Pop
This recreation of Dylan’s Free Trade Hall concert is supremely good
In May 1966, Bob Dylan toured the UK with The Band, minus drummer Levon Helm, and abrasively pulled the plug…
Spellbinding performance of a career-defining record: Corinne Rae Bailey, at Ladbroke Hall, reviewed
You won’t see two more contrasting shows this year than Corinne Bailey Rae performing her album Black Rainbows and Brian…
The case against re-recording albums
In 2012, Jeff Lynne released Mr Blue Sky: The Very Best of Electric Light Orchestra. Except it wasn’t. It was…
Virgin on the astonishing: Madonna, at The O2, reviewed
When I was a kid listening obsessively to AC/DC and Iron Maiden and Black Sabbath, I despaired of music writers.…
Drunk on devotion
The intimate acoustic show can denote many things for an established artist. One is that, in the infamous euphemism coined…
Band of brothers
Over the past few years, the National have become the most important band in modern rock music. The strange thing…
Country’s Van Halen
Pop critics routinely make the mistake of assuming the most important acts are the ones copied by the groups they…
Four-minute wonder
As the sun sets on another too-long summer festival season, let us take a moment to reflect on the Festival…
Sound and fury
The new Rolling Stones single, supposedly their best in many a decade, is called ‘Angry’. And while on the surface…
Playing it cool
Quite when the concept of coolness became a thing is uncertain, even to etymologists. As early as 1884, an academic…
Strange folk
In a few days, Lankum will most likely win the 2023 Mercury Music Prize for their fourth album False Lankum…
Deluge and delight
I love Green Man. The smallish festival is the second most beautiful site I’ve ever visited (after G Fest, which…
Uneasy listening
I have always been fascinated by artists who bounce between tonal extremes when performing, particularly the ones who serve their…
Come let us adore them
It’s not just who our pop heroes are that marks the passing of the generations; it’s how those heroes present…
Brought to book
‘We all secretly want to be rock stars,’ the 2022 Booker Prize-winning author Shehan Karunatilaka said recently. By ‘we’ he…
Salve Regina
We’ll get on to the brilliance of Regina Spektor in a moment. But first a question: why are pop music…
Heaven knows they’re miserable now
Bands that have hung around, or gone away and come back again, occupy an increasingly sizeable percentage of pop’s bandwidth.…
Matters of life and death
Seven years ago, I asked Bruce Springsteen what he meant when he talked of the covenant between himself and his…
Dream team
Most artists begin an arena show with a bang: emerging from the floor, the gods, on a hoist, everything short…
A tale of two fortunes
Here’s a mystery for you. Why were Spoon, one of the most dynamic, sharpest rock bands in the world, playing…
A tale of two troubadours
There are artists you go to see expecting to be challenged, surprised, even let down. And there are artists you…
Amazing Grace
Some artists need flash bombs to make an impression on stage. Some need giant screens. Some need to run around…
Nepo daddies
Rob Grant releases his debut album, Lost at Sea, this week. A 69-year-old millionaire and former ad man, furniture exec…
Metal fatigue
I’m not sure I’ve ever seen anything worse than Mötley Crüe in Sheffield. Nothing more tuneless, empty, vapid and dismaying.…
