Issue 584

Knocked Up

(15) 128min

23 Aug 2007

Production assistant Alison Scott (Katherine Heigl) gets the opportunity of a lifetime when she is given the chance to present on an entertainment TV channel. One day her producer tells her that her body could do with being a little ‘tighter’. But no…

New digital video service to teach fans how to recreate songs

23 Aug 2007

Aspiring musicians are being offered the chance to learn their craft from the music maestros themselves this month, following the launch of ‘Now Play It’, a new digital video service developed to help offer a more instant and direct way of learning, to…

Jarvis Cocker

23 Aug 2007

During the heady days of Britpop I was a Jarvis Cocker obsessive; following Pulp around from town to town, skipping school to buy concert tickets and waiting outside venues and hotels for autographs and photos until all hours of the morning. Once the…

Lady Chatterley

23 Aug 2007

Showjumping’s loss is cinema’s gain. As a teenager Marina Hands was a sufficiently accomplished equestrienne to feature in the French junior national team, along with the future actor-director Guillaume Canet. ‘We weren’t good enough to become…

Ricky Gervais

23 Aug 2007

There really can’t be too many comic names who would get away with performing a one-off gig at the Fringe for an International Festival ticket price, but Sir Richard of Gervais is one such man. With Fame, his obedient fans will be entertained with tales…

Mountain biking

23 Aug 2007

You’re tired and you’re sore. Nights on the vodka still don’t mix with nights on the air mattress. Sunlight splits the trees as the smells of pine forest, fresh earth and your own Red Bull–tinged breath fill your nostrils. It’s daft o’clock in the…

Björk

23 Aug 2007

It is a muggy summer’s afternoon, and although she has been doing interviews in an airless west London hotel suite for several hours, the Queen of Quirk is in fine form and fizzing with energy. Having recently released Volta – touted as her most…

The Easy Star All-Stars

23 Aug 2007

It seems that these days the cover version is more popular among artists and listeners than ever. Mark Ronson’s stone-cold funk renderings have made him friends aplenty (as well as a few enemies), and one cottage label has made the high concept leap…

Breach

Chris Cooper interview

23 Aug 2007

Chris Cooper’s got pedigree. The 56-year-old American actor began his impressive big screen career with the great independent filmmaker John Sayles, making four films with him, including Cooper’s 1987 debut, the miner’s union drama Matewan, and the…

Beastie Boys

23 Aug 2007

Take an objective look at the Beastie Boys’ musical output over the last 25 years and in all honesty it’s pretty patchy. Patchy but fun-filled. Rarely do we see a group so switched on – they’ve been rocking their whole implausible career for kicks. Who…

Bobby Gillespie

23 Aug 2007

Fire Engines ‘I’m a big Fire Engines Fan. They were a big influence on us: fifteen minute sets, very intense. ‘Get Up and Use Me’ – their single. ‘Candy Skin’, ‘Meat Whiplash’, ‘Sympathetic Anaesthetic’, you know? Big fan of the Fire Engines…

Bonus points

23 Aug 2007

The Unknown Pleasures Tent Kicking off the fun in the Manicured Noise Field on Friday will be Glaswegian dubsters and reggae-ska lovers, Mungo’s Hi-Fi. Their party mix of mellow, feelgood beats has already gone down a storm at the Knockengorroch…

Orpheus X

23 Aug 2007

The gods are surely smiling on Edinburgh this month, as the American Repertory Theatre rocks up to the Edinburgh International Festival with a modern version of the Orpheus myth. The brainchild of master performer and maverick musician Rinde Eckert…

And When Did You Last See Your Father?

23 Aug 2007

‘It’s not my story, of course. It’s Blake’s story,’ says screenwriter David Nicholls of his latest project. Having cut his teeth on TV drama Cold Feet, Nicholls successfully adapted his own novel Starter For Ten for the cinema before he agreed to give…

Trisha Brown Dance Company

23 Aug 2007

In 1962, one building in New York City became the centre of the modern dance world. Artists flocked to Judson Memorial Church to produce work, and when they left, went on to influence dancers and choreographers around the world. But when I ask Trisha…

Flavour of the month

23 Aug 2007

Food at festivals is too often hit and miss. At best you may find some culinary treat that shocks and delights the pallette, while others are there to fill a hole as you rush from stage to stage between bands. But the organisers of Connect are…

The sound of progress

23 Aug 2007

Hand-picked from the regular industry showcases at King Tut’s, 20 of the top bands in Scotland have been selected to play the YourSound Band Stand. Among the Friday line-up: North Atlantic Oscillation, Le Reno Amps, Frightened Rabbit and…

