tue 04/11/2025

New Music Interviews

10 Questions for Christine McVie of Fleetwood Mac

Ralph Moore

theartsdesk meets Christine McVie on a sunny Friday afternoon in September; the Warner Brothers boardroom (with generous hospitality spread) is suitably palatial. We’re the first media interview of the day, so she’s bright and attentive. McVie was always the member of Fleetwood Mac who you’d want to adopt: the most approachably human member of a band constantly at war with itself.

Read more...

theartsdesk Q&A: Musician John Foxx

Kieron Tyler

“The best and most confident debut since ‘Anarchy in the UK,’” said weekly music paper Sounds of the debut single by Ultravox! “Dangerous Rhythm” had been released in February 1977. “Cosmic reggae," declared Record Mirror. Melody Maker identified a “rare quality and haunting presence”. The NME said the song was a “reggae abstraction” and “mesmeric”. Ultravox! – the attention-grabbing exclamation mark was ditched in early 1978 – were off to a good start.

Read more...

theartsdesk Q&A: Musician/DJ Mark Hawkins aka Marquis Hawkes

joe Muggs

This is not a standard dance music story. Marquis Hawkes is one of the club music success stories of the past couple of years – since the first release in 2012 on Glasgow's revered Dixon Avenue Basement Jams, there've been many 12" club hits on multiple connoisseurs' labels, and his album Social Housing on the Fabric club's Houndstooth label has soundtracked many people's summer this year, with the artist all the while remaining anonymous.

Read more...

theartsdesk Q&A: Conductor Jules Buckley

Matthew Wright

Conductor, arranger and composer Jules Buckley is a notable champion of non-classical orchestral music. He has pioneered orchestral arrangements with singer-songwriters such as Laura Mvula, Anna Calvi and Caro Emerald. Even more boldly, he has established orchestral collaborations with numerous artists from rock and electronic music, including the Arctic Monkeys, Professor Green, Basement Jaxx, and electronic improviser Beardyman.

Read more...

10 Questions for Musician Jasper Høiby

peter Quinn

Copenhagen-born bassist Jasper Høiby moved to London in 2000 to attend the Royal Academy of Music. In 2005 he created the trio Phronesis which has toured extensively in Europe and North America and won awards for Jazz Album of the Year in Jazzwise and MOJO for its 2010 album, Alive, as well as a London Jazz Award for its "Pitch Black" performance at Brecon Jazz festival in 2012.

Read more...

Paul Simon Introduces 'Stranger to Stranger'

Adam Sweeting

Perhaps as a hopeful harbinger for Paul Simon's new album Stranger to Stranger, Disturbed recently topped Billboard's Mainstream Rock Songs chart with their flabbergasting version of Simon's 1965 song "The Sound of Silence". However, while vocalist David Draiman could launch a career as a new kind of Wagnerian baritone on the strength of his extraordinary performance, Simon himself is headed in a less stentorian direction.

Read more...

10 Questions for Musician Martin Fry

Adam Sweeting

It was in the long-ago year of 1982 that Martin Fry and ABC released The Lexicon of Love, a feast of addictively lush pop-soul swathed in Anne Dudley's orchestrations and producer Trevor Horn's sparkling electronic innovations. Fry bestrode it like a knowing nouveau-glam mastermind, treading in the ironic footsteps of Bryan Ferry and David Bowie as he effortlessly juggled camp, kitsch and sardonic wit.

Read more...

10 Questions for Musician Tinchy Stryder

Thomas H Green

Tinchy Stryder (b. 1986) has had a successful pop career since 2009, including two chart-topping singles (“Number 1” and “Never Leave You”). Born Kwasi Danquah in Ghana, his family moved to London’s East End when he was nine and, in the early years of the new millennium, he established himself as a rising talent of the grime scene and member of the Roll Deep Collective.

Read more...

10 Questions for Musician Debashish Bhattacharya

Thomas H Green

Debashish Bhattacharya (b 1963) is India’s leading lap steel guitar player. Equally happy in the worlds of Indian classical and West-leaning fusion music, it’s no exaggeration to say he changed the way his instrument is regarded, at home and abroad.

Read more...

10 Questions for Musician Beth Orton

Thomas H Green

Beth Orton (b 1970) is a singer-songwriter who first came to prominence via her collaborations with the Chemical Brothers, at the start of both their careers. She recorded an album with the producer William Orbit in 1993 but it was her 1995 album, Trailer Park, a canny amalgamation of folk and electronica, that really put her on the map as a solo artist.

Read more...

Pages

Subscribe to theartsdesk.com

Thank you for continuing to read our work on theartsdesk.com. For unlimited access to every article in its entirety, including our archive of more than 15,000 pieces, we're asking for £5 per month or £40 per year. We feel it's a very good deal, and hope you do too.

To take a subscription now simply click here.

And if you're looking for that extra gift for a friend or family member, why not treat them to a theartsdesk.com gift subscription?

latest in today

'We are bowled over!' Thank you for your messages... ...
Benson Boone, O2 London review - sequins, spectacle and chee...

After cancelling his Birmingham gig an hour before curtain-up due to illness, the anticipatory hype around whether...

Die My Love review - good lovin' gone bad

Directed by Lynne Ramsay and based on the book by Ariana Harwicz, Die My Love is an unsettling dive into the disturbed psyche of...

Midlake's 'A Bridge to Far' is a tour-de-forc...

“Climb upon a bridge to far, go anywhere your heart desires.” The key phrase from the title track of Midlake’s sixth studio album conveys the...

Macbeth, RSC, Stratford review - Glaswegian gangs and ghouli...

It’s hard to pinpoint exactly what’s so very different about Belfast and Glasgow, both of which I have visited in the last few...

Sananda Maitreya, Town Hall, Birmingham review - 80s megasta...

During a false start to “Billy Don’t Fall”, on Sunday night at Birmingham’s iconic Town Hall, Sananda Maitreya took the opportunity to address the...

First Person: Kerem Hasan on the transformative experience o...

There is a scene in the second act of Jake Heggie and Terrence McNally’s Dead Man Walking in which the man condemned to death, Joseph De...

Mr Scorsese, Apple TV review - perfectly pitched documentary...

This five-parter by Rebecca Miller is essential viewing for any...

Madama Butterfly, Irish National Opera review - visual and v...

Emotional truth backed up by musical sophistication is what saves Puccini’s drama about a geisha deserted by an American officer from mawkishness...

Hallé John Adams festival, Bridgewater Hall / RNCM, Manchest...

Am I dreaming? Did I really see a living composer of...