• The Singer, Not the Song – Five Singers Who Didn’t Write the Lyrics

    March 19, 2014 - By 

    There’s a school of thought that suggests you have to mean every word you sing, that the songs are born out of personal experience, and you need to live it like you sing it. Nick Drake and Ian Curtis delved to the depths of their souls, and lost their lives in the process. Mark Kozelek and Mark Eitzel exposed their own failings and regrets through songs, whilst Elvis Costello laid himself bare, inviting the world to pass judgement. But whilst this does make for an intensely personal listen, it doesn’t strictly mean that you have to suffer for your art…

  • Getting re-acquainted: ZZ Top – Sharp Dressed Man (1983)

    March 4, 2014 - By 

    Like a punch in the face, ‘Sharp Dressed Man’ explodes out of the speakers, a sleek, streamlined beast of a song, riding a pulsating electric beat into the horizon. Never mind the suits, the beards, and the cool cars, ZZ Top’s legacy to popular music is making hard rock that you can dance to. Trying to sound ‘modern’ is the kiss of death, but when you do it as good as this, you’re onto a winner. Eliminator, ‘Sharp Dressed Man’s parent album, kinda came out of nowhere. ZZ Top had been a very successful boogie-rock band, churning out blues riffs,…

  • 20 Years of Being Brave – How Marillion Crawled Back From Obscurity

    February 20, 2014 - By 

    Twenty years ago, a record called Brave hit number ten on the UK album chart. It was by a band who had best been known for ‘Kayleigh’, a hit single they’d had nine years earlier, fronted by a different singer. It’s all ancient history now, but the band are still going, and whilst they’re still largely known for that hit single, the hardcore fans have been celebrating the Brave anniversary with much fanfare, a veritable army of fans rhapsodising over the raw, emotive music contained within the album. But how can a band who are arguably remembered for one 29…

  • Classic Album: The Smiths (1984)

    February 13, 2014 - By 

    Hindsight is a wonderful thing. After 30 years of disappointments, you can look back and see exactly what started it all, throwing all amount of history and emotional baggage on top of it to make some kind of distorted, grotesque picture of what it was like. But when you sit down to listen to The Smiths‘ debut album, which celebrates its 30th anniversary this month, you’d be forgiven for wondering what all the fuss is about. For an album that supposedly changed everything, it’s so damn ordinary. The Smiths’ debut had a tortured genesis, involving betrayal, back room deals, and…

  • Ten Reasons Why You Should Love Iron Maiden

    January 20, 2014 - By 

    Whether you like it or not, Iron Maiden are one of the most successful British bands of the last 35 years, ignoring traditional methods of support to stay at the top of the pack. They’ve (fairly) consistently managed to stay ahead of their peers, and even after all this time, still manage to pull out a few surprises. They’re going to be spending a large portion of 2014 on the road, effectively laying rest to their 80s legacy in a series of epic gigs all across Europe. But for those of us who’ve never appreciated the unique charms of the…

  • Stephen Malkmus & The Jicks – Wig Out at Jagbags

    January 8, 2014 - By 

    Whether he likes it or not, Stephen Malkmus is one of the building blocks of indie rock, an essential strand of DNA that manifests itself in certain choices and attitudes towards music that have dominated the agenda since about 1990 or so. And since the messy dissolution of dear, departed Pavement back in 1999, he has more or less done everything he can to distance himself from that role, picking up his guitar, and soloing long into the 21st century, reinventing himself as a kind of Jerry Garcia for the post-Nirvana age. Which, it might generally be assumed, is a…

  • The End of an Era? How a Generation Got Beat Pt. 2

    November 28, 2013 - By 

    Over the years, ATP has become a watchword for a certain kind of classicism, an “accepted history” of what ‘good’ music is over the last 30 years. In this version of events, punk is good, rock is largely bad, unless it doesn’t take itself seriously, although “new” metal is ok. Electronica is generally given a by ball. Bands like Mission of Burma, Yo La Tengo (below), and The Flaming Lips are regarded as in the same way Mojo readers regard The Beatles, The Rolling Stones, and Eric Clapton, and many of the younger people there are aware they’re seeing something…

  • The End of an Era? How a Generation Got Beat Pt. 1

    November 27, 2013 - By 

    I looked down at my wrist. I held the scissors in my other hand, almost trembling with excitement. Or was it fear? I couldn’t say. Closing my eyes, I felt the pressure in my fingers, and heard the gentle sound of metal slicing through ribbon. After three years of wearing my ATP 2011 wristband, I removed it, like a surgeon operating on a tumour. I still hadn’t slept properly since The End of an Era Part 1, the first half of the festival’s great farewell, but the magic had been broken. If this was the end, then it was a…

  • The Love That Dare Not Speaks Its Name – Why It’s Still Not Cool To Like Progressive Rock

    November 7, 2013 - By 

    There’s a certain school of thought that declares punk rock as the saviour of music, wiping away an era of awful, bloated sounds. It was essentially the ‘Second Coming’ of good music, without needing a ‘First Coming’ to justify that title. “NO FUTURE!” screamed the punks, but what they really meant was “NO PAST”, and over the years, as the music press has become populated by the disciples of punk, this has become accepted as fact. And of all the victims of this cull, none fell further than progressive rock. With the way people listen to music having irreparably changed,…

  • Classic Album: The Wicker Man OST (1973)

    October 31, 2013 - By 

    What is the sound of fear? Over the years, musicians and composers have tried various things, and certain tropes have emerged: the stabbing strings, the gothic grandeur, the discordant noise, or the Theremins and strange electronic sounds. But back in 1973, Paul Giovanni and Magnet took a completely different path, tapping into an altogether more earth vein of horror, capturing the cruel majesty of The Wicker Man. For many people, The Wicker Man is one of the towering giants of horror (if you’ll pardon the pun), a masterpiece of sustained dread that digs deep into our hearts to unearth a…