CDs/DVDs
Albums of the Year 2021: Eliane Elias - Mirror MirrorMonday, 03 January 2022
After watching so many gigs through a computer screen, it was a joy to hear live music again in familiar haunts – from Ronnie Scott’s and the Southbank to Grand Junction, Paddington – in 2021. It made you appreciate anew not only the high-wire... Read more... |
Albums of the Year 2021: Sault - NineFriday, 31 December 2021
If ever there were a year to cherish new music, 2021 was it. Lockdown v3.0 came with unwelcome updates (shit weather, structured home-schooling) and the only end in sight was of the nation’s collective tether.With passports rendered next to useless... Read more... |
Albums of the Year 2021: Little Simz - Sometimes I Might Be IntrovertThursday, 30 December 2021
It was two female artists who mainly soundtracked 2021 for me. And they couldn’t be more different. Although Off Off One by Kate Stables (aka This is the Kit) was recorded just before Covid changed everything, there are some ominous mentions in the... Read more... |
Albums of the Year 2021: Céu - AcústicoWednesday, 29 December 2021
Has there ever been a time when the music industry has had its gaze quite so firmly fixed on the past? Once the streaming stats started giving the message that revenue growth was going to come from back catalogues rather than current releases or new... Read more... |
Blu-ray: Hungarian MastersTuesday, 28 December 2021
Three films, each restored to glorious 4K, make up Second Run’s Hungarian Masters set. Billed as “essential works by three of Hungarian cinema’s most renowned filmmakers”, each film earns that praise in its own way.Zoltán Fábri’s ... Read more... |
Albums of the Year 2021: Frida Hyvönen - Dream Of IndependenceFriday, 24 December 2021
Frida Hyvönen’s UK profile isn’t as high as it is in her home country Sweden. Over here, what she gets up to is less apparent than the activities of some of her more heavily marketed fellow Swedes. Hence Dream Of Independence coming as a surprise,... Read more... |
Albums of the Year 2021: Katherine Priddy - The Eternal Rocks BeneathWednesday, 22 December 2021
Katherine Priddy’s debut album came out in the summer, and it’s remained a high point for the rest of the year as 2021 plays out to the sombre drums and drones of resurgent pandemic warnings, fresh lockdowns, closed venues, silenced auditoriums. Her... Read more... |
Albums of the Year 2021: Greta Van Fleet - The Battle at Garden's GateTuesday, 21 December 2021
Is there anything more comforting to men of a certain vintage than the crunching guitars and wailing vocals of classic rock? Not for me. This year, the genre transported me back to a musical era of sheer joy and wild, creative spirit; a time when... Read more... |
Albums of the Year 2021: Limiñanas / Garnier - De PelículaMonday, 20 December 2021
2021 was a year of two halves in New Musicworld. For the first seven months or so, venues remained closed and live performances were either a cherished memory or something experienced online. During the last five months, however, concert halls and... Read more... |
Albums of the Year 2021: Dry Cleaning - New Long LegSunday, 19 December 2021
There’s something about a search for fine detail in the music I’ve listened to this year, whether it’s reaching to recognise the Orkney birdsong in Erland Cooper’s Holm (Variations & B-Sides) or conjuring up images of the characters Arlo Parkes... Read more... |
Albums of the Year 2021: Toya Delazy - Afrorave Vol 1Saturday, 18 December 2021
2021 might not seem the most likely of years for the globalisation of dance music to intensify, what with the lack of travel and the lack of... well... dancing. But, in fact, thanks partly to the enforced time spent online which led to a lot of... Read more... |
Albums of the Year 2021: Marina - Ancient Dreams in a Modern LandFriday, 17 December 2021
We did that whole state-of-things COVID/Brexit/anxiety/neurosis blah-blah in the end-of-year pieces last year. And, indeed, the year before (when Bozza was elected). Not this year. I’m over that. Let’s crack on. Live life. Own it. All that. An... Read more... |
