What does it sound like?:

Revved up and raring to go after touring with The Ramones, Talking Heads flew to the Bahamas to record at the newly opened Compass Point Studio with Brian Eno in the producer’s chair. They were a band in hurry, battle-hardened and armed with a clutch of songs they knew worked a crowd. Rather than separate into constituent parts, Eno recorded them as a single unit. The early run-throughs are the band playing together, live, all in the same room, with minimal Eno treatments. As a result, disc two of this set is fantastic: raw, frantic with energy, but as tight as a gnat’s chuff. The band clearly can’t believe their luck, loving their job and working in such a beautiful part of the world. David Byrne chortles away with delight at the beginning of the alternative With Our Love, hardly the cheeriest of songs, and the sense of glee pervades the whole project from beginning to end. It’s not often the work-in-progress tracks sound so great but these are definitely worth repeated listens.

John Cale had taken Eno to see Talking Heads perform almost a year before. A smitten Eno invited them to » Continue Reading.

What does it sound like?:

Last year, Claudia Brücken celebrated a significant birthday with a round number. Bearing in mind she first enjoyed pop success in the eighties with German band Propaganda, you can guess which one it was. In fact, their first album, A Secret Wish, was released exactly forty years ago, a rather grand affair, typical of the label ZTT. The producer was Stephen Lipson “under the supervision of” Trevor Horn, but you can barely tell the difference. Brücken’s contribution to the songwriting and distinctive co-lead vocal, were an essential part of its character. The band quickly broke up in acrimony, fuelled by Brücken’s relationship with Paul Morley, when they discovered their contract meant they weren’t going to make any money, ever. Since then, apart from spending the nineties bringing up her two children, she has remained musically active furrowing the by-ways of the music industry, often working with others, including ex Propaganda members and OMD’s Paul Humphreys. xPropaganda’s The Heart Is Strange in 2022 was a third attempt at a reunion but only involved Brücken, Susanne Freytag and Lipson, and not Micheal Mertens and Ralf Dörper. It’s a fine album, if indicative of the complications of » Continue Reading.

What does it sound like?:

Keith Jarrett is the pre-eminent solo piano performer of his generation. His Köln Concert is legendary, a remarkable improvisation, despite, or because of, a dodgy piano. It’s one of the best selling jazz albums of all time, shifting over four million copies. He has released many solo piano recordings before and since. His first was in 1972, Facing You, the product of spending a day in an Oslo studio bunking off from The Miles Davis Septet. New Vienna is his twenty-fifth, most captured live. In addition, there are another four solo multi instrument LPs. Jarrett clearly enjoyed playing alone, expressing himself through his fingers, just him and his instrument.

The Köln Concert was recorded in 1975, when his performances were characterised by emotional intensity and physical energy. Twenty years later, he contracted Chronic Fatigue Syndrome and was forced to change his style. He had to play with greater economy and focus more on the beating heart of his artistry with fewer dramatic flourishes. He resprung the keys on his piano so that they flowed more smoothly, requiring significantly less initial pressure to get through the so-called breakaway, like piercing the surface tension of water. » Continue Reading.

What does it sound like?:

After more than forty years in the music business and fifteen studio albums, plus two as a solo artist, how does a songwriter like Mike Scott keep the creative juices flowing? Your heart might sink a little when you learn he has gone for a concept album, a chronological song cycle based on the life and times of Dennis Hopper, especially if you’ve heard the rather bland track, Dennis Hopper, from 2020’s Good Luck, Seeker. However, there is hope in that Scott has always been a decent story teller with an ear for a catchy tune, chooses his collaborators wisely and the life he describes here was certainly eventful. His mastery of a range of musical genres means he can capture the flavour of the psychedelic sixties, the cynical, narcotic seventies and the chaotic, narcissistic eighties, and throw in curveball ventures into thrash, lounge jazz, country, Hollywood strings and collage to capture the milestones in Hopper’s story. After all, The Waterboys have been through various phases themselves: “Big Music”, folk, “raggle taggle”, rock, Celtic, soul, blues, hip-hop, electronica, dance and funk. A Scott biography of Hopper is a tantalising prospect.

Dennis Hopper’s first films » Continue Reading.

What does it sound like?:

By 1975, Walter Becker and Donald Fagen retired from touring, kicked off their shoes, ensconced themselves in their studio and amused themselves putting crack session musicians through their paces recording their weird and peculiar songs. They’d had three Billboard top ten singles, still getting radio plays, and three well-received albums that sold well. The first, Can’t Buy A Thrill, sounded like a various artists showcase for their songwriting, with multiple lead vocalists and a bewildering range of musical styles, from Bossa Nova through Rock and Pop to Jazz and show tunes. Countdown To Ecstasy featured a tight band that really cooked with spectacular twin guitars. Pretzel Logic was polished and slick and damn near peerless.

They reinvented the notion of Rock band as a faceless entity, one without any kind of frontman. For many, the only photo of the band was in hazy black and white on the back of Countdown To Ecstasy, and that charisma-free collection of hairy herberts tells you everything. Their songs demanded an arms-length semi-detachment. They were criticised for emotional sterility but if your subject matter includes ruthless corporate greed, alienation, a sordid affair, a missing drunken father, a » Continue Reading.

What does it sound like?:

In Richard Ashcroft’s mind, he performed stratospheric anthems to enraptured stadiums, lighters aloft, even when playing to three figure audiences in a town hall. You can’t fault his ambition, his self belief and his ego. For a brief period of time, with the release of Urban Hymns in 1997, his vision was realised. The Verve’s third album replaced Oasis’s third at number one in the UK and threatened to supplant them altogether. The comparisons were uncanny. Both bands were from greater Manchester, the friction between singer and guitarist was often unbearable, and the songs churned away at the same steady beat. In September, The Verve were the support for Oasis at Earl’s Court, but the success of Bittersweet Symphony and The Drugs Don’t Work made it into a battle of the bands event that many thought The Verve won. For the first two albums, Nick McCabe’s guitar was relied upon to light up the music. But, he left in a huff and the replacement, a much easier going gentleman called Simon Tong, was handy for keyboards as well. McCabe returned to help record Urban Hymns, by which time Ashcroft had discovered it was much » Continue Reading.

What does it sound like?:

Three years ago, when Madfish issued American Dreamer, an 8 LP box of her first seven studio albums plus an extra platter of bonus material, Laura Nyro fans cried, “What about CD?” Now, Madfish have gone all in with this gargantuan 19 CD limited edition box set: 10 remastered original studio albums, each with their own disc, 6 live albums including 2 previously unreleased live concerts, Laura’s original demo tape from 1966 and a bonus disc of rarities including mono versions, alternative takes and live tracks, plus a 90-page coffee-table book with liner notes by Vivien Goldman and a foreword from mega-fan Elton John. They won’t be crying now, except maybe over the expense.

Laura Nyro began her career as a quiet, introspective teenager with prodigious talent, recording her first album at 19 years old. Her songs seem to be wrung from her very being, burning with an intensity that belies her years. They stand out for her unconventional use of meter and rhythm, and dramatic emotional range. Her lyrics are routinely referred to as “poetic” because they are both beautiful and elusive. If you allow her to, she will scorch your soul and » Continue Reading.