Emma Newlands

Stephen Carlin

16 Aug 2007

Examining and dissecting popular culture is a hurdle that has felled many a stand-up, but the very dapper Carlin has some aces up his sleeve with a seemingly laid-back delivery revealing extremely shrewd and highly amusing observations. Technical…

Jim Bowes

9 Aug 2007

Whether WMDs can be launched within 45 minutes may be debatable, but a far safer bet would be to spend that length of time in the company of Bowes. An affable and enthusiastic host, he guides us along the journey from polite to increasingly assertive…

Stuckey and Murray

9 Aug 2007

A musical comedy act is a tough tightrope to walk at the best of times, and although the camaraderie of this duo is impossible to fault, it proves that a song doesn’t automatically become funny because it contains the word ‘douchebag’. One to avoid if…

The Queef of Terence

9 Aug 2007

The insincerity and superficiality of daytime TV make a ripe target for lampooning, and the three stars of Queef start out promisingly in this supposed pilot for a show. With a finely-tuned sense of character acting and comic timing, they deserve a…

Cirque de Sabotage

9 Aug 2007

This female three-piece act proclaims itself as ‘heavily character-driven, comprising sketch-based slapstick and silliness, woven together with verbal dexterity and an extensive wardrobe of props and costumes’. True enough, but then so was the…

Psister Psycho

1 Aug 2007

The path to true love never runs smooth, but it’s a bumpier road than usual in unconventional love story Psister Psycho. ‘The eponymous villain is a psychotic arms-dealing lesbian robot nun,’ says Danielle Ward, who last year performed…

Stephen Grant

1 Aug 2007

‘Comedy just pokes at problems, rarely confronts them squarely,’ Woody Allen once said. He didn’t, however, reckon with Stephen Grant whose self-proclaimed mission this August is not only to ‘obliterate untruths and punish inaccuracies’, but to solve…

The Be Good Tanyas

16 Jul 2007

ROOTS THE BE GOOD TANYAS City Halls, Glasgow, Sun 22 July ‘We approach music simply, very simply,’ says Sam Parton of Vancouver-based trio The Be Good Tanyas. ‘In terms of production, we don’t tend to stray too far from what our capacities…

Summer in the City

3 Jul 2007

It’s summer. Well, as close as it gets to summer in Scotland. Sunshine is carefully rationed so when it does make an appearance you’d better be prepared to make the most of those breaks in the cloud. Here we present some of the best ideas for enjoying…

Candie Payne

21 May 2007

MELANCHOLIA Phil Spector’s name may now be more likely to be linked at the moment to incarceration than innovation, but the eccentric New Yorker’s influence still casts a powerful shadow over the performance by diminutive Scouse songstress Candie…

Amy Macdonald

King Tut’s, Glasgow, Tue 13 Mar

27 Mar 2007

ACOUSTIC POP I thought that if you had an acoustic guitar, a wise man once said, then it meant that you were a protest singer. Quite what he’d make of 19-year-old Amy Macdonald is difficult to predict; her lyrical targets include reality TV, ‘the…