Feature

Scotland: A Changing Nation

3 Jul 2008

‘I don’t want to blow our own trumpet, or anything,’ says Maureen Barrie, standing with her arms spread in front of a blank wall that will shortly be emblazoned with a giant replica of a Tunnock’s Teacake, ‘but we’re a hell of a nation if you think…

T in the Park - Biffy's James Johnston recommends

3 Jul 2008

I n Case of Fire Festivals are always a great place to check out new bands, and T in the Park has a great tradition for uncovering hidden gems. In Case of Fire are definitely worth checking out. We played some shows with them last year in their native…

T in the Park - KT Tunstall

3 Jul 2008

‘I remember playing T in the Park for the first time in 1996. I was 21 and a backing singer with the Skuobhie Dubh Orchestra, the band led by the man now known as King Creosote. We played in the ceilidh tent and Radiohead, Alanis Morrisette and Beck…

T in the Park - Panic at the Disco

3 Jul 2008

It’s hard to be cool when you were ‘discovered’ on the internet by Pete Wentz with only three songs in your repertoire and your ‘fans’ were a few thousand e-friends who thought you were totally hot. Still, you’ve got to give Panic at the Disco points…

T in the Park - Rob da Bank

3 Jul 2008

Richie Hawtin ‘Spastik’ ‘Will he play it, won’t he play it? Hawtin is the don, and this record lives on and on. This track IS the Slam Tent at T.’ http://tiny.cc/Plastik Aphex Twin ‘Analogue Bubblebath’ ‘Heard this at sundown at Sonar…

T in the Park - Running order

3 Jul 2008

FRIDAY MAIN STAGE The Verve Richard Ashcroft and co make a long-awaited return promising all the hits and some newly recorded material. Stereophonics Welsh outfit still successfully peddling their distinctive brand of pub rock with…

T in the Park - T Break Stage

3 Jul 2008

Friday State of Affairs Promising Edinburgh-based foursome who cater in wonderfully heartfelt indie rock. No Kilter Excitingly frenzied math-punk quartet from Glasgow. Figure 5 Much-adored skiffle-tinged, psychedelic garage pop…

T in the Park - The Fratellis

3 Jul 2008

The Fratellis aren’t a band you’d think of as suffering from existential self-doubt, eh? But a spell out of the spotlight has left singer and guitarist Jon Fratelli with the slightest lingering doubt about his band’s success and longevity. ‘I’m…

T in the Park - The Ting Tings

3 Jul 2008

Walking through Glasgow’s Botanic Gardens with the band who are number one in both the UK singles and downloads chart is a cheerful feeling, and it’s not purely down to the bright, sunny Saturday afternoon weather. Katie White and Jules De Martino…

T in the Park - Up-and-comers

3 Jul 2008

MGMT What Psychedelic synth-pop duo from Brooklyn Unique Selling Point They sound wonderfully woozy on record but the MGMT live experience reveals a harder, darker and much more edgy side to the band. Imagine full-on swampy rock colliding with…

Fitter Happier - Radiohead interview

19 Jun 2008

They’re one of the biggest bands in the world despite refusing to play the music industry’s game. Mark Robertson talks to Radiohead about success, self-indulgence and their reputation as the most miserable men in rock

The Edge of Love - Sharman Macdonald interview

Edinburgh International Film Festival

5 Jun 2008

At the programme launch of the 2008 Edinburgh International Film Festival artistic director Hannah McGill thanked the makers of The Edge of Love for providing her with the perfect opening night film. What McGill no doubt meant by this was that The Edge…

Edinburgh International Film Festival - Jeanne Moreau

5 Jun 2008

Born between the wars to an English chorus girl mother and a French restaurateur father, Jeanne Moreau was born to play what feminist film critic Molly Haskell called ‘the glorious fantasy, appealing to both sexes, to men as eternal mistress, to women…

Chris Waitt interview

Edinburgh International Film Festival

5 Jun 2008

If someone gave you money to interview all your exes and find out what you did wrong in those relationships, would you do it? Filmmaker Chris Waitt didn’t hang around for an offer and approached Warp X with the pitch for his documentary A Complete…

Festivals - Something For Nothing

5 Jun 2008

If you’re looking to wet a whistle, then look no further than the Orkney Beer Festival (22–24 August, www.visitorkney.com ), held at the Stromness Hotel. A now annual wing-ding, guests are invited to join fellow tipplers for a taste of the local Orkney…

Festivals - Hire Learning

5 Jun 2008

From bar worker and front of house to book seller and litter picker, the festival world needs literally thousands of paid and unpaid staff to help make their events a success. DC Site Services help run many of the major festivals, so keep a close eye on…

Festivals - Strange Days Indeed

5 Jun 2008

An integral part of the cultural calendar, festivals are fast becoming a vibrant part of the tourism industry – both at home and abroad – and organisers are undoubtedly raising the bar to keep up with demand, pushing the boundaries to give the audience…

