|  |  |  | | | | | Music news, reviews, comment and features | guardian.co.uk | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | (Wichita) Considered dispassionately, the second album from Those Dancing Days more than fulfils the promise of their first singles, released in 2007, when most of them were still at school. Once gauche and shambolic, albeit charming, the Swedish quintet have blossomed into purposeful musicians, whose seemingly straightforward indiepop songs frequently surprise with off-kilter rhythms and unexpected melodies. The trouble is that it's hard to consider Daydreams and Nightmares other than dispassionately. There's nothing intrinsically wrong with it: it has memorable powerhouse choruses (especially in I'll Be Yours and Can't Find Entrance), polished verses, solid and song structures nicely roughened by Cissi Efraimsson's inventive, twisty drumming. What it doesn't have is personality – the irrepressible, effervescent personality that made those 2007 singles such a delight. It's not totally missing: Fuckarias is glorious, a bubblegum-punk screech driven by hyperventilating drums, sparking bristling guitars off Linnea Jonsson's incandescent vocal. But how slick and anodyne the rest of the album sounds beside it. Rating: 2/5
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Daneman/Thomas/Williams/Theatre of the Ayre/Kenny
(Wigmore Hall Live) We owe the current surge of interest in John Blow's Venus and Adonis, ironically, to the Purcell tercentenary two years ago. Purcell admired Blow's little opera, written for Charles II probably in 1683, and modelled Dido and Aeneas on it. Comparison of the two works, however, has resulted in repeated assessments of Blow in a Purcellian context, something that lutenist Elizabeth Kenny and her ensemble Theatre of the Ayre admirably avoid here by prefacing the opera with some of Blow's chamber and vocal works, together with music by his French contemporaries, Michel Lambert and Robert de Visée. The performances might be a bit low-key for some tastes. Though Venus and Adonis is much more than a piece of erotica, there are times when it needs to be more full-on than it is here. The scrupulous instrumental work isn't always helped by a dryish recording. Sophie Daneman and Roderick Williams make a sensuous pair of lovers, while Elin Manahan Thomas's Cupid could be a bit more mischievous. Rating: 3/5
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | The selling of Jessie J is an attempt to will into being a British icon to take on Ke$ha, Gaga and Perry on their home turf. But an icon she isn't What makes a great pop star? It's not quite the music, or the videos, or the clothes, the fame or even the outrages. All those things matter, but it seems to me they emerge naturally from some more basic quality. A pop star's job, I think, is to do what Greil Marcus once wrote about Mick Jagger – that he showed people "a new way of being in the world". Before him, there were no Mick Jaggers. After him, rather a lot. And to an extent his actual music played catch-up with his way of carrying himself. This thing pop stars do goes beyond personality or charisma, into becoming a kind of template. It's quite a big thing to attempt, but not inconceivable even now. For a couple of years after Lily Allen appeared, every new female songwriter was compared to her, no matter how tenuous the audible link. This is partly because the music industry isn't very enlightened when it comes to selling female songwriters, but also because Allen turned out to be one of those jigsaw pieces you didn't realise were missing from pop. She's still a reference point: the debut album from Jessie J, Who You Are, has attracted the comparison. There is a lot of expectation around this album, and around Jessie J herself – not just the hits, and the BBC Sound of 2011 award, but an early and sizeable push towards America. Katy Perry's hitmaker, Dr Luke, has co-written a track or two, and Jessie J will be appearing on Saturday Night Live this month – not bad going for a British act four months out from her debut single. But does Jessie J offer that kind of template quality? Not really. Who You Are doesn't tell us a lot about who she is: she's confident, she's fortunate, she's real, she believes in herself. But these noble qualities are what everyone raised to the purple of celebrity has in common, and their forceful expression doesn't make them more interesting. Listening to the album, full of put-downs to schoolyard enemies and diary-room proclamations of "I need this!", it feels as though Jessie J won some secret reality show we never got to see. There's even, on Mamma Knows Best, its very own "big band week". Jessie J has appeared at a time when American pop is doing well for stars, and the selling of her seems to me an attempt to will into being a British icon who can take on Ke$ha, Gaga and Perry on their home turf. And if not her, then who? Adele has the advantage of already selling records in America, but she's all about wholeheartedly inhabiting an existing archetype, not creating her own. She's leapfrogging pop, targeting a more respectable world. Coming up on the outside is Katy B – a Brit School graduate like Jessie J and Adele, but one who shows signs of being able to offer something more idiosyncratic. Serving an apprenticeship singing on funky house records, her first solo singles – Katy on a Mission, Louder, and Lights On – showed a gift for capturing simple, exact emotions within the clubbing experience, like wanting a DJ to play one final record once the lights have gone up. Katy B isn't the finished article any more than Jessie J is, but it's that grasp of specifics which makes her more exciting. She may or may not become a great pop star, but she's already doing something they do – creating things that could only be by her.
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Severus
(Naxos, 2CDs) Bizet was always ambivalent about the piano. He was, by all accounts, a superb player, yet he fretted that the public would primarily view him as a pianist rather than a composer, and therefore limited his appearances as a performer. He wrote for the instrument sporadically from 1851 to 1857, returning to it between 1865 and 1868. The earlier pieces are strongly influenced by Chopin, while the later works are more eclectic. Some of his bigger pieces, such as the Variations Chromatiques (1868) and the Lisztian Chasse Fantastique (1865) are uncharacteristically melodramatic and grandiose. But as early as 1857, a Rondo Turque reveals the instinctive feel for landscape that characterises his late, great evocations of Provence and Spain, while Chants du Rhin (1866) and Marine (1868) have the conciseness and emotional precision of his finest work. He also made transcriptions of his own orchestral music, and pianist Julia Severus closes each of her discs with one of the suites from L'Arlésienne, prefacing the first with genre pieces and the second with narrative or descriptive works. She just lets the music speak for itself with a minimum of interpretative fuss. Very fine. Rating: 4/5
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | (Abstract Logix) For his tight funk-drumming creativity, melodic and harmonic sense (he's as good a jazz pianist as he is a drummer) and musical inclusiveness, the UK's Gary Husband has the pull to assemble an all-star studio venture boasting the likes of guitarists John McLaughlin, Allan Holdsworth, Robin Trower, Steve Topping and Steve Hackett, McLaughlin's former Mahavishnu partners Jan Hammer (keys) and Jerry Goodman (violin), Husband's former Level 42 boss Mark King and more. It's unapologetic jazz-fusion, but being Husband's project it's a subtle one, full of poetic synth effects, hard-nosed bluesy grooving, and flying fast guitar-led themes. Sometimes the leader just jams on squelching synths with his own overdubbed drums; sometimes he drives elegant rock ballads like the yearning Moon Song with Steve Hackett's singing guitar. And the sinister, looming Boulevard Baloneyo is an electronic odyssey for Husband, Holdsworth and bassist Jimmy Johnson. It's a fusion fan's dream, but jazzy and quirky enough for a wider audience. Rating: 3/5
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Watts/English Concert/Bicket
(Harmonia Mundi) Elizabeth Watts's debut album for Harmonia Mundi is something of a puzzle. Watts is, of course, widely regarded as one of the finest British sopranos to have emerged in the last decade. We think of her, however, primarily in terms of Mozart, Strauss and the excesses of Baroque opera, so the choice of Bach seems perverse. The programme consists of complete performances of Mein Herze Schwimmt in Blut and Jauchzet Gott in Allen Landen, together with a selection of arias from some of his other cantatas. Not all of it ideally suits her. Watts is always at her most striking in her upper registers. But apart from Jauchzet Gott, there's little here to keep her there, and sections of Mein Herze Schwimmt in Blut lie uncomfortably low. More perplexing are imprecisions in her coloratura throughout, and a rather odd way with a text. A habit of nudging individual words, fine in lieder, can be awkward in Bach, where line is often all. The instrumental contributions from the English Concert under Harry Bicket are nicely done, but the disc as a whole is a disappointment. Rating: 3/5
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | So Elton John thinks The X Factor is 'boring'? Hasn't he been following the successes of the stars Simon Cowell has nurtured? Lost in Showbiz knew that Piers Morgan's interview with Simon Cowell was going to be good – after all, nothing says ruthless no-holds-barred interrogation like being interviewed on US television by someone who owes their entire US television career to you. But it couldn't imagine just how good. It started to get an inkling that it was on to something very special when Morgan broached the subject of Elton John's criticism of The X Factor ("boring and arse-paralysingly brain crippling", "I'd rather have my cock bitten off by an alsatian than watch The X Factor" etc). This caused Cowell to go into pious it's-all-about-the-music mode, and few things in the world make Lost in Showbiz's heart race like Cowell in pious it's-all-about-the-music mode. People like Elton John, he said, were "only worried about themselves". "I always want to say to them: 'I tell you what, you just made a million dollars off your last private gig. Go and give it to a bunch of young musicians you care about, put them in the studio. Go and nurture them. Go and spend some time looking after them.'" Closing its ears to those who sneeringly add: "Then go and drop them like a hot brick after 'disappointing' sales of their debut album", Lost in Showbiz notes that this provides handy clarification for anyone who had previously assumed The X Factor was essentially the musical equivalent of a giant effluent truck with its nozzle attached to the charts, its pump set to "expel" and Cowell cackling dementedly in the cabin, while waving a vast wodge of banknotes with one hand and making the "wanker" sign at everyone who passes by with the other. To them, it sends a clear message: you're wrong. The X Factor is essentially a philanthropic organisation. Cowell's personal fortune of £165m has been amassed by accident, merely as an unwanted byproduct of his selfless dedication to helping others. And what others they are. Of course, attention is often hogged by Leona Lewis, this week understandably voted the most influential woman to have lived or worked in London over the last 100 years in a poll for International Women's Day conducted by Metro. She got 70% of the vote, while Emmeline Pankhurst got 1.7%, which provoked precisely the kind of po-faced grumbling that Cowell addressed in his interview. Many people pointed out that Pankhurst was described by Time magazine as someone who "shaped an idea of women of our time and shook society into a new pattern from which there could be no going back". To which Lost in Showbiz can only respond: yeah, and what was her version of Run by Snow Patrol like? Any good? But let us not dwell on Lewis, for she is merely the brightest in a crowded firmament of superstars who owe their legend to The X Factor and the selfless dedication of Cowell to looking after new talent. It seems almost pointless to reel off their names, permanently emblazoned as they are in the national consciousness and the history of rock'n'roll alike, but here goes: Tabby Callaghan! 2 To Go! Cassie Compton! Addictiv Ladies! Miss Frank! 4 Sure! 4 Tune! Journey South! Ben Mills! Admittedly, it's quite hard to keep track of some of their activities – their websites often appear to have either gone offline or don't seem to have been updated for several years – but who can blame them for seeking a degree of anonymity, a little privacy, in the glare of the enduring, perhaps even interminable, globe-straddling fame that an appearance on The X Factor can bring? Those who Lost in Showbiz has been able to find bear testament to what can be achieved with the benefit of Cowell's nurturing hand, feeding your career with the Baby Bio of his wisdom and experience. Their websites are packed with phrases that glitter, sprinkled as they are with the stardust of unimaginable success: "the second single was a download-only purchase that reached No 94 in the charts"; "his third album is due for release by Conehead Records sometime in June", "personal appearance at the Tropicana Club, Chapel St Leonards, near Skegness". It's hard to pick out highlights among such a catalogue of triumph, but let us linger for a moment on the website of Andy Abraham and marvel at the headlines on the news page. "Andy amazes guests at frozen food specialists Farmfood's Moulin Rouge evening, Leicester!" "Andy performs at prestigious equestrian event in Bedfordshire!" Do any words sum up a musical career that's been selflessly guided to its absolute zenith quite like "guest appearance at the British Dressage Northern Region Senior Home International Competition Gala Dinner"? If there are, Lost in Showbiz has yet to hear them. Then, pausing only to look at the future bookings of The MacDonald Brothers – the selfless hand of Cowell had guided them to Wemyss Bay Holiday Park, Renfrewshire, which Lost in Showbiz can only assume is like headlining Glastonbury, except in a caravan site near Greenock – and to boggle momentarily at the thought of how Same Difference's recent signing session, for an album that failed to chart at all, at an Asda in Fratton went, let us move on to series four winner Leon Jackson. He paid lavish tribute to the altruistic nurturing abilities of Cowell when he gave a series of interviews announcing that he would never perform his 2007 Christmas No 1, When You Believe again – I know, Lost in Showbiz had to clutch at the furniture to steady itself as well – in protest at the "crushing moment" of learning he'd been dropped by Cowell by reading about it in a newspaper after his first album came out. Lost in Showbiz confesses it feels a lump rise to its throat as it thinks of the delicacy and generosity with which he fosters new talent. It points a steely gaze in Elton's direction and asks: can you honestly offer that kind of support and encouragement to an artist?
