Gallery
Live: Anna Calvi – Dark Mofo Festival, Hobart
Anna Calvi, described by Brian Eno as ‘the best thing since Patti Smith’, put on an absolutely blistering show at Dark Mofo this year. A combination of a mesmerising wild stage presence, virtuoso guitar shredding and an operatic voice that mixed scaling dizzy heights with impassioned screaming, Calvi was the complete package. Covering mostly songs …
Live: FKA Twigs – Dark Mofo Festival
FKA Twigs ended her gig as she started: alone and unadorned: a remarkable rendition of her current single ‘Cellophane’. In the vast cavernous Mac2 hall on Hobart’s waterside in the midst of the outrageous and ambitious Dark Mofo Festival, she put on a mesmerising performance that made the big venue intimate and kept the crowd …
Live: Dirty Three- Dark Mofo Festival
Dirty Three were recently called ‘one of the world’s greatest living bands’. It’s simply true. It was 1pm on a Sunday over the Dark Mofo weekend, the first of two gigs in one day for the band. I pondered, given their duties later on, whether the band would hold back, keep their powder dry, for …
Live: Dark Mofo Festival – Costume
Like some new romantic looking for the tv sound, Adam Ouston (under the nom de plume Costume) could have been straight out of London’s infamous Blitz Club in the eighties. Architecturally impossible hair, layered makeup, glittering outfits, strobing lights and angular backing dancers in a mist of dry ice – all the ingredients were there. …
Live: Dark Mofo Festival – Sharon Van Etten
In the creaky, weary, glorious old Odeon Theatre in Hobart, Tasmania, Sharon van Etten made an explosive, incandescent start to the one of the most brilliant festivals in the world today. Her voice, incredible on record, is extraordinary live: ranging from operatic, soaring highs in ‘No-one’s Easy to Love’ to growling exhortations in ‘Seventeen’ where …
Live Review: Richard Hawley/Studio Electrophonique – The Picturedrome, Holmfirth. 04/05/2019
Me and the musical Prince of Sheffield Richard Hawley have history. Sadly, history that he’s blissfully unaware of. Back in 1989, or it could have been 1988, slightly drunk on cheap cans of Skol, Richard Hawley thanked me after I said ‘nice job’ or some suchlike pleasantry after seeing his band of the time Treebound …
Live: Fontaines D.C. at Gorilla, Manchester on 13 April 2019
Fontaines D.C. have just finished their first major tour across Europe, a tour that essentially was off the back of a couple of outrageously good singles last year and at pessimistically smaller venues. It was sold out everywhere. The Gorilla in Manchester, sold out this night, has a capacity of up to 700 punters. In …
Live: Papa Roach and Nothing More – Leeds O2 Academy – 21/04/19
The sound of an air raid siren rings around Leeds O2 Academy as Jonny Hawkins, vocalist of lone support band Nothing More, is stood atop a ladder towering over the crowd. The American rockers launch straight into a blistering set of energy and big hitting songs to match. Christ Copyright is a crowd favourite but …
Live: Siobhan Wilson – Saint Luke’s Glasgow 3.2.2019 Plus Gallery
Siobhan Wilson ensures that the Celtic Connections festival ends on a high note, with an eclectic set of new songs, old favourites and stunning covers at Saint Luke’s. 2019 has seen the most widespread Celtic Connections festival since it began in 1994 – with 2000 artists from 25 countries taking part in 300 events on …
LIVE: Escape The Fate- This War Is Ours Anniversary Tour, Gorilla Manchester, 25/01/19
A lot of things can change in ten years; relationships, work, opinions, goals- anything really. However one thing that has remained unwavering over the decade since its release is the fervour and the love Escape The Fate fans have for their second album (first with current vocalist Craig Mabbitt) This War Is Ours. It is …