pop
Coldplay, Hampden Park, Glasgow review - a pop spectacle for all agesThursday, 25 August 2022
It is a testament to Coldplay’s capacity for reinvention that a good portion of this stadium crowd were not even born when the band first broke through over two decades ago. Such an age range in the audience clearly caught the eye of Chris Martin,... Read more... |
Album: Hot Chip - Freakout/ReleaseWednesday, 17 August 2022
You know those people who claim to literally only like the very first music a band does at the start of their career, then kind “Meh” decades-worth of solid later stuff? Ridiculous, right?That’s me and Hot Chip. 16 years ago I fell in love with “... Read more... |
Album: Beyoncé - RenaissanceMonday, 01 August 2022
There’s polarising discourse and there’s polarising discourse, and then there’s Beyoncé discourse. On the one hand, there’s “the Bey Hive”: the very model of a furious modern fandom who will boost her and monster her critics at a microsecond’s... Read more... |
Album: The Kooks - 10 Tracks to Echo in the DarkWednesday, 27 July 2022
From Brighton to Berlin with the Brit School alums, who formed 20 years ago – allegedly out shopping in Primark. Virgin signed them three months later. What started as “a joke” has endured through five albums – and here comes their sixth, 10 Tracks... Read more... |
Haim, OVO Hydro, Glasgow review - charismatic siblings personable as everMonday, 18 July 2022
Sweetness never lasts too long at a Haim gig. No sooner had Alana Haim, the youngest of the Californian siblings, finished a speech about her delight about being back in Glasgow by announcing she was going to “smell the f****** roses” then bass-... Read more... |
Album: Imagine Dragons - Mercury - Act 2Friday, 01 July 2022
“What happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas.” That’s the rule, right? Unless, of course, what happens is that you form a pop-rock act with a remarkable ear for a route-one hook and a direct line to the emotional core of teenagers everywhere. In that case... Read more... |
The Rolling Stones, BST Hyde Park review - let it rock!Monday, 27 June 2022
A few spots of rain greeted the arrival of the Rolling Stones on BST Hyde Park’s stage on Saturday night, and after “Street Fighting Man”, as Mick Jagger dedicated the show to the much-loved and lamented drummer Charlie Watts, a rainbow appeared... Read more... |
The superstar, the Svengali and a rising young talentMonday, 20 June 2022
I'm at the New Theatre in Oxford. Elvis Costello is playing through the final stages of his 2022 UK tour. The venue is full of memories: I saw The Kinks and Tom Jones here in the 1960s and then The Who in the early 70s. On my left, there’s Paul... Read more... |
theartsdesk on Vinyl 71: Sparks, Ibeyi, Amy Winehouse, The Residents, Hanterhir, Astor Piazzolla and moreThursday, 16 June 2022
Summer has arrived outside and sunny sounds are blasting from the speakers at theartsdesk on Vinyl. But not just sunny sounds, to be truthful, also sounds that cover most of the human emotional range, all from plastic discs in varying colours. Check... Read more... |
Harry Styles, Ibrox Stadium, Glasgow review - pop prince lets the music do the talkingMonday, 13 June 2022
A guessing game could be played prior to Harry Styles taking to the stage at this gig, the first night of his UK tour and, as he later noted, his first stadium show as a solo act. There were ripples of excitement whenever anyone was near the stage... Read more... |
Charli XCX, O2 Academy, Glasgow review - sweat-drenched pop amid feverish atmosphereTuesday, 17 May 2022
“This town makes me sweat”, declared Charlotte Aitchison at one point in this set, as she took a brief breather between songs. The 29-year-old should have tried being in the audience, for this was a sweat-drenched evening right from the opening... Read more... |
Album: Dubstar - TwoFriday, 13 May 2022
Dubstar didn’t really fit the niche where the 1990s put them. Signed to Food Records, original home of Blur, they were lumped in with Britpop but their music was always closer to the thoughtful electronic pop of Saint Etienne, and they also had –... Read more... |
