FEATURE: The Lockdown Playlist: Songs from Great Albums Turning Ten This Year

FEATURE:

 

 

The Lockdown Playlist

Songs from Great Albums Turning Ten This Year

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I will not put too many anniversary Lockdown Playlists…

out there, but as there are some really good albums that have big anniversaries this year, I wanted to mark that. Now, I am looking back to albums released in 2011: some pearls that are celebrating a decade in the world this year. 2011 was not that long ago, but I think the decade-mark is an important anniversary so, with that being said, here are some amazing songs from the first year of the previous decade. In the course of compiling the playlist, it has been nice to go back and realise just how strong 2011 was! If you need a reminder, then this Lockdown Playlist is all about albums that get to celebrate ten years in the world…

VERY soon.

FEATURE: Walk Straight Down the Middle: Kate Bush’s Awards and Nominations – and Why She Deserves Even Greater Recognition

FEATURE:

 

 

Walk Straight Down the Middle

IN THIS PHOTO: Kate Bush  attending the Evening Standard Theatre Awards in November 2014 (where she won the Editors Award)/PHOTO CREDIT: Dave Benett

Kate Bush’s Awards and Nominations – and Why She Deserves Even Greater Recognition

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THIS might be a theme that few…

IN THIS PHOTO: Kate Bush at the Capital Radio Awards in March 1979 at the Grosvenor Hotel in London (she won two awards: for Best British Female Singer, and Best British Newcomer)/PHOTO CREDIT: Richard Young/Rex Features

Kate Bush fans are demanding be covered, but I was looking back on some features from last year and it struck me: just think about all the awards Bush has been nominated for since the start of her career! It should come as no surprise but, through the years, she has been nominated a lot for her incredible work. Back in August, I asked whether she would be inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 2022 (and nominated this year) – Bush was nominated in 2018, though she remains one of the most famous non-inclusion. I know that awards and honours are not everything and the mark of a great artist, but it is a way of giving kudos and recognising their impact. When it comes to Kate Bush, in many ways, she remains underrated and under-furnished when it comes to awards. I have been re-watching a video of Bush receiving the Editor's Award from Evening Standard in 2014 (below). Although she is nervous, she truly seems humble and grateful - she was given the award for her residency, Before the Dawn. In 2013, Bush was awarded a CBE, and one has to think a damehood cannot be too far away! Whilst some people do not like honours like this and return them, I think Bush is genuinely touched and blown away if she receives such high esteem. I will go into a bit more detail but, in terms of the big honours that have come Bush’s way, her Wikipedia page gives us some information:

“She has been nominated for 13 British Phonographic Industry accolades, winning for Best British Female Artist in 1987, and has been nominated for three Grammy Awards. In 2002, Bush was recognised with an Ivor Novello Award for Outstanding Contribution to British Music. In 2017, she was nominated for induction in the 2018 Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Bush was appointed Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) in the 2013 New Year Honours for services to music”.

I will have a look at this alphabetically but, as you can see from the relevant section of Wikipedia, Bush is an artist who has been nominated for BRIT Awards, yet she has only received the one: in 1987, she won for Best British Female. It is not a surprise that she has been nominated so often, but I am surprised that Running Up That Hill (A Deal with God) did not win Best British Single in 1986; likewise, Bush was nominated as Best British Female in 2006 after the release of Aerial (the year before). I know award shows like the BRITs have been accused of odd omissions through the years, but Bush is a quintessential British treasure whose music should have garnered more respect from them through the years! It is good that she has been nominated quite a few times, yet I wonder whether there should be a special award created. Bush won a Q Award in 2001 – she picked up the Classic Songwriter gong. As Q is no longer in publication, I think the wave of attention her work has garnered through the years should see an award show like the BRITs create a new category(ies) like Q’s Icon Award, and Classic Album.

IN THIS PHOTO: Kate Bush at the Q Awards in October 2001 (she was given the Classic Songwriter award on the night)/PHOTO CREDIT: Richard Young/Rex Features

One might say that this is crowbarring an award or two into things to accommodate someone like Bush, but I think there is an opportunity to nod to legendary musicians who have made a huge difference in the world. It is a shame there will be no further Q Awards, as it was one of the last great ceremonies that provided a great range and some awards that you really wanted to see go to someone like Kate Bush! I think that her appearances like the one in 2001 for the Q Awards was quite rare, as that particular one happened eight years after The Red Shoes arrived - she took a long break from music after that album. She was out of the public spotlight at this point, so a rare appetence like this was treasured. The award clearly meant a lot to Bush; it was only four years later when she would release Aerial into the world. I think many of her award ceremony appetences have been rare, as she does not go to film premieres or things unconnected with her own music. It is always wonderful seeing music industry people and fans applaud and provide ovation when Bush collects an award!

I am shocked that her massively-praised 2014 residency did not pick up many awards. I think the BRITs has streamlined its categories recently, and I feel we will see change regarding separating genders when it comes to awards - I think the awards will become more gender-fluid and less segregated. Even so, I think Bush is worthy of a bit more love from the BRITs given all that she has accomplished! In 1978, Bush won Best International Single at the Edison Awards. This is one of the world’s oldest music ceremonies and, given the success of Wuthering Heights, I am glad that it won. If one does look through all the awards that Bush has been nominated for, it does seem a shame she has not won more – though how bothered she is by this remains to be seen. Being an American ceremony, it is small wonder that Bush has been overlooked by the GRAMMY committee. She did not really feel major success in the U.S. until 1985, so maybe one can forgive a lack of representation before then. I do wonder why Hounds of Love received no nominations in 1986 and why it took until 1988 for her first nomination – Experiment IV for Best Concept Music Video. Bush received a couple more nods in the 1990s, but I think that her American fanbase is much larger now than it was in the 1980s. She has made an enormous impact on so many musicians and, given the sheer amount of categories, I do think that albums like Aerial, and 50 Words for Snow are big omissions. Both could easily have fitted into Best Alternative Music Album, I think, and I feel that this would have reflected appreciation for tremendous albums.

The Ivor Novello Awards are among the most prestigious in all of the world. This award show seems tailor-made for Bush. This is a case of an award show truly recognising Bush’s contribution to music. Although she has been nominated and lost quite a few times – for Wuthering Height (The Best Song Musically and Lyrically, and The Best Pop Song) in 1979, Babooshka (The Best Song Musically and Lyrically) in 1981, The Dreaming (The Outstanding British Lyric) in 1983, Running Up That Hill (Best Contemporary Song) in 1986, and 50 Words for Snow (Album Award) in 2012, she did win in 1979 for The Man with the Child in His Eyes (The Outstanding British Lyric). Bush also won in 2002 for Outstanding Contribution to British Music and, whilst I am surprised Running Up That Hill did not win and Aerial was not even nominated, she did get that honour back in 2002. To add to that, Bush became a Fellow of The Ivors Academy last year (she was quite thrilled: “I feel really honoured to be given this fellowship by The Ivors Academy. It means so very much to me. Thank you to all my family and friends and to everyone who has been there for me over the years. I’ll treasure this statue of Euterpe always and ask her to sit on my shoulder while I work”). The MOJO Awards are one of the less-hyped of the calendar, but I think that it is less commercial than many others. Bush has received two nods from the MOJO Awards: 2005 and 2006 for the Songwriter Award. Again, it is surprising that she did not win those awards; one would have expected some sort of nomination for 50 Words for Snow. The fact that she is nominated at all is brilliant and, when you look at the sheer breadth of award shows that have included Bush’s music, it is simply amazing!

I guess the NME Awards is another big one and, whilst many might not assume Bush to be their sort of artist, she did win in 1979 for Best Female Singer. Her return to the stage did get her nominated in 2015 for Music Moment of the Year…and I do hope that she wins the Icon Award very soon – last year, Courtney Love won. Again, some might say Bush is not the most ‘Rock’ or alternative artist around, but her contribution to so many artists who are covered/loved by NME should be noted! That said, the Progressive Music Awards have nominated Bush a few times: in 2012 for Prog Goddess, and Artist of the Year; in 2015, Before the Dawn was nominated for Live Event of the Year. Given the reception to that residency, it would be interesting to know how Bush lost out on that last nomination! Circling back to NME’s awards, and I think Bush has plenty of Rock credentials. Consider albums like The Dreaming in 1982, and even Hounds of Love. I think she has been left out when some of her albums would have made for perfect winners! Once more, she has been nominated (which is important), but I wonder whether there is a perception of Bush’s music and people pigeon-holing it. The penultimate award show I wanted to mention is the Smash Hits Poll Winners Party. It was one of the most popular award shows when Smash Hits was in publication (1978-2006).

IN THIS PHOTO: Kate Bush at the 1979 British Rock and Pop Awards ceremony on 26th February, 1980 (she won for Best Female Singer; she also picked up the same award in April 1979)/PHOTO CREDIT: Mirrorpix

Although she was nominated in a very questionable category, Most Fanciable Female, in 1980 and 1981, she did win Best Female Singer in 1980. I think this award win holds more clout and dignity than the Most Fanciable Female. I am glad that Bush won in 1980, as this must have been before Never for Ever (her third album) was released. I do wonder why Hounds of Love was not nominated, mind. Not to undermine the fact that Kate Bush has been nominated a few times, but you think about some of her best albums and wonder why they did not garner more in the way of awards. I guess sales and chart positions are more important, however it seems like there are periods where she was ignored somewhat. The last award show I will bring in is one where Bush has won once: the South Bank Sky Arts Awards. 50 Words for Snow won Best Album in 2012, and I am pleased the album got that respect. I think it is another case of others/award shows not truly appreciating a wonderful album. Bush showed up to collect her award and, like other occasions where she has  given an acceptance speech, she seemed stunned and thrilled – and quite nervous too! (I have included a video at the end of this feature).

I will end it there, but I wanted to shine a light on the awards and honours aspect of her work and the bodies that have included Bush through the years. Even though there have been some real omissions – from the GRAMMYs, Rock & Roll Hall of Fame and the likes of NME -, it is wonderful that Bush has had her work honoured and celebrated so often! I don’t think Bush has collected her last award yet and, in the coming years, I feel there will be some big honours such as an Icon Award - or a similarly high plaudit. I highlighted a few awards Bush has won but, from Wikipedia (apologies if some of the dates/exact award titles are incorrect), there are some that I have not covered: BPI Awards (Best Female Singer, 1979); Record Mirror Poll (Best New Artist, 1978)…

Melody Maker Annual Poll Awards (Best Female Vocalist and Brightest Hope of 1978); BPI Awards (Best Female Singer, 1980); Music Week annual awards (Top Female Artist, 1979); Capital Radio Awards (Best British Female Singer and Best British Newcomer, 1979); Record Mirror poll (Best Female Singer, 1979); TV Times top ten awards (Most exciting TV female singer 1979) and US College Music Awards (Best British Female Solo Artist, 1987). Many might say that Bush has achieved more than enough with her adoring fanbase and success but, when it comes to recognising one of the greatest musicians, songwriters and singers ever (and producer), more awards are…

THE very least that she deserves.

FEATURE: Too Good to Be Forgotten: Songs That Are Much More Than a Guilty Pleasure: The Beach Boys - Kokomo

FEATURE:

 

 

Too Good to Be Forgotten: Songs That Are Much More Than a Guilty Pleasure

The Beach Boys - Kokomo

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WHEN we think about the classic songs…

 IN THIS PHOTO: Mike Love, David Marks, Brian Wilson, Dennis Wilson and Carl Wilson of The Beach Boys in 1962/PHOTO CREDIT: Michael Ochs Archive/Getty Images

from The Beach Boys, God Only Knows, or Good Vibrations springs to mind. I know that there are people who like Kokomo, but I have seen it appear on many lists of guilty pleasures – and it is a song that I really like. I admit that it is not one of the best songs the American band ever recorded, but I feel it has been unfairly maligned by many. I am going to grab a bit from Wikipedia when it comes to providing a bit of information on Kokomo:

"Kokomo" is a song written by John Phillips, Scott McKenzie, Mike Love, and Terry Melcher and recorded by American rock band the Beach Boys. Its lyrics describe two lovers taking a trip to a relaxing place on Kokomo, an invented idea of an island off the Florida Keys. It was released as a single on July 18, 1988 by Elektra Records and became a No. 1 Hit in the United States, Japan, and Australia (where it topped for about two months). The single was released to coincide with the release of Roger Donaldson's film Cocktail and its subsequent soundtrack.

It was nominated for the Grammy Award for Best Song Written Specifically for a Motion Picture or Television in 1988, but lost to Phil Collins' "Two Hearts" (from the film Buster). "Two Hearts" and Carly Simon's "Let the River Run" from Working Girl jointly beat it for the Golden Globe Award for Best Original Song”.

Although Kokomo has done well in regard to sales, it is a track that has split critics. On the surface, the song is perfectly harmless and there are no lyrics that make you cringe or that stand out as being particularly bad. Maybe it is just the general sound of the song that has led people to give it some bad press or see it as a guilty pleasure. I have been a fan of The Beach Boys since I was a child, so I am pretty broad-minded and open when it comes to their songs. Even though I have a lot of time for Kokomo, others have not been so kind. Returning to the Wikipedia article, and one can see that Kokomo has won success and derision:

"Kokomo" has received mixed reviews. In 1989, the song received a Golden Globe nomination for Best Original Song – Motion Picture in 1989. Conversely, it has been included in lists of poorly received songs, such as VH1's "40 Most Awesomely Bad No. 1 Songs" and Blender magazine's list of the "50 Worst Songs Ever”.

I want to introduce an article from Stereogum from 2018 - as they looked back at Kokomo thirty years after its release. They highlight the fact that The Beach Boys, by 1988, were almost a spent force. However, despite the state of the band, Kokomo is a song that resonated at the time and still gets played to this day:

“We’ll start with the most obvious thing: there is no Kokomo. Not off the Florida Keys, anyway. Sure, a couple places staked claims, but only after the occurence of the least obvious thing: a has-been pop act, minus their creative engine, scoring a #1 hit off the soundtrack to a forgettable film about bartending. “Kokomo” — released 30 years ago this month — was the Beach Boys’ first original Top 20 single in 20 years, and their first chart-topper in 22.

The state of the Beach Boys in 1988 was, in a word, shitty. Their last record, 1985’s digitally crispy The Beach Boys, performed middlingly despite contributions from Culture Club, Ringo Starr, and Stevie Wonder. A couple clues to their malaise appear within the record. On the back, there’s a dedication “to the memory of our beloved brother, cousin and friend”; Dennis Wilson, the band’s drummer and only true surfer, had drowned in the water off Marina Del Rey in December of 1983. And on the label, there are three songwriting credits for E. E. Landy.

The result was ruthlessly catchy: a combination of dreaminess and insistence, like a tank disguised as a cloud. The “Aruba, Jamaica” bit was bumped to the beginning for maximum effect; Love managed to work in a reference to cocktails, and possibly (in the line “that Montserrat mystique”) a reference to Baron Tennant’s island folly. Van Dyke Parks parachuted in to arrange the steel pans and play accordion, despite (allegedly) being stiffed by Love on plane fare. Studio saxophonist Joel Peskin (whose professional relationship with the Boys stretched back to 1979’s L.A.) contributed the oddly poignant solo. One name was notably absent: Brian was unable to attend the sessions, possibly due to his doctor’s interference. When he first heard the song on the radio, he didn’t even recognize it as a Beach Boys tune. His solo record had just dropped — deliciously, the opening lines are “I was sittin’ in a crummy movie/With my hands on my chin.”

In time, though, “Kokomo” fever faded, and the men responsible for it are starting to pass on. Carl Wilson died in 1998, John Phillips in 2001, Terry Melcher in 2004, Scott McKenzie in 2012. Mike Love, who has long enjoyed the exclusive rights to tour under the Beach Boys name, is the sole living writer. Last fall, he released a double album, with the second half devoted to re-recordings of Beach Boys classics. “Kokomo” is nowhere to be found. Presumably, he decided not to mess with perfection”.

