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3,160 articles
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Daft Punk - Random Access Memories
24 May 2013
A track by track breakdown of the heavily hyped, mixed-bag of a disco-synth album
It’s the most anticipated album of the year, but it’s only partly been worth the wait. While Tron-helmeted duo Thomas Bangalter and Guy-Manuel de Homem-Christo’s commitment to using real live musicians and an eclectic pool of guests to recreate the…
Public Service Broadcasting - ABC2, Glasgow, Wed 8 May 2013
23 May 2013
An overwhelming visual spectacle outshines the electronic duo's music
Despite having only released their debut album Inform-Educate-Entertain two days prior to this gig, the London based duo have already started to gather a steady cult following due to a slew of well received EPs and heavy exposure on BBC 6 Music. The…
The Stone Roses: Made of Stone
17 May 2013
Shane Meadows' rockumentary fails to satisfy either as a concert film or fly-on-the-wall doc
To borrow from an old Stone Roses B-side, the Mancunian band’s much-hyped reunion may well have been ‘what the world is waiting for’, though it’s hard to claim the same for this accompanying Shane Meadows-directed documentary. The director of Dead Man’s…
Sparrow and the Workshop – Caves, Edinburgh, Thu 9 May 2013
22 May 2013
The alt.country/rock trio launch latest album Murderopolis with aplomb
There’s a party atmosphere to tonight’s gig at the Caves, the second of two launch parties for Sparrow and the Workshop’s new album, Murderopolis. Bunting and balloons festoon the stage; a bottle of whisky makes its way round the crowd; and both Sparrow…
Sweet Baboo - King Tut’s Wah Wah Hut, Glasgow, Tue 7 May 2013
15 May 2013
Charming set combines lyrical originality with self-deprecating humour
‘I go dancing and chancing my luck with all those girls - that’s why I’m bound for hell’, sings Stephen Black, aka Welshman Sweet Baboo, on catchy 2010 single ‘I’m a Dancer’. To look at this freckly face, rabbit-in-the-headlights expression and guitar…
EP review - Garden of Elks, 'Extended Play'
22 May 2013
Noise pop/college rock debut from a Glasgow band, starting to grow antlers
Fuzzy, relentless and slathered in Pixies and Sonic Youth influences, 'Extended Play' is a frantic debut affair which announces Garden of Elks as a band with genuine promise. Billing themselves as a ‘noise pop’ outfit, GOE are worthy of a place…
Little Women - Lung
15 May 2013
Somewhere between free jazz, avant-classical and downtown art-rock
(Aum Fidelity) Like their more fidgety Brooklyn associates Zs, Little Women operate somewhere between free jazz, avant-classical and downtown art-rock. Lung is conceptualised around the human breath, treating it as a sound source and organising…
Adam Buxton presents: The Best of BUG
23 May 2013
The comedian’s music video-themed show is still going strong
Who’d have thought there was so much comedic scope in music videos and the inane YouTube comments they attract? But scope there undeniably is, as Adam Buxton has proved with his hugely successful show BUG. A bimonthly event at the British Film Institute…
eagleowl - The Pleasance Theatre, Edinburgh, Fri 10 May 2013
22 May 2013
It only took ten years, but eagleowl’s first album finally hatches
Despite being Edinburgh and UK gig-playing regulars for almost a decade now, this was the night they launched their debut LP This Silent Year, an evening that saw the Fence-signed sextet eagleowl beam in all their slowcore majesty. Well thought-out…
Discopolis, Dems and Jonnie Common among highlights at Big Day In
15 May 2013
Inaugural Edinburgh indoor mini-fest: Wan day, hunners o’ bands
Having successfully assembled an astounding line-up of electronic indie talent from across the UK, the initial concern for Electric Circus’s inaugural Big Day In mini-festival was getting people through the doors, especially given that the…
Unknown Mortal Orchestra - King Tuts, Glasgow, Wed 1 May 2013
15 May 2013
Infectious, hallucinatory reveries, marred slightly by too much sound desk tweaking
Perhaps it is shell-shock after their recent propulsive success at SXSW, or possibly their own astonishment at selling out King Tuts on their first UK headline tour, but Unknown Mortal Orchestra turn up tonight as nervous as if it were the first day at…
The National - Trouble Will Find Me
15 May 2013
A great sixth record, but not one which parades the fact before you
(4AD) The idea that much of the music here was written by guitarist Aaron Desner while bedevilled by bone-aching fatigue and sleepless nights following the birth of his baby daughter is a compelling one. It ties into the sense of a band shattered…
Sparrow and the Workshop - Murderopolis
15 May 2013
Third album from Glasgow rock-noir trio has psych-rock heart