Happy Mondays

23 Aug 2007

‘Hola!’ Shaun Ryder is just back from Spain, and has clearly been learning the language. In between shows leading up to next week’s T on the Fringe gig, though, the surprisingly sharp and decidedly affable Happy Mondays frontman is at home, ‘catching up…

Silicone Remembers Carbon

23 Aug 2007

In the first ten minutes of experiencing David Rokeby’s work at Glasgow’s CCA, I am ‘taken’, ‘dismayed’, ‘intrigued but resistant’, ‘troubled’, ‘voyeuristic’ and then ‘convinced’. So the randomly generated adjectives tell me, words that appear floating…

Idlewild

23 Aug 2007

‘We’ve always been the band of bad timing, haven’t we?’ laughs Idlewild singer Roddy Woomble. ‘We’re perennially called underachievers or underdogs, because we’ve always put out records that are out of sync with what’s being played on the radio. We’re…

Screwloose

23 Aug 2007

New kid on the electro block Screwloose makes its debut at the Arches this fortnight with a solid roster of interesting musical guests to get your teeth into. Even if it seems that every club in both Scottish cities has the ‘electro’ genre in its revue…

Room to roam

23 Aug 2007

Summer festivals are attended by two kinds of people. Those who think camping is fun and those who think it is a near manifestation of hell on earth. If you’re the former, you revel in every muddy, messy moment. If you’re the latter, you are conflicted…

Craig Davidson

23 Aug 2007

Craig Davidson doesn’t pull any punches. We might as well get the terrible boxing pun out the way at the start, because his debut novel, The Fighter, is a brutally violent but brilliantly written tale set in the world of underground bare-knuckle…

Josie does Edinburgh

23 Aug 2007

Hello again, I’m delighted to report that, three weeks in, I’m surviving. My show Trying is Good has received what I am describing as ‘delightfully mixed’ reviews. I have seen some inspiring shows over the last week, Will Adamsdale and Kristen Schaal…

News round-up

23 Aug 2007

This year’s if.comedy awards are set to be sprinkled with a little Hollywood gold dust, when actor Christian Slater returns to the Edinburgh Fringe to announce the winner this week. Slater, who brought One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest to the Fringe in…

Tenori-On

23 Aug 2007

It’s hard to neatly sum up the Tenori-On. The bare facts are these: it’s a new music device from Yamaha; it produces a light show that corresponds with what is being played; it can be programmed in real time and is a new innovative, intuitive…

Modest Mouse

23 Aug 2007

When I call for a chat, Modest Mouse’s Isaac Brock is at home in Washington State. He’s been hard at work all morning trying to replace the starter on his van, and seems excited at the prospect of getting his hands dirty. Not the sort of pastime you…

The Jesus and Mary Chain

23 Aug 2007

Jim and William Reid drew out their plans for their rock’n’roll band down on paper long before they ever picked up their instruments. They knew how they wanted to sound and look but it was surely not in their master plan to be playing their first London…

Picasso on Paper

23 Aug 2007

They say that all is fair in love and war – although the word ‘fair’ seems a little humdrum when you take in the remarkable collection of works exhibited in one of the Festival’s undeniable big guns. Throughout a selection of around 120 graphic works…

Hallam Foe

(18) 95min

23 Aug 2007

As writer and philosopher William Gass once noted: ‘for the voyeur, fiction is what’s called going all the way’. No one knows this better than rural Scottish boy Hallam Foe (Jamie Bell). While his father (Ciarán Hinds) and stepmother (Claire Forlani…

John Pilger

23 Aug 2007

In this day and age, journalist is a job title which is afforded a disdain from the general public on a par with estate agent, parking attendant and serial killer. Trust is a commodity that is lacking when it comes to relations between newspaper people…

Vashti Bunyan

23 Aug 2007

From Stones protégée to modern folk icon, Stewart Smith counts down the four ages of effervescent folk singer Vashti Bunyan

MIA

23 Aug 2007

Were we to try and describe the precise sound which London-born, Sri Lanka-raised MIA makes, we’d be here all day. While she can be very broadly described as an electro-grime act whose vocals are a combination of hip hop cajoling and reggae rhythm…

Hot Chip

23 Aug 2007

Hot Chip will break your legs, snap off your head. At least, that’s what they claim on The Warning, the title track of their magnificent second album. Apparently the London-based electro-pop duo of Alexis Taylor and Joe Goddard met at school, where they…