I am a big fan of The Beach Boys’ earlier ‘surf’ period and the work they were producing in between 1962 and 1964. That said, I feel that Kokomo has received some unwarranted flack as it is a catchy song that gets into the head! It is not as sophisticated as what we heard on the masterpiece, Pet Sounds, in 1966; it does not have the same sort of timelessness as their classic cuts. Even so, have a listen to the song as it cannot fail to lift the mood. One can hear the layered sound and great vocals The Beach Boys were known for but, perhaps, without Brian Wilson injecting his songwriting genius, Kokomo was never going to be an all-time great song from The Beach Boys. I think it is much more than a guilty pleasure and, if you need some sunshine and escapism, Kokomo has you covered and will get you singing along! If you have been resistant to Kokomo and have not heard it for a while then I must offer a warning: as soon as you start to listen to it, the song will…

 PHOTO CREDIT: ABC Photo Archives/ABC via Getty Images

RATTLE around the brain for ages!

FEATURE: Second Spin: Queen Latifah - Nature of a Sista'

FEATURE:

 

 

Second Spin

Queen Latifah - Nature of a Sista'

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WHEN thinking of…

Queen Latifah’s second studio album, Nature of a Sista’, it is a classic case of critics wanting something similar to her debut and being disappointed with a slightly new musical direction. That 1989 debut, All Hail the Queen, is a hugely confident and wonderful album that gained a lot of great reviews. When Nature of a Sista’ arrived in 1991 there were quite a few who were hoping for something like Hail the Queen. The most marked difference between albums is Queen Latifah incorporating more sounds and moving away from a pure Hip-Hop sound – we can hear elements of Reggae, Jazz, and R&B. Whilst there is a broader sound palette – some felt Queen Latifah had diluted her sound -, the lyrics of gender politics and romance are effecting and stunning. I think the songwriting through Nature of a Sista’ is incredible and, whilst there are a few weaker tracks, this is an album that deserves more praise. Queen Latifah wanted to stray away from a more hardcore sound and experiment. Other acts like A Tribe Called Quest were doing it in 1991, and this was the golden age of Hip-Hop for that reason and many others (if you wanted something more intense and political, then you could listen to Public Enemy, say). I like that there were artists who had Hip-Hop at their heart, but they were broadening their sound and crossing genres. Maybe critics were hoping that Queen Latifah was going to be this hard-hitting Hip-Hop artist through her career and, when she took a detour on her second album, there was a degree of deflation in terms of reviews.

I really respect Nature of a Sista’ and the instrumentals, which were provided by live musicians, fuse elements of Reggae and Jazz. There are a lot of different styles mixing alongside one another and, whilst that could have been messy and unfocused, Queen Latifah makes it work. In terms of lyrical perspective, she was employing humour and self-assurance; encouraging women to take pride and respect themselves - rather than placing any stock in sex or money. The early-1990s was an interesting time for Hip-Hop, with artists like Queen Latifah and Monie Love (who Queen Latifah teamed up with on 1990’s Ladies First) among a wave of wonderfully diverse and amazing artists. Although her label, Tommy Boy, dropped her after the disappointing performance of Nature of a Sista', Queen Latifah delivered Black Reign in 1993 – that album contained the huge anthem, U.N.I.T.Y. I think that there are people who see Nature of a Sista' as a bit of a blip between her debut and third album; I feel Nature of a Sista' is the sign of a brave and curious artist not wanting to repeat herself. It is a shame that the album gained some mixed reviews. One such review came from AllMusic, who had this to say:

“Nature of a Sista isn't the outstanding album Queen Latifah is quite capable of recording. But even so, it's a decent sophomore effort that has more strengths than weaknesses. The North Jersey native tends to spend too much time boasting about her microphone skills -- something that can wear thin in a hurry -- but there's no denying the fact that she has considerable technique. As on her first album, Latifah indicates that she could hold her own in a battle with just about any rapper, male or female. And the positive image she projects is certainly commendable. But as likeable as much of this album is, it's obvious that she is capable of a lot more. Artistically, Latifah is selling herself short”.

There were not a great deal of feminist songs in Hip-Hop in the early-1990s. There was a lot of misogyny and sexism, so I think that albums like Nature of a Sista' are very important and inspired a lot of people. Maybe, at the time, there was some dismissal from critics…but one looks back on albums where sisterhood and self-respect are being discussed and wonders whether reviewers need to take another listen and reassess. If Queen Latifah turned her focus back to her community for 1993’s Black Reign, albums like Nature of a Sista' were a reaction to the culture of the time. In this article from Refinery29, we learn more about the sort of themes and attitudes prevalent in Hip-Hop during the early-’90s:

“The terms were used so often in 1990s hip-hop that they became colloquialism, rolling off the tongues of male rappers as easily as if they were describing the color of someone’s eyes. As hip-hop became the dominant (and most profitable) genre of the mid-to-late '90s, status rather than street cred became the primary bragging right of artists. Songs about struggle were replaced by anthems of excess. The setting moved from the street corner to the bow of a yacht. And one of the most coveted trophies of all was a woman.

 But not just any woman. She was a fantasized fetish, disposable arm candy. In many music videos of the time, women like this wore as little as possible and gyrated or sulked in whatever way best pleased the alpha male rapping the lyrics (the point of view in hip-hop was still overwhelmingly male.) This wasn’t empowerment through sexual expression. It was sexist hate speech. Queen Latifah wasn’t having it, though”.

Maybe some critics and fans were looking for music that was as potent and driving as some of the lyrics – an idea that the messages seem a bit weak without an intense vocal or some huge beats in every verse. I think that people should check out Nature of a Sista' as it is a fantastic album with many highlights. Maybe Queen Latifah was aiming for crossover appeal with Nature of a Sista', and I guess one can see Black Reign as a more focused album where she cemented her reputation. In a more positive review from 1991, Entertainment Weekly noted the following:

“Three years ago Queen Latifah tore the rap world apart, slapping macho rappers in the mouth with her fast and furious feminist rhymes, hitting them below the belt with groove-heavy rhythms and hard street beats. She spiced up hip-hop with a fierce house-music tempo, infused rap with Jamaican-style chanting and toasting, and never sounded contrived. Now an established club and recording artist at 21, Latifah is staking out new ground. Nature of a Sista’ bounces with the Queen’s usual dose of feisty, fresh rhymes, but it also shows her softer, more feminine side.

 She still keeps the brothers in check (”Latifah’s Had It Up to Here” and the album’s first single, ”Fly Girl”), but she’s toned down the sass and become more sensual and sophisticated. Here’s one woman who rejects sexism, but not sex. There’s more to Latifah than just gender politics; she purrs on some of the album’s slower tracks, then picks up the tempo on the ragamuffin-style ”Sexy Fancy,” which shows that Queen Latifah can be hard-line and playful at the same time. There’s something else special in the nature of this deep and resonant sista’: class”.

There are certain albums that you listen to and love personally that others do not rate it as highly. I have been listening to Nature of a Sista' this week and really getting involved with the album! It is not Queen Latifah’s best release, but I think that it is far stronger than its reputation suggests. It must have been hugely challenging and tough for women in Hip-Hop in the 1990s, so I do genuinely think that Nature of a Sista' is groundbreaking - and it is an album that needed to be released. One might say that certain tropes and attitudes in Hip-Hop have not changed – themes of excess; sexism and misogyny -, but I feel Nature of a Sista' inspired a lot of female rappers to follow in Queen Latifah’s lead (even if she was not the first to talk about empowerment and raise issues around sexism). If you have not heard Nature of a Sista', give the album a try as it is a really…

REWARDING listen.

FEATURE: Cloudbusters: The Kate Bush Tribute Acts

FEATURE:

 

 

Cloudbusters

IN THIS PHOTO: The American Kate Bush tribute act, Baby Bushka (they sadly lost their member, Nina Leilani Deering (very top left), in a car crash last year)  

The Kate Bush Tribute Acts

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I have alluded to Kate Bush tribute acts…

 IN THIS PHOTO: Baby Bushka’s ‘Bad Bush’, Dr. Batya MacAdam-Somer/PHOTO CREDIT: Baby Bushka

before when looking at her amazing fanbase and how there is a lot of love out there. I was not aware of the excellent American group, Baby Bushka (named after Bush’s single, Babooshka). You can find more information here. They need support so that they can keep playing and survive the pandemic. This is how they describe themselves:

“THE MUSIC AND MAGIC OF KATE BUSH REACHES FAR AND WIDE ACROSS THE SEAS AND SKIES TO SAN DIEGO, CALIFORNIA WHERE EIGHT WOMEN GATHER TO CREATE THE "WONDERFULLY BEWITCHING" BABY BUSHKA.

WITH GREAT RESPECT AND WIDE EYES, THIS POWERHOUSE TROUPE DELIVERS "OTHER-WORLDLY VERSIONS" OF YOUR FAVORITE SONGS "FROM THE ETHEREAL TO THE BOMBASTIC AND BACK AGAIN".

FILLED WITH FOUR-PART HARMONIES AND EPIC CHOREOGRAPHED DANCING, BABY BUSHKA IS A WONDER YOU HAVE TO EXPERIENCE TO BELIEVE”.

The group sadly lost one of their members, Nina Leilani Deering, in a car crash…so it has been tough for them since they lost her last year. The group are great, and I would urge people to check out their work. Rather than it being a straight impersonation of Kate Bush, you get a very different and unique experience. I think that it is great that there are different kinds of Kate Bush tribute acts around. I wonder what Bush makes of it – I am sure she is flattered! It is no surprise that an artist with such a fascinating career and brilliant music has compelled others to get onto the stage.

Cloudbusting is a great Kate tribute act from the U.K.

“Formed back in 2012, well before any suggestion that Kate was ever going to perform live again, Cloudbusting's mission was, and still is, to bring Kate Bush's music to the live stage.

Cloudbusting are 5 musicians from the UK, dedicated to performing this incomparable music with no hint of pastiche or impersonation. There is, and only ever can be, one Kate.

We perform the music as faithfully to the original as possible, aiming to bring perhaps the less obvious of Kate's songs to the stage - some of which have never been heard played live before.
​ 'If you missed out on seeing Kate Bush herself, Cloudbusting are the next best thing.'    
Simon Mayo, BBC Radio 2.

'Mandy started singing and I thought ‘Wow, that’s amazing!’    
Paddy McGuinness, BBC TV

'I need to go to this!'
 Zoe Ball, BBC Radio 2

“Utterly, surreally brilliant.” 
Mick Wall, Classic Rock Magazine.

Mandy’s vocals were so good, I could have been listening to Kate herself!’
​Preston Heyman, Kate’s drummer”.

 I do hope that the band can get back on the road. There are dates announced, but we may need to wait to get through the lockdown before any live gigs resume. It is a shame but, with many artists streaming gigs, maybe that is an option for Cloudbusting.

Lorrie Brown is another great tribute act. It seems that she offers something different to Baby Bushka, and Cloudbusting:

“We remember being captivated when unknown performer Kate Bush appeared on Top of the Pops singing a quirky song based on a book.  The first thing you noticed back then was her completely original look and behaviour on stage. The song was almost secondary but it went on to become a legend, much like it's unprecedented singer.  The rest, as they say, is history and KB went on to become a UK pop music Icon in her own lifetime.

Quite a challenge for any tribute performer, not least because of the original's amazing vocal range and tone. Step forward Lorrie Brown, who doesn't hold back from the challenge.  Also gifted with incredible Vocal ability, Lorrie delivers the perfect, respectful tribute to the iconic singer. The show is a festival of Kate's greatest songs , all sung to perfection by Lorrie backed by her band, the Red Shoes.

All the hits are there from Wuthering through Wow to Symphony in Blue, the entire career of Kate is covered in this highly-polished and professionally presented show”.

One great Kate Bush tribute artist I have been aware of for a long time now is Sarah-Louise Young. You can follow her Twitter account for An Evening Without Kate Bush. She has an amazing passion for Kate Bush, and I think she is one of the U.K.’s finest Bush tribute acts. Like all those who perform Bush’s songs on the stage, Young does it in her own way and creates this unique and stunning universe! I know dates were booked for last year and cancelled, but I hope Young gets to perform her incredible show in 2021:

“Enter Strange Phenomena, howl with the The Hounds Of Love and dance on the moors with Wuthering Heights.
Kate’s not there, but you are.

From the makers of ‘Julie Madly Deeply’. But completely different.

Performer Sarah-Louise Young (Cabaret Whore, The Showstoppers, La Soiree) has teamed up with theatre maker Russell Lucas (Warped at VAULT Festival) to explore the music and mythology of one of the most influential voices in British music.

From releasing ‘Wuthering Heights’ at the age of 19 to selling out the Hammersmith Apollo nearly forty years later, Bush has always surprised and confounded her critics.

Through it all her fans have stayed strong. Young invites you to celebrate her songs with this unique and mind-blowing show”.

Another cool Kate Bush tribute band is Them Heavy People. Nadine leads the band:

“Nadine's passion for music has always played a huge part in her life and as early as five years old Nadine recalls her love for Kate Bush.

Nadine's pursuit for a singing career started thirteen years ago when she started her own Karaoke business. Singing the odd song or two Nadine was talent spotted by a theatre company who urged her to audition for an upcoming musical 'Masquerade' at The Prince of Wales Theatre. The audition was a success and she was offered the role as leading lady. Other roles followed. 

In 2010 she joined a female vocal trio called 'The Rubys' , entertaining pubs and clubs around Staffordshire and The Midlands. Nadine loved to sing the odd Kate Bush song because as she recalls "I loved her music and found her songs easy to sing".

Nadine's ability to sing those 'HIGH notes' and her uncanny vocal resemblance to Kate became a talking point in clubland.

Nadine still sings with 'The Rubys' but her true passion is being part of 'Them Heavy People' where she can sing her favourite songs from her favourite artist Kate Bush”.

“Them Heavy People have been performing as a Kate Bush tribute in the current line up since February 2016, although the band spent a year in another guise before this. Nadine has been a fan of Kate since her early childhood, as her mother was a big fan, and she has been bought up listening to Kate. The band are keen to replicate Kate's songs as accurately as possible, although this is no easy task, given that Kate did a lot of production work in the creation of her songs. Great care has been taken in the rehearsal process to bring Kate's songs alive (many of which have never been performed by  Kate herself in a live situation), and samples of some of the actual records have been used to give authentic sounds on the keyboards. Nadine has an uncanny vocal resemblance to Kate, using her natural voice to give note perfect renditions of classic hits, album tracks and fan favourites.  Backed by seasoned professionals under the musical direction of  Dave on the Bass, the band never fail to delight audiences with their interpretations that closely resemble the original recordings. The show has a strong visual element, using projections behind the band, as well as many iconic costumes that all come together to bring a show that is very close to seeing the real Kate herself.      'A must-see for any Kate fans’”.

When it comes to artists and tribute acts, they can vary in quality. It is hard to emulate Bush’s vocals and style, so that might explain why there is not a surge of tribute acts. I wanted to highlight a few great ones, just to show you how various people are representing Bush on the stage. Let’s hope that they all get to perform at some point this year but, if I have missed any out, then let me know. I hope that Baby Bushka can keep going and ride the pandemic. I know that Cloudbusting will want to keep going and deliver some gigs this year. Some may say that it is sacrilege copying Kate Bush or trying to be her, but there is real affection from her tribute artists. Nobody is really trying to be her; instead, we get these different forms and takes that is really interesting. Although the U.K. and U.S. have premier Kate Bush tribute acts, I would be interested to see if there are others in countries like Australia. We often think about the artists who are inspired by Bush, but not often about artists performing her music and, in their own way, paying tribute to a true hero. I love the Kate Bush tribute acts that are out there but, with her music reaching more people and her popularity building, I wonder if we will see any more…

 IN THIS PHOTO: Kate Bush in 1979/PHOTO CREDIT: Mike Forster/ANL/REX/Shutterstock

FORMED very soon.

