Category: Uncategorized
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Cerrone: DNA
Cerrone, who like a Brazilian footballer just has the one name, is possibly someone you never heard of but you’ll know what he did. He has sold more than 30m albums but only had one real hit, Supernature, back in the 70s. But along the way he helped invent electronic dance/disco, the kind with a…
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Man The Lifeboats: When The Time Bell Rings
The album title could be lifted from Dire Straits’ classic Sultans of Swing, and, if not of sultans of that genre, Man The Lifeboats are at least rulers of reel (sorry, best we could do). This album is a collection of rocking folk tunes that would have an audience (at the very least) tapping its…
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Philip Grange: Homage
If Philip Glass’s take on Vivaldi is aimed at mass appeal, this work from Philip Grange is at some other end of a spectrum. It’s far from difficult but it’s also not a lightweight piece you can instantly relax into. Grange is an academy and professor of music at Manchester University and there is a…
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Gill Landry: Skeleton at the Banquet
Landry — formerly of Old Crow Medicine Show — wrote these songs while spending the summer in small-town Western France. He doesn’t say, but we bet 80s-vintage Leonard Cohen was being played as he wrote; Cohen of that era will spring to mind when you play it. Musically, its dominated by Landry’s soft baritone; the…
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Eleanor Hodgkinson: Nino Rota, Complete Solo Piano Works, Vol. 1
You all know the music of Nino Rota — he wrote scores for films such as The Godfather; the famous main theme from that, Speak Softly, Love is his. He also wrote the music for 150 other films. His day job was director of the Conservatorio di Musica Niccolò Piccinni in Bari and he also…
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Sebastian: Thirst
Without wanting to sound pretentious, you only have to know that this is out on (dance label) Ed Banger Records, to know the sound. The label is home to Justice and Uffie (Pop the Glock), as well as Cassius, Krazy Baldhead, DJ Mehdi and Mr Oizo: old-school club bangers. (Think Stardust’s Music Sounds Better With…
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Ian Krouse: Armenian Requiem
This is a powerful work; perhaps too powerful for some; while it has some beautiful moments, it can also be imposing. Aficionados of choral work will undoubtedly appreciate the power and technical skill, however. It was composed to mark the centenary of the Armenian genocide of 1915, and is an ambitious sacred work built around…
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No mystery to popularity of musical whodunit Curtains
Curtains is written by the same team that brought the world Chicago and Cabaret — which explains the classy feel of this musical whodunit. A real breath of fresh air if you are looking for a musical with a difference, Curtains brings together the unlikely combination of musical theatre, comedy and murder mystery. Filled with…
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Spider’s Egg: SWR NewJazz
Sometimes we think jazz is the only music you need, ranging as it does from the electronic ambient to full-on prog: it’s as daft calling it all jazz as it is calling “world” anything that’s not western pop. Normally the different sounds are on different albums by different people: on this mind-blowing CD, out now…
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Raised Fist: Anthems
This is heavy rock/metal/punk but not as you might reasonably predict it to be. It’s quirky; heavy rock in a party hat. It’s generally not intrinsically comic, they just have a different view of rock to the rest of us, and it’s impossible not to warm to their enthusiasm. The music is beefy and solid…
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