Issue 585

Macbeth

6 Sep 2007

There’s nothing particularly new about updating Shakespeare’s medieval Scottish tragedy to a modern criminal underworld setting - see the 1956 American mob movie Joe Macbeth - but Australian filmmaker Geoffrey Wright nevertheless makes a decent stab at…

Get on course

6 Sep 2007

Dance Edinburgh A vast range of courses from salsa and ballet to breakdancing and street dance are available at Dance Base along with various pay on the day classes. Book before 29 September for the autumn term. Classes run from beginner to advanced…

Ian Rankin interview

6 Sep 2007

So this is the end, then. Well, perhaps not quite. Exit Music, the much trumpeted latest work from Ian Rankin sees his world famous cynical copper Detective Inspector Rebus handing in his warrant card for the last time and retiring permanently to the…

Scottish Dance Theatre

6 Sep 2007

In the past ten years, Scottish Dance Theatre has commissioned over 30 works, none more captivating, emotive and engaging than Liv Lorent’s Luxuria. So it’s little wonder that for its 21st anniversary tour, the Dundee-based company has chosen to…

Small Engine Repair - interview with Iain Glen

6 Sep 2007

It’s the eyes. I’m sitting in an Edinburgh member’s club, and I’m looking at the 46-year-old Edinburgh born actor Iain Glen. I’m trying to work out what has compelled me to follow his career since his remarkable turn as poet, artist and Barlinnie inmate…

Rise of the Footsoldier

6 Sep 2007

If you’ve already picked up any of the Nick Love titles displayed alongside the vegetable-rack in your local supermarket (The Football Factory, The Business, Outlaw), then you’re in the target audience for Julian 'Rollin’ With the Nines' Gibley’s feral…

Spotlight on open mic nights

6 Sep 2007

So you want to share your innermost thoughts with a room full of appreciative strangers, with the added bonus of payment and the chance of a dynamic post-show sexual encounter? Well then, stand-up comedy could be the job for you, provided you’re…

Dating - Love is in the air

6 Sep 2007

Not so very long ago, the idea of one of your friends owning up to joining a dating agency would have been unimaginable. Most of us would rather have walked over hot coals or lie on a bed of glass than admit to something which carried such social…

Alan Moore & Various

6 Sep 2007

SUPERHEROES A lot is made of the genius of Alan Moore, and we can never discredit the man who gave us The Watchmen and The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen or took Swamp Thing to new celestial heights. But that doesn't mean his every utterance is…

The hot young things of Scottish theatre

6 Sep 2007

Who: Hannah Donaldson, 23, who graduated this year from RSAMD What: Will be playing the lead role in the Tron’s production of Antigone, directed by David Levine, and can also be seen in the upcoming series of Rebus. Sunny, pretty and immediately…

Control wins List screenplay award

6 Sep 2007

Forget all the other festival awards: there is only one that counted this year and that was The List and The Writers’ Guild’s Edinburgh Writing Award for Best Screenplay of a New British Film. There were 11 UK films at this year’s Edinburgh…

KT Tunstall interview

6 Sep 2007

Looking around the room gives a clear indication of the reason behind KT Tunstall’s remarkable success. Crammed into the boardroom at XFM Scotland’s headquarters in Glasgow are two dozen competition winners being treated to an intimate acoustic show…

An Audience With . . .Nick Nairn

6 Sep 2007

Up until now, the most terrifying moment in Nick Nairn’s career was during the height of the recent foot and mouth crisis, when he interviewed the First Minister live on the BBC programme Landward. However, Nairn likes to push himself, and so to kick…

The outer limits

6 Sep 2007

We packed Allan Radcliffe and Kirstin Innes off on two very different Scottish weekend breaks – the former thrown to the wind in the rugged peninsula of Knoydart, the latter placed in the lap of luxury in a country house – with strict orders to…

Klaxons interview

6 Sep 2007

The List It’s been the buzzword in the music press for the last year. But what does the term ‘new rave’ mean to you? Simon Taylor-Davis I don’t really think the term new rave has anything to do with the actual music: it’s terminology for an attitude.

The Sopranos - final season

6 Sep 2007

In May 1998, traumatised executives at US cable channel Home Box Office (HBO) were in mourning when the last episode of the ground-breaking spoof chat show comedy The Larry Sanders Show aired. Having reached a creative peak since its inception in 1965…

News round-up

6 Sep 2007

Big-hearted Scottish comedy Gregory’s Girl has been hand-picked as part of a specially selected best top ten film poll by Scottish Screen. The film topped a hitlist of educational films aimed at kids. Cinema Paradiso, Monsters Inc, Great Expectations…

Butcher Boy

6 Sep 2007

With corporate indie currently riding high in the charts and flash in the pan, fashion-obsessed tykes pervading the blogs, Butcher Boy are more than a breath of fresh air. If you haven’t yet had the pleasure of their musical company, first album Profit…

Half Life - interview with Angus Farquhar

6 Sep 2007

It doesn’t take long in conversation with Angus Farquhar to realise that he’s not a great fan of Time Team. The artistic supremo of NVA has, for a good few years now, presided over a succession of multi arts projects, which might sit as comfortably…

Justice Interview

The French revolution

6 Sep 2007

More than just the latest duo to traverse the English channel to blow our minds, David Pollock reckons Justice are at the vanguard of a new musical movement

Touching the void

6 Sep 2007

There’s something about the term ‘the void’ that grates ever so slightly. The mention of it conjures up, at best, the Jungian notion that we humans are empty vessels into which experience is poured. The term is so overused that when you meet it in the…

Drawing Room

6 Sep 2007

It used to be called the Brewery Tap, which was simple. Turn tap on, punters (students, largely) come to drink. Turn tap off, punters leave. Often shambolically. Now it’s Drawing Room, and a bit more complex. There are puns happening, because they…

The Serpent - interview with Olga Kurylenko

6 Sep 2007

The most striking thing about the slick French thriller The Serpent is Olga Kurylenko, the beautiful 27-year-old Ukrainian model-turned-actress who plays the film’s femme fatale-cum-crime victim, Sofia. Kurylenko’s character only makes it as far as the…

DVD Round-up

6 Sep 2007

The stand-alone DVD rental and retail markets have been buzzing over what turned out to be a perfect summer for home entertainment. As we move into September, the box-set heavyweights move in to fill the hole in those darkening nights. You really can’t…

Singles & Downloads

6 Sep 2007

It’s Autumn again and, as ever, there are a sack full of new singles struggling to squeeze into limited radio rotation spots like fat men caught in a revolving door. Just as scientists have a tough time predicting natural disasters, gauging how…