FEATURE: Always in Fashion: Five Years: The Magnificent David Bowie

FEATURE:

 

Always in Fashion

PHOTO CREDITS (unless otherwise stated): David Bowie 

Five Years: The Magnificent David Bowie

___________

I was not going to put out another feature…

regarding David Bowie but, as today (10th January) marks five years since his death, I want to do one final feature. There has been a lot of media coverage over the past couple of days because, on Friday, we celebrated Bowie’s seventy-fourth birthday. I want to quote from a couple of articles that have come out that explores Bowie’s legacy. I was struck by a feature about Bowie’s iconic photos and how, when you think about him, one realises that Bowie had this visual legacy – both in these incredible photographs and the way his different looks and reinventions have inspired future artists:

“Lady Gaga's character-shifting and costumes were predated by Ziggy and the Thin White Duke – a sartorial tribute that she often acknowledges. Meanwhile, the recent hand-wringing over Harry Styles's dress on the cover of Vogue regularly neglects the fact that Bowie did it first in 1970, wearing a fetching floral dress designed by Michael Fish on the cover of The Man Who Sold the World. It's a game of dress-up that validated even his out-of-the-box projects, including playing the role of the Goblin King in cult 1980s fantasy film Labyrinth, narrating Sergei Prokofiev's Peter and the Wolf, and performing The Little Drummer Boy with Bing Crosby. He was an outsider who looked the role – let the man make art.

Throughout his career, too, these experimental shifts in his persona were signposted by getting in front of a camera. As documented in the newly published book David Bowie: Icon, which features shots of the star by 25 different photographers, Bowie always understood the power that photography would have in his world. While the images captured during his life are impressive to look back on now, even in the moment, it was clear to many photographers that they were making something special. Here we speak to a few of them to get their reflections on working with a creative legend.

PHOTO CREDIT: Janet Macoska 

But while Bowie used the ability to tell a story through photographs, Janet Macoska believes that he also understood the effect he had on the people who took them. The Cleveland, Ohio-based photographer spent her teenage years photographing acts who regularly used the city to launch their US tours. When she first saw Bowie perform in 1974, she recalls initially being intimidated by the intensity of his stage presence and two-toned eyes, even though she treasures an ethereal, slightly out-of-focus shot from that first show. But when he returned in 1976, on a tour that didn't allow photographers, she was given the opportunity to photograph his stage set-up. In return she was allowed to sneak into the show, camera in tow, her rule-breaking "overlooked" by management.

I got a letter in the mail from Switzerland, and I didn't know anybody in Switzerland. It was from David thanking me for my gift – Janet Macoska

"I popped out every once in a while, to shoot a few photos, but David had two big gorilla guys on stage, one on each side of the stage," she recalls. "If he saw a camera, he would point at it, and the gorilla guys will come out and take your film. So there I am popping out, and he catches me at it. And he puts his hand out and just waves with a little 'No you didn't do that, shame on you!' And then he smiled and he called off the gorillas. And I shot the whole show! It was like being blessed".

I would recommend people read that entire BBC article, as it shows that David Bowie was such a collaborative photographic subject. I suppose other artists are like that, but I think imagery was so important to Bowie; in the sense that he wanted to make photos as powerful and moving as his music. I think a lot of the photos that we see of Bowie connected with so many people. Not only have various musicians striven to inject a bit of Bowie’s mystique, strangeness and beauty into their music/images…I feel Bowie has affected wider society, in terms of the L.G.B.T.Q.I.A.+ community and inspiring others to express themselves in a more open and different way. Another fascinating feature came from The Times. We hear from various people who knew Bowie and, more and more, one learns that he had these various sides and qualities:

“Iggy Pop worked with Bowie in 1971, when he produced Iggy and the Stooges’s third and final album, Raw Power (released in 1973) , and again in the late Seventies, when the pair relocated to Berlin and wrote some of their best material. It led to Pop’s atypically gentle China Girl becoming a hit for Bowie in 1983. “That was a quiet period, focused on the ostensible task,” Pop said of the Berlin years, when I spoke to him in 2019. “With the Stooges in England it was, ‘Where can we get a goddam hamburger?’ With Bowie in Berlin it was going to a club and having a few drinks. We were doing the things most guys that age do.”

“I met him at an after-hours club in New York called the Continental, David was at the back of the room by himself, drinking an orange juice,” says Nile Rodgers of Chic, who collaborated with Bowie in 1983 on Let’s Dance. “In order to figure out how to work together, we went to museums and people’s houses with extensive record collections. To my amazement, we liked a lot of the same stuff: avant-garde jazz like Cecil Taylor and Eric Dolphy, big band music, early rock’n’roll. The super-success of Let’s Dance made him feel strange, but deep down all artists want to touch as many people as possible. He definitely wanted Let’s Dance to be a hit.”

The aristocratic singer and fashion figure Daphne Guinness remembers Bowie as the ultimate autodidact. “We shared a love of second-hand bookshops and opera scores,” says Guinness, who became friends with Bowie in 2013 after they met at a party and she told him that the first single she bought was The Laughing Gnome. “It is unusual to meet someone who is interested in the leitmotifs to Tristan and Isolde and Götterdämmerung, let alone studies the dots on the page of the scores like they are Morse code. He was very encouraging when I started making albums, although he said my lyrics had a tendency to get too ‘Tennyson-y’. I would describe him as elegant, curious and very funny. It seems to me that the world went wrong the moment Bowie died.”

Five years after his death Bowie’s influence looms over our lives more than ever. You could argue that he achieved that final goal of going on for ever, but perhaps we shouldn’t deify him or take him too seriously. In Francis Whately’s documentary Bowie: The Last Five Years, the director asks him what he would most like to be remembered for. “I’d love people to believe,” he replies, “that I had really great haircuts”.

I would advise people to check out Bowie: Dancing Out in Space on BBC Radio 6 Music at 8 p.m., as it will be a fascinating show where leading figures from music, literature, philosophy, technology and comedy talk about the impact of Bowie on their lives. It is impossible to simplify and limit the words one says regarding Bowie’s influence. The more one reads about him and hears testimonies, the more you appreciate how his music and magic touched so many. Esquire investigated how one can hear and feel David Bowie in a lot of artists today:

“Bowie’s influence—his creative shape-shifting, meticulous blending of art and pop, embrace of fashion without surrendering songwriting discipline—was so pervasive during his lifetime that it can be tough to isolate his impact during these last five years. As rock has increasingly become an exercise in nostalgia, the bands he championed in his later years (LCD Soundsystem, Arcade Fire) have broken up or waned in impact. Visually- and conceptually-savvy artists like St. Vincent, Bjork, and Jack White certainly carry the torch, but even they have started to feel like holdovers from another era.

The Bowie DNA is obviously present in The Weeknd when he wears those unexplained face bandages or in Lady Gaga’s reinventions and costuming (though, as my teenage son cannily points out, Gaga’s grand pop gestures are really more Freddie Mercury than Bowie). But if his greatest contribution of all was to give a voice to the outcasts and misfits, to speak for those on society’s fringes and provide them a valued space in rock & roll, then the question is where do those freaky kids now turn?

Bowie surely would have loved and embraced this evolution, not just because of his lifelong championing of Black music (the sound of Blackstar was inspired by Kendrick Lamar’s jazz-inflected hip-hop), but because his entire career was dedicated to moving forward. This aspect of Bowie is documented in his most progressive statements and actions—from his prediction of streaming as the future of music to calling out MTV on its racist programming policies to his sale of “Bowie Bonds” anticipating the current acquisition frenzy on the publishing side of the music business—which social media is quick to cherry-pick and keep these clips in regular rotation”.

I will bring things to a close soon, but I wanted to quote from a great article from The Guardian that discusses how Bowie continues to uplift us five years after his death. I was particularly captured by how restless he was regarding art and literature; how feverish his imagination was – and how it kept collecting ideas and fed that into his work:

“Curator Beth Greenacre, who managed Bowie’s art collection for 16 years until his death, told Harper’s Bazaar in 2016 that he “collected ideas, thoughts … they all fed into his life. He would look at one artist and it would lead him to another artist, which would lead him to a book, which would lead him to a theory, which would lead him to a philosophical text, which would then lead him back to another artist.”

That’s the thing: life, for Bowie, was a series of encounters with people and things that made change possible, not a series of transactions designed to get one over on other people. I’ve missed him more than ever since he died because, seen in the whole, his life stands in rebuke to the philistinism, cynicism and bad faith that’s come to dominate public life.

He wanted to keep learning, and wanted us to keep learning. Bowie would share reading lists, playlists, lyrics saturated with cultural allusions. In the words of songwriter Edwyn Collins, speaking in response to the news of Bowie’s death: “He was warm; you could walk around with him in your head all day and it comforted you”.

I know that is a slightly random collection of thoughts and articles about Bowie, but I wanted to show how amazing the man was and how far and wide his influence has reached. I would encourage people to seek out as much as they can in the way of documentaries and radio tributes. Even though David Bowie has been gone for five years, his influence is everywhere! I think we will be dissecting and discussing his genius for generations to come. There was truly nobody else like him. It seems that this divine star was…

BEAMED from another planet.

FEATURE: A Buyer’s Guide: Part Thirty-Seven: Sleater-Kinney

FEATURE:

 

 

A Buyer’s Guide

IN THIS PHOTO: Corin Tucker (left) and Carrie Brownstein of Sleater-Kinney in 2019/PHOTO CREDIT: Suki Dhanda/The Observer 

Part Thirty-Seven: Sleater-Kinney

___________

FOR this A Buyer’s Guide…

 IN THIS PHOTO: Sleater-Kinney in 2015 (with Janet Weiss, centre)/PHOTO CREDIT: Danny Clinch

I am spotlighting Sleater-Kinney. The iconic American Rock band that formed in Olympia, Washington, in 1994. The  current line-up features Carrie Brownstein (guitar and vocals) and Corin Tucker (vocals and guitar) - following the departure of long-time member, Janet Weiss (vocals, drums, and harmonica) in 2019. Sleater-Kinney rose during the Riot Grrrl movement, and they have since become a vital part of the American Indie Rock scene. Even though they went on hiatus in 2006, they reunited in 2014 - and, through their career, have barely dropped a step! I am going to recommend the four essential albums, in addition to an underrated album and a book that is a helpful companion – I will also highlight their current studio album. If you need a guide to Sleater-Kinney, then I hope that this guide will…

 PHOTO CREDIT: Anthony Pidgeon/Redferns

PROVIDE useful and informative.

______________

The Four Essential Albums

 

Call the Doctor

Release Date: 25th March, 1996

Label: Chainsaw

Producer: John Goodmanson

Standout Tracks: Call the Doctor/I Wanna Be Your Joey Ramone/Taking Me Home

Buy: https://www.discogs.com/sell/release/2033697?ev=rb

Stream: https://open.spotify.com/album/3ULIRcAOMyaT6K4gIhX8aJ?si=wtMMjG2PRLaXveOO4bF1sg

Review:

“This album's true brilliance lies within the lyrics. Call the Doctor is a triumph in feminist writing. Each and every lyric is so intensely intended. As I discussed earlier, the primary motif behind Call the Doctor is to draw attention to the absurd notion of fixed gender roles in society, which is the central theme of the majority of songs here. Often this is explored through compelling metaphors and comparisons from different perspectives, such as on aforementioned 'Stay Where You Are' where Carrie sings 'stuffed in the corner, little girl lost. I claw and I scratch and I beg and I scream, I just need you to save me this time' which plays on the idea of women as mysterious 'others' in need of male guidance and safety. Further, Sleater-Kinney draw attention to this patronizing ideology on 'Anonymous' where Corin sings 'feel safe inside, inside these well drawn lines; boyfriend, a car, a job, my white girl life' where the repetition of 'inside' emphasizes the domesticated experience of how women are expected to live and behave in a patriarchal society. You can draw direct parallels between these 'well drawn lines' and the masculine nature of the Punk scene which the band emerged from, which is discussed more directly in the roaring 'I Wanna Be Your Joey Ramone'. It isn't just the words themselves that makes the lyricism here so powerful, a lot of it comes from the ability of both vocalists to pour a mass of absolute emotion and conviction into every single line. It's as-if the motivation behind each word they belt out is as true to the original intention of Punk in its emergence, more so than any other 90s act.

Call the Doctor provided a necessary stepping stone for both Sleater-Kinney and the Riot Grrrl movement, inspiring a storm of female artists to form bands to make a change. I'd personally argue that it isn't their most creative album, no that comes next. What this album is though is a hard-hitting collection of songs from a group of newcomers, which even the most distinguished punk acts could've only dreamed to make. Sleater-Kinney add melody to punk music more flawlessly than any other group I've had the pleasure of listening too and lyrically they've crafted an anthology of brilliant poetry which continues to sticks with me, even when I'm not listening to the album. Thus, the puzzle was complete” – Sputnik Music

Choice Cut: Stay Where You Are

Dig Me Out

Release Date: 8th April, 1997

Label: Kill Rock Stars

Producer: John Goodmanson

Standout Tracks: Dig Me Out/Turn It On/Little Babies

Buy: https://www.discogs.com/sell/list?master_id=64435&ev=mb

Stream: https://open.spotify.com/album/3tshnNFNhHrO6NUQ0BHw42?si=_CVhLXJqRzyoUbhf7cqtIw

Review:

“Then, behold: Janet Weiss. She joined on 1997's breakneck Dig Me Out, an all-time great American punk statement, giving Sleater-Kinney the most crucial muscle a drummer can offer: not sheer force, but heart, taking the momentum to a new plane. Sleater-Kinney released their next four records with the larger Olympia feminist label, Kill Rock Stars, but none distilled the band's sound and attitude like Dig Me Out: sometimes brutal heartache, sometimes a menacing threat, always intelligent and extreme, there are enough hooks architected into these two- and three-minute songs to span several albums, but even the added dum-de-dum sugar seems as though it must be raw Portland agave.

"Little Babies" critiques stereotypes of motherhood, "Heart Factory" roars over synthetic emotions of the Prozac Nation, and the instantly classic "Words and Guitar" is an ode to rock that just feels necessary. At the peak of "The Drama You've Been Craving"—Tucker's "Kick it OUT!"—there are practically fireworks bursting on either side. Really, Dig goes from 0-to-100 within seconds of its opening salvo of a title track, which begs for transcendence from worldly oppression, "Outta this mess/ Outta my head." Unlike so much in the trajectory of punk, there is no nihilistic self-destruction in the face of chaos. More than skepticism, anti-consumerism, or the glories of tattoo art, punk teaches empathy, a principle Sleater-Kinney practiced with nuance. This is why Sleater-Kinney's music shines a light despite its loudness, why it is easy to be alone with the songs and feel protected. Sleater-Kinney would never forego the optimism to believe their songbook could make us smarter, angrier, more tender and hopeful. Dig Me Out dreams of a better future, clawing itself up with every note” – Pitchfork

Choice Cut: One More Hour

The Woods

Release Date: 24th May, 2005

Label: Sub Pop

Producer: Dave Fridmann  

Standout Tracks: The Fox/Modern Girl/Let's Call It Love

Buy: https://www.discogs.com/sell/list?master_id=64414&ev=mb

Stream: https://open.spotify.com/album/73ctstwnbNifu5U902X2zL?si=UVajihwATIezjBjSXG6_GA

Review:

“Tucker's voice and viewpoints are as thoughtful and fierce as ever, and as usual, she's even better when aided and abetted by Carrie Brownstein's harmonies, as on "Jumpers." Capturing both the deeply depressing and liberating sides of suicide, the song moves from moody almost-pop to an intense but still melodic assault; unlike so many bands, Sleater-Kinney can go back and forth between several ideas within one song and never sound forced or muddled. A martial feeling runs through The Woods, but unlike the more overtly political One Beat, dissent is a more of an overall state of mind here. The more literal songs falter a bit, but "Modern Girl" is saved by its sharp lyrics ("I took my money and bought a donut/The hole's the size of the entire world"), while Tucker and Brownstein's dueling vocals and Janet Weiss' huge drums elevate "Entertain" above its easy targets of retro rock and reality TV. However, the songs about floundering or complicated relationships draw blood: "Rollercoaster," an extended food and fairground metaphor for an up-and-down long-term relationship with tough-girl backing vocals and an insistent cowbell driving it along, is as insightful as it is fun and witty. The unrepentantly sexy "Let's Call It Love" is another standout, comparing love to a boxing match (complete with bells ringing off the rounds) and a game of poker. At 11 minutes long, the song might be indulgent (especially by Sleater-Kinney's usually economic standards), but its ebbs and flows and well-earned guitar solos underscore the feeling that the band made The Woods for nobody but themselves. It flows seamlessly into "Night Light," an equally spooky and hopeful song that offers promise, but no easy answers -- a fitting end to an album that often feels more engaged in struggle than the outcome of it. One thing is clear, though: Sleater-Kinney remain true to their ideals, and after all this time, they still find smart, gripping ways of articulating them” – AllMusic

Choice Cut: Wilderness

No Cities to Love

Release Date: 20th January, 2015

Label: Sub Pop

Producer: John Goodmanson

Standout Tracks: Price Tag/No Cities to Love/Hey Darling

Buy: https://www.discogs.com/sell/list?master_id=785249&ev=mb

Stream: https://open.spotify.com/album/7HDcY3h70X3zLjceUO874A?si=4rDXiHT7RjO29bOQG9RQoQ

Review:

“Their hiatus saw them veer ~off in different directions: Brownstein formed Wild Flag and created (and stars in) the TV series Portlandia; Weiss became the drummer for The Shins and Stephen Malkmus and The Jicks (among others); and Tucker started the Corin Tucker Band.