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | She's appeared on stage in a giant egg and made a dress out of meat, but what really scares Sir Cliff are her hats Finally, to the launch of Cliff Richard's forthcoming album of duets with soul legends, where the man who once described himself as "the most radical rock star there has ever been" – something the late American singer GG Allin, who used to perform naked but for a pair of boots, stick a microphone up his bum and eat his own poo on stage might have had cause to dispute – made a game attempt at proving his continued relevance to a younger audience. "I wouldn't mind singing with Lady Gaga," he said, "but she can't wear those hats." Lost in Showbiz doesn't like to nitpick with a knight of the realm, but it feels forced to say: Cliff, mate, she turned up at the Grammies in a giant egg, she played piano on The X Factor while sitting on an enormous lavatory, she wore a dress made out of meat to the VMAs and Snoop Dogg – who, frankly, seems a rather more worldly character than you – recently announced he was scared of her on the grounds that she might have "a snake or a knife" concealed in her vagina, and you're concerned about her hats? Whatever next? "I would have liked to perform a duet with the late American singer GG Allin – but not in those boots"?
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Queen's Hall, Edinburgh Pulse Shadows is one of Harrison Birtwistle's most powerful works, but it is no easy listen. Nine songs for soprano and small ensemble, and nine "meditations" for string quartet, explore post-Holocaust poetry by Paul Celan, who, though Jewish and living in France, wrote in the fanciful style of pre-second world war German expressionism (he believed "language must be set free from history"). The words are intense and puzzling, alluding to the Holocaust in dreamlike terms that the instruments then expand and deconstruct. Birtwistle set an English translation, but his music matches the German linguistic trick of jumbling existing units together to form new, bizarrely juxtaposed ones. The vocal line does some angular leaping about and swoopy Sprechstimme, but mostly delivers the words direct and syllabic. Claron McFadden handled it with unnerving ease: the songs were written for her, and she sang with composure and fluidity. In response, the instruments chatter, bicker and explode into driving rhythms, then sudden sparseness. A pair of tangled clarinets may be the shadows of the title, matching the singer's sounds before pushing them near to breaking point. Birtwistle gave the Hebrides his blessing to add a whole extra dimension to Pulse Shadows by playing Purcell Fantasias between movements. Much of his effect is about contrast anyway – how one sound jars and melds with another – and this addition really worked. The composers go well together, despite the three-century age difference: the same bursts of refractive energy, the same abrupt hushes. Even alongside Birtwistle, Purcell's scrunched-up dissonances still sound daring. Rating: 5/5
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Kings Place, London With London residencies at Kings Place and LSO St Luke's, the Aurora Orchestra, founded six years ago, is riding high, and after their latest concert it is easy to understand why. The players are young and dexterous; enthusiasm and exactitude go hand in hand. Founding conductor Nicholas Collon, similarly, has the rare knack of combining self-deprecating charm with great intelligence. They seem comfortable in Kings Place, too, where the acoustic can be merciless, but where music also acquires an in-your-face immediacy. Part of the Mozart Unwapped season, the programme was woven round two symphonies, Nos 27 and 31, and two of Mozart's grandest concert arias, Non Più, Tutto Ascoltai and Bella Mia Fiamma, sung by Rosemary Joshua. Voices sound big in this venue, and we were repeatedly reminded of the warmth of Joshua's tone and of her restrained yet passionate way with words. Non Più, Tutto Ascoltai evolves into an emotionally charged duet for soprano and solo violin, graciously played by Thomas Gould. The chromaticism of Bella Mia Fiamma makes it a vocal obstacle course, but Joshua was pitch-perfect and gloriously incisive. The symphonies were also very classy. No 27, with its teasing false endings and suave elegance, was full of sly exuberance, while No 31, "Paris", gleamed with hauteur and contrapuntal brilliance. There were a couple of shorter pieces, too – the Overture to The Marriage of Figaro, furtive yet noble, and the dark, obsessive Adagio and Fugue in C minor. The latter took a while to gather momentum, though the Fugue, when we reached it, was perfect in its implacable weight and grandeur. Rating: 4/5
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | From Ring of Fire in Spanish to Kraftwerk in French, there's a real pleasure in hearing familiar music sound unfamiliar I don't buy the canard that one language is any more or less suited to singing pop music than another. But artists and listeners carry assumptions and prejudices about what singing in a certain language signifies: singing in French sounds romantic, German industrial, Italian operatic, and so on. There were often sound commercial reasons for these tracks' existence. English hasn't always been the lingua franca of popular culture, and record companies often asked artists to record in foreign languages to quash rival non-English cover versions. Even so, information is scant about the motives behind many foreign language versions. They're rarely central to an artist's career, and are usually neglected by biographers seeking the bigger picture. So what we have here is curiosity value. You don't have to understand the lingo to appreciate them: there's a real pleasure in hearing a familiar record sounding unfamiliar. It's like hearing them for the first time. Johnny Cash singing Ring of Fire in Spanish? This discovery alone justifies this week's theme. Admittedly, el hombre de negro sounds a tad awkward singing in Spanish, but the mariachi trumpets of Ring of Fire help him get away with it. Kraftwerk naturally recorded many tracks in their native German, but hearing Showroom Dummies in French is a disorientating surprise. The first of several Ralf 'n' Florian songs sung in French, it sounds stranger and more otherworldly than ever. It's a celebration of Europe, a theme of the song's parent album Trans-Europe Express. Against their better judgment, the Beatles recorded two Beatlemania-establishing songs in German: She Loves You and I Want to Hold Your Hand. It was the only time they recorded outside the UK. They learned the songs phonetically - they obviously found better things to do in Hamburg than learning German. (The translator, Luxembourger Camillo Felgen, himself had a string of hits. Intriguingly, one was called I Respect Your Grey Hair.) The Fabs never again recorded in a foreign tongue. Have there ever been more effective ambassadors for the English language? The influence of the Beatles' Baby, You're a Rich Man is detectable in Magic Carpet Ride, along with Sergio Mendes and a healthy dollop of Philadelphia soul. It may well have been recorded first in Japanese, Pizzicato Five's native tongue, but it was released in the UK after the English version, so it fits the rubric. The Italian version of As Tears Go By has real value to Stones fans, as it has a substantially different arrangement to their orginal English-language recording, trowelling on the medieval knight-in-shining-armour Lady Jane shtick. A must for those who think the Stones lost something when they stopped featuring harpsichords on their records. The ramshackle Poor Old Soul saw indie pioneers Orange Juice moving in a funky direction, the French version retains the "no more rock and roll for you" declaration of the bridge. Groups such as the Wedding Present couldn't have happened without Orange Juice. But there's a big difference between these two immensely charming tracks. Pourquoi Es Tu Devenue Si Raisonnable? isn't a footnote in the Wedding Present's oeuvre, but a track that fans particularly cherish. Perhaps it's because it's not just a curiosity, but rather embodies David Gedge's wilful shunning of mainstream pop. David Bowie sings Ragazzo Solo, Ragazza Sola with, yes, some melodrama, but also with conviction. His Italian is convincing, even though, like many artists included here, he learned the Italian lyrics phonetically. But perhaps he should have taken lessons. This is more oddity than space: instead of translating Bowie's Kubrick-inspired saga of Major Tom, Italian lyricist Mogol concocted a new tale about a young couple who meet on a mountain. An infuriated Bowie only discovered this after the record had been released. Walk On By was the vessel by which Dionnne Warwick and songwriters/producers Burt Bacharach and Hal David conquered the world. Female singer, heartbreaking lyrics, orchestral arrangement: this potent combination was a fixture in the charts in the 60s. Pop music this good transcends national (and linguistic) boundaries. "Excuse me, I am a Frenchman, and I am afraid I don't speak very well English, but …" Of course, sometimes the English language version is the secondary version. In Sea, Sex and Sun (the original was sung in French, though its title was in English) Serge Gainsbourg makes up for his English-speaking shortcomings by laying on the lechery. The mischievous old Gallic goat concludes: "I would like to make love wiz you." Oh, all right then. Here's the A-list:Fuego D'Amor (Spanish version of Ring of Fire) - Johnny Cash Les Mannequins (French version of Showroom Dummies) - Kraftwerk Komm Gib Mir Deine Hand (German version of I Want to Hold Your Hand) - The Beatles Magic Carpet Ride (Japanese version) - Pizzicato Five Con le Mie Lacrime (Italian version of As Tears Go By) - The Rolling Stones Pourquoi Es Tu Devenue Si Raisonnable? (French version of Why are You Being So Reasonable Now?) - Cadeau de Mariage (The Wedding Present) Poor Old Soul (French version) - Orange Juice Ragazzo Solo, Ragazza Sola (Italian version of Space Oddity) - David Bowie Geh Vorbei (German version of Walk On By) - Dionne Warwick Sea, Sex and Sun (English version) - Serge Gainsbourg And here's the B-list:Plus de Liaisons (French version of No More Affairs) - Tindersticks Singer Stuart Staples channels Serge Gainsbourg on this late-night lounge lament. Ganz Allein (German version of In My Room) - Die Beach Boys Brian Wilson's early masterpiece emerges unscathed from being rendered in German, retaining its beauty, innocence and longing. Sadly, "Die" Beach Boys never recorded any songs in French, and so "Les Garçons de la Plage" remains just a Rutles parody. Wie Schon Das Ist (German version of How Sweet It Is) - Marvin Gaye Berry Gordy, always keen to reach the widest possible audience, got many of his Motown artists to record in Spanish, Italian, German and French, including Stevie Wonder, the Temptations, the Supremes and Smokey Robinson and the Miracles. Marvin Gaye's vocal retains its transcendence and the indestructable Tamla groove is, of course, intact. How sweet, indeed. Llamame (Spanish version of Call Me) - Blondie There should have been a law requiring all Euro-disco be recorded in different languages. Where are the Brussels bureaucrats when you need them? Llamame is great, not least because it's long - with Giorgio Moroder's productions, more is more. Ciao Ciao (Italian version of Downtown) - Petula Clark An English record about New York, sung in Italian. Pet also recorded Spanish and French versions as Tony Hatch's finest moment (that's Jimmy Page on guitar, fact fans) conquered the world. Its Italian incarnation sounds softer, less strident, but the vowel sounds have wisely been retained for the chorus. Der Twist Beginnt (German version of Let's Twist Again) - Chubby Checker When you don't understand the language a song's being sung in, there's a disconnect which often illuminates the song in unexpected ways. This, for instance, sounds completely bonkers. Traison (C'est Une Histoire) (French version of Treason (It's Just a Story)) - The Teardrop Explodes Mystery surrounds the decision to stick a French version on the B-side of the 12" of the Teardrop Explodes' Treason (It's Just a Story) - though admittedly it's not perhaps Julian Cope's oddest career move. Si No Estas Tu (Spanish version of Without You) - Harry Nilsson The power ballad by which all others must be judged. And they love those power ballads, the continentals. What's that? We do, too? Suppose you're right. Auf Dich nur wart ich Immerzu (German version of I Only Want to Be With You) - Dusty Springfield Reaffirms one's faith in humanity, hearing Dusty get her laughing gear round the Teutonic tongue. I'd like to hear Amy Winehouse sing one of her songs in German. (Actually, I would like to hear Amy Winehouse sing all her songs in German.) Holzfäller-Lied (German version of The Lumberjack Song) - Monty Python's Fliegender Zirkus (Monty Python's Flying Circus) Part of a TV special recorded by the Pythons entirely in German (though they learned the whole song phonetically). Filmed in Bavaria! * Here's a Spotify playlist including some of the songs mentioned above * Go to guardian.co.uk/readersrecommend tomorrow for a new theme
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | This Glasgow band have won plaudits from respected names including Guy Garvey and Fyfe Dangerfield. And Fearne Cotton Hometown: Glasgow. The lineup: Louis Abbot, Sarah Hayes, Kevin Brolly, Philip Hague, Joseph Rattray, Tom Stearn. The background: There are new bands who we cover because we love them and there are others that we do because their ever increasing popularity makes them unavoidable. Admiral Fallow are one of the latter. They have alighted upon a currently-in-demand sound. If we had a pound for every time we were approached by someone asking us to write about them or their band because they were "the new Mumford & Sons", we'd have ... about two quid, probably: one for Dry the River, and now this lot, a six-piece from Glasgow who play all sorts of instruments, including clarinet, flute, double bass and violins. There are also four singers, so clearly some members are more dexterous and multi-talented than others. This is not a problem. Nor is it a problem that Edith Bowman likes them ("Absolutely beautiful, a great new talent," she has said), nor that Fearne Cotton finds them "dreamy". We find Fearne Cotton dreamy, in the sense of "vague", of someone sleepwalking through their career. Admiral Fallow are wide awake, or so it sounds. This is folk plus: folk with extra energy and loads of, as we say, instruments that gives the music added charge and the sort of layered arrangements you might hear on an Arcade Fire album. And people are starting to really go for them, and not just dozy radio presenters, but respected bands, from Elbow (Guy Garvey has been raving about them) to Guillemots (Fyfe Dangerfield has invited them on tour), as well as actual paying punters. Not that Guy Garvey and Fyfe Dangerfield didn't pay to get into their gigs – maybe they did, maybe they didn't. We'd have to check. Their influences range from Midlake and Low to Tom Waits and Bruce Springsteen, and do you know what? For once we can hear elements of the artists they profess to admire in this group's music. On their Paul Savage-produced debut album, Boots Met My Face, you can indeed hear traces of Springsteen's widescreen rock and Waits's junkshop bricolage of brass, percussion and askew tunefulness. If their song Dead Leg isn't based on In the Neighbourhood from Swordfishtrombones, then we'll eat our hat – incidentally, a replica of the one that Waits wore on the sleeve of The Heart of Saturday Night. Elsewhere, expect from these admirable fellows – and one girl, who takes everything she touches into Beautiful South/Deacon Blue territory – songs about childhood football games made out of felt and plastic (Subbuteo), and one about watching your loved one in bed asleep with their arse in the air (Dead Against Smoking). How can they fail? The buzz: "I really love this band. I think they're great" – Guy Garvey, Elbow. The truth: This jaunty lot are not for us, but they do what they do well enough for widespread consumption. Most likely to: Meet their boots with our face. Least likely to: Play flick soccer. What to buy: The album Boots Met My Face and single Squealing Pigs are released by Lo-Five on 28 March. File next to: Mumford & Sons, Arcade Fire, Deacon Blue, Beautiful South. Links: myspace.com/admiralfallow. Friday's new band: If the Kids.