(Song, By Toad) This album starts with the words ‘when love was the greatest thing’ - and it is all you need to unravel the third long-player from a Glasgow rock-noir trio who variously conjure The Bad Seeds, The Shangri-Las, Johnny Cash and Melanie…
Young Fathers - Tape Two
15 May 2013
Textured and intriguing album from Edinburgh hip hop group who have come of age at last
(Anticon) As if their breakthrough release of Tape One earlier this year on groundbreaking Los Angeles intelligent hip hop label Anticon wasn’t vindication enough of the promise that Edinburgh trio Young Fathers have been putting in the bank for…
The Fall - Re-Mit
15 May 2013
Suggests insistent inter-band chemistry despite there being no real surprises here
(Cherry Red) Whoa-whoa-whoa, etc! Don't ever underestimate Mark E Smith, The Fall's founder, writer, vocalist and sole surviving member since they formed 35 years ago. Some may dismiss him as a past-his-best drunken parody of many former glories, and…
Alasdair Roberts & Friends - Stereo, Glasgow, Fri 3 May 2013
15 May 2013
Less a conventional folk gig than a subversive ceilidh organised by some cracked millenarian cult
Alasdair Roberts is hopping around the stage, picking out a jaunty Scottish dance tune on guitar. Huddled around him are fiddler Rafe Fitzpatrick and electric guitarist Ben Reynolds, while double-bassist Stevie Jones flanks them all, rocking and swaying…
Quercus - Quercus
15 May 2013
June Tabor and Huw Warren collaboration blending jazz and folk tradition
(ECM) The great English folk singer June Tabor has been working with Welsh pianist Huw Warren for several years, most notably on her 2011 album Ashore. Now, under the Quercus umbrella, the pair is joined by saxophonist Iain Ballamy, best known for…
Neil Young: Journeys
16 May 2013
An intimate homecoming documentary by the country rock legend, shot by Jonathan Demme
‘This is a town in North Ontario,’ are the first interview words uttered by Neil Young in this Jonathan Demme-directed documentary, and it’s probable that he’s consciously referencing the lyric of his own song ‘Helpless’. In the opening few minutes of…
Dirty Beaches - Drifters/Love is the Devil
15 May 2013
A beguiling, globe-trotting, genre-spanning lo-fi album from Alex Zhang Hungtai
(Zoo Records) Alex Zhang Hungtai’s peripatetic lifestyle has taken him from Taiwan to Canada and then around the globe, and his lo-fi compositions as Dirty Beaches have a sense of dislocation that is both engaging and unnerving. There is no real sense…
Glenn Jones - My Garden State
15 May 2013
Album of John Fahey-esque impressionistic storytelling from American Primitive guitarist
(Drag City) For an artist whose compositions are entirely instrumental, Glenn Jones has a special talent for impressionistic storytelling. Like a musical translation of a haiku or imagist poem, his finest songs reflect on an image or idea, bringing…
Juan Atkins & Moritz Von Oswald - Borderland
15 May 2013
Engaging, if slightly underwhelming release from two of techno’s most iconic figures
It’s something of an event when two of techno’s most iconic figures, Juan Atkins and Moritz Von Oswald, join forces in the studio. Intriguingly, they’ve offered scant information regarding their motivations behind Borderland. Perhaps we shouldn’t be…
Optimo: The Underground Sound of Glasgow
15 May 2013
Tracks from Golden Teacher, Auntie Flo and Debukas feature on mix compilation showcasing the city
(Glasgow Underground) The mouth waters and the ears tingle at the thought of this, the first in a series of compilations showcasing the sound of a city by someone who knows it well. The producers have chosen well here, for they could have no more…
Malcolm Middleton - Electric Circus, Edinburgh, Mon 29 Apr 2013
15 May 2013
Guitarist in his element marking reissue of brutally despondent debut album
’I have to apologise in advance,’ says Malcolm Middleton, ‘for being slick and so well-rehearsed.’ His tour opener, coming before bad habits of the road kick-in and soon after the ex-Arab Strap guitarist’s SAY award nomination for his release under the…
William Tyler & Hiss Golden Messenger - Summerhall, Edinburgh, Sat 4 May
15 May 2013
Songs setting a dense emotional mood and strong sense of place
Despite the setting in a cool, dark, wood-panelled lecture theatre, sometime Silver Jews and Lambchop guitarist William Tyler and Hiss Golden Messenger songwriter and fulcrum Michael ‘MT’ Taylor brought a certain sense of the pastoral with them for this…
Black Host - Life in the Sugar Candle Mines
15 May 2013
Splendid mix of prog tentacles and free jazz goo
(Northern Spy) Bursting out of some back-alley Brooklyn laboratory in an explosion of prog tentacles and free jazz goo, Black Host are bizarro world mutant cousins to Little Women. As the sole horn player in a jazz-rock (of sorts) combo, Darius…