Their new record is a testament to so many of the things they have always represented: left-leaning, feminist, intelligent and playful. Brownstein’s guitar playing remains vital, Tucker’s voice is still strong and true, and Weiss’s excellent drumming keeps everything from toppling over.

After their celebrated collaboration with producer Dave Fridmann on 2005’s classic rock-infused The Woods, the band went back to their roots, and to longtime producer John Goodmanson, who takes great care of their old conceits and new experiences..

This is crucial, exciting music, with an ear towards melody – as evidenced on album closer Fade – and mature reflection. There is honest self-examination on Bury Our Friends, and meditation on pointless consumerism on Price Tag. Fangless could have been made at any time in their evolution, with the singular guitar and furious drum intro, and the chorus on Surface Envy is one that will be sung back to them concert after concert, and in bedrooms all around.

A New Wave, with its discordant melody, has Tucker and Brownstein singing about inventing their “own kind of obscurity”, a sense of defiance which is also present on No Anthems and Gimme Love” – Irish Times

Choice Cut: Bury Our Friends

The Underrated Gem

 

Sleater-Kinney

Release Date: 1995

Label: Chainsaw

Producers: Tim Green/Sleater-Kinney

Standout Tracks: Don't Think You Wanna/How to Play Dead/Be Yr Mama

Buy: https://www.discogs.com/sell/list?master_id=170728&ev=mb

Stream: https://open.spotify.com/album/4BT2qMQcDmjNIIyLHik2lM?si=qzLEV5h5SoOpU6WjzIxgYg

Review:

“Sleater-Kinney's debut record is a medium-fi blast of thrashy riot grrrl rock. Some tracks are reminiscent of '90s Sonic Youth ("Be Yr Mama"), while others are just blasts of punk angst ("A Real Man"). The group suffers from excessively monotone melody lines, but succeeds with their overall confidence and an understanding of dynamics that is promising. This is a good first record, and a showcase for talent that would later blossom on The Hot Rock” – AllMusic

Choice Cut: A Real Man

The Latest Album

 

The Center Won’t Hold

Release Date: 16th August, 2019

Label: Mom + Pop

Producer: St. Vincent

Standout Tracks: The Center Won't Hold/Can I Go On/Ruins

Buy: https://www.discogs.com/sell/list?master_id=1590913&ev=mb

Stream: https://open.spotify.com/album/0UMuX8pRsyfSkv0gPJMipQ?si=uuz98RO2QeODUPuRXn2hEg

Review:

“This sense of sex being perhaps the only palliative in our fractious, disconnected world is essayed even more powerfully by Tucker, who has an innately more serious voice, an ideal foil for the sly goofball Brownstein. On The Future Is Here, her day begins on her phone, looking at the news, and ends on it too, perhaps looking at messages or photos from a decaying relationship. “You can cover me, just come over here and give me everything”, she promises, a sext of pure need, for orgasm, intimacy, protection. Age, too, plays its part: on The Dog/The Body, Brownstein admits she’s now “just the trick without the magic”, a wonderfully wry, smutty double meaning, while on Love she says she’s “done with being told that this should be the end” and celebrates “a well-worn body demanding to be seen”. Brownstein is singing about being on stage, but it’s also a credo for the boardroom, pavement and indeed bedroom.

The album closes on Broken, a piano ballad about doggedly existing through trauma, beautifully sung by Tucker – another brand new and intense flavour for the band. Losing Weiss will be a trauma in itself, but Sleater-Kinney have announced that they are survivors, making fires out of friction” – The Guardian

Choice Cut: Hurry On Home

The Sleater-Kinney Book

 

Hunger Makes Me a Modern Girl: A Memoir

Author: Carrie Brownstein

Publication Date: 20th October, 2015

Publisher: Riverhead Books

Synopsis:

“Fury sparks off the page in the chapter when Brownstein and her Sleater-Kinney bandmate Corin Tucker are summarily outed by Spin magazine, when their families did not know the two had had a brief relationship, and the journalist had not touched on the subject during the interview. (Tucker is now married, with children; Brownstein rejects the need for pat definition.)The slog to be perceived as musicians, rather than as female musicians (let alone sexually fluid feminist musicians), is a never-ending tightrope act. Brownstein rolls her eyes at positive write-ups full of unconscious internalised sexism, and tries to pin down how Sleater-Kinney staked out their difficult terrain. You can often hear Evergreen College – Olympia, Washington’s hotbed of DIY indie and radical feminism – in her more erudite, analytical passages, but her plain-speaking is more refreshing: “We have not talked about that night in Brussels since.”

Some mysteries remain, as they must. Sleater-Kinney is, essentially, a long, shifting dialogue between the interlocking guitars of Brownstein (mostly lead) and Tucker (mostly rhythm; there is no bass). Exactly how this complicated music is hammered out remains elusive. Also, although Brownstein sings on S-K’s later albums, why does the book’s cover photo find this sublime rock guitarist holding a microphone, not swinging her axe?” – The Guardian

Order: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Hunger-Makes-Me-Modern-Girl/dp/1594486638

FEATURE: The Lockdown Playlist: The Best of Donald Fagen

FEATURE:

 

 

The Lockdown Playlist

The Best of Donald Fagen

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AS today (10th January)….

 IN THIS ILLUSTRATION: Steely Dan (Walter Becker, the co-founder, is second from the left (in the pink glasses)/ILLUSTRATION CREDIT: Paul King Artwerks

is the birthday of Donald Fagen, I wanted to put together a Lockdown Playlist of some of his best songs with Steely Dan, in addition to great solo material. Although his fellow Steely Dan founder, Walter Becker, died in 2017, the group is still a touring entity – there are just not going to be any more original albums under the Steely Dan name. Because it is Fagen’s seventy-third birthday, I want to give a nod of the head to one of my favourite singers and songwriters. I am a massive Steely Dan fan, and I feel Fagen’s voice is one of the reasons I am so invested in the band. This playlist features songs co-written (with Becker); some he did not sing on. I also wanted to introduce people to the brilliance of Fagen’s solo works. Without further ado, here is an essential collection of songs from a songwriter who I consider to be…

AN absolute genius.

FEATURE: Passing Through Air: Two Radio Shows That Many Fans Would Love to Hear Kate Bush On

FEATURE:

 

 

Passing Through Air

PHOTO CREDIT: Trevor Leighton 

Two Radio Shows That Many Fans Would Love to Hear Kate Bush On

___________

WHEN it comes to Kate Bush and her radio exposure…

IN THIS PHOTO: Kate Bush in 2005/PHOTO CREDIT: Trevor Leighton 

it has largely consisted of interviews to promote her albums. I am not sure how common radio promotion was in the early years – where she was giving T.V. interviews -, but Aerial (2005), Director’s Cut (2011), and 50 Words for Snow (2011) were met with quite a few interviews. I do know that, in a few interviews, Bush was asked to pick a song that she wanted to spin; she was asked about various artists that inspire her. I recently wrote a feature outlining various artists that Bush loves and she cites as influences. David Bowie and Elton John are big names that she loves; she has also listed Captain Beefheart, Roxy Music, The Beatles, Steely Dan, Roy Harper and David Bowie as artists she admires. In an interview in 1980, Bush named ten albums that she enjoys listening to. It is nice getting an insight into musicians in regards who moves them. When it comes to Kate Bush, we know of the artists that are influenced by her – but discovering the sort of music that she digs is insightful and really interesting. In an interview of 2011 - it was with John Wilson of BBC Radio 4 -, Bush said that she had recently bought a Gorillaz album and The Union by Elton John and Leon Russell. I think that we associate Bush as being unique and not really listening to other music. Maybe we feel that, as it is hard to think of other artists when we hear her music, that means she doesn’t listen to music other music.

 IN THIS PHOTO: Matt Everitt (who presents the BBC Radio 6 Music series, The First Time with…)

Maybe Bush does not listen to a lot of modern music but, from her childhood, her house was awash with all kinds of artists and sounds. From Irish Folk to Rock music of the 1970s, she was exposed to so much varied music! It sort of brings me to a thought that I have had recently. There are two great radio shows that Bush would be perfect for. The First is The First Time with…, hosted by Matt Everitt for BBC Radio 6  Music, is one. It would realistically need to happen after we are through the worst of the pandemic, but I think this is a show that Kate Bush would be wonderful on. She and Matt Everitt have spoken before – when she was promoting the live album of her residency, Before the Dawn, in 2016 -, and there is an affection and chemistry between them. On the series, guests talk about their ‘firsts’ – whether that is gigs, records they bought or something else. Rather than it being a routine and predictable interview format, we get to hear artists discuss things beyond their current album. It is a series I love and have followed for a while, and I feel there are a lot of stories and revelations that Bush could offer that people do not know about. I would like to know what Bush’s first gig experience is. I know she saw David Bowie perform as Ziggy Stardust in 1973 (she must have been around fourteen or fifteen)…and that would be a good tale to recount.

Everitt is a great interviewer who can naturally put guests at ease and, as such, you get some great information. I know Bush does not often do a lot of interviews outside of promoting albums but, if there is a new album coming out next year, then it would be a perfect opportunity to tie the two together. I think Bush is more comfortable giving radio interviews to people she has already spoken with so, in this case, one could envisage few hesitation. It would be wonderful to get finer detail regarding her musical firsts and loves. I am not sure whether there are any plans regarding new material, so we may have to wait a while. When things start to get back to normal, so many fans of Kate Bush would relish her appearing on The First Time with… Maybe she is not even aware of the show so, if there is an album coming along in the future, I hope that Matt Everitt’s series is considered. I always love when Bush gives radio interviews, as she is so accommodating and warm. You get to hear her quite playful and relaxed so, if there was ever another chance for her and Everitt to hook up, I think she would provide a hugely listenable appearance on The First Time with…

 IMAGE CREDIT: BBC

The other radio show that is begging for a Kate Bush appearance is Desert Island Discs. It is hosted by Matt Everitt’s BBC Radio 6 Music colleague, Lauren Laverne. I am guessing Bush has been approached to appear on the long-running series; she must be one of the biggest names never to have appeared that so many would love to hear! Simply, the ‘castaways’ choose eight discs that they would take to a theoretical desert island – they also choose a book they would like to bring, in addition to a luxury. Having just given you an idea as to some of the artists and albums that have inspired Kate Bush, maybe one can guess a few of the songs she would select. I know she loves Elton John’s live album, 17-11-70, and I reckon she might choose a track from that. As Bush’s musical tastes are pretty broad and she likes the unconventional, it would be fascinating hearing which discs she wants to take to the desert island. Like Matt Everitt, Bush has spoken with Lauren Laverne before (when promoting 50 Words for Snow in 2011), and I know she would jump at the chance to speak with Bush again. As it is radio, Bush could do the interview remotely, though I think you get something extra and more harmonious (and smooth) when the guests are in the same room.

IN THIS PHOTO: Desert Island Discs host Lauren Laverne

A lot of Kate Bush’s musical heroes have appeared on Desert Island Discs (as has her own music) and, again, her appearance could be linked to album promotion – though, it is not the type of format where guests can plug their latest work much. When we dream of castaways we’d love to include on Desert Island Discs, there is that speculation as to what luxury they would take with them. One has to feel a piano would be Bush’s choice. But what about her selected book?! In the same way The First Time with… allows the guest to reveal things that they would not normally impart in regular interviews, Desert Island Discs is much more open and less predictable. Laverne asks her guests about various events in their life and then punctuates those answers with selected songs. There have been no radio interviews from Kate Bush for over four years now and it would be wonderful to hear from her. Maybe she will not want to do anything of that sort outside of album promotion but, after such a strange 2020, perhaps her opinions have changed. I know there would be intense excitement if she were to appear on either/both shows, and it would afford us all the opportunity to find out things about Kate Bush that we might not have otherwise known. I realise that it is unlikely that she will do these excellent radio shows. However, we all know that one…

CAN never say never.

FEATURE: Live and Clicking: The Reality of Gigs in 2021

FEATURE:

 

 

Live and Clicking

IN THIS PHOTO: Christine and the Queens performing at Primavera Sound in 2019 (she is an artist who performed a number of great streamed sets/performances last year)

The Reality of Gigs in 2021

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WE are only just in 2021…

 PHOTO CREDIT: @nainoa/Unsplash

and so there is uncertainty regarding gigs and what form they will take. Certainly, there is positivity regarding vaccines and the fact that things may improve significantly by the summer. For festivals, this creates a dilemma: Do they postpone them again this year or push them back until August or later? I think that the second option is best, as it would allow for greater safety and a chance for infection numbers to drop further. They may have to make a call in the next month or so, as a lot of planning goes into festivals and they cannot wait until the last moment. Gigs are slightly different. Last year, there were gigs where punters were socially distanced or watching from their cars. There were a couple where people were watching outside and there was a limited capacity. On other occasions, artists performed from empty venues and streamed it to people at home - whereas some performed these high-concept virtual gigs where one paid to watch something that is akin to a scaled-down version of a what they would deliver on tour. Artists are eager to get back on the stage and connect with their fans because, ten months after most large-scale gigs occurred, there is that hunger and demand. I want to bring in an article from the BBC. They looked at live performances in 2020 and what sort of live performances fans got to see in lieu of traditional gigs:

“The early days of lockdown were a voyeur's wish come true, as the world's biggest pop stars invited you into their living rooms, kitchens and bathrooms to play some tunes (highlight: The Rolling Stones' Charlie Watts playing drums on his armchair). By the end of the year, the productions had become a little more ambitious.

In November, Dua Lipa's Studio 2054 set a new bar for livestreams, with two dozen dancers, gigantic Day-Glo hula hoops, even more gigantic glitter balls, a roller disco and a generous helping of special guests - from Kylie and Miley to Sir Elton John, harrumphing his way through Rocket Man

IN THIS PHOTO: Dua Lipa.

The concert cost $1.5m (£1.1m) and took five months to put together - but it more than made that sum back, with 284,000 ticket sales and streaming deals in India and China. In the end, the concert was seen by more than five million people worldwide.

"We'll definitely do it again," Dua's manager Ben Mawson told Rolling Stone. "Certainly for the rest of our artists, we'll do more."

But virtual gigs don't just make financial sense: Fans who can't afford to travel to big cities like London and New York can suddenly attend an exclusive show - and, because the audience is huge, tickets are more affordable (Dua's prices started at £7.50).

We can expect to see them become part of the regular tapestry of the music industry, even when concerts resume.

The second part of the article that I want to source from speculates when tours might return. It does seem that, even with some good news about vaccines, it will take a while to immunise people and see coronavirus cases fall sufficiently. Maybe we will not see big tours return until late this year:

Depending on who you ask, live music will be back by Easter, or maybe the summer, but it could be the end of the year. And even with a vaccine, it will be a while before tours can go back to normal.

While bands like Steps and Little Mix have announced arena shows for November, others, like Nick Cave, have already cancelled their 2021 tour plans.

Initially, at least, social distancing will be enforced at indoor venues, with enforced one-way systems to the bar and toilets.

Rapid turnaround Covid-19 tests at festival gates is another prospect, although the idea isn't foolproof. Other proposals include thermo scanners, spraying fans with a disinfectant "fog" as they enter a venue, and interactive wristbands that vibrate to indicate a lack of social distancing.

Ticketmaster has also been looking at whether it is possible to link digital tickets to your vaccine status or a negative Covid test through a smartphone app.

