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Music: This week's releases
- 11/7/2009
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Lately, dubstep has opened its heart, and for the scene's most progressive producers, juddering sub bass is now just one dark shade to be applied from a vivid colour palette. Birmingham's Emalkay is less
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Saint Etienne: Fox Base Beta
- 11/6/2009
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Saint Etienne's 1991 debut Fox Base Alpha should, in theory, be a tough work to Âupdate, partly because it's an album utterly of its time â?? 'to the sound of the World of Twist, you leant over and gave
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JLS: JLS
- 11/6/2009
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Whether singing doo-wop or signed to Motown, black boybands have been integral to pop, infusing it with soul, rhythm and blues. By placing themselves in the British boyband, JLS ignore this illustrious
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Amerie: In Love & War
- 11/6/2009
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Had the right breaks come her way back in 2005, when she was flying high with the single 1 Thing, Amerie Rogers could have been a Rihanna-sized pop/R&B star. She's an inventive Âproducer, Âcapable songwriter
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Jimmy Webb/The Webb Brothers
- 11/6/2009
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Billed as 'three generations of the Webb family' (legendary songwriter Jimmy; his father, Bob; and his so-so singing sons, the Webb Brothers, Christiaan, Justin and Jamie), this has the makings of a classic
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AA Bondy: When the Devil's Loose
- 11/6/2009
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Louisiana boy Auguste Arthur Bondy served his rock'n'roll dues in 1990s alt-rock nearly-weres Verbena, before turning to a more sedate, rural sound for his solo work, arriving at this second album after
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Bon Jovi
- 11/5/2009
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As Jon modestly reminds us, his band normally play stadiums when they visit Britain. 'Apart from opening the O2, I don't know when we were last indoors in the UK,' he muses to the 300 fans (of 33,000
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Martha Wainwright: Sans Fusils, Ni Souliers, Paris
- 11/7/2009
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Listening to this album, subtitled Martha Wainwrights Piaf Record, its hard not to draw comparisons with the live album on which her brother, Rufus, recreated Judy Garlands 1961 Carnegie Hall appearance.
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Mayer Hawthorne performs live Culture Minute
- 11/3/2009
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Mayer Hawthorne was born in Ann Arbor, Michigan, an affluent town just outside Detroit. His sound is a contemporary take on the vintage soul which, thanks to Berry Gordyâ??s Motown Records, responsible
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Frank Turner
- 11/2/2009
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's success goes to show that Eton produces more than just pillars of the establishment. This particular Old Etonian, a former classmate of Prince William, has acquired a fervent following by dint of an
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Live: Kris Kristofferson at Disney Hall
- 11/2/2009
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The singer-songwriter keeps it close to the bone in a no-frills acoustic solo show. "Closer to the Bone," the title track from Kris Kristoffersonâ??s latest album , made an ideal choice as the opening
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Rain Machine: Rain Machine
- 11/1/2009
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As singer, guitarist and hirsute professor in superb Brooklyn art-rockers TV on the Radio, Kyp Malone's solo album (as Rain Machine) should be a landmark release. But Malone â?? never a bundle of laughs
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Espers: Espers III
- 11/1/2009
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The strain of wyrd folk adopted by Philadelphian collective Espers on their first two albums was wyrder than most, blending eerie folk melodies with strung-out time signatures and proggy song structures.
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Blakroc: Blakroc
- 11/1/2009
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For a while rap/rock collaborations were an easy way to double your fun, at least during the late 80s and early 90s, when Run DMC and Aerosmith's Walk This Way and Public Enemy and Anthrax's Bring the
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Tricky: Maxinquaye
- 11/1/2009
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Time has not dimmed the impact of this extraordinary record. It's Enter The Labyrinth time as Tricky takes you through the twists and turns of his psyche, as philosophical rumination segues into truth
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Leona Lewis: Echo
- 11/1/2009
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In 2007, for the release of Leona Lewis's first album, Sony conjured a persuasive aura of instant class around a singer who in plain view of more than 10 million X Factor viewers had clearly been a Pizza
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Shirley Bassey: The Performance
- 11/1/2009
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In The Performance we are invited to deduce that there is more (in a way, less) to Bassey than meets the eye: away from the spotlight, she's just a woman. This is familiar diva territory: you behave like
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Stereophonics: Keep Calm and Carry On
- 11/1/2009
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Look, it's far too easy to be plain mean about Stereophonics, but the title of the Welsh band's seventh album is an open goal. Taken from the recently popularised Second World War propaganda poster, the
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The Xx
- 11/1/2009
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For most children, music lessons remain an opportunity to muck about, a break from all that maths and English. At the , they clearly do things differently, since several of its recent alumni are now among
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McAlmont and Nyman: The Glare
- 11/1/2009
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No disrespect to the likes of Thieves, Bernard Butler and Jools Holland, but you can tell how much David McAlmont's stock has risen by the identity of his more recent collaborators. Having laboured through
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Susanna And The Magical Orchestra
- 11/6/2009
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Susanna Wallumrod. Also On The Web: What The Critics Said All critic scores are converted to a 100-point scale. If a critic does not indicate a score, we assign a score based on the general impression
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Spiral Stairs - The Real Feel
- 11/5/2009
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Stairs, aka Scott Kannberg, has put out material post- with Preston School of Industry, but The Real Feel is his first under his ahem, own name. Of course the first comparisons one is tempted to make
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Molina and Johnson: Molina and Johnson
- 11/5/2009
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Few get more lonesome on record than Will Johnson and Jason Molina. I mean, sure Centro-matic can shake the rafters, and South San Gabriel can expand and overwhelm, and Magnolia Electric Co. often sound
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Vince Guaraldi: The Definitive Vince Guaraldi
- 11/5/2009
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Put yourself in Lee Mendelsons position for a moment. Imagine its 1963 and youre a television documentary producer driving across the Golden Gate Bridge, thinking the film youre developing in collaboration
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Sliimy: Paint Your Face
- 11/5/2009
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First off, it rhymes with Jimmy. Make no mistake, Sliimy makes extreme music. You wont find it in the hardcore section of your local record store, thoughits the other extreme. Its unapologetically feythe
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