New Music Reviews
The South Bank Show: Tim Minchin, Sky Arts 1Friday, 19 April 2013
The new South Bank Show has glided into its second season with a seemingly effortless profile of multi-hyphenate Tim Minchin. In case we’ve forgotten what exactly we admire him for these days – so varied has been his decade-long career been, through satire, rock, musical comedy, stage performance, to co-creator of the RSC transfer-spectacular Matilda that's now storming Broadway – then this was a good reminder. Read more... |
Kurt Elling, Ronnie Scott'sThursday, 18 April 2013
OK, so you've given your copies of Rod's It Had To Be You and Robbie's Swing When You're Winning a few listens (released many, many years ago, the latter is still top of the iTunes jazz albums chart in a gazillion countries). You've memorised the words and now you quite fancy giving “Summertime” a bit of a go. A touch of rubato here, a judicious tweak of the melody line there and, hey, you're singing jazz! Er, not quite. Read more... |
Brass Band Battle: Serbia vs Mexico, BarbicanMonday, 15 April 2013
Remember the Brass Band Battle of a couple years ago? The one that pitted Romania’s Fanfare Ciocarlia vs Serbia’s Boban & Marko Markovic Orkestar on CD and stage? The concert at London’s Koko was great fun, less a "battle" and more a good humoured showcase for two great Gypsy brass bands to tear it up. Read more... |
Reissue CDs Weekly: Sandie Shaw, Country Joe & the Fish, David Bowie, MorrisseySunday, 14 April 2013
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Thatcher: The Sound and the FuryTuesday, 09 April 2013
The political legacy of Margaret Thatcher is being sifted and analysed all over the world. But what of the music she left behind? The first and only female Prime Minister had barely a cultural bone in her body, but on her watch a young generation of musicians had something to kick against or, in one or two cases, a set of values to emulate. The music writers of theartsdesk have identified some of the songs which define the age of Thatcher. Read more... |
Reissue CDs Weekly: Shuggie Otis, Peter King, Electronic, Billy MackenzieSunday, 07 April 2013
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Emeli Sandé, Usher Hall, EdinburghTuesday, 02 April 2013
Only an April fool would deny Emeli Sandé her right to rule as the home-grown pocket diva for the Smartphone generation. The current elfin queen of the UK pop charts took the stage in Edinburgh last night having already won over her capacity crowd on Amazon, i-Tunes and in miles of supermarket aisles. Read more... |
Reissue CDs Weekly: Simple Minds, Klaus Dinger, The Primitives, Transvision VampSunday, 31 March 2013
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Mari Wilson, The Komedia, BrightonMonday, 25 March 2013
Long before Amy Winehouse, there was a north London retro soul'n'jazz girl with a beehive hairdo making inroads into the Top 40. However, after a short run of hits in the early Eighties Mari Wilson never achieved the epic popularity of her dark-haired successor. Thus we find her in a Brighton basement playing a cruise ship set to a chicken-in-a-basket audience. Read more... |
Noel Gallagher, Damon Albarn, Graham Coxon, Royal Albert HallSunday, 24 March 2013
"Noel. Noel." Damon Albarn had to shout twice before Noel Gallagher joined him onstage to strum his guitar during Blur's neo-bluesy "Tender". Maybe Albarn's former Britpop rival wanted their historic musical union to take just a little bit longer. Maybe he wanted Albarn to wait just to assert himself. Or maybe after all these years of standing between very loud bands and very loud audiences he is a little deaf. But it happened. Read more... |
Sandie Shaw: Sandie/Me/Love Me Please Love Me
Shuggie Otis: Inspiration Information/Wings of Love
Simple Minds: Celebrate – The Greatest Hits +Pages
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