However, the company stressed it could not enforce such measures - which would be enacted at the discretion of the event organiser”.

That will come as a sobering blow for those who want to see live music very soon! Maybe intimate or slightly smaller gigs can resume because of the relative ease at which venue owners can screen ticket buyers regarding their COVID-19 status – or admitting people who have had two doses of a certain vaccine. The problem comes when you have to check and screen thousands of people – once more casting doubt on whether festivals can come back as soon as we’d hoped. Let us hope that we can enjoy some form of live music by the time the summer rolls around. After such a hard and quiet 2020 for live music, there is going to be an explosion of desire for that first taste of something approaching normality.

That sort of turns things to virtual and streamed gigs. I do not think, as I have said before, that this type of live performance will become the norm. That said, one did not really see too many of them in 2019; many artists have popularised streamed gigs at a time when they have not been able to get on the stage. Whilst streamed gigs are always at the mercy of technology and its unreliability, the ones I have seen covered and reviewed have been very professional and smooth. I think, until the summer at the very earliest, artists will continue with live-streamed gigs in place of tours. It will take a long time before bigger artists can tour the world safely; a more practical and realistic way of ‘touring’ is going to be through our screens. For many people, these streamed gigs provide an experience they might not have otherwise enjoyed. It can be costly travelling to venues and buying tickets so, at a reduced rate, one can enjoy something quite ambitious and spectacular. Dua Lipa’s Studio 2054 was one such event that got some great reviews and gave fans a taste, in some sense, of a bigger live gig. A lot of smaller artists have had to rely on more stripped-back streamed gigs but, with no travel involved, many have been able to provide more gigs to their fans than they usually would.

I think this year will be one of two halves. The reality until the summer is going to be virtual sets and performances where we are sat looking at a screen. I do think we will see artists emulate the sort of feats that the likes of Dua Lipa created - it will be interesting to see whether musicians find new ways to stream and device original concepts. Then, later this year, there will be a slow return to live music. There will be a sort of tiered system where socially distanced gigs can come back; then smaller venues may be able to open, before large venues and festivals think about reopening. It will be sad if festivals were postponed until next year, but they are in a tough position right now regarding making that impossible decision. If you are interested, I think you will be able to look back on some streamed/virtual gigs that happened last year. I think these types of performances will be prevalent for a few more months at least. I also think, as I have remarked before, that many artists will combine traditional gigs with live-streamed ones when things start to get back to normal. It will be good to see live music return in a way where people get together and bond but, when it comes to how we experience live music, we are going to have to get used to streamed and virtual gigs for a while longer. There are positives and negatives of this type of performance, but I think artists have adapted wonderfully in a very tough period. The most interesting thing will be seeing how musicians across the board take streamed live performances and…

PUSH them to new levels.

FEATURE: Music Technology Breakthroughs: Part Four: The Sony Walkman

FEATURE:

 

 

Music Technology Breakthroughs

IN THIS PHOTO: The Sony Walkman debuted in Japan in 1979/PHOTO CREDIT: Alamy 

Part Four: The Sony Walkman

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IN this feature…

I am highlighting technological breakthroughs in music. This can either be something to do with software and an advance that helped in terms of music production, or it can be a device or hardware that has changed how we listen to music. I have already talked about the iPod coming through in 2001. Today, I am spotlighting the Sony Walkman. I talked about this hugely important piece of music history in 2019 when celebrating the fortieth anniversary. I think, maybe, the Sony Walkman is the most important music device there has ever been. Some might say that is a gramophone but, as they are quite different, I am referring to how the Sony Walkman is portable and allowed one the chance to experience music that way. Although the Sony Walkman was quite expensive when it came to the U.K., I recall having one in the late-1980s/early-1990s; it was my gateway to the Sony Discman - that would be part of my world years later. I think people associate the Sony Walkman with being popular in the 1980s, but I knew a lot of people who had one in the 1990s. There is this retro value to owning one today. I can imagine an original Sony Walkman goes for a lot of money! I may feature the Sony Discman in a future article, but I think it was more unreliable than the Walkman equivalent; it often skipped and was a bit precarious when it came to playing C.D.s. The Sony Walkman, to me, revolutionised how the world listened to music; the fact that one could take an album and artist with them!

Before continuing on my thought, I want to bring in a couple of articles that discuss the history/legacy of the Sony Walkman. In 2014, The Verge gave a short history:

“The first of Sony's iconic portable cassette tape players went on sale on this day, July 1st, back in 1979 for $150. As the story goes, Sony co-founder Masaru Ibuka got the wheels turning months before when he asked for a way to listen to opera that was more portable than Sony's existing TC-D5 cassette players. The charge fell to Sony designer Norio Ohga, who built a prototype out of Sony's Pressman cassette recorder in time for Ibuka's next flight.

After a disappointing first month of sales, the Walkman went on to become one of Sony's most successful brands of all time, transitioning formats over the years into CD, Mini-Disc, MP3 and finally, streaming music. Over 400 million Walkman portable music players have been sold, 200 million of them cassette players. Sony retired the classic cassette tape Walkman line in 2010, and was forced to pay a huge settlement to the original inventor of the portable cassette player, Andreas Pavel. But the name lives on today in the form of new MP3 players and Sony's Walkman app. They heyday of the Walkman may be over, with kids today baffled and disgusted by the relative clumsiness of cassettes. But the habit it spawned — listening to music wherever and whenever you want — is bigger than ever”.

I wonder why the Sony Walkman was so successful and practical, whereas the Sony Discman was flawed and did not provide the same convenience and quality? Certainly, I relied on my Sony Discman when I was growing up, but I found the Sony Walkman much more robust and durable. It seems a shame that we do not really have a modern equivalent of the Sony Walkman. There are modern iPod designs, but not the Sony Walkman as such – another reason why the originals are in-demand and selling for a big price! There is a sleeker new design which is available, but it seems very similar to how you would listen to music on a Smartphone – more like an iPod than a traditional Sony Walkman. I am talking more about something modern and multi-functional where playing a cassette is possible. As cassette sales were huge last year, there are clearly a lot of people who have a lot of love for the old-skool format. A redesign of the Sony Walkman would be great and prove very popular. Smartphones are fine, but I feel there is this desire for physical music and having that tangible aspect. The legacy and influence of the Sony Walkman is huge! The Irish Times described how one was afforded personal freedom regarding their music listening – and how there was stiff competition on the market soon enough:

“The transistor radio started that shift. A decade before Masaru Ibuka, co-founder of Sony, instructed his staff to design a portable, playback-only stereo, kids were listening to T Rex and Mud on similarly sized plastic boxes. The Walkman gave them greater control.

It ushered in the compilation tape (nobody then called them “mixtapes”) and its use as a reliably ineffective seduction aid. Somewhere there is academic research proving that no woman has ever listened to all 20 tracks on any tape proffered by any eager suitor. It doesn’t matter if, using brief pieces from early Brian Eno recordings as stuffing, you filled the C-90 from the first tape leader to the last. Nobody cared that you’d given it a hilarious name and collaged a cover from last week’s NME. “Erm … What did I think of the Nipple Erectors track? It … had a great beat?”

The machine also advanced the notion of personal electronics as fashion. We’re not talking about the original TPS-L2 here. Retailing at a million pounds (well, plenty anyway), that first model had all the portability of a fridge freezer and all the design flair of a Trabant motorcar. The TPS-L2 actually came with a sling that allowed you to wear it like a satchel. It was the lovely, neat WM-2 that opened the long path towards YouTube videos in which maniacs “unbox” the latest iPhone. (In apparent tribute, there is now a video on that site of a restaged WM-2 unboxing.) The orange-padded headphones were as much a symbol of the age as the leg warmer or the vinyl tie. Never before had technology become an essential part of an era’s daywear.

The Sony Walkman fought its corner in a series of interlocked wars. In most territories, competitors had to name their reverse-engineered product a “personal stereo”, but, in German-speaking countries, courts concluded that “Walkman” had become the accepted generic term. This is why Hoover really would prefer you to call their most famous appliance a “vacuum cleaner”.

The rise of the CD forced Sony to develop the famously terrible Discman, a device that worked only a little better than strapping a turntable round your waist. There were MiniDisc versions. You can still buy an MP3 incarnation. But streaming on the smartphone ultimately annihilated the personal-stereo market”.

I wanted to salute a huge moment for music: in 1979, when the world became aware of this new breakthrough called the Sony Walkman. Its impact has resounded through the decades and, today, we take for granted the fact we can listen to music on the move. In the 1980s, it was a really new thing, and I can only imagine how excited people were (I was born in 1983)! I shall leave things there but, when it comes to music/listening hardware, there are few more important than…

THE Sony Walkman.

FEATURE: Spotlight: Sarah Close

FEATURE:

 

 

Spotlight

Sarah Close

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I am going pretty hard on the Spotlight features…

because there are a lot of great artists that warrant focus. I have been following Sarah Close for a while - and I will finish with a review of her exceptional album, And Now’ We’re Shining. There aren’t too many interviews with Close from the last year or two, so I have taken from interviews a bit further back. Go and follow Sarah Close and check out her music – I have put all the links at the very end -, as she is another artist that I feel is going to expand in 2021 and reach new people. It is a shame the London-based artist will not be able to tour more this year. Let’s hope summer looks better and we can see Close in action! I want to start by quoting from an interview from The National Student from 2018. We learn more about Close’s earlier life, taking inspiration from Taylor Swift, and frustrations she has with the industry:

“Growing up on the small island of the Isle Of Wight, Sarah has admitted that the size of her hometown limited her options creatively; "I think feeling so isolated was one of the reasons I got into music, I didn't have other kids in my village to hang with so I had to find things to keep me busy! I don't think my home area has an obvious influence on my songs and writing, but I do have a couple songs that explore growing up and feeling like a bit of an outsider because of a different childhood to other people".

Fantasising about a what life could be past the small island, Sarah got light of the idea of putting herself out there through by pure coincidence from her covers rival Taylor Swift. "I was hugely inspired when I found out that Taylor Swift wrote and performed her own songs, that made me believe that I could do the same! That and 'Naive' by the Kooks is what made me pick up a guitar and start teaching myself."

Sarah was inspired to follow in Swift's tracks but found herself held back by a feeling we all know a little too well. "I'd known I wanted to do it for a while, I'd been watching other singers on YouTube and saw that they were doing what I wanted to do. What worried me most was people at school finding out and teasing me for it, I told a friend what I wanted to do and she encouraged me so much that I just did it. People at school found out about my channel earlier than I expected them to, but luckily everyone was super nice and supportive which only spurred me on more!"

As an individual that has explored the industry in all its glory, Sarah does not shy away from being vocal about her frustrations within the belly of the beast. "I think the industry is lacking in diversity, especially in the behind the scenes roles. I'd love to meet more women and POC working as A&R's and managers." However, that's not to discredit her experiences to date - having worked alongside Parlophone Records and now coming back to a point where she's in full control of her own music. Releasing independently through The Kodiak Club and self-directing her own music videos can be intimidating, but Sarah takes it all in her stride. "At the end of the day no one really knows what song is going to bang or not, so trust your gut and put out songs that feel right to you!”.

I love Sarah Close’s songs, as they are really accessible and instant. I can hear something like If It Was Me, or Cool, and they will burrow in my head. She has an exceptional voice and songwriting talent, and I feel she will be a huge name of the future! Her fanbase is already huge. One can expect it to grow and explode as she puts out more music. Apologies to go back in time, but I am fascinated by a deep interview from Golden Plec of 2019. We learn a lot about one of Britain’s finest young artists:

“Sarah Close has built up a name for herself as a talented and versatile singer-songwriter. Having started her career by uploading covers to YouTube, the Isle of Wight native has also studied songwriting, signed to a label and become independent again, learning a lot about the music industry along the way. We sat down with her to talk about her career thus far, being able to make decisions for herself and the murky area between music and YouTube.

Recently, Close released 'London' a song that tells the tales of her love-hate relationship with the city, a feeling that has resonated with a lot of her fans, "'London' was a song that I wrote back in 2015. And it's always just been a song that I love. I was talking to some friends who have just moved to London we were saying about how tough it is to acclimatise, and to get used to people being like, "hey, let’s meet up" and never hearing from them again and just how lonely it is."

 Close studied songwriting for two years before dropping out, a move which she sticks by as she thinks it was the right decision at the time. "I came to London knowing I wanted to do music but I didn’t know anyone in the city. My parents really encouraged me to enrol in some kind of course so I could have a student loan and have a bit of the student lifestyle and go out and meet friends. So I went on a songwriting course."

Close had it in mind that she wouldn't make it the whole way through the course from the outset, "I kind of made it my goal that I wouldn’t have to make it the whole way through. That I would work hard enough that halfway through my career outside of uni would be so busy that I could have the opportunity to drop out. So I worked really hard, saved money so I could quit uni and be okay.

"by the end of second year it wasn’t really giving me anything any more. I don’t think you can teach music, I think you have to have passion and drive - you can be taught to write a song but unless you’re going to go out and practice, what’s the point? So I was just like, this course isn’t doing anything for me and left."

By this point her online presence had grown dramatically, and the music industry started taking notice, "I started getting interest from labels. So I decided I wanted to make an EP and get that out then I signed my record deal with Parlophone in  2017."

Adjusting to a label life was another learning curve for Close who was unsure of others taking over her previous responsibilities, "I had never had a team before - I had made everything myself. All of sudden there’s a group of people that are like “hey, you need tour posters? We’ll make them!” And it was amazing… but it was also hard for me to not have to do everything because I was so used to it."

She also notes how she found it to be another part of the industry that she could now understand a little bit more, "I feel like labels are still like a locked door that everyone kind of knows what’s going on but you don’t really know until you’re in it."

There is a side of her that is annoyed by those who jump on the music bandwagon simply because they have a big audience on social media, "100% yes. Because I sat there as a 5 year-old like "I want to be a singer, I want to write songs" and I’ve spent hours and hours working and trying to make it happen. But also, everyone is entitled to do whatever the hell they want so who am I to talk shit on them, like, you do your thing."

Part of what made her departure from the label easier to take was that she was now in control of what she could release, so what exactly does that entail? "What you see is what you get with me - I’m an idiot on Instagram stories and I post videos with no makeup on and in my pyjamas and I always want to keep things very intimate and not too polished, but I definitely want my music to go in a slightly more intimate manner. I think that my covers online were just my voice and my piano and I really enjoy the songs in my set where it’s just me and the piano, so I would love to strip things down a bit more. But then I really love the big pop songs so it’s kind of finding the space between”.

I know I took rather heavily from that interview but, as it is one of the more recent ones, it has given us insight into the brilliant Sarah Close. I will end with a review of her latest work, but there is another interview that I saw from 2018 that gives us a little more information about Close. She spoke with The Student Pocket Guide in 2018:

“Q4. What are you biggest aspirations in life? (career and lifestyle wise)

I want to play shows around the world, there’s no better feeling than being on stage for me (apart from maybe fresh bed sheets…) and I’d love to be able to make music and keep writing my songs for years to come. I’m super interested in business too, I’d love to develop my record label The Kodiak Club and one day sign and help other artists out, especially any aspiring musicians from where I grew up- the Isle Of Wight. Whilst I love London and this city, I want to end up living back by the sea, and I also want a dog.

Q5. Have you always been passionate about music since a young age?

Yes. I recorded my first ‘album’ age 5/6  on a cassette tape of songs ‘I had written’ (I made them up on the spot), but no seriously, my parents always had music playing and are musical themselves and very early on I knew I wanted to pursue singing.

Q9. If there’s anyone you’d want to collaborate with who would it be, and why?

Shawn Mendes, because I love his voice and I think he’s so cute. Amine, I love everything about him and think he would be so fun to work with. Charli XCX, she’s a mega babe and I reckon we’d made something awesome and then finally SZA, who wouldn’t want to work with her?”.

