1980s
It Chapter Two review – time to stop clowning aroundThursday, 05 September 2019![]() Just two years after It Chapter One became the most successful horror film ever made, Pennywise the Dancing Clown is once again giving the American town of Derry absolutely nothing to laugh about. But this time around it’s audiences who... Read more... |
CD: Iggy Pop - FREEWednesday, 04 September 2019![]() It’s half a century since Iggy shrieked that it was “No Fun”, that it was “1969, OK”, that he wanted to be your dog. His original Stooges and his storied cohorts David Bowie and Lou Reed are all no longer with us. The Ig is the last man standing and... Read more... |
Reissue CDs Weekly: Tunnelvision - Watching the HydroplanesSunday, 01 September 2019![]() A ghostly voice pronounces “there’s no need to make the sepulchre white.” Following this declaration, what sounds like an ocarina wails mournfully over spindly guitar, a sonorous bass guitar and circular, heartbeat drumming. Tunnelvision’s “Whitened... Read more... |
theartsdesk on Vinyl 52: Yardbirds, Fad Gadget, Spoon, Cate le Bon, Cabaret Voltaire and moreSaturday, 31 August 2019![]() Welcome to the latest edition of theartsdesk on Vinyl, the monthly online musical resource that knows no genre boundaries as it treks through every release on plastic that it can find. This time round we’ve everything from death metal to obscure... Read more... |
The Souvenir review – Joanna Hogg's most emotionally wrenching film yetThursday, 29 August 2019![]() Joanna Hogg’s melancholy autobiographical drama The Souvenir cuts too close to the bone. That’s a compliment: like Sally Rooney’s equally unsettling first novel Conversations With Friends, Hogg’s movie almost forces the viewer to relive that... Read more... |
CD: Tanya Tucker - While I'm Livin'Friday, 23 August 2019![]() When Johnny Cash and Rick Rubin released the former’s stripped back, soul-bearing American Recordings in 1994 the impact was massive. Not only did it show a way that country music could cross over to a much wider audience, the alt-rock crowd, for... Read more... |
Reissue CDs Weekly: Come On Let's Go!Sunday, 11 August 2019![]() The core paradox with powerpop is that most of those who sought to create the perfect guitar driven, hook-laden pop song failed to score hits. Come On Let's Go! – Power Pop Gems From the 70s & 80s is stuffed with the classy and memorable, but... Read more... |
Cindy Sherman: #untitled, BBC Four review - portrait of an enigmaMonday, 29 July 2019![]() Cindy Sherman predicted the selfie, so goes the claim. From our current standpoint, it is all too easy to analyse her many hundreds of photographic self-portraits made since the late 1970s as cultural forebears of the digital medium. What this BBC... Read more... |
Stranger Things 3, Netflix review - bigger, dumber, betterTuesday, 09 July 2019![]() It sometimes feels like an age between Stranger Things seasons. Blame Netflix. The binge-watching trend that it helped solidify means that most people consume all eight hours of content in a single weekend. It comes and goes in a flash. But don’t... Read more... |
The Secret Diary of Adrian Mole Aged 13-3/4, Ambassadors Theatre review - needs a chill pillSaturday, 06 July 2019![]() Time hasn't necessarily been kind to this slow-aborning West End transfer of a show first seen (and lauded) in its 2015 debut in Leicester and then again two years later for a summer run at the Menier Chocolate Factory. The Secret Diary of Adrian... Read more... |
CD: Ingrid Michaelson - Stranger SongsWednesday, 26 June 2019![]() Eight albums in, you can imagine why a singer-songwriter in the confessional vein of Ingrid Michaelson might be ready to look elsewhere for inspiration - and inspiration for new album Stranger Songs came from a curious place. Each of the album’s 11... Read more... |
Download Festival: downpours can't dampen spirits at metal bonanzaWednesday, 19 June 2019![]() Download is Britain’s premier metal festival, attended by all ages. Theartsdesk’s three person team offer up their reviews of one day each, as they navigated their way between Eighties hair metal, contemporary Viking metal and any other metal you... Read more... |
