Surely one of the most unique and original ‘bands’ releasing music in the UK today, Tinariwen are a group of musicians out of Mali who came together in the 1970s to play traditional Touareg music. They formed around Ibrahim Ag Alhabib, who spent his early life in a Malian refugee camp and made his first guitar as a young child after seeing a cowboy playing a guitar in a Western.
Category: Reviews
Album: Catherine MacLellan – Water in the Ground/Dark Dream Midnight:
Catherine Maclellan has done the folk world a bit of a favour by not only releasing her third album Water in the Ground but by also including her first album Dark Dream Midnight- two great and very different albums for fans to take in.
Album: The Rumblestrips – Welcome to the Walk Alone
Fans of The Rumble Strips will have been shocked when they heard the hornless first release from the new album Welcome to Walk Alone. Given the band have teamed up with producer Mark Ronson, you might be forgiven for expecting it to sound like Grimethorpe Colliery Band covering the back catalogue of Dexy’s Midnight Runners. Instead it opens with the majestic ‘Welcome to the Walk Alone’ which is reminiscent of Scott Walker’s saturnine best.
Album Sampler: Lisa Mitchell
Nineteen year old Australian Lisa Mitchell has come along way since her breakthrough as a finalist in the 2006 Australian Idol. Even then as a little sixteen year old, she showed immense potential that is finally getting realised. Lisa has taken a hop, skip and a jump from Albury, New South Wales, all the way over to London to prepare her debut album Wonder.
Album: Water Tower Bucket Boys – Catfish on the Line
If you don’t like Bluegrass then you might as well stop reading now.
Hello…(hello)…(hello). This here internet sure has a mighty big echo when it gets empty. Well, since you’ve stuck around I’ll keep on reviewin’:
Single: Wildbeasts – Hooting and Hollowing
Hooting and Hollowing is the latest musical gem from the Wild Beasts. Although the four piece from Kendal still ooze theatrical charisma, the absurdly fantastic quirks that defined their first album are slightly diluted and replaced by mystical guitar echoes, layered arrangements laced with understated funk and a deep bass that punctuates the song.
Album: Pocketbooks – Flight Paths
On first listen to Pocketbooks debut album there is one band name that pops into your head that you fear will be haunting this young group for their whole artistic career. This album sounds so much like Belle & Sebastian you wonder if they would have a leg to stand on if taken to court for plagiarizing by a furious Stuart Murdoch. The vocal tune structure is the biggest give away, rising and falling melodies that continue for longer than groups think to try (maybe this is because B&S made it their own), and that steamroll through each song almost pulling the rest of the instruments with it.
FFS’s Glasto part #3: Adam Wilkinson – Dan Black, The Dead Weather, Bombay Bicycle Club, Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds
Another year and new legends are born. Which moment will be remember for the longest from this year’s Glastonbury Festival is as impossible to guess as the weather was through this unpredictable June weekend. Neil Young and Bruce Springsteen showed the world that rock stars approaching, or even well into, their sixties can still blow their younger counterparts off the stage, Blur drew tears from everyone as Damon Albarn broke down on stage during the tear jerking classic ‘To The End’ and secret guest appearances from Jack White’s Dead Weather, The Klaxons and even The Boss himself ensured that this would be a year to remember.
FFS’s Glasto part #1: Rich Furlong – Slow Club, Fleet Foxes, Animal Collective, Bat For Lashes, Bon Iver, Blur
“I hate Glastonbury so much, I really do.” Now, as festival gambits go, this is a feisty (if not downright wreckless) one. However, 10 minutes into a Worthy Farm debut marred by sound problems, tetchy stewards and an unresponsive crowd, Slow Club perhaps have the right to be a little miffed. Fortunately, as the set develops, Rebecca’s spikiness serves to cajole the initially apathetic Guardian Lounge crowd to life and lends the songs a feverous energy which, coupled with the pair’s increasing confidence on stage, gets people on their feet. Such is the group’s enthusiasm, that by the time Giving Up On Love has rollocked its way to glorious conclusion even the floating voters have no choice but to get up and boogie. The world is going love Slow Club, or Rebecca is going to have words…
Album: Wave Machines – Wave If You’re Really There
It seems that whenever the economy takes a bad turn electro-pop comes creeping back out of the woodwork. Wave Machines’ debut album ‘Wave If You’re Really There’ is one of many recession-electro releases that we’re to be subjected to this year. Its not all bad news though, this release might just have enough great dance tracks to stand out from the crowd.