Go and visit Sarah Close’s official website, where one can purchase the amazing And Now, We’re Shining. It was one of last year’s finest releases; it shows that Close is one of the most interesting and strongest artists we have in the country right now. I want to bring in a great review for And Now, We’re Shining:

“UK artist Sara Close’s first album And Now We’re Shining perfectly showcases all of Close’s talents. The album features a bedroom pop genre with one song combining popular 80’s music trends with 2000’s trends. Sarah Close’s vocals are phenomenal. The entire album, she shows off her range, adding multiple harmonies into each of the songs. Her harmonies are so incredible and add so much depth to each song. Every single song on this album is so catchy. Her album is also versatile– you can listen to it while you lay in bed avoiding online work or while on a run.

One thing I loved about her album was how different each song sounded compared to one another. Each one had a different tone and vibe that made her album more relatable. Just like we go through different moves and feelings every day, this album mirrored that.

Some of my favorite songs were “If It Was Me” and “Almost”. Both of these songs, although sound different, focus around the same boyfriend who is always late and very conceited. It follows the idea of wanting to say something and cutting the relationship off but not saying anything.

I am obsessed with “Stay”. It is easily my favorite song on this album. Listening to the song the first time brought chills and tears to my eyes. The emotion is felt so clearly in her voice and it connects Close to the listener. The dynamics of the song adds so much depth to the meaning of the song. It starts off slow and picks up, but it does it so subtly that I didn’t even realize how much the dynamic changed until the last couple seconds of the songs.

Especially during the pandemic, And Now We’re Shining is the perfect album to listen to. The vocals encapture the listener and easily distract from the craziness that is going on. Whether it be for three minutes or thirty, this album is definitely a pick-me-up. I currently use the songs Almost, If It Was Me, Crazy Kind and You Say in my run playlist”.

I have a lot of love and respect for Sarah Close as an artist, but I also admire what she says in interviews and how inspiring she is. If you are thinking about which artists to follow this year, make sure Sarah Close is near the top of your list. She is an amazing talent and, as we look ahead to brighter times, I do feel like she will tour the world and play at some massive shows! I will leave it there but, in a sea of promising artists, Sarah Close is one of the very best. I have been aware of her music for a couple of years and she always produces simply amazing music! There is no denying that she is…

AN incredible talent.

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Follow Sarah Close

Official:

https://www.sarahclose.co.uk/

Twitter:

https://twitter.com/Sazclose

Facebook:

https://www.facebook.com/SAZCLOSE/

Instagram:

https://www.instagram.com/sarahclose

YouTube:

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCNpY7BgxICtDNZDSGtqUdAw

Spotify:

https://open.spotify.com/artist/5nQybVOGIy5TZ1XK9CaDiS?si=MLOcxb0oR-qC_v88v25tBA

FEATURE: The January Playlist: Vol. 2: Don’t Lose Your Head When The Bandit Is Near

FEATURE:

 

 

The January Playlist

IN THIS PHOTO: Kings of Leon

Vol. 2: Don’t Lose Your Head When The Bandit Is Near  

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IT is good to see so many big…

 IN THIS PHOTO: Hannah Reid of London Grammar

songs released this week! I would have thought it would take a bit of time for 2021 to warm up but, in the second week of the year, there has been this explosion of great new tracks. Among this week’s new cuts is music from Kings of Leon, London Grammar, Nao (ft. Adekunle Gold), Slowthai (ft. A$AP Rocky), Vagabon (ft. Courtney Barnett), shame, Alice Glass, Jazmine Sullivan, David Bowie (two new songs were released on his birthday yesterday), Virginia Wing, Black Honey, and Nubiyan Twist (ft. K.O.G.). This is a big week for music so, if you need a kick to get the weekend off to a good start, then have a listen to the tracks below. I am excited to see what the rest of January holds and whether we will get the same sort of quality and quantity. Even though 2021 has started a bit poorly in some ways, when it comes to music, things have got off to…

IN THIS PHOTO: shame/PHOTO CREDIT: Sam Alexander-Gregg

A great start!

ALL PHOTOS/IMAGES (unless credited otherwise): Artists

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King of Leon – The Bandit

London Grammar – Lose Your Head

Nao (ft. Adekunle Gold) - Antidote

David Bowie - Tryin’ to Get to Heaven

slowthai (ft. A$AP Rocky) - MAZZA

PHOTO CREDIT: Cameron McCool for Interview Magazine

Alice Glass – SUFFER AND SWALLOW

PHOTO CREDIT: Ashley Verse

Tom Grennan – Little Bit of Love

Jazmine Sullivan - Girl Like Me

Taylor Swift - it’s time to go

PHOTO CREDIT: Tonje Thilesen for Notion

Vagabon (ft. Courtney Barnett) - Reason to Believe

PHOTO CREDIT: Ingrid Renan

Tamar Aphek – Russian Winter

Saweetie (ft. Doja Cat) – Best Friend

Virginia Wing – St. Francis Fountain

PHOTO CREDIT: Holly Whitaker

shame - Nigel Hitter

Saint Agnes – Repent

TV Priest - Press Gang

PHOTO CREDIT: Emma Swann

Black Honey – Believer

Rhye – Come in Closer

PHOTO CREDIT: Carla Mundy

Lonely the Brave – Keeper

Nubiyan Twist (ft. K.O.G.) – If I Know

ZAYN – Vibez

Charlotte Lawrence - Talk You Down

IN THIS PHOTO: Bill Callahan/PHOTO CREDIT: AveThirtyFour

Bill Callahan & Bonnie Prince Bill (ft. George Xylouris) - Rooftop Garden

Casper Clausen – Dark Heart

PHOTO CREDIT: Rachel Dray

Odette – Amends

Zara Larsson (ft. Young Thug) - Talk About Love  

Steve Earle – Lone Pill Hill

PHOTO CREDIT: Jonathan Vivaas Kise

Emelie Hollow - Don't Leave Me Now

Olivia Rodrigo - drivers license

PHOTO CREDIT: Linda Nylind/The Guardian

Bugzy Malone (ft. CHIP) - Notorious

PHOTO CREDIT: Scott Irvine

A Winged Victory for the Sullen - So That The City Can Begin To Exist

FEATURE: Modern Heroines: Part Twenty-Six: Kelly Lee Owens

FEATURE:

 

 

Modern Heroines

PHOTO CREDIT: Kim Hiorthøy 

Part Twenty-Six: Kelly Lee Owens

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FOR this instalment of Modern Heroines…

I am heading from New Zealand (where I focused on Lorde previously) to Wales, and to the door of the remarkable Kelly Lee Owens. She is one of my favourite artists of the moment, and I have loved her Inner Song – one of the best albums of last year. Not to discard her earlier work but, as Inner Song is her biggest album to date (her 2017 debut, Kelly Lee Owens, is terrific and well worth listening to), I am going to focus more on that. As usual with these features, I will introduce some interviews and a couple of reviews too. Rather than me share my thoughts regarding an artist and ramble a lot, I think that the information from interviews especially gives us more detailed and honest answers and background. Inner Song was included in many people’s best albums of 2020 and, as we are in a new year, I am interested to see where Owens goes next. She has not been able to tour Inner Song and do as much as she would have wished, so I hope that this year provides her with greater opportunity and exposure. I was interesting in learning more about the Electronic musician and producer. In an interview from The Guardian from May last year, we learn more about her move from London to Wales; we also discover more about some big themes that appear through Inner Song:

“When Owens moved from Wales to London in her 20s, she worked at Pure Groove records, where she met many DJs who encouraged her to pursue music. She had always been Team Indie, with a stint in the shoegaze band the History of Apple Pie, but the sessions for her former co-worker Daniel Avery’s Drone Logic album, on which she provided her hypnagogic vocals, turned her on to techno. Watching her friend in the studio with her future engineer, Ghost Culture, she says, “it seemed like they were crafting magic”.

Owens decided to craft magic of her own, ditched her band and started performing as a one-woman Berghain with synths and guitar. But as her popularity grew, her personal life started going south and she wasn’t enjoying her breakthrough success. “A relationship that I was in was quite destructive,” she says. “Me being me, I just powered through.” But then, “there were times when I was in bed, and I couldn’t move,” she admits. “I was trying to juggle lots of things to keep different people happy, and neglecting myself.” It’s a familiar story for women, putting others’ happiness ahead of our own. “We’re actually taught to do that, I think,” Owen agrees.

She recently dedicated a playlist of calming tracks to care workers, some of whom she is still in touch with from her hospital days, and who she is understandably concerned about. “The PPE [shortage] is absolutely huge,” says Owens. “I know a lot of doctors who are refusing to work, and I fully support them in that. The government is putting it as a war, so we have ‘heroes’, and actually all they’re doing is what they’d normally do with wars, which is to sacrifice people.”

Death crops up a little on Inner Song, including the destruction of the planet on the climate-crisis banger Melt!. But the album is also concerned with finding your way back to yourself. In a way, the making of it has been preparation for a scenario like the current moment: many of her lyrics suggest finding strength in solitude, atop kosmische soundscapes and 2-step beats. Owens’s voice is front and centre this time, instead of acting as another instrument, and we hear a lone male voice, too, on “psychedelic lullaby” Corner of My Sky: that of John Cale, whom she had asked to read a poem. It’s still rare to hear a lone male vocal on a piece of electronic music produced by a woman. “That’s quite bizarre, isn’t it,” ponders Owens, “but I think you’re right”.

I am interesting in sticking on the themes of Owens’ background and the themes she explores on Inner Song, as I love to see where artists came from and how they have developed. As Inner Song is such a beautiful and important album, it does require some deep consideration and exposure. Apologies if, like these features sometimes can do, there is a little bit of back and forth and a lack of rigid structure, but I have been scouring through interviews Owens conducted last year and some really fascinating information has come up. I want to bring in a few sections from an in-depth interview from NME, where we get a bit more of Kelly Lee Owens’ upbringing, and why trauma and death are areas that intrigue her:

“Kelly Lee Owens grew up, in her own words, as a typical “Virgo loner” in Flintshire on the north coast of Wales. She’d find comfort and joy in the musical world as opposed to “smoking on a wet pavement” with friends. In her bedroom, she’d play CDs and sing her own melodies atop, and came to master the bass, drums and more. Radiohead, The Cocteau Twins and New Order are key influences and she lauds their abilities to embrace melancholy but never abandon the rave.

Owens’ unflinching approach to empathy and inquisition has manifested itself in all parts of her career. At one point, she worked as an auxiliary nurse in a cancer ward, lending a helping hand to patients close to the end. She doesn’t consider death a taboo – she wants people to be educated in the complex emotions of mortality and grief in the same way that life is supported at birth. In the past year, more than 42,000 people are expected to have died from COVID-19 or associated illnesses.

 “There’s trauma in knowing there’s a sense of isolation in death,” she says. “Something I’m interested in, and seems to come naturally, is supporting someone through the last moments of their lives. When my Nan died, she was being held and I was talking to her through this moment. A family friend recently passed and I recorded voice notes to play to him as he passed. There’s huge fear and stigma around death, but we need to think about this more in general to support people through these times so it’s less traumatic”.

The record explores our connection and behaviour towards the natural world and the accelerating climate crisis. Initial reports suggested that a reduction in air and car travel domestically and internationally had led to a substantial drop in carbon emissions, but it’s now considered that lockdown has had a negligible impact on halting global warming. During these isolated periods, green spaces have nurtured healing emotions for some, while others reconsider the value of outdoor space”.

I want to introduce one more interview before I move on and bring in some reviews for Inner Song but, as I look ahead and see which artists are going to make real impressions, Kelly Lee Owens is in my thoughts. I think that she will be an artist who we hear a lot more from; someone who will grow stronger and more incredible with each album – someone who will go on to influence a lot of other artists coming through.

Inner Song is a beautiful immerse and fascinating album that not only provides some phenomenal musical moments, but we also learn quite a lot and are made aware of some very big and important issues. Rather than the album being preachy and heavy-handed. When she spoke with FADER last year, Owens was asked about the themes on the record and, again, how nature and the natural world plays a crucial role:

“Why do you think it took you until now to get to that place of understanding what you need?

Because none of this stuff is taught in educational systems. There's no emotional education. You find that often from specific people in your life, good friends or people who come into your life, or mentors. I had to discover it for myself through books, other things. One of them was actually sound and healing. But, yeah, the support systems just aren't really there. I believe that that's for a reason — I feel when you're able to deal with your traumas in life, you can actually thrive, and I feel like this society, these systems, don't necessarily want you to thrive — they want you to stay in survival mode.

I think it's just something that has to, unfortunately, be self taught, because we've lost the art of storytelling. We've lost the art of community. And we've lost the art of interconnectedness with all things. There’s this individualism which, I think, has created a lot of loneliness and disconnection. And it's not about that. Let’s hope that we can now have more conversations, and there's more places that people feel like they can go to. People always need a place to be, and sometimes that place can be music.

A lot of the record focuses on nature in quite an interesting way. Why did you want to grab at the hugeness of it all? It seems to focus on how consequential the world is beyond the human perspective.

I think the bigger perspective has always helped me. The collective experience is always something that I've tried to tap into. I do feel interconnected to everything else, I don't believe in the separation of anything. I think [the separation of humanity and nature has] been the greatest trickery of our existence. Well, it’s classic divide and conquer, hey? ‘Let's go beyond each other, let's go as far as nature, let's disconnect [indigenous peoples] from themselves, which is also the land, and everything.’ I'm trying to dismantle that [idea], also, which I feel is important, and connect to the collective experience — understanding that what I do affects you, what you do affects me, and affects nature. I'm talking about [nature] as a separate entity, but I do feel we are it.

These concepts of reconnecting with nature and slowing down one’s life might be seen by some as New Age-y. What grounds these ideas for you?

I hate that label, I fucking hate that shit. [That label is] another tool. It's another tool to make people out to be mad or have their ideas invalidated or say that it's not real. It's such bullshit. This is what's sad to me: all of this stuff, that's so basic, has been mocked for a long time. Maybe that's one of the trickeries in itself: making someone out to be a hippie, giving things bad names and bad labels so that people rubbish it. That’s one form of trickery in itself. I am a grounded person. All I'm saying is, I want people to be able to deal, to thrive, to not be in survival mode. To feel a sense of community and home. And if that's New Age-y and hippie and mocked in a bad way, so be it. That shit's real. Sorry, I've gotten a bit on my high horse here. People are just so quick to mock stuff, but I look at someone's life, whether it's, you know, [someone] working nine-to-five in a job that they hate, who is completely disconnected from themselves and other people. Surely that's not it. We're understanding that fundamentally that doesn't work”.

I really love what Kelly Lee Owens is producing right now and, whilst I have brought in interviews where we learn more about her process and what goes into Inner Song, I have not sourced any reviews to show what critics made of it. I really love the album and I think it was one of 2020’s very best. The reviews for the album were amazingly positive, and one only needs to listen to Inner Song for a few minutes to understand why. Here is what Loud and Quiet wrote when they praised such an incredible record:

“In 2017, Kelly Lee Owens emerged with her self-titled debut, determined to prove that she was more than just a voice you heard on other artists’ albums. She more than succeeded, with tracks like ‘Bird’ and ‘Arthur’ demonstrating that she too could craft the kind of undulating rhythms and mesmeric techno that peers Daniel Avery and Ghost Culture were gaining recognition for.

Fast forward a few years, and it seems that this time around the battle has been proving something to herself. “I wasn’t sure if I could make anything anymore,” she’s admitted, “and it took quite a lot of courage to get to a point where I could create again.”

The result of that struggle is stunning. On Inner Song, she’s stepped on, not away, from the dreamy pop and techno influences that had informed her output so far, and pushed them to places she can definitively call her own.

It’s not to say her previous work debut didn’t have anything to say, but it takes a heady mix of confidence, purpose and ambition to spin samples of melting glaciers and people skating on thin ice, and convert it into a juddering comment on climate change as she does on ‘Melt’. Even if you take that track without that context, it still stands as a bona fide banger with its thudding car-door-slamming bass battering you to a point of screwed-face, techno-fist satisfaction.

Elsewhere, Owens’ vocal tendrils wisp and twirl in the downtempo electronic haze of ‘Re-wild’, ‘Jeanette’ starts off in the world of Aphex Twin’s ‘On’ before reaching for the lasers without breaking stride, and ‘Night’ hits like an ice-cold version of Jon Hopkins’ ‘Open Eye Signal’.

