Manchester
Jesca Hoop, Hoxton Square Bar and KitchenFriday, 01 April 2011
Of all the unlikely musical pairings in recent times, Jesca Hoop and Guy Garvey deserve special mention. The genial Elbow frontman, all northern charm and indie anthems, is like a favourite bitter. Hoop, on the other hand, former nanny to Tom Waits'... Read more... |
Summary of main Arts Council winners and losersWednesday, 30 March 2011A sliderule of 11-15 per cent reductions in annual grants by 2015, compared with this year, has been applied to Britain's major orchestras, opera, dance, theatre and music organisations. One major gainer is London's Barbican Centre - one major loser... Read more... |
Elbow, O2 ArenaTuesday, 29 March 2011
Is Guy Garvey really as lovely as he seems? I hope so. Last night, on the first of two nights for the Bury band at the O2 Arena, their lead singer, this big bearded bear of a man, came across as clever, funny, confident, warm, positive and... Read more... |
CD: Elbow - Build a Rocket Boys!Saturday, 12 March 2011
There’s a gorgeous song on this album called “With Love”, on which singer Guy Garvey rhymes “dentures” with “adventures”. And there, in a nutshell, you have Elbow: juxtaposing grubby, prosaic earthbound reality with soaring romance, finding magic in... Read more... |
CD: Beady Eye - Different Gear, Still SpeedingFriday, 25 February 2011
This isn't an awful album. It even starts really well. The opener, “Four Letter Word”, comes pounding in with the sort of jackbooted psychedelic rock attitude that Oasis always promised and so rarely delivered. Add a swooshy noise and it could... Read more... |
Winterlong, Soho TheatreFriday, 25 February 2011
In contemporary British drama, kids are usually either suffering or doomed innocents. But Winterlong's Oscar is different. He is a loner who was abandoned by his schoolgirl mum and his scary dad at the age of four years old, and tries to make his... Read more... |
Simply Red, O2 ArenaMonday, 20 December 2010
When theartsdesk asked Simply Red’s PR company for some pictures of the band to accompany this review, the images sent were of Mick Hucknall – alone. Which is probably all you need to know about who Simply Red are. Last night’s audience at this,... Read more... |
The new funk: Belleruche exclusiveWednesday, 27 October 2010
Here, we present the exclusive first showing of a new video by the Brighton/London band Belleruche. This clip for “Fuzz Face” is highly arresting, an ingenious and slightly disturbing collision of hi and low-tech, made using thousands of photocopies... Read more... |
The Genius of British Art, Howard Jacobson, Channel 4Monday, 18 October 2010
Howard Jacobson, fresh from his Booker Prize triumph, was on an admirable mission last night: to rescue the good name of the Victorians. He wanted us to stop caricaturing our 19th-century forebears as prudish, self-righteous, pompous and... Read more... |
I Am Kloot, Union ChapelWednesday, 29 September 2010
I Am Kloot are a band it’s hard not to like in an almost personal way. The Manchester-based trio exude warmth, northern charm and a sense of self-contentment, seemingly impervious to the fact that they still haven’t made it as big as everyone thinks... Read more... |
The Road to Coronation Street, BBC FourFriday, 17 September 2010
A drama about Britain’s (and by the time Coronation Street reaches its 50th birthday in December, the world’s) longest-running soap starts with a huge advantage - its producers could just quote lumps of the brilliant original scripts, written by... Read more... |
Röschmann, Collins, BBCPO, Noseda, Royal Albert HallThursday, 09 September 2010
Maybe it's a truism that most instrumental music, at least before World War One, aspires to the condition of song. Few have gone farther in that respect than the composers of the three purely orchestral works in last night's Prom. Add to the mix a... Read more... |