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | At long last, Asian artists are gaining the success – and sales figures – they deserve. So isn't it about time we celebrated the AMAs like we do the Brits and Mobos? When they started 10 years ago, the UK Asian Music awards could have ended up being just another niche event. A decade later, and they've become a showcase for cutting-edge talent and a platform for artists such as Jay Sean and Rishi Rich. The success of MIA and Jay Sean has shown that the UK has long been ready for an Asian invasion. Many Asian artists in the US and in the Indian subcontinent see breaking the UK as a sign of success and critical credibility.
It's ironic, then, that the US has been more open to British Asian talent than the UK. For example, Jay Sean, the most successful British Asian act of all-time, knocked the Black Eyed Peas off No 1 in America with his single Down in 2009. However, his success only came after he parted company with Virgin and set up his own label.
Part of the reason why the mainstream music industry has been slow on the uptake is because of its lack of awareness about sales figures. Before YouTube and MySpace, albums by artists such as Apache Indian exchanged hands in Asian video stores and markets, and were promoted largely through word of mouth and the (growing) Asian media. Though Apache Indian looked to have broken the glass ceiling with hits such as Boom Shack-A-Lak in the early-90s, the expected avalanche of new talent failed to materialise, and occasional hits such as Panjabi MC's Mundian to Bach Ke seemed to be exceptions that proved the rule. Bands including Asian Dub Foundation were critically acclaimed but never really gained mainstream traction. In an industry that deals in simple categorisations, British Asian music didn't fit snuggly into established genres, such as the one-size-fits-all world music category, as it is very much a British phenomenon from the streets of Southall and Leicester. The creation of the BBC Asian Network in 2003 marked a turning point for the industry. It joined forces with the Official Charts Company to record downloads and chart sales in 25 key retailers. This year, for the first time, the AMAs have included an award for the bestselling single and nominees are expected to include Panjabi MC, Foji, JK, Panjabi By Nature and Sukshinder Shinda. Also, in the running is Jay Sean with his single Hit the Lights, featuring Lil Wayne.
While the AMAs has faced some of the criticism that the Mobos received about "ghettoising" Asian music, they have really served the purpose of drawing mainstream attention to underground genres, demonstrating that there is more to Asian music than Bollywood and bhangra. R&B singer Mumzy Stranger, who has been nominated in the best male and best album categories, says: "British Asian music is full of talent just like any other scene. It's taken such a long time because Asians have slowly become more diverse. The talent has always been there but the confidence and support has lacked." Also, while acts such as Jay Sean, with his brand of R&B have been accused of not being particularly representative of young British Asians' concerns, these accusations seem to come mainly from people who don't know what it's like to be young, British and Asian. For these acts, it's not just a case of semantics, it is about being accepted as musicians who are of Asian origin rather than Asian music acts.
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | It's not class that's a problem for the Vaccines, it's being hyped more than their catchy retro indie deserves It's a mark of how fast music moves these days that the backlash seems to arrive almost before the band does. No sooner had the Vaccines' media drum roll begun – one journalist proclaimed them "the band that will kickstart a new era" – than it got drowned out by raspberries, many of them revolving around bassist Freddie Cowan's family background: an old broadsheet article surfaced detailing the four-bedroom South Kensington apartment his mother had apparently gifted him as "a party flat". Much heated debate about privileged musicians followed, allowing another airing of the famous toffs-can't-rock argument, previously big with noted thinker Alan McGee and the drunker wing of Oasis's fanbase. The notion that anyone would rigorously police their record collection along class lines – a firm no to Nick Drake, Public Enemy and Crass, a hearty welcome to Northern Uproar, Phil Collins and Skrewdriver – is so specious, it leads to the suspicion that people were just using whatever they could lay their hands on to batter a band they didn't like much in the first place. You can see why they might on the basis of debut single Wreckin' Bar (Ra Ra Ra). The bit in brackets is a little unfortunate given the negative attention Cowan's privileged background attracted, leading to the hope that every Vaccines song might come with a parenthetical subtitle that inadvertently suggests a life of moneyed advantage: (Totes Amaze!), (According to My Former Housemaster) or (How Dare You Address Me Like That, You Little Oik, My Father's Master of the Beaufort Hunt). More troublingly, while it's a good idea to set out your stall with a song that lasts 84 seconds – hinting at a snotty take-it-or-leave-it directness – it generally helps if said song does something striking within those 84 seconds, and the three-chord thrash of Wreckin' Bar doesn't. It starts, it ends; the most interesting thing that happens in between is a lyric about F Scott Fitzgerald, which with the best will in the world, seems unlikely to kickstart a new era. Meanwhile, listeners of a certain vintage might wonder how they missed the meeting where it was decided that the next big thing would resemble something off the once-reviled NME cassette C86. It's a sensation borne out by the rest of What Did You Expect from the Vaccines? – a title that rather prompts the answer: I'm not sure, but it certainly wasn't an album that sounds like dimly remembered Bristolian shamblers the Groove Farm. Comparisons have been drawn to the Strokes, but the Vaccines really recall rigorously unfunky, pre-Madchester indie. It's all there: the reverby production that told you a little about Phil Spector's influence on the period's alt-rock and a lot about inadequate acoustic tiling in cheap recording studios; the guitars struck with angsty, frustrated downstrokes; the drums that either go bum bum-bum tish in imitation of a 60s girl group, or else race along with the clipped precision of a cheap drum machine; the closing track that ends in an improvised noise freak-out of preternatural weediness the lyrics that pout sulkily at a girl who's chucked them. In fairness, the girl who gets pouted at sulkily on Nørgaard appears to be a catwalk model, which suggests the Vaccines are setting their romantic aspirations a little higher than, say, the BMX Bandits ever did. You could argue that the appeal of old-fashioned indie was based on both a shambolic DIY spirit that existed in opposition to the period's mainstream rock and, occasionally, the presence of songs good enough to withstand the most lackadaisical performances a band could throw at them. The Vaccines certainly don't have the former – they are the mainstream – and when they don't have the latter, as on Wreckin' Bar, the dreary Under Your Thumb and All in White, you start to wonder not just where the hype came from, but what the point is. You spend at least a third of the album thinking that, which leaves two-thirds where, if what's on offer is absolutely nothing new, the songwriting sticks. The tune over the bum bum-bum tish drums on Wetsuit is implausibly catchy, the turn of phrase on If You Wanna – "That's what all the friends I do not like as much as you say" – is neatly done, Blow It Up's melodic cocktail, equal parts Pixies' Velouria and the Beatles' I Should Have Known Better, is peculiar, but it works. In the era their music recalls, the Vaccines' ambitions would have extended no further than a few Peel sessions and a few singles on Subway or Creation. But in the post-Britpop world, that's no longer the way: the overriding impression left by What Did You Expect from the Vaccines? is of a first effort by a fairly good indie band boosted far out of their league by an overexcited music press. That, rather than their supposedly privileged background, is what might ultimately do for the Vaccines, something their album title and downbeat interviews suggest they're aware of: an old-fashioned band, wrestling with a modern problem. Rating: 3/5
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Band will charge for CD and vinyl copies of The Fall, released as a free download to fanclub members on Christmas Day Gorillaz are to start charging for The Fall, an album they released as a free download on Christmas Day. The band have announced that the record will be issued on CD and vinyl, as well as a paid download, next month. The Fall was made during Gorillaz's 2010 US tour, with Damon Albarn claiming it was recorded on an iPad. Last December, Gorillaz teased fans with details of the album via a digital advent calendar; on Christmas Day, fanclub members were provided with a link to download the LP. The album is still there, and even if you haven't joined the Gorillaz fanclub, you can stream it for free. This may be about to change. Yesterday, Gorillaz announced The Fall will be released on 180g vinyl on 16 April, International Record Store Day. A CD release will follow, as well as a paid download, on 18 April. It is not clear whether the free stream will then be taken down. Gorillaz did issue a press release, but it was scarce on details. Instead, the group's fictional frontman, 2D, offered his thoughts on the Plastic Beach follow-up. "The Fall, is mostly just me," he said, "something more gentle and just ... well ... it's just me and an iPad really mucking about ... trying out some stuff. Just looking at America and then tapping on the screen ... I'm not really concentrating too hard on it ... So, right, each album got all of us on it somewhere, but each time it's ... more of one of us than the others ... Well, that's how I see it anyway."