The points of reference abound, but make no mistake, Inner Song is a showcase of Owens’ rich repertoire that sheds dream pop layers for deep, progressive house and barging techno. The subaqueous rhythms of her debut have evolved, and melodic spoken word intensity is explored on the John Cale collaboration ‘Corner of My Sky’.

Whatever she needed to exorcise to reach this point, it was worth it: this album is a leap in artistry that sees Kelly Lee Owens return fully-formed, hopefully more fulfilled, and damn near flawless”.

I have been listening back to Inner Song a fair bit over the past couple of weeks and I am being struck by songs that, maybe, had a lesser effect on my before. It is one of those albums that really does blossom and throw surprises at you the more you listen. If you have not bought Inner Song, then it is worth getting.

I will end with one more review – this time from NME. They gave the album five stars and were blown away when listening to such a masterful and memorable work:

“Elsewhere, Owens draws on the climate crisis and her love of nature: incorporating samples of melting glaciers and people literally skating on ice, ‘Melt!’ is a call for action, her clipped vocal disappearing into the distance. ‘Corner Of My Sky’, a collaboration with Owens’ homeland hero, the Welsh artist and former Velvet Underground member John Cale, tells the story of the land where they grew up via spoken-word, poetry and song. Carrying a cinematic atmosphere, it paints a vivid picture of why we should appreciate the natural world’s intricacies.

The poignantly instructive repetition of polysemic lullaby-like closer ‘Wake-Up’ stretches this idea, pondering the importance of stopping for a moment: “losing our minds for the short-term gain, short term everything; never pausing to take it in, always avoiding your sense of dread,” Owens sings, her timely lyrics documenting how easy it is to lose touch with what really matters in life.

By allowing her songs to breathe, leaving space for contemplation, ‘Inner Song’ is a perfectly-arranged album where each track has a part to play: an emotive-yet-euphoric collection that’s made for late-night reflection, Kelly Lee Owens has made one of the most beautiful records of the year”.

I shall stop there but, after two studio albums, and Kelly Lee Owens has established herself as one of the finest artists in the world. I think the next few years will be really successful and busy for her. As we begin to slowly move towards normality, she will get the chance to take Inner Song on the road and make up for some lost time. Kelly Lee Owens is a hugely inspiring human and…

A treasure of the current music scene.

FEATURE: The Lockdown Playlist: Songs from Great Albums Turning Twenty This Year

FEATURE:

 

 

The Lockdown Playlist

Songs from Great Albums Turning Twenty This Year

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I am enjoying putting together anniversary playlists…

and getting to think about some loved albums that we will spotlight this year. I am now focusing on the year 2001 and all of the very best albums from an amazing year for music. As these huge records celebrate their twentieth anniversary this year, I hope people who are not familiar with them pick them up and give them a spin. I think 2001 is one of the very best musical years and, as someone who grew up at that time and still in my teens, it was a period of revelation and discovery. To mark a wonderful year, here are songs from albums celebrating twenty years this year. I really like all of the albums, so it has been a pleasure to put together this…

LOCKDOWN playlist.

FEATURE: The Lockdown Playlist: Looking Ahead to the Release of Spare Ribs: The Best of Sleaford Mods

FEATURE:

 

 

The Lockdown Playlist

IMAGE CREDIT: Rough Trade 

Looking Ahead to the Release of Spare Ribs: The Best of Sleaford Mods

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I have not put together a feature…

 IN THIS PHOTO: Andrew Fearn (left) and Jason Williamson of Sleaford Mods

regarding the best albums to buy this month – as there are not that many -, but I have done for February. One of the two albums I am really looking forward to this month (aside from Arlo Parks’ Collapsed in Sunbeams) is Sleaford Mods’ eleventh studio album, Spare Ribs. It is out on the 15th of this month and I would urge people to grab it. This is what Rough Trade say:

“Poised to blow the cobwebs off life and unleash some much-needed wit and charm upon us, Sleaford Mods announce the forthcoming release of their astonishing 6th studio album, entitled ‘Spare Ribs’, on 15th January 2021.

Recorded in lockdown in a furious three-week studio blitz at JT Soar in July, the polemical Jason Williamson and dexterous producer Andrew Fearn kick against the pricks with unrivalled bite, railing against hypocrisy, inequality and apathy with their inimitable, scabrous sense of humour.   And ‘Spare Ribs’, featuring Amy Taylor of Melbourne punks Amyl and the Sniffers and the British newcomer Billy Nomates, finds the duo charged with ire at the UK Government’s sense of entitlement, epitomized by its devil-may-care approach to the coronavirus crisis.

Commenting on the new album Jason says, “'Our lives are expendable under most governments, secondary under a system of monetary rule. We are stock if you like, parts on a shelf for the purposes of profit, discarded at any moment if fabricated or non-fabricated crisis threatens productivity. This is constant, obviously and notably in the current pandemic. The masses cannot be present in the minds of ill-fitting leaders, surely? Or else the realisation of their catastrophic management would cripple their minds. Much like the human body can still survive without a full set of ribs we are all 'spare ribs’, preservation for capitalism, through ignorance and remote rule, available for parts”.

The album is out on a range of great formats – including cassette and MP3 -, and I think Spare Ribs is already going to be one of this year’s very best! Formed in 2007, Sleaford Mods features vocalist Jason Williamson and, since 2012, musician Andrew Fearn. To honour one of the most-anticipated albums of this year, this Lockdown Playlist collects together the best cuts from Sleaford Mods (their earliest album on Spotify is 2013’s Austerity Dogs (their sixth studio album), so I am only including songs from then onwards). Regardless, I think the songs on the playlist provide ample proof that Sleaford Mods are one of the most consistently brilliant and engaging acts in music. I am excited about Spare Ribs arriving so, in preparation, here are some golden gems from…

A mighty force.

FEATURE: Strictly Confidential: The Power and Pleasure of Dance as Therapy and a Way to Improve Your Mental-Health

FEATURE:

 

 

Strictly Confidential

PHOTO CREDIT: @dihrosa/Unsplash 

The Power and Pleasure of Dance as Therapy and a Way to Improve Your Mental-Health

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THERE are a couple of reasons why…

 IN THIS PHOTO: Comedian Bill Bailey won the latest series of the BBC’s Strictly Come Dancing/PHOTO CREDIT: BBC

I am mentioning dance and focusing on it now. On BBC Radio 6 Music, there is a show on the schedule where a single song is spun to provide ‘dance therapy’: everyone listening can get down and lose themselves to a proper banger! Rather than it being glib or a throwaway thing, the intent is to show how one can feel better and rejuvenated by dance. Of course, it takes more than a single song to properly elevate the mood, but the power of music and dance is proven. This year’s Strictly Come Dancing has been one of the most-discussed and, in a year when they have had to change things and it has been a bit strange, so many people were connecting over it and being affected by the impact dance had on the contestants! I am not much of a dancer myself but, as we are practically locked down and there is no opportunity to dance socially, many people are doing it in their own homes. I think 2020 was pretty  hard for many - and the toll that has taken on their mental-health is huge. Exercise is a great way of assisting with that, but I think that dance offers that extra boost of endorphins and, at the same time, you are physically connecting with music. I can well imagine, when people can go out and dance at clubs and gigs again, there will be this swell, as one of the most frequent things I have seen on social media is how people miss seeing live music and being able to get sweaty (and have that connection with the music).

 PHOTO CREDIT: @omgitsmattyvee/Unsplash

I am not suggesting that people exert that much energy when it comes to dancing, but if you are struggling with any range of mental-health issues, then dance can help. Maybe it is not possible to use dance professionally as therapy, but the idea of dance therapy is to help you think differently about your body. It can help when it comes to a lack of social connection; if you are living with low self-esteem, depression or some form of trauma, then movement is very beneficial. Here is some information regarding dance therapy (this is a useful organisation that can help) and what it can entail:

“According to the Association for Dance Movement Psychotherapy, dance therapy is “founded on the principle that movement reflects a person’s pattern of thinking and feeling.” The aim of this approach is therefore to use dance and movement to facilitate emotional, mental, spiritual and social growth.

In dance therapy, the body is considered the main form of communication and can be especially helpful for those who find it difficult to put how they feel into words.

Within sessions, a dance therapist will encourage you to communicate how you’re feeling using both verbal and nonverbal communication (like movement). Music may be included to help with this, alongside props such as fabrics and balls.

Dance therapy can be offered in a one-to-one setting (just you and the therapist) or in a group. Whichever format you choose, the relationship between yourself and your therapist will be key. Building rapport and trust will help the process, allowing you to be more open within sessions.

PHOTO CREDIT: @rainierridao/Unsplash 

That both body and mind are interconnected.

That physical movement can express aspects of our personality.

That non-verbal means can be used to communicate part of the therapeutic relationship.

That the movements we make can represent our unconscious processes.

That improvisation and experimentation can help to bring about changes and new ways of being”. 

There are obvious heath benefits to dance. One can do it recreationally or as part of a class. I have seen so many people express distress during this very dark time. Maybe they would feel inhibited or strange dancing at home – even if it is private -, so it might seem quite embarrassing. I can appreciate that. For those who want to take a class, there are articles that recommend good dance classes online (those you can do virtually). For me, the benefits of even simple dance – no more than a bit of a jig when there is a quiet moment – can really help out. When it comes to depression, the positives of dance are clear:

“One of the main reasons people dance is to modify their emotional state; typically, they strive to feel more joy and happiness and to reduce stress and anxiety. Since its inception dance therapy, similar to somatic psychotherapies, has emphasized the reciprocal interaction between body and mind, and the ability to regulate emotions via changes in body postures and movements.

PHOTO CREDIT: @aditya_ali/Unsplash 

The exploration of new movements can evoke novel perceptions and feelings. It may also facilitate seeing a wider range of possibilities in a given situation. Some new or old movement patterns may evoke repressed material and enhance better understanding of oneself and one’s environment and history.

One of the most compelling studies supporting this idea examined complex improvised movements, and identified unique sets of movement components that can elicit the feelings of happiness, sadness, fear or anger. The associations between emotions and specific motor components have been used in the past for diagnosis or emotion recognition. This study goes further and proposes specific techniques for modifying emotions”.

Online gigs/events like Dua Lipa’s Disco 2054 have really got people involved and dancing along; if you have been keeping abreast of Sophie Ellis-Bextor’s Kitchen Discos, then I would recommend you watch them. She has shown that you can create a mini-party in the home without too much effort – although she does crack the disco ball out! Everyone is going to be different regarding whether they feel comfortable being more exuberant and visible about their dancing or whether they want to do it in private. Even a little boogie at the desk can be nourishing. There are great playlists suggesting the best dance songs, and there is also a mix if you want to dance alone. Things will get better this year but, as so many of us have been living with mental-health problems and finding it hard to get motivated and see the positives, I feel that dance is a very good (temporary) solution. Whether dancing as therapy or doing it as a form of exercise, it will not take too long until you…

 PHOTO CREDIT: @mrakityanskiy/Unsplash

REAP the rewards.

FEATURE: I Can't Give Everything Away: David Bowie’s Final Masterpiece: Inside the Stunning Blackstar

FEATURE:

 

 

I Can't Give Everything Away

 David Bowie’s Final Masterpiece: Inside the Stunning Blackstar

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THE name of the final track on…

David Bowie’s Blackstar, I Can’t Give Everything Away, seems to define the album as a whole. Released on 8th January, 2016, not only did people not know much about the album and what it would sound like, but we lost Bowie only two days later from cancer. There was no announcement of his illness so, when he was making this album knowing his cancer was terminal, it must have been devastating knowing people would receive this phenomenal album and, after brief celebration, there would be worldwide devastation. The album was largely recorded in secret between the Magic Shop and Human Worldwide Studios in New York City with Bowie's long-time co-producer, Tony Visconti, and a group of local Jazz musicians – comprising saxophonist Donny McCaslin, pianist Jason Lindner, bassist Tim Lefebvre and drummer Mark Guiliana. For his twenty-fifth and final studio album, Bowie wanted to get away from Rock and styles that he had covered before. He and producer Visconti were listening to Kendrick Lamar’s To Pimp a Butterfly and were inspired by the fact that album is not a conventional Hip-Hop release – and they must have been intrigued by its deployment of Jazz sounds throughout. Although Blackstar is very much the work of David Bowie, I think the different genres he splices together is amazing. There is still Rock to be heard on Blackstar, but it is more experimental and industrial in its sound.

Together with some incredible Jazz, it is another case of the ever-changing Bowie being influenced by new sounds and directions. It is a shame that we will never get a follow-up to this amazing album. With musical elements of Boards of Canada, Death Grips, and D’Angelo, Blackstar was one of Bowie’s most experimental album in years. I think another tragedy about the bittersweet nature of Blackstar is that Bowie was on a fine run of form. 2013’s The Next Day was another surprise-released album and it got some incredible reviews. I can imagine Bowie in his seventies still making music and maybe trying something completely different. Rather than wonder what could have been and lament his loss, let us concentrate on one of Bowie’s most emotional and affecting albums. We can read some of the lyrics about him accepting death and mortality; there is a lot of foreboding through the songs but, even though he was very ill whilst recording, I think we get some truly incredible vocal performances. With seven tracks on the album, there are no wasted moments - and each song is over four minutes in length (the title track, which opens the album, is nearly ten minutes long). I am going to bring in a couple of reviews for Blackstar in a minute. The album gained a positive reaction and, whilst most critics were judging the album upon its release and prior to Bowie’s death, I wonder whether they would upgrade their scores when that news hit. I think Blackstar is an album that reveals itself across multiple listens and, since 2016, I have been spinning it a lot.

On 10th January, it will be five years since Bowie died - and I want to put out five features that address a different album/aspect of him. The BBC are celebrating the icon’s work in a series of shows, Bowie Five Years On, and it will bring his music to new people – it will also be sad to know that he is not with us anymore. I am going to finish off with a couple of reviews – one from 2016, and the other written last year. When they assessed the magnificent Blackstar, this is what Entertainment Weekly had to say:

“Nearly every track on Blackstar is strange and unnerving, almost wraithlike, but beautiful too; threaded through with elements of elegantly skronked-out jazz, serrated guitar lines, and swooning orchestral flourishes. (Longtime collaborator Tony Visconti is billed as coproducer, and a cadre of young jazz-world luminaries appear, including Donny McCaslin, Ben Monder, and Mark Guiliana.) The dreamy, multilayered “Lazarus” sounds like some gorgeous song-Frankenstein strung together from disparate but oddly complementary scraps of history: part smoky Weimar cabaret circa 1933, part Tortoise studio session circa 1993. “Sue or In a Season of Crime” is galloping and urgent, a cracked domestic dream of determined reassurances (“I’ve got the job/We’ll buy the house”; “The clinic called/The X-ray’s fine”) that turn desperate and vaguely murderous when Sue leaves the narrator for another man. “Girl Loves Me” is a slow, delicious spiral into nonsense and stomping melody whose only clear lyrical takeaway is the indignant refrain: “Where the f— did Monday go?” (Anyone looking for a little Victorian storytelling with their sadomasochism might like the arch, giddy, and wildly saxophoned“’Tis a Pity She Was a Whore” even more).

PHOTO CREDIT: Jimmy King 

Lines can be drawn from Blackstar back to Space Oddity and Aladdin Sane, the three-piece-suit-on-MTV ’80s and the industrial darkness and moody experiments of the ’90s and ’00s. But Bowie has never been much of a nostalgic or a self-mythologizer; he can’t be, really, when his vision beams so consistently in one direction: forward. Maybe that’s why Blackstar feels so vital, and arguably better than anything he’s done in years. There are more than enough narratives to follow down the rabbit hole here, and themes and imagery so dense they could probably be dissected for days or even weeks. Most of all, though, it’s the kind of album that works beautifully as a physical experience — an all-senses headphone surrender to the sound of an artist who is older and almost definitely wiser but still fantastically, singularly himself”.

I think, when the BBC and other celebrate the life of David Bowie and look back on his enormous legacy, albums like Blackstar will play a very big part. I will explore Bowie’s influence on the music industry and his different personnas in days to come but, to finish off, I want to bring in an AllMusic review from last year:

“David Bowie died within days after the January 8, 2016 release of Blackstar, an event that immediately shaped perceptions of his 25th album. Unbeknownst to all but his inner circle, Bowie wrote and recorded Blackstar after receiving word that he had liver cancer, so the album was certainly shaped through the prism of this diagnosis. A close listen reveals how the album is littered with references to dying -- indeed, it concludes with a note of acceptance in "I Can't Give Everything Away" -- but Bowie's remarkable achievement with Blackstar is how it's an album about mortality that is utterly alive, even playful.

