Americana
Album of the Year: Jason Isbell - SoutheasternMonday, 16 December 2013
In the right circles, Jason Isbell already has enough of a reputation as one of contemporary Americana’s finest songwriters - both solo and as part of the Drive-By Truckers - that for him to drop an album as subtly stunning as Southeastern shouldn’t... Read more... |
CD: Midlake – AntiphonWednesday, 30 October 2013
Many bands would pack it in after the departure of their lead singer, especially if he was their main songwriter. In Midlake’s case, the damage was compounded by Tim Smith leaving after work had begun on the band’s fourth album. Antiphon is what it... Read more... |
CD: Lissie - Back to ForeverMonday, 14 October 2013
Open letters are so passe. There’s a track on Back to Forever, the second album from folk-pop crossover star-in-the-making Lissie, that addresses the recent shenanigans of Miley Cyrus and her ilk as well as the singer’s own place in the music... Read more... |
Grand Theft Auto VThursday, 19 September 2013
If you think games are for kids, or not art, or beneath you – read on. Grand Theft Auto V, while flawed in many ways, proves you wrong. The latest in the controversial and 18-rated series has already broken first-day sales records for just about... Read more... |
Paul Bunyan/The Secret Marriage, British Youth Opera, Peacock TheatreThursday, 12 September 2013
It’s raining Bunyans, and since Britten’s early American operetta with its sights originally set on Broadway teems with song and invention that can’t be a bad thing. A fortnight after Welsh National Youth Opera commandeered Stephen Fry to voice-over... Read more... |
CD: Neko Case - The Worse Things Get, the Harder I Fight, the Harder I Fight, the More I Love YouMonday, 26 August 2013
I have little patience with those that link mental anguish with creativity, glamorising the former as if the latter were any consolation. That said, there is comfort to be drawn from songs that spin the blankness of depression into something... Read more... |
Paul Bunyan, Welsh National Youth Opera, CardiffSaturday, 24 August 2013
Reading through WH Auden’s libretto for Britten’s first stage work – the so-called operetta Paul Bunyan – it’s sometimes hard to decide whether the intention was to participate in the great American dream or to make fun of it. In 1941 both artists... Read more... |
CD: Emily Barker & the Red Clay Halo - Dear RiverWednesday, 03 July 2013
Every so often, an album comes along that reminds you why you love the medium: not because it’s a simple collection of individual songs, no matter how good they are, but because it’s a carefully curated statement of artistic intent. Taken... Read more... |
Neko Case/Lady Lamb the Beekeeper, Village Underground, LondonSaturday, 25 May 2013
Neko Case wasn't about to launch a Yeah Yeah Yeahs-style pre-emptive strike aimed at the Village Underground's amateur camera-wielders. She doesn't mind the odd photograph, she said; just don't try to film her. It makes her feel a little... Read more... |
BioShock InfiniteFriday, 29 March 2013
We're at a moment of change in games – new consoles, new ideas, new ways of playing. And what better game to usher out one era and in a new one than BioShock Infinite?This first-person shooter is still wedded to the core mechanics of traditional big... Read more... |
CD: Low - The Invisible WayThursday, 14 March 2013
TWenty years in operation, Minnesota’s Low could have comfortably chosen cruise control. Instead, for their 10th album they’ve looked to their own past and taken a step back from the Crazy Horse-influences which coloured their last album C’mon.... Read more... |
The Civil Wars, O2 Academy, GlasgowSaturday, 03 November 2012
There’s something admirable about the way that The Civil Wars have become quietly, unassumingly massive; packing mid-sized venues the length of the UK and chalking up over 100,000 copies of their debut album sold since its March release on these... Read more... |