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Alice in Chains bass player at the heart of Seattle's grunge-rock sound standfirst here and here and hereand here and here The American rock musician Mike Starr, who has been found dead aged 44, achieved international success as the bass player for Alice in Chains. Formed in Seattle in 1987, the band came to be regarded by many as second only to Nirvana when grunge rock became popular in the early 1990s. Starr, who was born in Honolulu, Hawaii, had previously played with the guitarist Jerry Cantrell and the drummer Sean Kinney in a group called Diamond Lie. Shortly after being joined by the vocalist Layne Staley, they renamed themselves Alice in Chains and developed a sound that mixed huge, Black Sabbath-flavoured riffs with the aggression and nihilistic angst of punk. Alice in Chains quickly won a loyal following around Seattle and Washington state. Cantrell's expressive guitar textures meshed well with Staley's weary vocals while Starr and Kinney locked down huge, rolling rhythms. A local promoter, Randy Hauser, was so impressed by the band that he financed a recording demo and passed it on to Susan Silver, the manager of another emerging Seattle group, Soundgarden. With Silver as their manager, the band signed to Columbia Records and released an EP, We Die Young, in July 1990, attracting a strong response from US rock radio. A month later, the group's debut album, Facelift, was released to a positive critical response but modest initial sales. Seattle was becoming known for a popular new American rock sound dubbed grunge, which blurred the boundaries between heavy metal and hardcore punk and eschewed the posturing that had rendered the Los Angeles rock scene a cartoon. By mid-1991, the band's single Man in the Box was on heavy rotation on MTV and Facelift had sold close to half a million copies in the US, making Alice in Chains one of the first Seattle bands to break out across America. They toured widely, made the well-received acoustic EP Sap, and then returned to the studio to record a second album, Dirt. Released in September 1992, the album proved a huge critical and commercial hit, reaching No 6 in the US chart. Dirt stands as arguably grunge's most remarkable document: the songs are heavy yet underpinned by precise melodies and Starr's fluid, supple playing, while the lyrics graphically document heroin addiction, self-loathing and dysfunction. In the UK the band had four Top 40 hits with tracks from Dirt: Them Bones, Angry Chair, Down in a Hole and Would?, which was also included on the grunge soundtrack to Cameron Crowe's Seattle-set film Singles (1992). Starr was credited with co-writing one of Dirt's tracks, Rain When I Die. However, the lifestyle the band sang about was destroying them and Starr left the group in 1993. His increasing drug addiction had meant he was unable to function on tour. He later claimed he was fired by the band. Starr was replaced by the bassist Mike Inez. Alice in Chains continued to record, but Staley's addiction problems forced them into a hiatus and Staley was found dead in 2002. The band later regrouped with a new singer, William DuVall, and have since enjoyed renewed popularity. Shortly after leaving the band, Starr joined Sun Red Sun, a rather ineffective attempt at a heavy metal supergroup, whose members included Al B Romano, Ray Gillen and Bobby Rondinelli. They recorded an eponymous debut album but disbanded after Gillen's death in 1993. The following year, Starr was sentenced to 90 days in jail for stealing a piece of luggage at an airport in Houston, Texas. After continuing to suffer from drug problems, he appeared in 2010 alongside the actor Tom Sizemore and the basketball player Dennis Rodman on the US reality TV show Celebrity Rehab With Dr Drew, which documented Starr's treatment for heroin addiction. He later appeared in a spin-off TV series, Sober House, charting his struggle with sobriety. He is survived by his father. • Mike Starr, musician, born 4 April 1966; found dead 8 March 2011
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Alice in Chains bass player at the heart of Seattle's grunge-rock sound The American rock musician Mike Starr, who has been found dead aged 44, achieved international success as the bass player for Alice in Chains. Formed in Seattle in 1987, the band came to be regarded by many as second only to Nirvana when grunge rock became popular in the early 1990s. Starr, who was born in Honolulu, Hawaii, had previously played with the guitarist Jerry Cantrell and the drummer Sean Kinney in a group called Diamond Lie. Shortly after being joined by the vocalist Layne Staley, they renamed themselves Alice in Chains and developed a sound that mixed huge, Black Sabbath-flavoured riffs with the aggression and nihilistic angst of punk. Alice in Chains quickly won a loyal following around Seattle and Washington state. Cantrell's expressive guitar textures meshed well with Staley's weary vocals while Starr and Kinney locked down huge, rolling rhythms. A local promoter, Randy Hauser, was so impressed by the band that he financed a recording demo and passed it on to Susan Silver, the manager of another emerging Seattle group, Soundgarden. With Silver as their manager, the band signed to Columbia Records and released an EP, We Die Young, in July 1990, attracting a strong response from US rock radio. A month later, the group's debut album, Facelift, was released to a positive critical response but modest initial sales. Seattle was becoming known for a popular new American rock sound dubbed grunge, which blurred the boundaries between heavy metal and hardcore punk and eschewed the posturing that had rendered the Los Angeles rock scene a cartoon. By mid-1991, the band's single Man in the Box was on heavy rotation on MTV and Facelift had sold close to half a million copies in the US, making Alice in Chains one of the first Seattle bands to break out across America. They toured widely, made the well-received acoustic EP Sap, and then returned to the studio to record a second album, Dirt. Released in September 1992, the album proved a huge critical and commercial hit, reaching No 6 in the US chart. Dirt stands as arguably grunge's most remarkable document: the songs are heavy yet underpinned with precise melodies and fluid rhythms, while the lyrics graphically document heroin addiction, self-loathing and dysfunction. Alice in Chains toured the UK, where they had four Top 40 hits with tracks from Dirt: Them Bones, Angry Chair, Down in a Hole and Would?, which was also included on the grunge soundtrack to Cameron Crowe's Seattle-set film Singles (1992). Starr was credited with co-writing one of Dirt's tracks, Rain When I Die. However, the lifestyle the band sang about was destroying them and Starr left the group in 1993. His increasing drug addiction had meant he was unable to function on tour. He later claimed he was fired by the band. Starr was replaced by the bassist Mike Inez. Alice in Chains continued to record, but Staley's addiction problems forced them into a hiatus and Staley was found dead in 2002. The band later regrouped with a new singer, William DuVall, and have since enjoyed renewed popularity. Shortly after leaving the band, Starr joined Sun Red Sun, a rather ineffective attempt at a heavy metal supergroup, whose members included Al B Romano, Ray Gillen and Bobby Rondinelli. They recorded an eponymous debut album but disbanded after Gillen's death in 1993. The following year, Starr was sentenced to 90 days in jail for stealing a piece of luggage at an airport in Houston, Texas. After continuing to suffer from drug problems, he appeared in 2010 alongside the actor Tom Sizemore and the basketball player Dennis Rodman on the US reality TV show Celebrity Rehab With Dr Drew, which documented Starr's treatment for heroin addiction. He later appeared in a spin-off TV series, Sober House, charting his struggle with sobriety. He is survived by his father. • Mike Starr, musician, born 4 April 1966; found dead 8 March 2011
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | North Korea's pop stars may be cherry-picked by the Dear Leader and sing nothing but pro-revolutionary anthems, but they still know how to cause a stir ... All pop music in North Korea is sanctioned by the state, so if you don't like songs about The Importance of Fertiliser or Uniting Happily Under the Powerful Juche Idea, then tough – go and listen to the frogs croaking down on the river bank instead. Of the bands permitted, two of North Korea's most famous are the Pochonbo Electronic Ensemble and Wangjaesan Light Music Band, who have been churning out pro-socialist revolutionary singles for decades. Wangjaesan were reportedly conceived by the ever-talented Kim Jong-il, who handpicked the group's members. He's not just a despotic dictator, you know – he has a reputation in his homeland as being quite the artisan. As well as his taste for fine light music, he's also a cultured film producer, as this monster movie he made in the 80s tastefully proves. Pochonbo, meanwhile, have kept themselves busy as Wangjaesan's main contenders by clocking up 140 albums, some of them with specially created English-language cover art so they can be sold to tourists in the many gift shops Koreans insist on taking you to at every opportunity (only hard currency, Euros or fine imported cigars accepted). There was mild controversy last year when a secret video featuring Wangjaesan's female dance troupe entered the public domain. The video was being privately circulated among the elite, but reached the North Korean public before making it over the border to China – and therefore the world. Normally seen in traditional, body-cloaking hangbok dresses as they perform polite folk numbers, this little clip revealed unprecedented levels of sexiness in Pyongyang, as the girls popped up in sparkly hot pants and did the splits. Western displays of decadence like this are illegal but, given Kim Jong-il's alleged love of pornography, perhaps he turned a blind eye to this one.
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Plucked from obscurity by TV On the Radio's Kyp Malone, this singer and violinist is probably glad he took up busking Twenty-four-year-old singer and violinist Marques Toliver seems to have a fortuitous backstory. Born in South Daytona, Toliver moved to New York where he started busking, earning roughly $80 for three hours' work. While performing he was approached by Kyp Malone from TV On the Radio who suggested he work with the band on some songs (he has also played with Grizzly Bear). Fellow TVOTR member Dave Sitek then introduced him to Holly Miranda, whose touring band he joined briefly before moving to London in 2009. Bet he's pleased he took up busking, eh? Since moving to the UK he's been signed by Bella Union, and his debut EP, Butterflies Are Not Free, is out on 25 April. So what does he sound like? Deep in My Heart sighs and soars, Toliver's lush singing reminiscent of both Marvin Gaye and Maxwell, while plucked violin and autoharp create a sometimes jagged, sometimes pillowy sound. The rest of the EP is just as good.
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Exclusive video: Patrick Wolf performs a heartfelt rendition of his new song Armistice live in our studio
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Patrick Wolf performs a heartfelt rendition of his new song Armistice live in our studio
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | We're looking for great arts bloggers and critics from France, Germany, Spain and Poland. Are you one of them?
Over the next month, the Guardian and guardian.co.uk will be paying particular attention to four European countries: France, Germany, Spain and Poland. This naturally includes culture and the arts. We're looking for great arts bloggers and critics from those countries to write for us. Are there any you enjoy reading? Or might you even be one yourself? Please post your recommendations below.
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Singer ends marketing partnership with US retailer, allegedly over its support of anti-gay political candidates Lady Gaga has cancelled a major marketing deal with US retailer Target, allegedly due to the company's weak support for gay rights. Target, which had been expected to release an exclusive version of Gaga's forthcoming album, has been criticised for donations to political groups seen as anti-gay. "Lady Gaga and Target came to a mutual decision to end their overall exclusive partnership a few weeks ago," a spokesperson for the singer said. But according to the Advocate and Metro Weekly, the decision was not rooted in an financial dispute. The deal was "in a sensitive stage of continued discussion for probably the last three weeks", according to publicist Bob Witeck, who claims to have had knowledge of the proceedings. "Throughout this whole process, [Gaga] has remained true to her audience. I think she's a person of great integrity, and I think people will recognise that." Many Gaga fans questioned the Target deal, announced last month, given the retailer's record of supporting controversial rightwing candidates. Target is notorious for a $150,000 (£92,587) corporate donation to MN Forward, a lobby group that supported Tom Emmer in his 2010 bid for Minnesota governor. Emmer, who lost the election, was vocal in his opposition to gay marriage. "Part of my deal with Target is that they have to start affiliating themselves with LGTB charity groups," Lady Gaga told Billboard at the time of the announcement. "Our relationship is hinged upon their reform in the company to support the gay community and to redeem the mistakes they've made supporting those groups." But though Target has made contributions to organisations such as Project 515, which advocates same-sex marriage, a spokesperson couldn't guarantee that the retailer would not continue to support candidates with anti-gay voting records. Lady Gaga's third album, Born This Way, is due on 23 May. Elton John has described its titular lead single as "the new gay anthem".
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | An extract from Mark Donne's The Rime of the Modern Mariner, a tribute to London's docks and Britain's declining shipping industry, narrated by Libertines frontman Carl Barât, and showing at the SXSW festival, which kicks off tomorrow
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Rapper joins stars including Nelly Furtado, Beyoncé and Usher in expressing regret for performing for the Gaddafi family 50 Cent has followed the example set last week by Nelly Furtado, Beyoncé, Mariah Carey and Usher, expressing regret for performing at a private concert for the family of Muammar Gaddafi. The rapper announced that he will make a donation to Unicef, supporting their "vital relief [work]" in Libya. While the Gaddafi family is now at the centre of Libya's brutal domestic conflict, the dictator's family previously had a reputation for extravagant, star-studded parties. Gaddafi's son, Mutassim, threw elaborate New Year's Eve bashes in the Caribbean, hiring performers such as Beyoncé and Carey, while 50 Cent was paid to give a private concert during the 2005 Venice Film festival. Performers allegedly received as much as $2m (£1.23m), while celebrities such as Usher were paid simply to attend the parties. "In light of the ongoing events in Libya, 50 Cent will be making a donation to Unicef, which is providing vital relief supplies to meet the needs of women and children at risk during this crisis," a spokesperson for the rapper told the Associated Press. 50 Cent, whose real name is Curtis Jackson, has not revealed the amount of his donation, nor whether it is the same as the amount he was paid by the Gaddafi family in 2005. Furtado is still the only star to have revealed exactly how much she received for her performance, pledging to donate the $1m (£614,703) to charity. Beyoncé claimed she didn't know the Gaddafi family was linked to the 2009 concert, but donated the money to Haiti relief as soon as she found out. Usher said he was "sincerely troubled to learn about the circumstances" of his appearance at the same party, pledging to donate an unspecified amount to human rights charities. And Carey apologised for being "naive and unaware of who I was booked to perform for"; she will donate proceeds from a future single. Despite 50 Cent's charity donation, there are several other acts who have not responded to reports that they received money from the Gaddafi family. Lionel Richie, Timbaland and Enrique Iglesias are allegedly among the performers, while Jay-Z, Lindsay Lohan and Jon Bon Jovi were reportedly guests at the events.
