New music
Kieron Tyler
The subject of The Possibilities are Endless does not appear until 24 minutes into the film. When Edwyn Collins is manifested, it is as a silhouette, as spectral as he is tangible. Collins is bifurcated: corporeal but also removed. The massive stroke he had suffered meant he could not summon the words he needs, has mobility issues and did not recall the connections between the episodes from his life in his memory. Who Collins is has been rewritten yet he remains the person he was, as attested by his partner Grace Maxwell.The Possibilities are Endless charts the iron-willed Collins’ difficult Read more ...
Kieron Tyler
The news that keyboard player Ian McLagan had died of a stroke at 2:39pm today at a hospital in his adopted home of Austin, Texas is tremendously sad. McLagan outlived his former Small Faces bandmates Ronnie Lane and Steve Marriott, and it seemed as though he would be around forever. Drummer Kenney Jones is the only Small Faces member left with us.Despite having defined a vital aspect of the Sixties with Small Faces and going on to global stardom with The Faces, McLagan was approachable and led a low-key life in Austin. Seen behind his keyboard at the city’s bars and always open for a chat Read more ...
Guy Oddy
It’s a rare year when 80s psychedelicists-with-a-black-sense-of-humour the Butthole Surfers stray into the studio. So when guitarist Paul Leary and bass player, Jeff Pinkus join up with Melvins’ mainstays, King Buzzo and Dale Clover, it’s not unreasonable to expect something special. Hold It In is not a disappointment and offers plenty of twisted, gonzo metal with Metallica-sized riffs, some completely whigged-out psychedelia and much inbetween.The metal-with-a-twist of tunes like “Bride of Crankenstein” and “Sesame Street Meat” will certainly keep long-term fans of the Melvins happy with Read more ...
Barney Harsent
Craig Bratley has been impressing for a good while now behind the desk and the decks alike. A handful of must-have 12”s and DJ sets at nights including the stellar A Love from Outer Space and the ever-reliable Música Noche have ensured that this is an album for which the bar of expectation has been set very high.“Transmission One” starts things off and the synth sounds glow with the warmth of a comforting, crackling fire. It manages to be both futuristic and enjoyably dusty at the same time – like finding an old Eagle annual on a visit to your mum’s. Then comes “Dance with a Mannequin”, which Read more ...
joe.muggs
The story of Busted and McFly was a weird case of pop lightning striking twice. Busted, an early 2000s attempt to put together a boyband-with-guitars for girls who don't like boybands, was a huge success – not least because one of its members, James Bourne, proved to be an extraordinarily deft bubblegum pop-punk songwriter. But not only that, but another auditionee for Busted, the then also teenaged Tom Fletcher, was taken on by the management as part of the band's writing team, and as apprentice to Bourne proved to be at least his equal – spawning offshoot band McFly, multi-platinum albums Read more ...
Heidi Goldsmith
“I have quit smoking!” the rock star exclaims to rapturous applause, taking a luxurious drag on an e-cigarette. And the artificial smoke dissipates across the stage, revealing a 67-year-old Marianne Faithfull perched on an antique leather chair, shoulder raised and pouting as if caricaturing her own youth. It is a subtle and triumphant reference to her past of destructive drug abuse and yet tonight quite clearly shows that for Faithfull the stage (alongside nicotine replacement and a wooden walking stick) is now her crucial crutch for rehabilitation. Though she fills many a Read more ...
Thomas Rees
Expectations can be dangerous when it comes to live music, but sometimes managing them is easier said than done. Go and see a band like Jaga Jazzist, a genre-crossing collective of Norwegian multi-instrumentalists who skyrocketed to fame in 2002 when the BBC named A Livingroom Hush jazz album of the year, and you expect it to be big. Especially when it’s the group’s 20th anniversary tour and you arrive at Union Chapel to find the queue stretching around the block.As we filed in, I was in rock gig mode, prepared to leave with mild tinnitus, a few new bruises and a stupid grin plastered Read more ...
Kieron Tyler
Over its 20 minutes, "Le Strategie Saint-Frusquin" colours its dark, funeral declaration with the insistent rhythm of an elephant dragging itself from a tar pit, textures from distorted guitar and saxophone, and occasional interjections of a voice sounding as though it’s beaming down from an early Apollo mission. "Pisces Analogue" is similarly lengthy and as engaging. Involving washes of pulsing electronics, it passes through five movements, each more intense than the previous. After a pause for quiet reflection at 12 minutes, it climaxes with a sky-scraping crescendo evoking a departure from Read more ...
Kieron Tyler
Various Artists: Native North America (Vol. 1) – Aboriginal Folk, Rock and Country 1966–1985America’s music could be jazz, gospel, blues or rock ’n’ roll. Or all of them. Each has black roots. Then there’s the white-rooted country, which also informed rock ’n’ roll. Taking the simplistic line has its problems and doesn’t allow for blurred boundaries, nuance and the fact that history is never neat, but it is clear that all these musical forms generally and initially proliferated amongst communities that are not native to the American continent. What about the music of native North Read more ...
Kieron Tyler
In 1971, the British rock group UFO released their second album. Titled One Hour Space Rock, its cover bore the subtitle Flying and, yes, images of UFOs in the form of flying saucers and a bald, naked and pink humanoid with claw-like fingernails. Musically, although the album had its freaky sections and sported the lengthy tracks "Star Storm" and "Flying", what was on offer was mostly day-to-day blues-rock.Nonetheless, this was an overt acknowledgment that rock music was on a more-than-nodding acquaintance with the concerns of science fiction. One Hour Space Rock wasn’t a bestseller and UFO Read more ...
Adam Sweeting
The future's uncertain and the end is always near, as Jim Morrison put it, and you wonder how long Oz's antique rockers can keep cranking it up. After 41 years, most of them vastly successful, they're now missing guitarist and riff-creator Malcolm Young (who's suffering from dementia), while it's not clear whether drummer Phil Rudd is still on board after a drugs bust and allegations that he was trying to get somebody killed.Despite all that, Rock or Bust, their 16th studio album, manages to deliver a few jolts of the old megaton swagger. Angus Young is still there on lead guitar, and judging Read more ...
Thomas H. Green
There is an odd moment about halfway through Lily Allen’s set. Clad in a shaggy white mini dress akin to a Puli dog’s coat, she announces the next song will divide the audience into those that love it and those that hate it. Her sweet voice then wraps itself around the soundtrack to last year’s John Lewis seasonal TV ad, her version of Keane’s “Somewhere Only We Know”. I fall into the latter of her categories but I look around and a smattering of middle-aged heterosexual couples, who’d previously looked somewhat incongruous here, have grasped their partners and are doing gentle slow dances. Read more ...