2010s
Clutch, Bush Theatre review - new comedy-drama passes its testThursday, 22 September 2022Max is big and black and Tyler is slight and (very) white, an odd couple trapped in a dual-control car as Max barks out his instructions and Tyler prepares for his driving test. If their relationship is to get started, like the clutch of the... Read more... |
La donna del lago, Buxton International Festival 2022 review - Rossini’s romanticism for todayFriday, 15 July 2022Buxton International Festival’s opera scene is clearly back on track for 2022, and its most substantial production a taut and tension-filled presentation of Rossini’s La Donna del Lago.Jacopo Spirei’s production, with design by Madeleine Boyd, has... Read more... |
Music Reissues Weekly: Judex - Cult of JudexSunday, 10 July 2022A compilation album titled Pennsylvania Unknowns was issued in 1982. Its 17 tracks chronicled the US state’s Sixties garage rock and psychedelic scenes. Amongst the bands included were Pat Farrell & The Believers, The Flowerz, The Loose Enz and... Read more... |
Album: Arcade Fire -WEThursday, 05 May 2022When the pandemic closed in, Canadian experimental indie rock troupe Arcade Fire were on the cusp of heading into the studio to record their new album. COVID had other plans. But rather than pause, the husband and wife duo of Win and Regine... Read more... |
Vanya and Sonia and Masha and Spike, Charing Cross Theatre review - Tony-winning play checks out ChekhovWednesday, 17 November 2021Vanya and Sonia and Masha and Spike has taken eight years to reach the London stage, which is surprisingly long for the Tony Award winner for Best Play of 2013: the pandemic, unsurprisingly, didn't help. But in a burst of somewhat un-Chekhovian... Read more... |
Milk and Gall, Theatre 503 review - motherhood in the age of TrumpThursday, 11 November 2021Tuesday, 8 November 2016. Vera is in a New York hospital room giving birth to a son. On anxiously checked phones, the votes are piling up for Hillary, but the states are piling up for Trump. Vera’s world will never be the same again.Mathilde Dratwa’... Read more... |
Album: Rudimental - Ground ControlSaturday, 28 August 2021To coin a cliché, the fourth album from London pop-dance success story Rudimental is a game of two halves. The first is off-putting and dull but halfway through, the band seem to wake up. There are 16 songs on the album. The eighth, “Handle My Own... Read more... |
Reissue CDs Weekly: Tame Impala - InnerSpeaker (2010➝2020)Sunday, 04 April 2021Heard now, InnerSpeaker sounds as it did when it was issued in 2010. Tame Impala’s debut album was crisp, fizzing; a pithy collection of psychedelic rock nuggets which made its case instantly. This was modern psychedelia, infused with a dash of... Read more... |
Disc of the Day Celebrates 10 Years of Album ReviewsMonday, 15 February 2021Ten years ago yesterday, on Monday 14th February 2011, one of theartsdesk’s writers, Joe Muggs, reviewed an album called Paranormale Aktivitat, by an outfit called Zwischenwelt. It was the first ever Disc of the Day, a new slot inserted into... Read more... |
New Music Lockdown 6: David Gilmour, Taylor Swift, Prince, Bat For Lashes and BlossomsWednesday, 13 May 2020As the music industry slips into the rhythm of lockdown, so the spigot slowly becomes untapped and events, livestreams and similar start to flow more steadily. This week a host of big names are up to a bunch of different stuff, all worth checking.... Read more... |
Sex Education, Series 2, Netflix review - the teen sex show we deservedFriday, 14 February 2020Netflix’s Sex Education has returned to our screens and streams. The show made waves last year for its refreshing take on the teen comedy-drama. It took on abortion, consent and female pleasure — subjects strikingly absent from our actual high... Read more... |
Albums of the Year 2019: Sharon Van Etten - Remind Me TomorrowTuesday, 31 December 20192019 has been quite the year. Amongst other difficulties being a grown-up hurls at you on the reg, I lost my guiding light (may her adventures on the other side of this universe be everything and more). And the testing times that ensued sees me now... Read more... |