Live Review: Radiohead (The Quietus)

Back in the early 90s Thom Yorke used to DJ at my local student disco with Felix from Basement Jaxx. Who would have known that the men spinning The Farm's 'Groovy Train' and James' 'Sit Down' would end up making such an impact on popular music over the next two decades? "Radiohead may appear morose to some for their refusal to engage in rock music's standard routines... but their music has an ability to inspire passion of each and every kind." That's what I wrote here, anyway, after I'd seen their first ever show in Prague: http://thequietus.com/articles/02585-reading-leeds-festival-preview-radiohead-in-prague-live-review

Live Review: Radiohead (The Quietus)

Feature: The Music Industry Is Dumb Part 37,573 (The Quietus)

Record labels are dying, they say. But whose fault is that?

"You know that sensation when you've spent ten minutes leafing through a menu choosing which of the delectable items is worth your cash, only to be told by a disdainful waiter that, sorry, it's not actually available? That's the feeling I get every time I read about a new record and then discover I can't buy it for months..." Ah, well. It's probably leaked anyway. No wonder people don't buy records anymore.

Read my full rant here: http://thequietus.com/articles/02447-radiohead-versus-the-release-schedule

Feature: The Music Industry Is Dumb Part 37,573 (The Quietus)

Album Review: It's Immaterial - Song (Uncut)

5/5
Criminally overlooked literate synthpop classic

Four years after ‘Driving Away From Home’ pegged them as one hit wonders, Liverpool duo John Campbell and Jarvis Whitehead’s second album was greeted by universal apathy. Much like The Blue Nile’s Hats the previous year – which shared producer Calum Malcom – its lush electronic sounds oozed vulnerability, but whereas Paul Buchanan crooned soulfully of twilight romance Campbell’s melancholic delivery focussed on “the sound of ordinary lives”. Haunting portrayals of Thatcherite suburbia – where “Sunday means ‘wash the car down’“ – linger in the imagination, and the frustrations of unemployment may never have been so sympathetically evoked as on ‘Endless Holiday’. Indispensable.

Album Review: It's Immaterial - Song (Uncut)

Album Review: Jacques Dutronc - Et Moi Et Moi Et Moi (Uncut)

4/5
French legend’s late ‘60s output mined

Celebrated in Cornershop’s ‘Brimful Of Asha’, Dutronc won over French audiences by mixing rock ‘n’ roll, French chanson and lyrical cynicism. A former arranger at Vogue Records – he also wrote for future wife Francoise Hardy – he released his debut single ‘Et Moi…' in 1966, its garage rock leaning on ‘Subterranean Homesick Blues’ while brutally mocking contemporary self-righteous narcissism. With twenty two tracks sourced from his first three albums, including the psychedelic ‘Hippie Hippie Hourah’, the thunderous ‘Les Cactus’ and dancefloor classic ‘Le Responsable’, this compilation easily and belatedly justifies Dutronc’s place alongside Gainsbourg in French culture.

Album Review: Jacques Dutronc - Et Moi Et Moi Et Moi (Uncut)