When I first started this site back in late 2009 I didn’t know how the music industry worked from the inside – I’d only ever experienced it from outside, as a fan (even now I don’t fully understand all the arcane workings of it – one of the reasons why I’m doing this series). But … Continue reading »
Do you remember your first obsession? Mine was David Bowie. I collected everything about him I could get my hands on, every album/bootleg recording and magazine, nicked books from the library, recorded (on cassette!) snippets of songs and interviews on the radio, stayed up all night watching Rage in the hope that they would play … Continue reading »
Shortly before his gig at Kaserne, Basel last night, Patrick Wolf tweeted a link to a Guardian article questioning the merits of re-recording one’s own songs. ‘It’s bonkers how much I’ve been made to justify why I made this album’, he tweeted, referring to his latest release Sundark and Riverlight, a two-disc acoustic re-working of … Continue reading »
The prolific Patrick Wolf has released yet more magnificence from the fecund recesses of his musical genius. To highlight surviving a whole decade in the music biz (it is 10 whole years since the release of his debut album Lycanthropy), he has released Sundark & Riverlight, a two-disc selection of songs from his five-album oeuvre … Continue reading »
She has performed, toured, recorded and worked with some of the biggest names in the music industry, both commercial and indie, and is also a well-respected writer, producer and orchestral arranger in her own right. Yep, we’re talking about the lovely, gracious Fiona Brice. A classically trained musician (she is a graduate of both Kings … Continue reading »
Browsing through the Guardian Music site recently, I saw their new, Spotify-enhanced (hello, sponsorship ‘cooperation’ deal, eh) project, Six Songs of Me. Quite a cool idea. But I thought their choice of questions left a little to be desired, and besides, only *six* songs? You can’t condense a lifetime’s worth of obsessive music listening to … Continue reading »
Ahh, Patrick Wolf. Currently sitting at the top of my Gigs of the Year list, for his formidable (and as yet unbeatable) concert back in April. Still on tour for his fifth album, Lupercalia, Wolf swings back to Switzerland on Thursday for a gig at Winterthur’s Salzhaus. Sadly, he isn’t being supported by my favourite … Continue reading »
Norwegian singer-songwriter Sondre Lerche has hovered on the edge of my radar for a while now, without ever coming into clear view. But I’ll finally get a chance to experience his genre-busting jazz-folk-pop-rock-blues (you get the picture – he is eminently capable of anything, apparently) thingamajig for myself when he plays on Monday night at … Continue reading »
Patrick Wolf‘s fifth album Lupercalia has just been released to critical acclaim, he’s played to an adoring crowd at Glastonbury, and he’s engaged to be married later this year – life is good right now for this one-time lone Wolf. Back in April I sat down with Patrick a few hours before his Zurich gig … Continue reading »
After lying dormant for the last decade, late 90s digital hardcore outfit Atari Teenage Riot are back making their customary screaming racket and generally causing a fuss. Blazing a fiery trail of highly political, anarchist revolt through the latter part of the 90s, ATR released three studio albums (Delete Yourself!, The Future of War and … Continue reading »
