Issue 639

MacDonald Fujii Davidson Tamura Bancroft - Cities

East and west come together on jazz culture clash

3 Sep 2009

Almost by definition, free improvisation is very much a global music language. When players from diverse parts come together on a free agenda, cultural influences will clearly play their internal part in shaping the emerging musical conversation, but…

La Befana

A play, a pie and a pint at Oran Mor

3 Sep 2009

If it’s Autumn it must be time for another series of lunchtime plays courtesy of Oran Mor and that old reliable, the Play, a Pie and a Pint season. The season gets into its stride with this collaboration between artist Adrian Wiszniewski and composer…

Monsters of Folk - Monsters Of Folk

3 Sep 2009

With a band made up of such indie big guns as Conor Oberst, Mike Mogis (Bright Eyes), Jim James of My Morning Jacket and singer-songwriter M Ward, you’d imagine there would be an almighty scrap over who took frontman duties. Not with Monsters Of…

Twin Atlantic - Vivarium

3 Sep 2009

Not since the sacred Biffy Clyro has The List been this excited about a bunch of young Scottish rockers. Twin Atlantic conjure up images of early Idlewild and Foo Fighters with a post-rock twist, and one listen to mini debut offering Vivarium proves why…

Girls - Album

3 Sep 2009

Love is in the air and the 60s are in the chords as Girls come over all romantic in their debut album. Looking as if they’ve raided the dressing up boxes of MGMT for outfits, and the genres of rockabilly, 60s girl groups and surf pop for sounds, Chet…

Part Chimp - Thriller

3 Sep 2009

Imagine a supernova collapsing into a super-gravitational black hole, sucking in whole star systems, then eating pies and doughnuts for all eternity, and that still wouldn’t be as heavy as Part Chimp. This third album from the London…

J Tillman - Year in the Kingdom

3 Sep 2009

Unknown to most, current Fleet Foxes drummer J Tillman is a prolific singer-songwriter in his own right, and this sixth solo outing is a companionable jaunt through a similar alt.folk hinterland to his day job. With fragile banjo, tremulous dulcimer…

Jamie T - Kings and Queens

3 Sep 2009

(Virgin Records) Following up a Mercury-nominated debut was always going to be difficult. Yet two-and-a-half years later Jamie Treays has managed to polish up his act with a more mature, sharper sound, while still remaining true to his gutter poet…

The Breast Cancer Care Fashion Show

Stories told by those who've lived through, and are living with, breast cancer

3 Sep 2009

The seventh annual Breast Cancer Care Fashion Show takes to the catwalks this fortnight. This year, however, the emphasis is on raising awareness as well as funds. Each of the 20 models, female and male, ranging in age from twentysomethings to…

Christ. - Distance Leads to the View

3 Sep 2009

Electronic music has always been a constant battle between (wo)man and machine, the two wrestling for the upper hand to produce something that sounds unique, unearthly and often ungodly. For his latest instalment Christ.’s taking things back to basics…

Nicola Benedetti set for Proms in the Park

3 Sep 2009

Always a great night, the BBC’s Proms in the Park returns to Glasgow Green to celebrate the end of the Proms series of concerts in relaxed – and appropriately Scottish – style. Violin soloist Nicola Benedetti performs with the inimitable tenor and…

The Bowery re-opening

3 Sep 2009

After a summer being requisitioned as a Fringe venue, Edinburgh’s prettiest little NYC-style hipster joint reopens this week. Over the next fortnight, look out for everything from anti-folk gigs to badge-making workshops, writers groups to Ukeboogie, an…

Warehouse 364

Clichéd and flat

3 Sep 2009

A case of mistaken identity leads a part time prostitute to the doors of Warehouse 364, a place where ‘good things happen to bad people.’ Clichéd and flat from the very beginning, this piece is let down by its underdeveloped and repetitive plot.  This…

Bedtime Stories

A fun tribute to an essential piece of furniture

3 Sep 2009

One double bed and nine darkly comic vignettes form the basis for this show, which has returned to Edinburgh with a brand new cast. A talented team deliver stories as diverse as a stressed bed salesman, to an unbelievably embarrassing one night stand…

Ward No. 6

Entertaining and tragic adaptation of Chekov's work

3 Sep 2009

Chekhov’s classic tale of insanity and ruthless ambition is brought to the stage in this slick and energetic interpretation by DogOrange. Highly physical and original, this adaptation is both entertaining and tragic as the concepts of alienation and the…

Ballers Social Second Birthday Party

3 Sep 2009

Spend two days in the company of Ballers and LuckyMe as they celebrate their second birthday. And it’s a bumper line-up of warped hip hop, leftfield dubstep and wonky electronica featuring the likes of Jamie Vex’d (live), Darkstar, Rustie and The…

Bob Log III

Delta blues madness at King Tut's

3 Sep 2009

For a unique take on the Delta blues, Bob Log III is your man. He is clad in a crash helmet and cat suit with a telephone wired into his face-plate, leaving his hands free to concentrate on slide guitar while he uses his feet to drum. Expect a bizarre…

Off the Page

Stirling's book festival

3 Sep 2009

Book lovers are set for a treat this month as a flurry of leading authors make the trip to Stirling. A week-long jamboree of literary lovelies, this year’s line-up includes Ian Rankin, Rodge Glass and ex-WPC Karen Campbell. The kids should be kept…

Nathan Fake returns to Kapital

3 Sep 2009

Nathan Fake returns to Kapital this month to showcase his new album Hard Islands. Signed to James Holden’s Border Community, Fake will be putting in a live (or ‘a laptop with some controllers and shit,’ as he describes it) set of melodic techno and…

David Gray

10 years after White Ladder made him, the singer/songwriter is back at the ABC

3 Sep 2009

Not as ubiquitous as during the days of White Ladder (his 1999 album that went stratospheric), it’s easy to forget that David Gray had a canny knack for constructing simple yet effective songs. His new album Draw the Line is out later this month.

Orbital

Dance pioneers entertain at the Academy

3 Sep 2009

The second coming of dance music pioneers Orbital continues. After the euphoria that greeted them at Rock Ness this summer, the Hartnoll brothers are back for more of their classic techno cuts and lush ambient electro. O2 Academy, Glasgow, Sun 20…

Fuck Buttons

Avant-garde, post-rock, sweary sorts come to Glasgow

3 Sep 2009

Experimental electronica meets squalling fuzzy post-punk in the hands of the wonderfully monikered Brighton duo Fuck Buttons. Signed to ATP Recordings expect discordant synths, freaked-out vocals, slabs of drone rock and crashing waves of blissful…