Manchester
Meet: Interview With Fearless Vampire Killers, 12.5.15
Ever polarising and fascinatingly dark, Fearless Vampire Killers are a testament to the idea of staying true to yourself, in spite of anyone else. Through being told their album wasn’t good enough and splitting with their record label, the band released their second album Unbreakable Hearts last year- confident in the knowledge their fans would …
Live Review: Lower Than Atlantis / We Are The Ocean / PVRIS – Manchester Academy 2, 14.04.2015
Openers Pvris brought a barrage of synth infected pop-rock tracks from their debut album White Noise (2014). Ironically starting out with Smoke, which quite literally was the only thing that clouded over the bands performance. “Can you cut the smoke? We’re not that cool” vocalist Lyndsey Gunnulfsen stated however the intensity of the smoke didn’t …
Meet: Davey Richmond, Glamour Of The Kill Interview
Glamour Of The Kill are a band who like to keep busy. If it’s not on their own headline tour then it’s in support of other bands, making connections that have lead to many a collaboration both on their own songs and others. However in the here and now, Glamour Of The Kill are headed around …
Meet: A Conversation With Jon Kennedy
Being a music writer, I get the chance to hear and meet some pretty amazing artists. Just when I think I’ve heard it all here comes five other musicians that blow me away. Artists doing their own thing in a unique way. And not only that, but my eyes are opened to music and music …
Album Review: The Charlatans – Modern Nature
The Charlatans are an ageing Indie Holy Cow, the kind of band whose back catalogue xfm love to (very) selectively mine when they’re not heavily rotating the execrable Kasabian and the fading Kings of Leon. There are legions of fans, they’ve been around for over 25 years, and they have produced some decent tunes like ‘Just When You’re Thinking Things …
Live Review: Inspiral Carpets – Leadmill, Sheffield 6.12.14
The haircuts were considerably shorter, and maybe the clobber was a few sizes bigger than ‘back in the day’, but with the amount of Adidas trainees, Italian sportswear and sun hats been worn in the queue outside the Leadmill, it wouldn’t have taken a genius to deduce that one of the legends of the Madchester …
Live Review: Belle and Sebastian – Manchester Cathedral 28.10.2014
Manchester Cathedral is a magnificently historic, Gothic edifice. On paper at least, giving a band like Belle & Sebastian the opportunity to play its hallowed nave appears both inspired and a mite sacrilegious, in a naughty-but-nice way. Is this not the band that sings about getting a “dose of thrush from licking railings” amidst other …
Meet: Mercury Nominees GoGo Penguin interview
Its been quite a few weeks for Manchester Jazz Trio GoGo Penguin. Fired skywards by their recent Mercury Barclaycard Album of the Year nomination, they followed it up with a spot on Live on Jools Holland the other night. After a couple of years skirting around the edges of public consciousness, which saw heavy support …
LIVE: Northside. Brudenell Social Club, Leeds 17/03/14 + View from the pit gallery
‘Shall we take a trip down memory lane? … …Flashback to your days of youth. You’ve been there once, you’re living proof.’ Northside – ‘Shall we Take A Trip’ Looking around the Brudenell on Thursday night certainly was a trip down memory lane. So much terrace and baggy era retro gear on display you could …
EP Review: Eerie Glue//Joey Fourr – ‘Yr New Favourite EP’
I reckon every recording artist both signed and unsigned pre-about-2000 has at one point in their career recorded music in the Lo-fi style. The mental image of a young Rick Astley crooning into a 4-track tape recorder accompanied only by a rickety nylon-string may startle more than say, Keith Morris doing it, but I suspect …