rock
CD: Benin City - Fires in the ParkSunday, 07 July 2013
This is not an easy record to get a handle on. When I first got it, I bounced through a couple of tracks idly, and it felt like it was coming from the messy genre fusions of the mid-90s – somewhere between trip-hop, indie-dance, rap-rock and mildly... Read more... |
Bruce Springsteen & the E Street Band, Hard Rock Calling, Olympic ParkMonday, 01 July 2013
"Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park" is a wonderfully grand name for the venue for this summer's Hard Rock Calling festival, but the reality doesn't quite match up. Rather than basking in the glory (and shiny new stadium architecture) of Mo and Jessica's... Read more... |
CD: Deap Vally - SistronixSunday, 23 June 2013
It is unfortunate that those who hate Deap Vally find it way easier to articulate why than those who love them. There’s little new in the bluesy, garage-rock riffs that pose and swagger their way through debut album Sistronix, and it’s not as if -... Read more... |
Iggy and The Stooges, Royal Festival HallFriday, 21 June 2013
Having witnessed Neil Young’s shambolic O2 concert on Monday – Young treating the occasional venture into his back catalogue with listless contempt whilst serving up multiple banalities from his recent albums – I considered skipping seeing more... Read more... |
Neil Young and Crazy Horse, O2 ArenaTuesday, 18 June 2013
"Don't say it's over," wailed Neil Young at the end of "Hey Hey, My My", his raging anthem against the dying of the light which still sounds as bellicose and cantankerous as it did in 1979. And happily it isn't over yet, because on this evidence the... Read more... |
CD: Black Sabbath - 13Sunday, 09 June 2013
The original Black Sabbath were a feat of engineering on a par with a classic Land Rover or an AK47. Everything about them was basic, brutal, unadorned and brilliantly functional – and as such achieved a very real, if rather grim, kind of beauty. So... Read more... |
CD: Queens of the Stone Age - ...Like ClockworkSaturday, 01 June 2013
Reasons behind the prolonged absence of Queens of the Stone Age are legion, including line-up turbulence, successful side projects and the near-death experience of band linchpin Josh Homme. As if to acknowledge and compensate for the lengthy gap in... Read more... |
Rock ‘n’ Roll Britannia, BBC FourSaturday, 18 May 2013
From being “a strange facsimile of the original” to generating the “first British record made by people who are 100 per cent convinced that they are doing the right thing”, Rock ‘n’ Roll Britannia breezily mapped the protracted birth of a British... Read more... |
Beware of Mr BakerTuesday, 14 May 2013
For those familiar with Ginger Baker’s virtuosic musicianship, but not with his life, the biggest revelation of the warts-and-all documentary Beware of Mr Baker may be that next to drumming, playing polo was the great time-keeper’s obsession. One... Read more... |
Reissue CDs Weekly: Sun RecordsSunday, 12 May 2013
Various Artists: The Sun Rock Box - Rock ‘n’ Roll Recorded by Sam Phillips 1954-1959It’s no exaggeration to say that Sam Phillips transformed society. With his associate Ike Turner, he brought Jackie Brenston’s “Rocket 88” to the world in 1951... Read more... |
Reissue CDs Weekly: Killing Joke, Motown, Bob Marley, The WinkiesSunday, 28 April 2013
Killing Joke: The Singles Collection 1979-2012Killing Joke were one of the most singular British bands to emerge in wake of punk. Their metal-edged, tribal stomp didn’t fit in with anything else going on at the time. Collecting 33 tracks from their... Read more... |
Alice in Chains, The Fillmore, MiamiSaturday, 27 April 2013
Reformed rock bands may be ten-a-penny but no other return quite matches the resurrection of Alice In Chains. The first grunge band to break big with their 1990 debut album Facelift, Alice In Chains matched Nirvana both in their ability to marry... Read more... |
