Music, Previews, Issue 619

Hogmanay 2008 - Paolo Nutini

Reports of Hogmanay’s death have been greatly exaggerated. Certainly Edinburgh’s event, which suffered all manner of gloomy speculation pretty much since the bells finished ringing us into 2008, has returned with perhaps the strongest line-up in memory.

The Burst Noel Christmas Party

Like microwaveable turkey dinners, borderline alcoholism and falling out with your siblings, Malcolm Middleton is in danger of becoming something of an unhappy seasonal institution. The ex-Arab Strap guitarist’s bid for a Christmas number one last…

BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra: Christmas at the Movies

CHRISTMAS CONCERT SPECIAL There are Christmas concerts for everyone this festive season, from Milkshake! Live, My First Carol Concert (see Kids) to Bach’s Christmas Oratorio in its annual candlelit airing by Ludus Baroque and Dunedin Consort’s…

Idlewild

ROCK RESIDENCY It’s a good time to be an Idlewild fan. For one thing there’s a new album on the way, set to be released in April, and before that we have this one-off run of King Tut’s shows – that’s six brilliant records delivered live, across five…

The Vaselines

INDIE ‘No-one would be listening to us now if Nirvana hadn’t covered our songs,’ says The Vaselines’ Eugene Kelly with disarming honesty. ‘We’d just be another band who released an album, broke up and then disappeared. But the Nirvana connection…

The Skatalites

SKA Well, you could hardly propose a less festive gig, but ska pioneers The Skatalites make their triumphant return to Scottish shores this month for another round of spot-the-founding-member. There ought to be three, namely Lloyd Knibb, whose…

Biffy Clyro

The Biffy have been huge in Scotland for a good while now (hence selling out the SECC) but it’s been gratifying to see the rest of the world catch on to their off centre rock brilliance. For a band who create such complex rock it’s perhaps strange to…

Heartbeat

Electro, Italo-disco duo Heartbreak (British producer Ali Renault and Argentinean singer Sebastian Muravchik) recently scored a full five stars for their debut album Lies in this very magazine, where we described their sound as akin to ‘the Scissor…

Spectrum

Spacemen 3 set the template for proggy post-rock. Unsurprisingly, given their moniker, they offered a cosmic narcotic haze of guitar and practically invented the term ‘space rock’. They split in 1991, with Jason Pierce going on to form Spiritualized…

Vatersay Boys

Expect a full on Scottish hoe-down from the five piece Vatersay Boys as they bring fire and passion to traditional music on two boxes, bass guitar, drums and pipes. So look forward to an exuberant frenzy of ceilidh music and dynamic folk that’s perfect…

Be a Familiar

You can’t accuse Be a Familiar of a lack of ambition. Their songs are crammed with soaring brass, piano, guitar and vocal harmonies all sung with a distinct Scots brogue. They take indie in new directions, expanding on the formula to create an up-beat…