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Another grunge star has died young. Tim Jonze asks: is it the most lethal genre? The tragic end of Mike Starr, the Alice in Chains bassist who died on Tuesday after a heroin overdose, might look like just another rock death. But for fans of grunge it was yet another reminder of the way heroin had blighted the scene ever since its inception in the mid-80s. After all, Starr wasn't the first grunge star to die early from heroin. In fact, he wasn't even the first member of Alice in Chains to fall prey to it – their singer Layne Staley fatally overdosed in 2002 at the age of 34. There are other grunge deaths of course – from Kurt Cobain to Kristen Pfaff – and the involvement of heroin mirrors the self-hating, nihilistic aspect to the music. But grunge probably isn't the most deadly of genres. After all, its story is more often littered with tales of survival – Stone Temple Pilots' Scott Weiland, Courtney Love, Mark Lanegan and Evan Dando all had their run-ins with the drug, but lived to tell the tale. Music has long been a risky business, and the deaths often mirror the genre. For instance, the sense of freedom and adventure of early rock'n'roll contrasts with the number of artists who lived fast and died young in car or plane crashes (Buddy Holly, Johnny Kidd, Eddie Cochran). The sexual freedom of disco also had a dark side, as Aids claimed several artists (Sylvester, Dan Hartman and Arthur Russell to name just three). Elsewhere, metal's fondness for theatre seems to have resulted in a series of bizarre deaths – from the surreality of Randy Rhoads being involved in a plane joyride (they hit their own tourbus) to the demonic nature of the Norwegian black metal scene, in which Varg Vikernes murdered his Mayhem bandmate Øystein Aarseth. Even when they don't die, metallers have a habit of getting ill in style. Take Slayer guitarist Jeff Hanneman, who had to pull out of an Aussie festival because he'd been diagnosed with necrotising fasciitis, a flesh-eating disease. Compare this to, say, Kings of Leon who recently pulled out of gigs citing a "torn bicep" at one, a burnt tourbus at another and – famously – being pooed on by pigeons at another. It's clear that landfill indie might be your best bet if you want a healthy life on the music scene. You might think singer-songwriters were too well-behaved to encounter death all that often, but you'd be wrong – the grim reaper needs to take some time off there, too. Or, with James Blunt still out there making music, at least show a bit more quality control. Suicide took the lives of many greats: Elliott Smith, Nick Drake, Vic Chesnutt. Again, this seems to reflect the music – introspective, tortured, an expression of rage, but without the deafening volume and tempo to render it truly cathartic. Perhaps the most health-damaging genre of all, however, is hip-hop, which makes a heroin-scarred career in grunge look more like a seven-day lentil binge at a yoga retreat. For those on the street, rapping about guns and drugs doesn't seem to be a barrier to being taken out by either guns (Biggie, 2Pac, Scott La Rock) or drugs (Pimp C, Ol' Dirty Bastard). But there are other, less documented, ways that hip-hop can mess with your health – especially obesity, which has delivered many a heart attack and claimed the lives of some, such as Puerto Rican rapper Big Pun. Once again, the mood of the music – living dangerously, then greedily – matches the deaths. Indulgence isn't the only problem for the middle-aged musician who thinks they're past the danger zone, though. Josh Homme recently railed against a US healthcare system that left two of his bandmates in no position to afford cancer treatment – one of whom, Natasha Shneider, died in 2008. "I've been beating myself up my whole life, but I'm insured, I know the status of my own health," Homme told the Guardian last year. "But even when you're insured, you still get slow-rolled. The bureaucracy of insurance has become its own problem. It's mystifying to me where it's all going." The list of musicians caught without health insurance includes successful names – Funkadelic guitarist Garry Shider, for example. The moral of this story being that even if you do make it out of rock'n'roll in one piece, what's waiting on the other side could be equally grim.
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Pet Shop Boys and dance maverick Javier de Frutos have turned a Hans Christian Andersen story into a ballet. How did the moon landings end up in there? Javier de Frutos and Neil Tennant are on their second glass of wine, and getting very emotional about Desert Island Discs. De Frutos, the Venezuelan-born choreographer, has delivered a passionate explanation of why he could never limit his musical choices to eight. Tennant, frontman of the Pet Shop Boys, is quietly triumphant about once being asked to do it. "Being on that programme was one of the best things in my life. I started with She Loves You. When I was nine, I just wanted to be that music. Then I had Fantasia on a Theme by Thomas Tallis. I remember being unable to believe those harmonies." The two men, seated at the Groucho Club in London, are meant to be discussing their new collaboration, based on the Hans Christian Andersen story The Most Incredible Thing, about a competition to create exactly that. But the collaboration is a pretty remarkable thing in itself: the Pet Shop Boys' first attempt at composing a ballet score, and De Frutos's first full-length narrative dance. It's hard to keep them on topic, though. One minute they're expounding the ballet's underlying theme, the life-changing power of art, the next they're off on a tangent: everything from the fall of dictators to Noël Coward and the potency of cheap music. I'm privately grateful that Chris Lowe, the other Pet Shop Boy, is in bed nursing a cold. These two are handful enough. It was Lowe, however, who first saw the potential of the Andersen tale. In 2007, the Boys had been reading Andersen's stories in a new translation. "Chris phoned me up to say he'd found one that would work as a ballet," says Tennant. Although the story was short, he adds, "it read like this great pitch for a ballet". The two had been considering composing a dance score for some time. "When you have a long career like ours," says Tennant, "you have to keep things fresh. You have to be excited and smiling and scared shitless about something." Having written a West End musical (2001's Closer to Heaven) and a film score (for Battleship Potemkin in 2005), a ballet seemed the next logical step. Their interest had also been aroused by Ivan Putrov, the then Royal Ballet principal. "We started going to see Ivan perform," says Tennant, "and we became very curious as to why classical ballet had remained so traditional in the way it looks. It hadn't gone through what I call the abattoir phase, as opera had in the 1980s, where everything was updated. So we were interested in writing a three-act ballet in the tradition of Tchaikovsky and Prokofiev, but with modern music and choreography. We didn't want to compose cod classical music – we wanted to write a ballet in our own style." Sure of little beyond the fact they wanted Putrov as their leading dancer, the Boys took their idea to Sadler's Wells, and ended up with playwright and director Matthew Dunster as dramaturge, and De Frutos as choreographer. This could have been a problem. The ballet was to be family entertainment, and that's hardly natural territory for De Frutos, given the early solos in which he performed naked, and the glittering assault he made on the Catholic church in his 2009 work Eternal Damnation to Sancho and Sanchez. The latter earned him death threats. But De Frutos has a gift for crafting poetic, sophisticated dance, and has successfully collaborated on several big productions. In 2007, his choreography for the West End musical Cabaret won him an Olivier. The Boys were impressed. "We instantly liked the sound of his name," says Tennant "so we looked at some videos of his work." "And they were not afraid," butts in De Frutos. Andersen's story hinges on a contest held by a king, who offers his daughter and half his kingdom to whoever can show him "the most incredible thing". A young man builds a clock that magically contains the whole world. But before he can claim his prize, the clock is smashed by a blacksmith who argues that destroying such a wonder is an even more incredible thing than creating it. As the judges reluctantly concur, the shattered parts of the clock come back to life and take their revenge. "It's such a profound story," says Tennant of the three-page tale. "It's basically saying you can destroy an object, but you can't destroy an idea." He and Lowe were moved to discover that the story had been secretly distributed by the Danish resistance during the Nazi occupation. Yet they were equally enchanted by the comic, folksy world it portrays. "It unfolds with incredible energy," adds Tennant. "In the beginning, when everyone in the kingdom is trying to do the most incredible thing, there is this one line, 'Small boys tried to spit on their backs'. It's a brilliant image – the idea that to a boy that's the most incredible thing." De Frutos agrees. "There's so much in there, three acts don't feel enough," says the choreographer, who has revelled in exploring all its theatrical possibilities. The second act centres on the magic of the clock, the design of which was inspired by The Weather Project, Olafur Eliasson's evanescently beautiful 2003 installation that brought a glowing sun to Tate Modern; the clock's marvellous contents are evoked by dance and film. These include landmark moments from history, like the Apollo 11 moon landing, and great works of art, among them ballets that De Frutos references in his own choreography. The princess, a curiously deadpan character in the original, has been turned into a rebel. "I've based her on Princess Caroline of Monaco, the original bad princess," says De Frutos. It's an act of homage inspired by the fact that, when Princess Caroline came to a performance of Eternal Damnation, she "made a bee line" for the cast afterwards. "She said she'd loved the work and we all absolutely had to come to her party." De Frutos cast Putrov as the blacksmith: while he's enjoyed showcasing the dancer's burnished, classical technique, he's also been "releasing Ivan's inner bully", hiring a fight trainer to help him through his assault on the artist/clockmaker. And now for 10 other ballets Tennant, too, faced new challenges. "Writing for a ballet is very different from writing pop songs. We have to work with much longer melodic lines and invent different musical themes for the characters. I had to get out the whole score of Romeo and Juliet to see how Prokofiev got from one scene to another, how he introduced different melodies." The scale of the score, written for electronic instruments and live orchestra, has opened up fascinating possibilities. "Chris and I both love woodwind, so we've been able to include lots of oboe and clarinet. We've experimented with different chords and harmonies. There's this one scale, the 'Rimsky-Korsakov scale', which is basically tone, semi-tone, tone, and gives a completely different quality." So galvanised are the Boys by their ballet, they've got a list of 10 others they want to write, starting with The Emperor's New Clothes. "Javier can dance the Emperor and be naked throughout," grins Tennant, flirtatiously. "Oh," says De Frutos, sitting beside him on the sofa, "everybody's seen my bits already." "But Chris and I haven't." How do they feel about Paul McCartney's recent announcement that he, too, has written a ballet score? "I'm slightly annoyed," admits Tennant, "that we're suddenly being seen as part of a trend." He and De Frutos would argue that, far from being a novelty, they're part of a long tradition, going right back to the collaborations of Petipa and Tchaikovsky and beyond. "Tchaikovsky wrote the pop music of the day," says De Frutos. "Everyone hummed his tunes, bought his scores and played them at home." "Every Tchaikovsky ballet, it's a fucking greatest hits album," interrupts Tennant. "This is what Chris and I have always done, giving ourselves new experiences, extending the boundaries of our music. There's no point doing something unless it's a thrill."
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Ronnie Scott's London By jazz's sometimes taciturn standards, Courtney Pine is an affably charismatic performer, but at root he's a serious man. A mixture of voracious truth-seeking and a commitment to enthusing audiences powers his desire to tell stories through music. His new Europa project applies African, American and Caribbean sensibilities to European genres – from Gregorian chants to the music of the Balkans. Famous as a saxophonist, Pine gives this venture a unique signature by concentrating on the fiercely elemental and quintessentially acoustic sound of the sonorous bass clarinet. As with most Pine groups, this one works on a strategy of slow-burn insinuations that build to ecstatic, technically dazzling climaxes – to the borders of the formulaic at times, but Pine's use of pop and dance music's anthemic methods has played a big part in his popularity outside the jazz loop. The bass clarinet mingled with the soft swoops of Amanda Drummond's viola in a deceptively hushed opening, before an ostinato of plosive, popping sounds from the leader, shadowed by Darren Taylor's bass, set up an eloquent viola solo of sensuously bending long sounds and pitch-eliding slurs. The Celtic jig Druid's Lyre showcased the thrilling Cuban violinist Omar Puente, who launched a glittering display of canny, fresh melody and technical fireworks, mirroring Pine's fondness for finales of semi-abstract, double-time figures and whistling high notes. Pine then played phrase-swapping games with all his partners, delivered the dark folk melody of They Came from the North over Robert Fordjour's thudding drumbeat, and gave way to a powerful unaccompanied display from pianist Zoe Rahman. Guitarist and mandolinist Cameron Pierre didn't get a break until late, but made relaxed and lissome use of it on the slinky tango Darwin's Dream. Rating: 3/5
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Barbican, London Bitter experience suggests there can sometimes be an inverse relationship between the enduring worth of a new score and the battery of percussion instruments deployed to perform it. So the heart sank at the amount of ironmongery on the platform before the UK premiere of the violin concerto by the Austrian composer Thomas Larcher. But how wrong can one be? Larcher's concerto was not like that at all. Though it required an enormous orchestra at times, it is scored in the most delicate and interesting ways. The full weight of that intimidating percussion section was only rarely deployed, and then to focused effect. The default modes of the concerto are an often haunting stillness, out of which the piece develops and to which, at the end of its two movements, it returns. The mood is set by the compelling opening pages, gravely played by the dedicatee Isabelle Faust, in which the accompaniment rocks gently back and forth beneath the spare solo line, before giving way to more restless and vertiginous but still delicately scored writing in which a fragmentary dialogue between the soloist and an accordion plays an atmospheric part. Larcher's indebtedness to the music of Toru Takemitsu made the Japanese composer's Requiem an appropriately severe and reflective opening to the evening, as well as enabling his compatriot, Kazuki Yamada, to reveal prowess as a collegiate rather than a despotic conductor. Yamada's rapport with the orchestra was also plain in Rachmaninov's second symphony, after the interval. But this is a problematic work and the symphony requires more direction and disciplined restraint than Yamada seemed inclined to provide if it is not to lose its way amid its own sumptuous loudness, as this performance did. The BBCSO clearly enjoyed themselves, though, and the personable Yamada must surely make an early return to the London podium. Rating: 3/5
