New Music Galleries
Boys on Film: Duran Duran's '84 tourTuesday, 09 December 2014
In 1984 Duran Duran were at the height of their fame. Seven and the Ragged Tiger, the band’s third studio album, became their first (and only) number one soon after its release in November the previous year, and announced a sharper, more dance-friendly, synth-driven sound. The world tour (apparently the band wanted to spend a year abroad to avoid tax), began in Australia, but was mostly spent in Canada and the US. Read more... |
PUNK+ - Sheila Rock's portraits from the frontlineThursday, 25 April 2013
The historians of punk are in full flow. Jon Savage's book England's Dreaming and the BBC Four's documentary series Punk Britannia have documented much of what needs to be said. But punk was as much a visual statement of intent as a musical one, which is why a new book of photographs by Sheila Rock is such a welcome addition to the punk library. Read more... |
theartsdesk at the Latitude Festival 2012: Squeeze, SquelchTuesday, 17 July 2012
As a giggling toddler posed for a photograph next to a pink sheep, a man in a Barbour jacket moaned about losing his garlic-crusher. On the lake, smitten newlyweds enjoyed a gondola ride, while, somewhere else, an elderly couple watched a show so moving it made them cry. Yes, this could have happened in one place only – the leafy surroundings of Henham Park, near Southwold in Suffolk, at Latitude Festival. Read more... |
Gallery: Hop Farm FestivalWednesday, 04 July 2012
Brand-free, eschewing sponsorship, and letting kids in for free, the Hop Farm Festival in Paddock Wood, Kent, has risen steadily in stature to become one of the major fixtures on the UK festival circuit. If the festival is young, most of its audience and stars are of a certain age. Last year saw Morrisey, Patti Smith, Lou Reed and Manu Chao headline, while Prince played his only UK show there. Read more... |
Photo Gallery: Moby, DestroyedSaturday, 14 May 2011
As well as a new album, Destroyed, Moby is putting out a book of photographic prints under the same title. The idea of the book is to capture the essence of being on a global tour, from the mundanity of waiting in airports to the majesty of landscapes and cities, from the explosive excitement of stadium-sized crowds to the solitude of hotel rooms at night. The images will also be on display in the Proud Gallery in Camden Town, north London. theartsdesk showcases a... Read more... |
Art Gallery: Guitar Heroes - Legendary Craftsmen from Italy to New YorkSunday, 13 February 2011
From a guitar by Matteo Sellas dating back to Germany before 1630 to one made in New York by John Monteleone in 2008, the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Guitar Heroes exhibition is will go down as the longest guitar solo slot in history. Including one of the four surviving models by Stradivari, it monitors the guitar’s development in Italy and the instrument’s... Read more... |
Photo Gallery: Portraits of Keith Richards 1963-71Thursday, 28 October 2010
The lens loved Mick. Those child-bearing lips, to use Joan Rivers’s ripe phrase, always came up a treat in photographs. Did it ever love Keith quite so much? Ever since he started creosoting himself in eyeliner and crumbling like an oxidising mummy before our very eyes, he has been the incarnation of the photogenic rock wreck. Once upon a time, though, when The Rolling Stones were at their creative zenith, the Human Riff presented a young and even ingenuous mug to the camera. Read more... |
Art Gallery: Ray Lowry - London CallingWednesday, 16 June 2010
It’s hard to believe that it’s 30 years since the release of The Clash's London Calling, an album that sounds as vital, immediate and relevant today as it did then. Yet there are probably people who remain more familiar with London Calling’s iconic cover than the music contained on the two discs of shiny black vinyl that came with it. Read more... |
Resonances at the Wallace CollectionMonday, 10 May 2010
It's an admirable project: to recast the interiors of stately homes as immersive artworks, a musical recital combined with sound installations designed to make the viewer look anew at their surroundings. Certainly as I entered the hallway of Hertford House in Marylebone, where the Wallace Collection is housed, the rich, shifting tones of Simon Fisher Turner's electronic sound manipulations filled the air like perfume, amplifying the opulence of the surroundings and making me – and others –... Read more... |
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