Unlike its predecessor, 2013's The Next Day, Blackstar doesn't carry the burden of ushering a new era in Bowie's career. Occasionally, the record contains a nod to his past -- two of its key songs, "Sue (Or in a Season of Crime)" and "'Tis a Pity She Was a Whore," were even aired in 2014 as a supporting single for the Nothing Has Changed compilation (both are revamped for this album) -- but Bowie and producer Tony Visconti are unconcerned with weaving winking postmodern tapestries; now that they've shaken free their creative cobwebs, they're ready to explore. Certainly, the luxurious ten-minute sprawl of "Blackstar" -- a two-part suite stitched together by string feints and ominous saxophone -- suggests Bowie isn't encumbered with commercial aspirations, but Blackstar neither alienates nor does it wander into uncharted territory. For all its odd twists, the album proceeds logically, unfolding with stately purpose and sustaining a dark, glassy shimmer. It is music for the dead of night but not moments of desolation; it's created for the moment when reflection can't be avoided. Fittingly, the music itself is suspended in time, sometimes recalling the hard urban gloss of '70s prog -- Bowie's work, yes, but also Roxy Music and, especially, the Scott Walker of Nite Flights -- and sometimes evoking the drum'n'bass dabbling of the '90s incarnation of the Thin White Duke, sounds that can still suggest a coming future, but in the context of this album these flourishes are the foundation of a persistent present.

PHOTO CREDIT: Jimmy King 

This comfort with the now is the most striking thing about Blackstar: it is the sound of a restless artist feeling utterly at ease not only within his own skin and fate but within his own time. To that end, Bowie recruited saxophonist Donny McCaslin and several of his New York cohorts to provide the instrumentation (and drafted disciple James Murphy to contribute percussion on a pair of cuts), a cast that suggests Blackstar goes a bit farther out than it actually does. Cannily front-loaded with its complicated cuts (songs that were not coincidentally also released as teaser singles), Blackstar starts at the fringe and works its way back toward familiar ground, ending with a trio of pop songs dressed in fancy electronics. This progression brings Blackstar to a close on a contemplative note, a sentiment that when combined with Bowie's passing lends the album a suggestion of finality that's peaceful, not haunting”.

Blackstar is one of my favourite albums of the 2010s and, having been a fan of David Bowie for many years, I think enough time has passed so that I can appreciate the album on its own terms - rather than associating it with a musician who was close to death and this was his last gift to us. As we remember David Bowie on the fifth anniversary of his death (10th January), I know a lot of people will be highlighting various albums and sharing their thoughts regarding a musical genius. Although Bowie may have released better albums than Blackstar, I think his twenty-fifth studio album…

IS among his absolute finest.

FEATURE: Golden Years and Modern Love: Why David Bowie Is One of the Most Influential and Important Artists Ever

FEATURE:

 

 

Golden Years and Modern Love

PHOTO CREDIT: Masayoshi Sukita 

Why David Bowie Is One of the Most Influential and Important Artists Ever

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I am going to bring together…

 PHOTO CREDIT: Jimmy King

a few different articles because, as we mark the fifth anniversary of David Bowie’s death on 10th January, people will be remembering the great man and what he gave to the world. There are certain artists where it is so difficult to narrow things down to the music alone. When we think of David Bowie, the way he changed between albums and could easily adopt different genres and styles and mould them to fit his music is amazing! Whether The Thin White Duke, Aladdin Sane, Ziggy Stardust or David Bowie, this is a man who has transformed music and inspired so many musicians – not just artists we hear today but many in the 1960s onwards. I think many people think of Bowie’s musical influence in terms of specific artists and the fact that so many people in general cite him as an influence. Do we break things down by genre and consider his impact that way? Because Bowie stepped into so many different genres and made them his own, his influence has spread through the decades and resonated with musicians right across the sonic map. Before I dove deeper, I want to highlight the Los Angeles Times’ article of 2016. They provide us some background to a masterful artist:

“Born David Robert Haywood Jones in Brixton, London, on Jan. 8, 1947, Bowie shared his birthday (albeit 12 years later) with the king of rock ‘n’ roll, Elvis Presley, to whom many critics often compared Bowie for his barrier-breaking influence on popular music.

He was a fan of early American rock and R&B performers such as Little Richard, Fats Domino and Frankie Lymon, and he began recording folk music with a range of bands in the 1960s. As his own career began to take off, he changed his surname to Bowie, largely to avoid confusion with Davy Jones of the Monkees.

In 1969 he released the album “Space Oddity,” whose title song became his first British top 10 hit. Under the influence of T-Rex’s Marc Bolan, Bowie formed a short-lived band called Hype with guitarist Mick Ronson and bassist Visconti, who became a Grammy-winning producer with Bowie through his final album. A version of that group would evolve into the musicians behind some of Bowie’s groundbreaking work at the beginning of the ‘70s, starting with “The Man Who Sold the World.”

In 1976 he played the alien visitor in Nicolas Roeg’s “The Man Who Fell to Earth.” The same year he released “Station to Station,” which included the top 10 single “Golden Years.” He moved to Berlin and began working with producer-songwriter Brian Eno on a trilogy of albums (“Low,” “Heroes” and “Lodger”) that often featured brooding electronics.

In 1977 he appeared in another film, “Just a Gigolo,” alongside Marlene Dietrich and Kim Novak. He also starred with Catherine Deneuve in the 1983 supernatural thriller “The Hunger,” after having starred in a Broadway production of “The Elephant Man” in 1980”.

I want to lean heavily on an article from Billboard. It posits that Bowie influenced more genres than any other Rock artist – even someone as important as Paul McCartney. It is fascinating seeing ways in which David Bowie has put his mark on so many different genres:

“Actually, it's more than formidable. While many late rock stars are rightly saluted for their influence and impact, Bowie occupies a higher historical tier entirely. He's not just an influential rocker. He's not merely one of the most influential rockers. Among rock stars, Bowie influenced more musical genres than anyone else, living or dead. He is, in that respect, the most influential rock star.

Let's run through this. Obviously, no one is going to question how essential he was to glam rock. While The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders From Mars and Aladdin Sane ensured his long-term career and infamy, glam rock as a genre owes him just as much. If Bowie hadn't gone glam, history would remember it as a goofy, cute curiosity -- a sub-genre full of wacky fashion and frothy pop songs, but producing no serious content (apart from one or two T. Rex albums, depending on your taste). Most glam rockers are remembered as that -- glam rockers. Bowie, however, produced two albums squarely within the style while simultaneously transcending it. The aforementioned titles aren't simply glam classics -- they're rock classics. They're singer-songwriter classics. They are, simply put, works of art.

 And then there's folk. With "Space Oddity" alone, his importance to folk-rock (and what would later be known as freak folk) was forever sealed. But that wasn't it -- songs on Hunky Dory and The Man Who Sold the World only furthered his impact on the folkie singer-songwriter realm.

Bowie's importance to electronic music, however, is far more direct. With Low, Heroes and, to a lesser extent, Lodger, the Berlin Trilogy gave electronic music its first major rock world crossover. No, Bowie didn't invent anything new -- even before Kraftwerk, Silver Apples had been experimenting with synths and electronics in the late '60s, and classically trained composers started recording in that realm as far back as the '50s.

But Bowie took the icy, arty electronics of Kraftwerk and brought them to a comparatively mainstream audience. That's not to say Bowie ripped them off, though -- he and Brian Eno brought a new level of sonic cohesiveness to what Kraftwerk started. Trans-Europe Express is a pioneering classic, but certain songs on side one have dated. On the other hand, there isn't a note on Low that's aged since it dropped in 1977. It's not a timeless record -- it seems to exist almost entirely apart from time. His greatest artistic achievement, Low's impact wouldn't be fully felt for a generation -- it wasn't until Radiohead's Kid A that rock and electronic would once again meet and move forward in such a mature fashion.

But what, you ask, of hip-hop? Surely that's an example of a major genre Bowie had no discernible impact on. As odd as it seems, that's not true. Among rock stars who did impact rap, Bowie is an important name. His post-Ziggy soul/R&B period -- which produced the sax-y white soul LP Young Americans and the super-funky No. 1 single "Fame" -- actually had an immediate impact upon the R&B scene at the time. By 1975, no one was more important to funk music than George Clinton, and on Parliament's immortal Mothership Connection, Bowie not only gets a shout-out, but even served as the inspiration for its centerpiece, "Give Up the Funk (Tear the Roof Off the Sucker)."

As for jazz, Bowie did work with Pat Metheny in the '80s, and he recruited a jazz backing band for his final effort, the experimental Blackstar. But even though Bowie dabbled in jazz, he didn't exactly impact new jazz music that came out after him. Then again, he was vital to the progressive expansion of rock in the '70s, which has inspired a number of jazz musicians since then”.

Bowie was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1996 and won a Lifetime Achievement Grammy Award in 2006. His stunning 1972 album, The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars, was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame in 1999. The icon has sold over one-hundred-million records worldwide, making him one of the best-selling music artists. In addition, five of Bowie's albums appear on Rolling Stone's list of the 500 Greatest Albums of All Time; four of Bowie's songs appear on the Rolling Stone list of the 500 Greatest Songs of All Time. Not only that, but four of his songs are included in The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame's 500 Songs that Shaped Rock and Roll!

 PHOTO CREDIT: Masayoshi Sukita

There seems to be no end to David Bowie’s importance and impact on the music world! I will take from a few more articles before wrapping up, as I was not aware of the sheer breadth of Bowie’s legacy. I know that Kate Bush saw Bowie perform for the last time as Ziggy Stardust in 1973 but, as this article explores, another huge artist got a taste of Bowie at a young age – it also outlines ways in which Bowie influenced wider society:

“David Bowie was the first concert Madonna ever attended. He was a collaborator of the Rolling Stones and Iggy Pop. He produced Lou Reed and sang with Bing Crosby. He sang with Queen and composed for The Flaming Lips. In fact, the list of artists Bowie has collaborated with in some form or fashion is hundreds of entries long. It’s a staggering body of work.

Moving away from music though, Bowie is considered a fashion icon and David Bowie’s influence is still being felt. Clothes fit him well and his constantly changing persona allowed him to wear whatever caught his fancy but his style was his own, no matter how many times it changed. People noticed and their work was influenced by him. Go to any fashion show, be it the work of Dries Van Noten, Jean Paul Gaultier, or Emilio Pucci, and you’re bound to see some piece that oozes with Bowie’s style and stature.

Bowie influenced art as well, both as a performer and a visual artist. His appearances always walked the line between a musical concert and a performance art piece featuring pink poodles with TV’s imbedded in their bellies or giant puppet costumes just to name a few. As an artist himself his work has gained quite a bit of attention. His show “David Bowie Is” shattered attendance records at the Chicago Museum of Contemporary Art”.

Forgive me for going back and forth regarding themes and such but, as there is so much to cover regarding Bowie’s influence on the world, some form of structure may go out of the window! Even though Bowie inspired so many L.G.B.T.Q.I.A.+ artists with his different personas and revolutions, he had a hard time convincing people that he was a different person away from the stage. I can imagine it must have been hard for him to get people to see David Jones rather than Ziggy Stardust or one of many different personalities that we saw through music or on the screen. Bowie’s impact on the music world in pure sonic terms is obvious, but I want to quote from an article that shows how his exploration of gender and gender roles influenced culture and is still influencing artists today. In Kirsty Diana Smith’s article of 2018, we learn more:

“Before Bowie’s famous showcase of defying gender norms, Ziggy Stardust, came to be, he was already causing shock with the cover of his third album in 1971, The Man Who Sold the World. Bowie’s long hair and silk dress contradict the typical expression of the rock and roll genre of the album. Due to the controversy it caused this cover was quickly changed, and was never released in the United States. Around this time period, Bowie would also leave the house dressed in women’s clothes (Odhn Rimbaud, online video, 2013) demonstrating how he was unafraid to go against social norms: in fact, he deliberately tried to. In 1972 Bowie released his concept album The rise and fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars, introducing the world to his creation: the androgynous alien who had come to earth in human form. Ziggy was drawn from Bowie’s time in New York spent with Andy Warhol and The Velvet Underground.

IN THIS PHOTO: Lady Gaga

Bowie’s influence on culture is incomparable when it comes to the advancement of discussions and attitudes towards sexuality and gender. In an era when it was still looked down upon to to come out as gay, Bowie remained unashamed in his exploration of his sexuality: announcing labels to the world; contradicting them; changing them, and taking them back (Bell, website, 2016). His openness to the possibility of not being heterosexual and his eagerness to express himself in unconventional ways impacted on many people’s personal acceptance of themselves.

The influence Bowie, particularly his Ziggy Stardust phenomenon, has had on music can be traced throughout the decades. It is likely a lot of the music released since the 1970s, along with the artist’s performance techniques, would not be the same if it hadn’t been for Bowie (Odhn Rimbaud, online video, 2013). The release of Bowie’s 1980 music video for Ashes to Ashes marked the arrival of new wave and new romanticism where boys could wear make-up and the weirder your clothes were, the better (Fletcher, interview, 2016). The impact of his gender fluid performances on modern day music can be seen perhaps most notably in Lady Gaga.

Although it is impossible to know for sure exactly what art and culture would exist today if the spotlight had never found Bowie, it is clear that a lot of what we know today; stretching from music to fashion to cultural acceptance, would not be the way it is if it were not for the creative bravery of David Bowie”.

It will be sad to celebrate David Bowie’s seventy-fourth birthday on 8th January and then, two days later, mark five years since we lost him. Other people will go into more depth regarding the sheer scope of Bowie’s influence: from his incredible liver work and changing faces, through to his constant musical innovation and curiosity, to his way of being able to predict the future – no less his views (in 1999) of how the Internet would change the world (and not necessarily always for the good). I just want to bring in one more article. This one from The Observer in 2017 argues that David Bowie is the most influential artist ever – something that is hard to argue against! I just want to bring in a few different segments:

“Even when he was charging headlong into the future, Bowie embraced the classic, the traditional, the appeal of history. He wasn’t politicized, although many have co-opted his image and his messages for political purpose, the heavy burden of advocacy was not there. Here was the radical honoring Marlene Dietrich, transforming into the Thin White Duke while wearing her famous tuxedo. Here was the avant-gardist singing a “Little Drummer Boy” medley with Bing Crosby on his “Merrie Olde” Christmas special.

What other rock star could do that without looking like he’d been tamed?

Here was the freaky provocateur turning to big swelling instrumentals at the end of “Life on Mars,” or bluesy jazz at the end of “Changes.”

For those on the fringes he was a standard bearer. He gave the audiophiles a magical complexity. But for the rest of us—or maybe just me—one year later and for always, what matters are the “boring” bits of Bowie. The variety of sound. The act of giving meaning to glamour. The grit amidst the glitter. A black star in the sky shining down on us all”.

On the fifth anniversary of his death, we will remember a legend who left us too soon. Even though he is no longer with us, his influence is everywhere! From mainstream artists through to ordinary teenagers struggling to find themselves and who they are, he has transformed society and music. It is clear that David Bowie has left…  

SUCH an untouchable legacy.

FEATURE: The Lockdown Playlist: Songs from Great Albums Turning Thirty-Five This Year

FEATURE:

 

 

The Lockdown Playlist

Songs from Great Albums Turning Thirty-Five This Year

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IN this next part of Lockdown Playlists…

that unite songs from albums who have a big anniversary this year, I am looking back to 1986. I was born in 1983, and I think my earliest memories of music were from that sort of time. I grew up around albums and songs from that time so, thirty-five years later, it is nice to listen back to these amazing albums! Some say that album anniversaries are arbitrary and it does not really make them any better or more relevant. I would disagree, as we get to celebrate albums that had a big impact when they were released; we get to see how they have affected people through the years and, if we are lucky, these albums will reach a whole new generation. To mark big albums of 1986, this Lockdown Playlist is a collection of some songs that…

TAKE me right back.