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Trailblazing female tenor saxophonist and vocalist The presence of female instrumentalists in jazz ensembles is no longer a matter for comment, but half a century ago it was far less usual. This made the achievements of the tenor-saxophonist Betty Smith, who has died aged 81, all the more remarkable. Where the occasional female trumpeter or saxophonist might be spotted playing section parts in a big band, Smith was always a soloist, ready and willing to come out front. During the 1950s she shone, playing Dixieland with the Freddy Randall band. Then, with the Best of British Jazz all-star mainstream outfit, she carved out a vital role for herself as both instrumentalist and vocalist. She later fronted her own bands, touring widely until she was incapacitated by illness. Smith was born in Sileby, near Leicester, and took up the saxophone as a nine-year-old, having already studied piano from the age of six. Impressed by her talent, a local benefactor paid for her to attend the private Stoneygate school nearby. As a teenager she was good enough to play at local clubs, and at 15, at her father's instigation, she auditioned for Archie's Juveniles, a travelling show featuring an all-girl saxophone septet. Immediately successful, and lured by the glamour of the road, Smith left school and embarked on a musical career. After performing for troops in the Middle East with the pianist Billy Penrose in 1948, she took a familiar route for female player, touring first with Rudy Starita's all-girl band in Germany before joining the better-known Ivy Benson orchestra, another all-female ensemble. She met her future husband, the trumpeter Jack Peberdy, at her 19th-birthday party. They married in 1950 and joined the trumpeter Randall's band the same year, Peberdy switching instruments to become its bassist soon afterwards. Randall's Parlophone recordings show off Smith's sinuous, tenor-saxophone sound and well-grounded swing style, reminiscent of American players such as Eddie Miller and Bud Freeman. Although their stay initially was brief, Smith and Peberdy worked full-time with Randall from 1953 to 1957, travelling the circuit of trad-jazz clubs and concerts, also journeying to the US in 1956. When Randall disbanded a year later, Smith formed her quintet (with Brian Lemon on piano and Peberdy on bass) and kept it going until 1964. In the US she performed on the same bill as Bill Haley's Comets. There were also summer seasons in Guernsey and Cliftonville, Kent, and regular trips aboard the SS Franconia, plus a spell as accompanists to the comedian Tony Hancock. Smith's group toured Australia and New Zealand and broadcast often, buoyed up by her bright personality, companionable vocal style and hard-swinging jazz approach. Later, she had her own programme on Radio Luxembourg and played and sang with the Ted Heath orchestra. By now as much an entertainer as a working jazz musician, and with a raunchy line in humour, she often appeared at clubs and festivals as a solo performer in Europe. There exists a video of her taking charge in vibrant fashion on After You've Gone with the Ted Easton band in the Netherlands, the American cornetist Bobby Hackett among the accompanists. Smith also worked regularly with Kenny Baker, the former Heath trumpet star. This association was cemented when Baker and two erstwhile Heath colleagues, the trombonist Don Lusher and the drummer and bandleader Jack Parnell, accompanied her in their Best of British combo. Smith stopped working after she became ill in the 1980s. Once billed as "the girl with sax appeal", she died in a nursing home in Kirby Muxloe, Leicestershire. Peberdy survives her. • Betty Smith, saxophonist and entertainer, born 6 July 1929; died 21 January 2011
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | This Canadian artist's outer-limits pop is ethereal and electronic but always accessible – even at its most atonal Hometown: Montreal. The lineup: Claire Boucher (vocals, music). The background: We were going to write about someone called Destroyer today until a reader kindly (actually, sternly) pointed out that the musician, an alias for Dan Bejar, has been going for yonks, even if he – the reader, not Bejar – is probably the only person in the UK to have heard of him. Shame, though, because according to Pitchfork his new album, Kaputt, totally supports our otherwise half-baked theory that, as per Jensen Sportag and the new Toro Y Moi album, there are concerted efforts afoot among young players to make smooth, almost jazzily dexterous and super-polished playing cool for the first time, like, ever – said Pitchfork review contains references to Sade's Diamond Life, Roxy Music's Avalon and Steely Dan's Gaucho. Say no more. So we hastily scrabbled around for something sensational with which to replace Destroyer – because, contrary to what some people believe, every attempt is made on a daily basis up here to find a new band that will stun and amaze – and what do you know: at the 11th hour (the 13th, to be precise, if you use the 24-hour clock), we were told about this Canadian musician and visual artist who self-released a record last year that "people who like Nite Jewel and Sleep Over will fall head over heels in love with", who uses "luscious vocals, chopped and warped beats, and a general mood of beautiful disorder and disarray", and who is issuing a new EP's worth of material in April. OK, so let's check: did we like Nite Jewel when we covered her for New Band of the Day in 2009? Yup, we sure did. And Sleep Over? Hmm, not sure about that one. Boucher aka Grimes does indeed make music worthy of inclusion alongside the wondrous Nite Jewel and Sleep Over in that it is mysterious and allusive, ethereal and electronic, sometimes harsh and textured and tough, but always supremely accessible even at its most atonal. The songs on her 2010 Geidi Primes album often cram four, maybe five, ideas into one track, but her ghostly vocals add a pop patina just as things get jagged. Venus in Fleurs is like Julee Cruise on Mogadon, Dragvandil is Diamanda Galas goes dubstep, and Swan Song recalls Cranes, and you should recall Cranes at least once a year because they were startling and sublime, as is Grimes. This is outer-limits pop that answers the question, can you be simultaneously eerie and cute? It is music made by someone not allergic to ideas, in a tiny bedroom inhabited by a true artist with an imagination of considerable size and scope. And we haven't even heard the new EP yet – a split-EP with fellow experimental Canuck D'Eon – because the PR didn't manage to send us the SoundCloud link in time, but no matter because the titles – Orphia, Vanessa, Crystal Ball, Urban Twilight, Hedra – put the "icing" into enticing, and the "oh!" into disorder and disarray. The buzz: "Late-night driving songs, hangover antidotes, exotic lullabies ... They are atmospherically intoxicating and often quite catchy" – obscuresound.com. The truth: If the new EP is half as good as the first LP and twice as good as Nite Jewel, then – well, you do the maths. Most likely to: Bloom darkly. Least likely to: Commit murder. What to buy: The Darkbloom split-EP with D'Eon is released on 12 April by Hippos in Tanks and Arbitus Records. File next to: Nite Jewel, Sleep Over, Cranes, AlunaGeorge. Links: myspace.com/boucherville. Thursday's new band: Admiral Fallow.
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | No excuse for the hyperbole: this really is one of the great Wagner productions of our time You all know by now – well some of you may know, and a few of you will have been there too – just how outstanding English National Opera's revival of Nikolaus Lehnhoff's staging of Wagner's Parsifal is at the moment. I've been lucky enough to see it twice, and while the show was already wonderful 10 days ago, last night was another of those exceptional, transcendent evenings where the operatic gods conspire to produce something infinitely greater than the sum of its parts. And one operatic god in particular: John Tomlinson was Gurnemanz last night. I mean, he wasn't just singing the role or playing the part or acting the character, or anything so mundane: he was channelling some mystical essence of belief, faith and power that went beyond theatrical illusion and communicated to the minds and bodies of all of us who were watching last night. His great monologues in the first and third acts were the towering highlights of last night's performance, and were almost unbearably raw and moving. Tomlinson managed that miracle of dissolving the distance between him, the music, the character, the orchestra, and the audience so that we were all taking part in Parsifal's mysterious drama of desolation, compassion and renewal. His Gurnemanz has been special throughout the whole run, but yesterday it felt as if he was pushing himself to the limits of his powers, bringing all of his vast experience of singing Wagner's music together in a single performance. The same was true of Mark Wigglesworth's conducting and the playing of the ENO orchestra, who cast an echt-Wagnerian spell from the first bar of the prelude, a complete musical world that you didn't want to leave even at the end of five and a half hours, and the performances of the other principals – Stuart Skelton's magnificently focused Parsifal, Jane Dutton's controlled and seductive Kundry, and Ian Paterson's thrilling, pain-wracked Amfortas – were all heightened by the alchemy of the moment. Thing is, there are some prosaic reasons for all this hyperbole: as the second-last night of the last ever run of one of the great Wagner productions of recent decades (the final performance is on Saturday, and there are still tickets available), it's no wonder that this Parsifal has become more and more special throughout its run. And it's often a truism that the best night to see any opera is likely to be the last show rather than the first, something that's even more likely with Parsifal, a piece whose subtlety and richness can only benefit from the cast, orchestra and conductor learning over weeks and months how to work with one another. Added to which, Radio 3 was recording last night's show, which must have made everyone involved feel that they were setting down their interpretation for posterity. This is a performance of Parsifal to compare with any of the greats. It will be broadcast on Opera On 3 on 21 May, which means that, thankfully, you will have the chance to hear this exceptional night at the opera for yourselves – and to see if you agree with the purpleness of my prose.
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Gallery: Images from the new book Any Day Now charting David Bowie's life from his birth in postwar London to his departure from the UK in 1974
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Images from the new book Any Day Now charting David Bowie's life from his birth in postwar London to his departure from the UK in 1974
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | The work of Dutch composer Louis Andriessen will be performed by the London Sinfonietta at this year's Ether Festival at the Southbank Centre. Extra members can win one of five pairs of tickets to the performance on 14 April Louis Andriessen is viewed as one of Europe's most important contemporary composers. His work is influenced by everything from jazz to minimalism and often features wind and brass as well as pianos and electric guitars. Next month, Andriessen's latest work, Anaïs Nin, will be performed by London Sinfonietta as part of the Southbank Centre's annual Ether Festival. The piece profiles the irony, despair and passion of the famous writer and diarist through a pulsating score infused with the sound of the 1930's American jazz scene plus surviving and created film footage. The evening will also include a performance of De Staat, Andriessen's 1976 work for large ensemble, which weaves in extracts from Plato to evoke a time when musical innovation was considered powerful enough to topple a state. Extra members can win one of five pairs of tickets to the concert. The competition winners will also receive a free concert programme and interval drink. The competition closes at midnight on 31 March. Click here to listen to hear Louis Andriessen's music and a discussion about Anaïs Nin and De Staat. Enter this competitionClick here to enter the competition Help with offers and events• You need to be a member of Extra in order to see the redemption pages. You can sign up here • Members also need to sign in to guardian.co.uk at the top left of the screen to be able to take up offers, book tickets or enter competitions.
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | As they reissue their hard-to-find debut album, QOTSA frontman Josh Homme recalls the inspiration behind a cult classic The first Queens record is iconic for us. Each album is a different marker on our path, but this is the one that started it all. It put the trance into the music. I had just left the Screaming Trees and returned to California. I wasn't even sure whether I was going to continue with music. Then I had this idea of giant waves of sound sweeping over me. I had an image in my head from an old Warner Bros cartoon of big, staggering robots. And that, I suppose, was my idea for Queens of the Stone Age: broken, drunk robots. I wasn't thinking long term. I was thinking about trying to create a new sound and I would figure the rest out later. I put a band together, and two days before we started the record I had another guy singing, a really talented guy, an amazing musician and an amazing player – but we just had a different vision. I could only realise mine if I stepped up and became the singer. It made me scared, cautious and bold at the same time. I had things in my head and I really didn't know how to do them. So I went underground – stepped out of the spotlight and played on the underground scene. The thing about those underground guys is that they'll tell you if you suck, and I quickly learned how not to suck. I like how I can hear on the first QOTSA record that I don't want to be the singer. I like the apprehension. There's almost like an "Oh, I hate my voice but I have to do this" thing going on. It's not a perfect record. I listen to the track Regular John and the vocals and the guitar are out ... but it has a thing to it. It has its own wicked way. The album is an exercise in repetition. It's trance music in the way it pushes your buttons. And I wanted to do something for girls. The way I thought about it was trance robot music for girls. I wasn't interested in the guys at all. I wanted to make something that girls could dance to that really had a freedom that Kyuss didn't. By the end, Kyuss felt restrictive. I'd lived my whole life in Kyuss since I was a boy, and we had all these rules that were based on what you couldn't do. And I wanted a new set of rules based on what you could. I have a distaste for authority because it's all about what you can't do. Not to be reactionary, but if someone drops a gauntlet and says, "yes we can", then I will go out and do that. This record helped push me away from Kyuss and start a new thing. I always thought it would take three albums to explain to everyone, "I'm gonna play whatever I want". You can't move too fast or you just lose everybody. The album doesn't sound dated to me. It just sounds like a cool record from a different time. The only reason I'm putting it out again is that it isn't available. I had it licensed in different places and they all ran out, so we're getting it out everywhere with Domino Records. It's ridiculous in this day and age that you can't get hold of people's records. I think there's a lot of Queens fans who haven't even heard it. The process of doing this has started getting us into re-examining the record so now we're gonna tour it. We're doing the first record in its entirety with some more stuff, and we'll be coming to Europe in May. And doing the rehearsals for the first record is really defining the new one. It's been turning the new record into something else. What we were doing was kind of bluesy and now it's turned into this trancey, broken thing. The robots are back! Josh Homme was talking to Dan Martin. QOTSA debut album is reissued through Domino and available now.
