CDs/DVDs
Album: Little Mix - ConfettiMonday, 09 November 2020
Little Mix, currently at another profile peak with their TV talent show The Search, are one of the most successful female groups ever, their tours amongst the highest earning of recent times. Like a CGI-shiny Instagram-age Spice Girls, now newly... Read more... |
DVD/Blu-ray: The LadykillersSunday, 08 November 2020
Much has been made of The Ladykillers having being directed by a Scot (Alexander Mackendrick) from a screenplay written by an American (William Rose). This last great Ealing comedy shares its dark tone and leading actor with Robert Hamer’s sublime... Read more... |
Album: Balothizer - Cretan SmashSaturday, 07 November 2020
Wherever we might live, the contagious energy and urgency of rock reflect the mood of our times: it’s hardly surprising that musicians from all over our super-connected world should re-invent their traditions in a way that absorbs rock’s decibels... Read more... |
Album: Kylie - DISCOThursday, 05 November 2020
We’re eight months into a global pandemic, and Kylie Minogue is serenading us from her kitchen. “We’re a million miles apart in a thousand ways,” she sings, feather-light vocals floating over a driving disco beat. “Can we all be as one again?”At... Read more... |
Album: Dame Shirley Bassey - I Owe It All to YouWednesday, 04 November 2020
The last time that these ears were grabbed by a new Shirley Bassey tune was when she went toe to toe with Propellerheads for the mighty “History Repeating” single in 1997. But it’s actually only been six years since her last album, which isn’t bad... Read more... |
DVD/Blu-ray: DementiaTuesday, 03 November 2020
The cheaply made experimental exploitation indie Dementia (1955) is one of those footnotes in movie history that makes cultists salivate. And with good reason – it’s a wry blend of film noir and horror that makes you wonder if it was a... Read more... |
CD: Cunning Folk - A Casual InvocationMonday, 02 November 2020
As this review goes live on the internet – an invisible medium even more pervasive than coronavirus – we’ve just enjoyed All Hallow’s Eve with not only a Blue Moon but October’s Hunter’s Moon, too, gazing down upon us from the constellation of... Read more... |
DVD/Blu-ray: Ghost HuntingSunday, 01 November 2020
Raed Andoni’s semi-documentary Ghost Hunting (Istiyad Ashbah) is nominally "about" the Israeli treatment of Palestinian prisoners but is an effective, potent denunciation of human rights abuses across the modern world. Andoni’s booklet introduction... Read more... |
Album: Barbara Dickson - Time is Going FasterSaturday, 31 October 2020
It’s 45 years since the West End success of John, Paul, George, Ringo… and Bert put a young Scottish folkie named Barbara Dickson on the map, launching a career that brought richly-deserved success on stage and screen, as well as in music. She’s... Read more... |
Album: Sam Smith - Love GoesFriday, 30 October 2020
Sam Smith’s third album is kind of perfect for a miserable autumn amidst a global pandemic. It’s reflective, it’s morose and it attempts disco-fun but can’t quite muster the energy to get its heels on.Love Goes was supposed to be released six months... Read more... |
Album: Dizzee Rascal - E3 AFThursday, 29 October 2020
You can’t ever go all the way home again, and for years Dizzee Rascal didn’t want to. His Mercury-winning debut Boy In Da Corner (2003) electrified with the shock of the new, its eccentric, genre-mashing sound topping juddering jungle bass with a... Read more... |
Album: Emma Ruth Rundle & Thou - May Our Chambers Be FullWednesday, 28 October 2020
Post-rock singer-songwriter Emma Ruth Rundle and high-volume, sludge metal-heads Thou are not obvious musical collaborators, but with May Our Chambers Be Full, they really have come up trumps with an album that may not encourage many to take to the... Read more... |