Festivals - Capital Gains

5 Jun 2008

Kicking off the capital’s world famous summer festivals in late July, it’s the Edinburgh Jazz and Blues Festival (25 Jul–3 Aug) which is the longest running jazz festival in the UK. Following hot on its heels is relative newbie to Edinburgh’s festival…

Indiana Jones & The Kingdom of The Crystal Skull - Shia LaBeouf interview

22 May 2008

When Shia LaBeouf describes himself as ‘president of the lucky club’ he’s not kidding. Even by Hollywood standards, the 21-year-old’s rise has been meteoric. Having shone as the child lead in 2003’s little-seen Holes LaBeouf spent the next four years…

Summer Film Special - Audrey Tautou - Priceless

22 May 2008

She scurries into the opulent embrace of the Grand Hotel in Paris, leaving behind the hubbub of the city, and plonks herself down in a capacious settee, legs decorously crossed, for a morning of interviews. The arresting brown eyes still exude a…

Sex and the City - Sarah Jessica Parker interview

22 May 2008

Carrie would not be impressed. She may be decked out in stylish Versace threads, and clutching a Fendi bag, but Sarah Jessica Parker is struggling to remember who designed her shoes. ‘Um, I can’t pronounce the name correctly . . .’ She might not have…

Summer Film Special - Best of the rest

22 May 2008

The Incredible Hulk The big angry green killing machine gets another bite at the superhero film franchise cherry (after the box office disaster of Ang Lee’s Hulk). This version is adapted by the folk behind the X-Men films, directed by Louis Leterrier…

Art School Degree Shows

22 May 2008

GLASGOW SCHOOL OF ART Ragnar Jonasson Painter Originally from Iceland, Ragnar Jonasson paints, but not using brushes or canvas. ‘I’m pouring paint,’ he explains, ‘from saucepans. I pour it onto plastic, then peel it off, so there’s nothing…

Gone Baby Gone - Ben Affleck interview

22 May 2008

Ben Affleck returns to his childhood stomping ground for his directorial debut, Gone Baby Gone. It focuses on the story of a child who gets kidnapped with the mother a prime suspect and, like Mystic River, it is adapted from a work by Dennis Lehane.

Ida Maria

22 May 2008

How do you solve a problem like Maria? Don’t worry, we’re not talking about any scary Saturday night television show featuring melty-face Andrew Lloyd Webber. No, this is a much nicer problem, in fact, this Maria isn’t really a problem at all, she’s a…

Property special - Beat the credit crunch

8 May 2008

If you are looking for a new mortgage, consider the issues around affordability, the tie-in period of the deal, the loan to value percentage available and other conditions. Do not focus on the published headline rate and assume that is the deal for you.

Property special - City guides

8 May 2008

EDINBURGH HOTSPOTS Leith How much: Average one bed £126,540; two bed £164,420 What: For better or worse, the Leith of Irvine Welsh’s Trainspotting is almost unrecognisable as new cafés, restaurants and bars jostle for space alongside the…

Property special - Do it yourself

8 May 2008

A survey by online listings company Gumtree found that nine out of ten people do not think estate agents justify their high fees, while 40% told the Office of Fair Trading they offer poor value for money. So the recent explosion of people deciding to…

Property special - Old versus new

8 May 2008

For many property buyers these days, draughty old flats in need of repair just won’t cut it. Luckily there are plenty of shiny new options available across Scotland’s central belt, from swanky waterfront developments such as Coalhill in Leith to sleek…

Property special - Rental guide

8 May 2008

Know what you want Where do you want to live and who with, if anyone? What are your expectations? Be realistic but don’t settle for something which, in a few weeks, won’t make the grade. Go it alone or agent Consider if you want to scour the…

Property special - Sarah Beeny offers some advice

Moving on up

8 May 2008

Sarah Beeny may have flirted with the idea of a different career path but property was definitely in her stars. ‘My father is an architect and I grew up around building sites so they didn’t seem daunting,’ she explains. As her then-boyfriend (now…

Property special

8 May 2008

Though she may have started house-hunting before the credit crunch hit the headlines, it took a quick look at the property market to tell Michelle Davies, 29, a software engineer who had lived in a rented flat since arriving in Edinburgh from Australia…

Persepolis - An interview with Marjane Satrapi

24 Apr 2008

Sitting across from me in a tartan-walled basement of a London hotel room, Marjane Satrapi cuts an imposing figure. Arms folded, with an all-black outfit reflecting her mood, the Iranian-born 38-year-old is in town to discuss Persepolis, her…

Nick Cave

24 Apr 2008

Nick Cave is in his car. It’s a big car, but no Chelsea tractor. He’s in the driving seat, howling madly along with the bombast blaring out of the speakers. This isn’t a cruise down endless stretches of autobahn, freeways of America or through the arid…