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | There are free downloads for fans of Fleet Foxes, Grizzly Bear and the Chemical Brothers in this week's roundup of the best music on the web On Monday, Fleet Foxes frontman Robin Pecknold took to the Seattle folk band's Twitter profile (twitter.com/fleetfoxes) to announce that, a couple of weeks ago in LA, he had recorded three acoustic songs. The next tweet explained that, "One is a duet with my friend Ed Droste from the amazing band Grizzly Bear, one is just a new solo jam, and one is a cover." The tweet after that offered a link – bit.ly/robinpep – to where you can download the EP for free. Which, if you like Fleet Foxes (or, for that matter, Mumford & Sons), is exactly what you should do. The EP begins with the wonderfully wistful cover, of Chris Thompson's 1972 song Where Is My Wild Rose. That leads into the solo track, Derwentwater Stones, a song that's as beautifully bracing as the Cumbrian lake in its title. And Pecknold then rounds things off with the soft, doleful harmonies of his duet with Droste, I'm Losing Myself. This is a real treat. New material has also just emerged online from the Chemical Brothers. Having contributed three tracks to the soundtrack of Black Swan, the duo are now providing the entire score to the upcoming action-adventure film Hanna. Three clips have been released to soundcloud.com/hannamovie so far, and it's all sounding rather mighty, with the band's trademark block rocking beats out in force. Only a 60-second preview is available of the track Quayside Synthesis, but that still provides enough time for it to rocket skywards before kicking like the proverbial mule. Meanwhile, in just under four minutes, Container Park establishes itself as an exhilarating monster of a tune, presumably to accompany a frenetic chase scene. Where Daft Punk's Tron soundtrack turned out to be a little mellow and symphonic for some fans' tastes, these snippets point towards the Hanna score being up there with the Chemical Brothers' most thrilling work. Every Monday at 7pm UK time, a one-hour radio show called Snacky Tunes broadcasts on Brooklyn's food-themed Heritage Radio. Each week, the programme invites alternative musicians into the studio to play songs and chat about food, sustainability and music alongside farmers, food writers and chefs. It's an unlikely mix, but it works, as you'll discover if you listen to any of the 69 shows they've made so far at heritageradionetwork.com. That's also where you can download Snacky Tunes Vol 1, an enjoyable, free, 15-track compilation of live performances from the show. Highlights include a twinkly ditty from Au Revoir Simone and a pleasingly melancholy electropop tune from Punches. It's music meets the love of food. Play on.
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Javier de Frutos revels in the raw and the provocative but his new collaboration with Pet Shop Boys is for the family In shortA maverick, an iconoclast and a heretic, Javier de Frutos is an itinerant choreographer, both personally and professionally. Wandering not just between companies but between the fields of dance, musicals, theatre and film, he carries his favoured themes with him: beauty and bestiality, desire and death, dissidence. BackstoryBorn in Caracas in 1963, Javier de Frutos studied contemporary dance in Caracas and London before heading to New York, where he performed for three years with minimalist choreographer Laura Dean. Following a year-long spell in Barcelona, he returned to London in 1994. His first UK solo caused quite a stir for his bold, even reckless choice of music (Stravinsky's Rite of Spring), his provocative theatricality, and above all his nakedness (nudity became a trademark of his solos). He went on to make several self-revelatory, combative solos, and subsequently started to work with other dancers and companies. But by 1998 he felt burnt out, and took two years off to travel through America in the footsteps of one of his heroes, Tennessee Williams. On his return, he worked with Isaac Julien on the 2001 Turner-nominated film The Long Road to Mazatlan (it ended in tears, with a bitter legal dispute over authorship). De Frutos stopped dancing himself, but began to choreograph for a wide range of companies, including Candoco, Rambert Dance Company, Rotterdam Dance Group and the Royal New Zealand Ballet. Alongside this, he worked in musicals – Carousel at the Chichester festival, Cabaret (which won rave reviews) at London's Lyric theatre (both in 2006); and in theatre – Death and the King's Horseman (2009), Macbeth (2010), Shakespeare's "lost" Double Falsehood (2011). Following much backstage histrionics, he bailed out of English National Opera's disastrous Kismet (2007) a fortnight before it opened ("I got good reviews just for not being there"). He has also worked on Mika's We Are Golden video and on the pilot for HBO's new drama Game of Thrones. But he's still best known for two things. First, his directorship of Leeds-based Phoenix Dance Theatre from 2006 to 2009. He completely changed the company's profile, with his own works and revivals of several American modern dance classics – massively changeable, but always bracing programmes. Critics sat up and took notice and the company was invited to headline the Venice Biennale, but behind the scenes was a maelstrom of internal wrangling, and in 2008 De Frutos was abruptly ousted. Second, for his controversial Sadler's Wells commission Eternal Damnation to Sancho and Sanchez (its title a dig at a Phoenix board member) which featured a hunchback pope in an orgy of sexual violence, provoking much outrage, booing and walking out; and the BBC also thought it best to cut it from their Christmas dance programme. There seems to be a calm after these storms, and De Frutos is currently collaborating with the Pet Shop Boys on what Sadler's Wells promises to be a "family" show – though in a recent Dance Gazette interview, De Frutos did point out that "they haven't told me which family …" Watching Javier de FrutosWhatever else he may be, De Frutos is never risk-averse. Nothing is done in moderation, he doesn't believe in good taste, and he values provocation above acceptance. He made his name as a soloist, exploring his own turbulent self in bare-all pieces that sprang from his ambivalent feelings – as an itinerant, Catholic-raised gay man – about religion, eroticism, solitude, love and fear. He used whatever it took to express himself: melodramatic, grandstanding music (Rite of Spring, Gypsy), cross-dressing, and a mash-up of styles from Anna Pavlova finesse to dirty bump and grind. With self-exposure his goal, he generally ended up performing naked. It was dancing in the raw. The most harrowing work of this period was Grass (1997), a trio to Madam Butterfly which found both abjection and exaltation in violence, and ended with gruelling images of mortified flesh and blood. By its nature hit and miss, such confessional work was also emotionally exhausting. When De Frutos began choreographing for others, he broadened his range (though he's still emotionally demanding with his dancers). He could lighten up: Elsa Canasta (Rambert, 2003) and Paseillo (Phoenix, 2008) are playful pieces, splashing through undercurrents of randiness without getting angsty about it. But the dark side is still there: Los Picadores (2007) and Eternal Damnation to Sancho and Sanchez show some of dance's most graphic violence; Cattle Call (2008, with Richard Thomas) explores the psychological brutality of auditions; Blue Roses (2007) mines the desolation at the heart of Tennessee Williams's The Glass Menagerie. Wildly unpredictable and hugely variable, De Frutos's work does have some recurring themes and characteristics: full-blown music, particularly Stravinsky (he's choreographed Rite of Spring four times, Les Noces twice), an operatic theatricality, hot-house emotions, references to dance itself (from Balanchine and Nijinsky to Las Vegas shows), inspiration from Tennessee Williams. Also, of course, sex, violence, death and religion. It's all very un-British. Who's whoA bit of a rolling stone, De Frutos hasn't gathered many regular collaborators. A notable exception is designer Jean-Marc Puissant, who has worked with him several times. FactAustralian film director Baz Luhrmann was in the audience for Eternal Damnation to Sancho and Sanchez. When the booing started, he booed politely too – because he thought it was supposed to be audience participation. (From an interview with David Jays, Dance Gazette 2011) In his own words"I hate work that has mere shock value or which entices or seduces me to agree with it, because it patronises the audience." Interview with Lorna Sanders, Dancing Times 2006 "The term 'worthy' comes to mind, and I can safely say worthy is not in my plans." De Frutos on Leeds-based Phoenix Dance Theatre shortly before becoming its director "It was the very right move to leave that hellhole called Leeds." De Frutos, shortly after leaving as director of Phoenix Dance Theatre Interview with Lyndsey Winship, Time Out 2009 "… work made me more stable – I had an outlet. I didn't go out and kill 20 people in a supermarket in Idaho – I just got my clothes off and did Stravinsky." On the cathartic value of his early work. Interview with David Jays, Dance Gazette 2011 In other words"At his best, De Frutos rides the line between audience fascination and disgust like a champion, dropping universal resonances prolifically along his path." Ismene Brown, Telegraph 2000 "Javier de Frutos may have confronted us with some of the most brutal truths that dancing bodies can deliver, but he also has the instincts of a showman." Judith Mackrell, Guardian 2003 "Since his earliest performances in this country … Javier de Frutos has enjoyed setting his audiences a challenge. Not for him the unbroken narrative line or the lyrical set-piece. His work is fractured and ambiguous, existing in the flickering half-light between action and metaphor. Violence and desire are frequent elements, sometimes ritualised, sometimes viscerally laid bare." Luke Jennings, Observer 2008 Do say"Catholic, much?" Don't say "There's no dance in it." Especially in De Frutos's more controversial works, viewers sometimes see only the provocation. But remember to look at the dancing and the choreography. There is usually quite a lot of it. See also
Companies such as DV8 Physical Theatre have explored confessional theatre, sexual politics, the dark side of the human soul, religion, and dance itself – but there's really no one quite like Javier de Frutos. Now watch this
Lucila Alves (Rambert Dance Company) in Elsa Canasta Cabaret at the Variety Club Showbiz awards Mika's We Are Golden Where to see Javier de Frutos next17-26 March, Sadler's Wells theatre: The Most Incredible Thing, a new collaboration with Pet Shop Boys.
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Libertines singer allegedly identified by eyewitness to burglary in the early hours of Tuesday morning Pete Doherty is reportedly under investigation for breaking into a record shop in Germany. The Libertines singer, who is currently shooting a film in the Bavarian city of Regensburg, was allegedly identified by an eyewitness to the burglary. The incident took place in the early hours of Tuesday morning, in Regensburg's Old Town. A woman on her way home claims she passed three men, all drunk, speaking English outside a closed record store. From behind her, she heard a crash and then saw one of the men reaching through the broken shop window. She later called the police from her home. "It was Doherty," she told a local newspaper. "I clearly recognised him." A spokesman for Regensburg police confirmed that there is a "famous suspect" in the case, but would not identify them. "We cannot accuse anyone definitely right now," Michael Rebele told Mittelbayerische Zeitung. A guitar and several records were taken from the shop. Doherty has come to Regensburg to shoot his first feature film role, in Sylvie Verheyde's The Confession of a Child of the Century. He co-stars with Charlotte Gainsbourg in the French production, based on a novel by Alfred de Musset. A spokesperson for Doherty refused to comment.
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Extra members can get 2 for 1 on tickets to hear this famous jazz pianist perform, as part of the Brandenburg Spring Choral Festival, on Thursday 7 April James Pearson, piano and musical director at Ronnie Scotts, is regarded as one of the world's most talented pianists. His work as a jazz musician has taken him all over the world, including most of the USA and Europe, where he has played in the major jazz clubs. Pearson has produced more than 50 albums and has played with some of the great jazz heroes including Dame Cleo Laine, Maria Ewing, Wynton Marsalis and Richard Rodney Bennett. On 7 April, as part of the Brandenburg Spring Choral Festival, James will perform a solo set in the atmospheric setting of St Martin-in-the-Fields, late in the evening and lit only by candlelight. Drawing on his classical background, and expressed through his unique jazz style, it will be a highly personal retrospective view of the themes of the Festival. Extra members can buy 2 tickets for the price of 1. Take up this offerClick here to take up the offer Help with Offers and Events• You need Help with offers and events •You need to be a member of Extra in order to see the redemption pages.
You can sign up here here
• Members need to sign in to guardian.co.uk at the top of the screen to be able to take up any offer or book tickets.
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | US rock legend announces only UK show this year, while reports suggest he will play two dates in China in April Bob Dylan has announced his only UK date for 2011. The US rock legend will play London Feis at Finsbury Park on Saturday 18 June. The inaugural event, which used to be called Fleadh, celebrates 21 years of the best Irish and international music. Elsewhere, fans in China may finally have the chance to see Dylan in concert. On Tuesday, online ticket agent Mypiao.com began taking reservations for tickets to see the US legend play in Beijing and Shanghai on 6 and 8 April, according to reports. The Chinese Ministry of Culture has not yet granted its approval and tickets are not yet offically on sale. Last April, a planned tour of east Asia was cancelled after officials refused the singer permission to play. But Chinese promoters are now quoted as saying: "These Bob Dylan concerts are destined to be one of the year's major tours and a musical event of depth, grace and greatness." The Hollywood Reporter quoted Kelly Cha, a young Beijing-based musician, as saying: "Dylan has probably got more fans than all the other acts that have visited China from overseas." Neither of Dylan's planned China shows is yet listed on the singer's official website but gigs are scheduled for Taipei, Taiwan, on 3 April and in Hong Kong, where he has played before, on 12 April. Tickets to see Dylan, who will turn 70 on 24 May, perform at the 12,000-seat indoor Beijing Workers Gymnasium and at the 8,000-seat Shanghai Grand Theatre, are reported to start at 280 yuan ($42) each. MyPiao advertised the most expensive tickets at 1,961.411 yuan ($300), a figure paying tribute to Dylan's show with blues singer John Lee Hooker in New York on 11 April 1961. Jeffrey Wu, of Taiwan-based promoters Brokers Brothers Herald, said the 2010 shows were cancelled because authorities were wary of Dylan's past as countercultural icon. In 2009, Oasis were told they were "unsuitable" to play in Beijing and Shanghai as Noel Gallagher had appeared at a Tibet freedom concert 12 years earlier.
