New Music Reviews

Deep Purple, NIA, Birmingham

Guy Oddy Wednesday, 16 October 2013

Read anything about rock music in the Seventies - about British hard rock music in particular - and three bands are pushed forward as titans: Black Sabbath, Led Zeppelin and Deep Purple. However, while both Black Sabbath and Led Zeppelin have gone on to receive widespread critical acclaim and massive sales since their glory days, Deep Purple have assumed the position of a guilty pleasure – at best.

Comment

Emily Barker & the Red Clay Halo/Chris T-T, Oran Mor, Glasgow

Lisa-Marie Ferla Tuesday, 15 October 2013

If Glasgow was to find a little corner for the traditional spirit of vaudeville to live on, it would make sense if it was this one: set the basement of a 19th century church with an audience sitting in lines on gold-painted seats; and two highly accomplished songwriters introducing each other with the sense of ceremony you so rarely find at concerts these days.

Reissue CDs Weekly: The Kinks, Hapshash and the Coloured Coat

Kieron Tyler Sunday, 13 October 2013

The Kinks: Muswell Hillbillies

Crosby Stills & Nash, Royal Albert Hall

Adam Sweeting Saturday, 12 October 2013

There was much to be said for attending the third and final show of Crosby Stills & Nash's Albert Hall stint, because this was the night when they played their debut album in its entirety. Clearly much – almost everything, in fact – has changed since 1969, but though the musicians are four decades older, their original collective spirit survives remarkably intact.

Comment

Puglia Sounds, Hoxton Square Bar & Kitchen

Ronnie Flynn Friday, 11 October 2013

Puglia, otherwise known as Apulia, is the heel of the kinky boot that makes up Italy. It’s usually associated with the golden sands of the Ionian coast, the clear, sun-spun waters of Castellanata Marina, the palaces of Bari, and the sublime fish restaurants of Peschici. There is, however, another side to this Italian paradise.

Reissue CDs Weekly: National Wake, Drugstore

Kieron Tyler Sunday, 06 October 2013

National Wake: A Walk in Africa 1979–81

Jacqui Dankworth, 606 Club

Matthew Wright Friday, 04 October 2013

Jazz singer Jacqui Dankworth’s fifth album Live to Love is, on the face of it, an unlikely forum for appreciation of quantum physics or the heroic plight of Pakistani campaigner Malala Yousafzai. This new release, launched at the 606 Club, contains both, but not because she has morphed into a fearsome amalgam of Tom Lehrer and Billy Bragg.

The Wasp Factory, Linbury Studio Theatre

Igor Toronyi-Lalic Thursday, 03 October 2013

A baby's brain is polished off by a throbbing welter of maggots. A field of sheep are on fire. A screaming child whose hands have been tied to a kite is flying out over the North Sea. How do you make an opera out of any of this? The answer of course is you don’t. You leave this kind of thing to cinema or the novel. Opera is - contrary to popular belief - extremely bad at spectacle, especially if the aim is to terrify. Horror has never had much of a look-in as a genre in the art form.

Shlomo: Human Geekbox, Corn Exchange, Brighton

Thomas H Green Monday, 30 September 2013

At the end of his hour and 20 minute long performance Shlomo gives us an encore, a percussive tune wherein his amazing noise-making abilities are piled on top of each other with a piece of sampling kit called a Loop Station. This multi-layered nugget is propulsive but the seated audience is unsure, as it has been throughout, whether the evening's ambience should be rowdily interactive or quietly appreciative, as if watching a play.