LIVE: CHVRCHES – 25/02/2013

– THE RUBY LOUNGE, MANCHESTER – So, It’s a bitterly cold Monday night and I’m keeping out of the cold in the lush surroundings of The Ruby Lounge, hoping to be uplifted and warmed by Glasgow based outfit Chvrches. Having only formed in 2011, Chvrches have caused quite a stir with their retro electro tones, […]
– ACADEMY 2, MANCHESTER – Everything Everything are one of the great success stories to emerge from Manchester since the turn of the century. The band themselves reflect on their earliest days as fledgling art-rockers in and around the city a few times during the night, and here they are riding high on the wave […]

LIVE: EVERYTHING EVERYTHING – 22/02/2013

Single Review: Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds – Jubilee Street

I always had a bit of a gripe with the TV series 24 – which claims to be a drama screened “in real time”. Fair play, one hour after it has started, the story has moved on by an hour – but you have actually only watched 42 minutes of action. In fact, a bit […]
The end is so often embedded in the beginning – so it is with Kavinsky. Clocking up 30 million views on Youtube thus far due to the song’s Drive cameo, ‘Nightcall’ has propelled this French 80s cinematic throwback act into a very modern overnight sensation (a cross between the Terminator and Beverly Hills Cop soundtracks […]

Album Review: Kavinsky – OutRun

LIVE: WOLF ALICE – 21/02/2013

– TROF FALLOWFIELD, MANCHESTER – It’s my first time at Trof in Fallowfield and I’m not quite sure what to expect. Here to catch North London’s garage pop-four piece Wolf Alice on tour in our fair city, I stumble up the awkwardly narrow staircase into a room full of well-dressed music enthusiasts decked in their […]
– SOUP KITCHEN, MANCHESTER – Flannel shirts, member only jackets and Levi jeans bring back distant memories of the 90s and I am expecting more of the same tonight with London’s shoe gaze specialists Mazes stopping off at Soup Kitchen before continuing along on their nation wide tour. I’m pleasantly surprised to find Pierre Hall’s […]

LIVE: MAZES – 19/02/2013

LIVE: COSMO JARVIS/RUBY-ANN PATTERSON – 14/02/2013

– SOUP KITCHEN, MANCHESTER – As you are all aware, today is the trashy commercial day often called Valentines, so I thought there would be no better time to lose my Soup Kitchen virginity and head to the venue for the first time. Good beer on tap, fun toilets and an eclectic mix of a […]
– SOUND CONTROL, MANCHESTER – A few years back I was reading an article about this up and coming artist called Darwin Deez; a 20 something hipster living in New York, working in a well respected vegetarian restaurant making lo-fi pop hits with jazzy guitar tones, quirky vocal hooks and jittery electro beats. Intriguing, right? […]

LIVE: DARWIN DEEZ – 15/02/2013

Album Review: Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds – Push The Sky Away

There is famously a darkness to everything Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds create. Sometimes it’s glaring, violent, in your face darkness, like the bubbling anger and mystery of ‘Red Right Hand’, or the title of their ninth album ‘Murder Ballads’. Even Bad Seeds songs that seem harmless enough on the surface always have something […]
– GORILLA, MANCHESTER – The first time I encountered Connor O’Brien’s Villagers was almost too perfect. They were first on the Park Stage on the Sunday of Glastonbury 2011, a festival that was bathed in unusually hot June weather, a glorious weekend that had lead to an almighty cumulative 3 day hangover on the Sunday […]

LIVE: VILLAGERS – 13/02/2013