Subway

23 Aug 2007

Perhaps understandably, the number of people who feel pessimistic rather than optimistic about Britain’s future has grown exponentially over the last few years, according to a flurry of recent surveys. This smart and stylish production from Vanishing…

Singles & Downloads

23 Aug 2007

Without the right tunes, a buff set of pipes are about as much use as a pair of boxfresh Nikes to a landmine victim. For proof, check out London’s latest supposedly hot-prospect Bobby Kray ’s ‘Silly Games’ (V2) ** – four minutes of rangy vocal…

Nathan Coley

23 Aug 2007

Be careful when entering this exhibition – a sturdy strip of wood runs right across the entrance just high enough to trip unsuspecting visitors flat onto the floor. This is not a health and safety oversight but artist Nathan Coley’s intervention…

Sean Hughes

23 Aug 2007

On the face of it, the stage Sean Hughes of 2007 doesn’t seem a whole lot different from the one who nabbed his first bit of fame back in 1990 as the youngest winner of the Perrier. With that boyish gaunt look still intact, he certainly doesn’t look any…

Trachtenburg Family Slideshow Players

23 Aug 2007

Having visited the Fringe in 2004 and 2005, last year wasn’t quite the same without the Trachtenburgs around, sporting their thrift store chic. There seems to be no real barrier between the onstage and offstage personalities of Jason, Tina Pina and…

Frank Skinner

23 Aug 2007

After a decade away from the stand-up circuit, you’d think that quite a fuss would have been made of Frank Skinner’s Edinburgh return, back in the exact same room where it all started for him with his Perrier-winning year of 1991. Yet when the lights go…

Ensemble 415

23 Aug 2007

It’s not unheard of for groups of musicians to give themselves identities that have something to do with numbers. The Sixteen, for instance, take their name from the regular quota of their singers. Or there’s New York’s Ensemble 21, whose contemporary…

Hitlist - the best rock, pop and folk

23 Aug 2007

The Black Lips Atlanta, Georgia may be hoaching with hip hop stars for the most part but there’s also lowdown rock’n’roll dogs like this bunch. Come feel their twang. Optimo, The Sub Club, Glasgow, Sun 2 Sep. (Rock & Pop) Connect Festival Hopefully…

Game?

23 Aug 2007

If you’ve ever been to a dinner party and wanted to scream in frustration then this creative company, Tangled Feet, have the play for you. What begins as a get together to welcome the neighbours soon morphs into a sharp, surreal insight into the…

Phil Nichol

23 Aug 2007

When a comic stands before his crowd after yet another uninspired anecdote and asks: ‘Don’t you think that was hilarious? I thought that was hilarious,’ you can only conclude that he knows he is in big trouble. With Hiro Worship, last year’s inaugural…

Hitlist - the best dancefloor action

23 Aug 2007

Happy Mondays’ Aftershow Keep the Madchester vibes flowing as Shaun and Bez descend on Studio 24 for a DJ set. Studio 24, Edinburgh, Fri 24 Aug. Relentless The darling of the great Tresor imprint, UK techno purveyor James Ruskin is in town to…

Stereotype Live

23 Aug 2007

Just when you thought it was safe to kick back for a traditionally sleepy September in Edinburgh along comes Stereotype Live with its one-long-night bash that promises to fuse live electronic performance and rare DJ sets in one last Festival blow out.

BBC bruisers

23 Aug 2007

Jeremy Paxman We’re not sure if there was ever a clause in his contract that read ‘be rude,’ or whether he just improvised as he went along, but Paxo has certainly stuffed a few politicos in his time. 26 Aug, 6.30pm, £8 (£6). Clarissa Dickson…

Hitlist - the best exhibitions

23 Aug 2007

Picasso on Paper An exhibition of drawings, prints and illustrated books spanning the career of one of the 20th century’s most important artists. Picasso’s early work gave those artists who followed him a route into pure abstraction, with his later…

The Beat Club

23 Aug 2007

Residents So far Pinup Nights are confirmed to launch this new venue. Guests We are promised top quality bands and DJs from the get go. Music policy Varied and eclectic. What they say ‘In these days of large, homogeneous, soulless operations…

Spiegel Garden to stay open an extra week

23 Aug 2007

The end of the Fringe may be in sight but the carnival atmosphere shows no signs of abating. Due to overwhelming demand, the Spiegel Garden will stay open for an extra week this August, continuing the festivities after most performers have left town. As…