guitars, bass and drums – but then there are also two percussionists, sampler and decks. Their music is consistently ferocious, with a hardcore, high-speed, ragging thump and semi-comprehensible lyrics that leaves no room for chart-friendly power ballads. Read more... |
Reissue CDs Weekly: A Slight Disturbance In My MindSunday, 22 March 2020
Two of the 84 tracks on A Slight Disturbance In My Mind: The British Proto-Psychedelic Sounds of 1966 are covers of songs from Revolver. Read more... |
The Indigo Girls, Facebook Live review - lightening the bluesFriday, 20 March 2020
Like all other performers, the Indigo Girls were forced to make the “heart-breaking decision” to cancel their spring tour. And in that moment, “we knew we wanted to play a free livestream show,” Amy Ray and Emily Saliers said in a statement. “People are feeling scared, isolated, uncertain, and unmoored. Read more... |
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
Andsnes. London Philharmonic Choir and Orchestra, Gardner, R...
If there was ever a time for the inevitable "Rach Three” (piano concerto, not symphony) in the composer’s 150th anniversary year - and...
Music Reissues Weekly: Why Don’t You Smile Now - Lou Reed at...
The Velvet Underground first played before an audience on 11 December 1965. A year earlier, their two founder members Lou Reed and John Cale were...
The Teacher review - tense West Bank drama
It’s hard not to review the Israeli occupation of Palestine when writing about The Teacher. The political context of this first feature...
Suor Angelica, English National Opera review - isolated one-...
Puccini elevated the operatic tearjerker to tragic status in three masterpieces: La bohème, Madama Butterfly and...
Joe Rogan, Netflix Special review - US podcaster leaves the...
Before Joe Rogan gained fame for his podcast The Joe Rogan Experience, he has been, variously, a comic, presenter of goofball...
The Magic Flute, Opera North review - a fresh vision of Moza...
In an autumn season of three revivals, Opera North begin by inviting James Brining, artistic director of Leeds Playhouse, to oversee his own...
Album: Lady Gaga - Harlequin
Lady Gaga has made clear this is not her official new artist album. It’s a side project, inspired by Harley Quinn, the nom-de-chaos of the Arkham...
Hough, Philharmonia, Rouvali, RFH review - where the wild th...
This autumn, the Philharmonia’s “Nordic Soundscapes” season promises music suffused with the epic vistas, and weather, of high latitudes, along...
The Outrun review - Saoirse Ronan is astonishing as an alcoh...
In 2016, Amy Liptrot made a fine publishing debut with a memoir about her alcoholism, The Outrun. Now she has co-written a...