Before music there was silence
Madonna deserves to have the good come before the bad. Since, MDNA is an up and down, inconsistent affair a song by song review prevails as the best way to take it in. GOOD GIRL: The opening spoken words of “Girl Gone Wild” obviously are reminiscent of “Like A Prayer.” It also makes me think [...]
Impulse buys don’t always work out. Foster the People was featured for as an iTunes free download. I’d heard the band was burning up the road getting seen and heard. I listened to “Helena Beat” for about a minute and bought the entire Torches album. On top of the unsettling feeling of not being sure [...]
If it wasn’t for one thing, I would think this band represents the second coming of Jesus. Well, his support band. “It’s A Good Thing” has an insanely catchy opening riff, that instantly sends your mind spinning into “Who is this?” territory. Not so much that Choo Choo sound like anyone, but that they sound [...]
Photo © Roger Allen Islington O2 Academy saw the final night of the “Prog 2.0 tour” come to London, with rising stars Touchstone topping the bill. On record at least, openers Enochian Theory are a prog-metal act with a nice line in atmospherics, and have been compared with the mighty Opeth. But tonight’s performance suffered [...]
Oh, My Heart? Oh. My. God. Stipe sounds so old. This tune comes off the highly-anticipated release Collapse Into Now from the Athens legends. Due in April. Listening to Michael Stipe – as I have not for a long time – is like seeing your cousin who you used to play with everyday decades down [...]
More music. These guys need to release it. As often as possible. Punk roots are turned upside down here, completely exposed to whatever elements these guys want to beat it up with. At times, caressing, at times angry and abusive, Thank You, Happy Birthday reaches out to touch you. Breaking out into the public consciousness [...]
We knew posthumous releases by Michael Jackson were coming. Tupac has had more music in the 14 years since his death than he did alive. People are still digging up new songs by Elvis and the Beatles. Go ahead, don’t feel bad. Sit back and enjoy the music. New is almost always better than nothing [...]
Mostly Autumn are a band who have undergone a major change in the past year, with the departure of much-loved lead singer Heather Findlay and her replacement by former backing singer Olivia Sparnenn. The new incarnation had already won over a large proportion of their fanbase when they toured earlier in the year playing a [...]
“And then there were five”, said Rachel Cohen at the start of The Reasoning’s gig at The Fleece and Firkin in Bristol, England. The departure of guitarist, vocalist and founder member Dylan Thompson on the eve of the tour came as something as a shock. The band’s decision to rehearse and tour as a five-piece [...]
The New Dance Orchestra is a project by Geoff Downes of Asia and Buggles fame, which for this album features Panic Room’s Anne-Marie Helder on lead vocals. It was an unexpected surprise when I heard about it online, and I ordered it unheard based solely on the reputations of the people involved. Billed as “Dance-Pop” [...]