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Guillemots are back with a new album, a new single and a video that suggests a Scouts camping trip gone wrong There's something deeply disturbing about forests, especially ones that feature Guillemots dodging in and out of the trees. This is just one of the death-defying stunts they pull off in the video (a Guardian exclusive) for the first single to be taken from their third album, Walk the River. Propelled by a fuzz-guitar riff and singer Fyfe Dangerfield's sprightly harmonies it starts off pretty jolly, but all is not quite as it seems, as Dangerfield explains: "I think in some way it's about a mania within, caused by something external, and the conflict over whether to embrace this thing or just ignore it and crawl away into familiar comforts." The video is a trippy camping trip, all funky funghi, neon-flashing trees and lonely nights in tents. Just like Scout camp all over again. The Basket is out on 10 April. Walk the River will follow on 18 April.
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Sue Bourne's film captures the drama and diamantes of thousands of dancers descending on Glasgow for the 40th World Irish Dancing Championship. It's released in the UK on 6 May 2011
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Guitarist Peter Buck says band have no plans to take their new album on the road, claiming their last tour was exhausting REM will not tour in support of their new album, Collapse Into Now. After decades of gigging, the band have no plans to "repeat themselves" with a calendar of concert dates, according to guitarist Peter Buck. "I'm not really sure that touring sells records," he said. REM last toured in 2008, playing 77 dates from Vancouver to Southampton to Mexico City. But that six-month stretch is still fresh in their minds. "We just toured, it seemed like, last week," Buck told Beatweek (via Spinner). Promoting REM's 2008 album, Accelerate, "[it felt] to some degree ... like we'd just been doing kind of the same thing we did last time. You just don't really want to repeat yourself in that way." Bassist Mike Mills confirmed the touring decision in a new interview with German Rolling Stone: "We won't tour," he said. "It makes me sad, but the last tour was exhausting – 2008 was a very long year ... I love touring, and of course I would appreciate the money, but at this point in time it would not be the right thing for us [to do]." Frontman Michael Stipe shared the sentiment. "I just don't want to," he said. "You have to listen to your instinct." Although a tour is not on the cards, this doesn't necessarily mean that REM will not play any live shows. "We'll just see what happens," Buck said. But neither are the band in any hurry to return to the studio. "This was the last record for our contract with Warner Bros, and we're not sure where we're going to take things from here," Mills told the Huffington Post. "We'll figure what we're doing next a little bit later."
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | An easy-to-use gizmo that has captured the imagination of everyone from Jonny Greenwood to Brian Eno What is it? A Korg-made effects unit developed initially with DJs in mind, but which with some clever marketing and the most brilliantly intuitive interface has become an incredibly sexy, must-have bit of kit for everyone from avant-garde producers to stadium guitar heroes. Originally launched in 1999, a brand new generation of the pad – the Kaoss Pad Quad – is out this month. Who uses it? The first time the Kaoss Pad came to the general public's attention was via Radiohead's Kid A, as part of the tantalising new arsenal of toys that began replacing Jonny Greenwood's trademark guitar explosions around the turn of the millennium. Brian Eno, perhaps predictably, was also an ardent early supporter, and he even got his old mate Brian Ferry into the world of Kaoss. Beatboxer Beardyman has almost become an unofficial spokesman for the Kaoss Pad, while the Kaoss rock star is undoubtedly Muse leader Matt Bellamy, who has a controller for his KP built into his futuristic signature Manson guitars. How does it work? The technology of the X/Y controller touchpad that modulates the effects and filters programmed into the Kaoss Pad isn't new or revolutionary, but it's so simply and elegantly implemented in this design that anyone can pick one up and in a matter of seconds get the hang of it. You simply swirl your finger around the pad until you find the sound you want, and then you can either freeze the setting or modulate it further by stroking and prodding the pad as you please. The various models of Kaoss Pad each have a subtly different purpose. The Kaoss Pad 3 can manipulate samples and loops as well as applying a range of effects, the Mini KP is a budget-price, but powerful Kaoss Pad, with 100 effects (flange, distortion, delay – you name it), and the Kaoss Pad Entrancer can process audio and video. Though mostly used to sample, loop, pitch-bend or otherwise manipulate music that has already been mixed down – such as in a DJ set – the KP is also pretty handy in live performances. It can act as a vocoder, or as effects for keyboards, guitar or any other sound source. Why is it classic? It's just so easy – and most importantly – fun to use. Eno described Kaoss Pads as "a way of taking sounds into the domain of muscular control ... you can really start playing with sound itself, with its physical character. It's immediately obvious what you do, and it takes you into a completely different place, because when working with computers you normally don't use your muscles in that way. You're focused on your head, and the three million years of evolution that resulted in incredible muscular skill doesn't get a look in." What's the best ever Kaoss Pad song? Radiohead's Everything in It's Right Place – the glitching, stuttering collage of Thom Yorkes is Jonny Greenwood feeding the singer's vocal through the Kaoss Pad. Five facts and things
* The new Kaoss Pad Quad gives you hands-on control of the effects applied; you can manually mix and match four pods of five effects for a total of 1,295 combinations. I've created a demonstration track of how these different combinations can work by adding live effects to a button-bashing improv on my Roland 303 – streaming here. * The Quad is divided into four core groups of effects: looper, modulation, filter and delay. With the looper controls you can sample and rearrange snatches of vocals or beats, or add pseudo-vinyl scratch effects. * The Quad also automatically syncs BPM to the music pouring through it, which means that the effects and filters you add never sound clashing or discordant. * The Kaoss Pad proved so popular as an effects unit that Korg used the same design and technology to power an X/Y controller synth – the Kaossilator. * The Kaossilator had barely been released before someone tried recording an entire album using only this small, inexpensive, keyboard-less synth. Gary Kibler's The Yellow Album is a pretty impressive display of what you can do with 100 preset sounds, one X/Y pad and a couple of nimble fingers.
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Body of 44-year-old Starr – who left the US rock band in 1993 – discovered in Salt Lake City in Utah Mike Starr, the former Alice in Chains bass player who went public with his drug problems on a reality TV show, has been found dead nine years after the band's singer died of an overdose. The body of the 44-year-old Starr was discovered on Tuesday in a house in Salt Lake City according to police. Starr left Alice in Chains shortly after the release of their breakthrough 1992 album Dirt and before they went on to enjoy greater success during the heyday of Seattle grunge. But the band was rocked in 2002 by the death of singer Layne Staley, whose body was found in a Seattle apartment. The remaining members resurrected the group with relative success in recent years, although Starr had largely disappeared by this time. Starr re-emerged in January 2010 as a patient on the third season of Celebrity Rehab, a VH1 reality show, but appeared to be unable to overcome his addiction. He was arrested in Salt Lake City three weeks ago on an outstanding warrant related to an earlier drugs charge, and was also carrying unauthorised prescription medications. TMZ, which broke the news of Starr's death, quoted his father as saying: "It's a terrible shock and tragedy." A spokesman for the Salt Lake City police separtment said that officers responded to call about a possible body at a residence in the city centre earlier on Tuesday afternoon. "There is nothing to indicate that this was foul play by another individual," police said.
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | In what way can Thatcher be counted as inspiring as a woman or for women (100 most inspiring women, G2, 8 March)? Was it her hair? Her phoney voice? Her handbag? Or the blood on her hands, which we are still mopping up? Isn't she more of a warning? That a woman can be just as sexist, just as anti-feminist, just as much of a bully as any man in power? She taught us that just having a woman at the top (anywhere) is not enough. And you forgot to mention: she bagged her own millionaire early on. Every little helps. Val Walsh Liverpool • Great to see the 100 fabulous women, but why no mathematicians? To counter this trend, we have today, together with Murray Edwards College, Cambridge, announced the launch of a European Girls' Mathematical Olympiad to take place in 2012. A similar event in China has successfully increased the number of girls participating in maths at the highest levels. Mary Wimbury Director, UK Mathematics Trust, Leeds • You include Caster Semenya, a callow South African athlete, at the expense of the indomitable Winnie Mandela, the brilliant Dr Mamphela Ramphele, probably the most respected and admired woman in South Africa, and Helen Zille, who has transformed the Western Cape. John Carlisle Sheffield • While I have no objections to Karren Brady being included in your "inspiring women", women were not "absent from football boardrooms" in 1993 when she took her position at Birmingham City. Brenda Spencer spent 24 years as secretary/chief executive of Wigan Athletic. Frank Riley Hexham, Northumberland • Trashy dance stomps. Appears on stage dripping in blood or perched on a toilet. A dress made of meat. Lady Gaga, inspiring? Ian MacDonald Billericay, Essex • I was dismayed to see that Caroline Lucas was not included. She has done so much for the Green party, and the environment is so important right now. Rosemary Haworth-Booth Barnstaple, Devon • Joanna Lumley's work on the Gurkha Justice Campaign alone should have put qualification for the list in no doubt. Tom Bassam London • No Mary Robinson? Unbelievable. Nick Nolan Ballylanders, Co Limerick • Polly Toynbee not included. You cannot be serious. Colin Pickthall Ulverston, Cumbria
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | In the third of our series looking at Indian artists, we meet the arts collective BLOT (Basic Love of Things). BLOT consists of VJ and visual artist Avinash Kumar and DJ and musician Gaurav Malaker
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Barbican, London Simon Rattle concerts are doing a London bus impersonation: none for ages, then arriving in droves. After his four Berlin Phil concerts in London last month, Rattle returned for his first LSO date in many years. Compared with the Berlin appearances I attended, this one was in many ways superior. Messiaen's monumental Et Exspecto Resurrectionem Mortuorum is coming up for its half-century. It may no longer have the cult status it enjoyed in its early years, and it has its meretricious side. But the five-movement sonic dazzler – chirruping winds alternating with portentous gongs and tamtams – still packs a hell of a punch. Rattle was absolutely on top of the piece, directing with a Boulez-like tension and severity, and the LSO playing was top notch. In 2002, Rattle performed Bruckner's Ninth Symphony – another work by a devout Catholic contemplating death – in London with his new Berlin orchestra. As a Bruckner interpretation, it was a terrible disappointment: marvellously played, of course, but finicky and superficial, the embodiment of the side of Rattle's musical personality that occasionally seems determined to shy away from the music's essence, especially in the Austro-German tradition. Nearly a decade on, though, Rattle's approach has matured. Perhaps, working with a new orchestra less freighted by history than the Berliners, Rattle felt less self-conscious. He achieved a flexibility of tempo and phrasing without any loss of the necessary sense of span that so eluded him in 2002. The first and third movements, two of Bruckner's greatest achievements, unfolded organically and idiomatically, making their crises all the more profound. The cosmic loneliness of the music spoke with its own voice. This time, Rattle showed he gets it. Rating: 5/5
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Usher Hall, Edinburgh It is an odd setup for a Haydn symphony: cellist on conductor's podium with back to audience, orchestra clustered around him. The programme listed Steven Isserlis (the cellist in question) as a standard member of the Academy of St Martin in the Fields string section, but there is nothing standard about having your own personal page-turner. Isserlis conducted Haydn's 13th from the cello – or rather from the hair, lurching side to side, curls shaking like a wet dog. The look was dramatic, but when he sat still for the slow movement's cello solo, the orchestra held together just fine. Next on came Joshua Bell to conduct Mendelssohn's Italian Symphony from a specially demarked first violin chair, which might have been upholstered in broken glass for all his leaping about. The problem with the ASMF's current tour is that, despite the feigned egalitarianism, the orchestra gets sidelined as a vehicle for the two big-name guests. This is a shame, because the orchestra sounds superb in its own right. They play modern instruments with the vigour and weightless virtuosity of the best period bands, bows ricocheting off strings, full of individuality but gelling as a cohesive and dynamic unit. Their sound was too small for the Usher Hall, but was still thrilling – the Mendelssohn buoyant and radiant, the Haydn gracefully poised. When Isserlis and Bell were on stage together, neither of them conducted; instead, Ian Brown navigated Brahms's Double Concerto, and the ASMF responded with clout. Default ferocity masked the first movement's stateliness; the two-against-three rhythms were punched hard rather than played expansively. The soloists matched in ardency, instant lyricism and stunning control. But their sounds are not an ideal blend: Isserlis's low register gets murky when he overeggs it, so Bell's bright tone ends up winning the balance. Rating: 3/5
| | | | | | | | | |  | |  | |  |
No comments:
Post a Comment