Nova Scotia - From working class revolutions to conceptual art

24 Apr 2008

1978 Traverse director Chris Parr commissions The Slab Boys. ‘Chris decided that the Traverse was going to focus on new Scottish writing, and in doing so he changed the face of theatre in Scotland,’ says Byrne. 1979 Margaret Thatcher elected…

Helen Walsh

13 Mar 2008

Helen Walsh has lived a little. At 13, while her classmates in Warrington were flicking through Smash Hits, she was swept up in the early 90s euphoria of acid house and ecstasy. At 16, as most girls her age sat their GCSEs, she was hooked on cocaine and…

Tight Budget

17 Jan 2008

Going for a song January is a great time to check out up-and-coming bands for free. Remember, even the most unpromising nights can be historic. On the west coast, Mono, Stereo, 78, the Liquid Ship and Tchai Ovna all have exciting free line-ups. In…

Manga

17 Jan 2008

It’s not always easy being a pioneer, something Neil Armstrong, Christopher Columbus or Marie Curie would have no doubt attested to. The same can be said for George Macdonald, lesser known perhaps, but equally forward thinking in his field: the world of…

Celtic Connections

17 Jan 2008

Music isn’t what it used to be. This is something we have to be thankful for as the constant evolution, recycling and re-fashioning of music means there’s always someone out there trying to do things a bit differently. While there’s been much carping…

Preview 2008 - Sons & Daughters

4 Jan 2008

These days all it takes is a snappy debut, flashy photo-shoots and a healthy number of online ‘friends’ for a band to think they have it sussed. Because there are so many of them around, acts are promptly and callously dropped if they don’t make their…

Preview 2008 - Books

4 Jan 2008

So, surely this year will mark a big new beginning when proper literature, you know, actual novels, replaces the ridiculously self-serving and endless charade that is the celebrity autobiography? Nah, not really. 2008 will witness little in the way of a…

Preview 2008 - Fashion

4 Jan 2008

Is it just me, or has it got dark in here? Spring/summer fashions usually burst out in bright colours, but this year most designers haven’t managed to shake the winter blues (and purples and greens). Klaxons, who led 2007’s tooth-jangling Technicolor…

Preview 2008 - Film

4 Jan 2008

I lost count of the number of times the death knell rang for the traditional Hollywood filmmaking model last year. The ongoing writers’ strike, the collapse of the star system (due to exorbitant actor salaries) and increasingly low box office returns…

Preview 2008 - Kelly Macdonald

4 Jan 2008

Kelly Macdonald caught the Coen brothers on the hop. Having convinced the casting director of the Coens’ new film, No Country For Old Men, that she could pull of an authentic West Texas accent, the 31-year-old Glaswegian actress was presented to the…

Preview 2008 - Oscar predictions

4 Jan 2008

Paul Dale gazes into his crystal ball and picks out those most likely to grab a gong this awards season Best Actor James McAvoy for his role in the adaptation of Ian McEwan’s Atonement or Josh Brolin for his appearance in the Coen brothers’ version…

Preview 2008 - Technology

4 Jan 2008

Technology is advancing at such a rapid pace that predicting the future with any accuracy is becoming increasingly tricky. As might be expected, media technology is set to become faster, more powerful, more efficient, cheaper, more portable and more…

Preview 2008 - TV times

4 Jan 2008

The ones to watch in 2008 Damages The critically acclaimed US legal series, starring Glenn Close and Ted Danson, arrives on these shores. BBC1 . Teenage Kicks Adrian Edmondson returns to the small screen for this eight-part series based on the…

90s revival

16 Aug 2007

When you are young there is no such thing as nostalgia, there is only the seemingly limitless advance of new experiences. Music inevitably provides the backdrop – a drunken first kiss, the first gig you ever sneaked into underage, or maybe just that…

Katrin Himmler

9 Aug 2007

Katrin Himmler was born into a family with a dark history, but has only now been able to write about it. She tells Doug Johnstone about reliving the past

Sounds of the City

Hey You Get Off My Pavement

1 Aug 2007

Fed up wading through the mud and the crowds at major music festivals? Karin Goodwin gets the lowdown on an innovative alternative and finds there is a whole lot going on in Glasgow this summer

Glasgow Smiles Better

Hey You Get Off My Pavement

1 Aug 2007

Don’t want to spend August sitting in front of your TV? You don’t have to, as Karin Goodwin brings you some of the weird and wonderful events taking place in and around Glasgow this month

Immaculate collection

The work is serious

1 Aug 2007

Alexander Kennedy strays from the beaten track and discovers some hidden cultural gems at Glasgow’s studio warehouse

Property - House rules

House rules

10 Apr 2007

With property prices continuing to soar and half of UK buyers reportedly being forced out of the market, buying a home has never been costlier or more nerve-wracking. But take heart, The List’s reporters have scoured the country and consulted the…