Music news

• Pete Oxley/Nicolas Meier: The Colours of Time review – stretching the guitar's exotic range

  22-12-2016 23:45
  
  (MGP)Pete Oxley and Nicolas Meier have already stretched the confines of the jazz-guitar duet by their broad world-musical interests and exotic range of instruments – as they memorably revealed on last year’s Chasing Tales album. Half of this typically melodious two-album set revisits that duo format, with bass and drums added on the second disc. The pair’s favourite sources – Pat Methenyesque songs, Hot Club swing, Latin cool, Turkish music – are prominent again, w
  
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• Fews: Means review – angular urban psychedelia

  22-12-2016 23:45
  
  (PIAS) Fews wear their influences on their sleeves. The piercing, angular guitar lines suggest they’ve been listening to early Interpol. The stark textures and angsty vocals recall The Back Room-period Editors, who in turn had been listening to Joy Division and the Cure. However, while the Sweden-based band aren’t yet wildly original, they do bring something different to the party. Mostly, a sense of careering, urgent turbulence, in which they simultaneously sound haunted and exhilar
  
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• Noname: Telefone review – nostalgic, intricate coming-of-age hip-hop

  22-12-2016 23:30
  
  Noname’s modest, intricate mixtape describes her coming of age experiences with such sweet reverie it makes you nostalgic for a childhood you never actually had. With both Knowles sisters and A Tribe Called Quest examining black identity on their career bests this year, the Chicago star similarly processes life as an African American (on Casket Pretty she imagines being shot by police), rapping about heartache and morality with glitchy electronic-soul as a soundbed. A vintage filter runs t
  
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• Daniel Avery: DJ-Kicks review – master technoist at work

  22-12-2016 23:15
  
  (!K7) Related: Daniel Avery's favourite tracks DJ mixes often get short shrift compared to studio albums: they’re not entirely new creations and anyway, with streaming sites curating intuitive playlists for your every mood, surely the skill for selecting music is becoming extinct? Not so the esteemed DJ-Kicks series on !K7 Records that, along with the mix series from Fabric nightclub and – less clubby, more laidback, the Late Night Tales series – is long dedicated to the art of
  
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• The Clang Group: Practice review – spikily irreverent and singular

  22-12-2016 23:00
  
  (Domino)Before becoming one of the producers who helped defined the sound of British pop in the 80s – with Madness, Dexys, Elvis Costello and more – Clive Langer had played with Deaf School, a Liverpool group who played a John the Baptist role in paving the way for punk and new wave in Liverpool. Aged 62, he has released his first album with a new group, and picked up where Deaf School left off 40 years ago. Practice is an album that manages to combine strangeness and accessibility,
  
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• GFOTY: Call Him a Doctor review – irreverent pastiche of a 'basic bitch'

  22-12-2016 22:45
  
  (PC Music)Like her PC Music compatriot Hannah Diamond, GFOTY (it stands for Girlfriend of the Year) is part parody. Specifically, the persona of 26-year-old Londoner Polly-Louisa Salmon is pastiching the “basic bitch”, that memetic term denoting myopically consumerist and dispiritingly dim womanhood. On stage she carries a Starbucks cup, on record she spouts cod-profundities like “Dying alone could be hard – especially if you have a dog”.Related: PC Music: the futur
  
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• Arborist: Home Burial review – acoustic warmth and world-weary depths

  22-12-2016 22:30
  
  (Kirkinrola)It says something about the quality of the debut album by Belfast-based Arborist that Kim Deal’s appearance on Twisted Arrow is merely one of many high points. Still, getting Deal to sing a duet on the album was a coup, and a surprising one: Arborist do not sound obviously influenced by Pixies or the Breeders. Home Burial’s gently acoustic arrangements are easy on the ear – it’s tempting to simply luxuriate in the oaky warmth of The Force of Her Will, the cres
  
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• Anderson .Paak: Malibu review – breezy blend of R&B, funk, soul and pop

  22-12-2016 22:15
  
  (Steel Wool)When an album as strong as Malibu fails to dominate the end of year polls, you know it’s been a strong year for R&B, funk, soul, pop and pretty much every other genre elegantly incorporated here. Sunny yet substantive, Anderson .Paak’s second studio album shows he is as at home settling into a breezy club groove over euphoric brass (Am I Wrong, featuring Schoolboy Q) or unleashing James Brown-esque funk yelps as he is waxing autobiographical tales of family hardship,
  
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• Francis and the Lights: Farewell, Starlite! review – fleet-footed modern pop

  22-12-2016 22:00
  
  (KTTF)As well as having a quite ridiculous name, Francis Farewell Starlite has one of the juiciest phonebooks in pop: he’s produced Drake, Frank Ocean and Chance the Rapper (who declared him “the new Prince”), and this album’s lead single, Friends, features Bon Iver and Kanye West. But he’s much more than a canny networker, producing fleet-footed modern pop with just the right amount of whimsy. The almost percussion-free opening track See Her Out (That’s Just
  
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• Justin Bieber indicted by Argentinian court

  22-12-2016 21:39
  
  The singer is facing charges from an incident three years ago.
  
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• Trygve Seim: Rumi Songs review – playful, guileless, accessible jazz

  22-12-2016 20:00
  
  (ECM)Norwegian saxophonist and composer Trygve Seim has created plenty of fine large-ensemble jazz and world music, but this lineup uses only sax, accordion, cello and vocals to accompany the writings of the 13th-century Persian poet and mystic Jalal al-Din Rumi – sung in English by mezzo-soprano Tora Augestad. Seim is a voicelike saxophonist, and his tenor and soprano horns wreathe enchantingly around Augestad’s serene recitations throughout this set. There’s playfulness as we
  
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• Toot sweet: the recorder renaissance

  22-12-2016 18:57
  
  Lucie Horsch, a 17-year-old prodigy, has just scored a major label contract, but she’s the latest of many great musicians to decide the recorder isn’t just for kidsLucie Horsch arrives with a small backpack from which she produces half a dozen recorders of various sizes. Showing the skills of an assembler of Ikea furniture, she puts them together at lightning speed, before giving a demonstration of her art.Horsch is the latest big thing in recorder playing, if that’s not a cont
  
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• Get To Know: Roosevelt

  22-12-2016 18:46
  
  Get to know Roosevelt in our exclusive interview...
  
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• Sir Terry Wogan helped me enjoy 'crazy amount of success', says Katie Melua

  22-12-2016 18:25
  
  The singer has just been awarded a Medal of Honour in her home country of Georgia.
  
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• Surviving Your Family At Christmas

  22-12-2016 18:12
  
  Just so much bad chat.
  
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• It's Christmas! The best festive songs, chosen by Slade, Neil Diamond, the Waitresses and more

  22-12-2016 18:00
  
  Slade, Loretta Lynn, Run-DMC and Mike Batt have given us some all-time Christmas classics. But what’s the one Christmas song they couldn’t get through the holidays without? They – and other festive hitmakers – give us their picksChosen by Jim Lea of Slade, whose 1973 single Merry Xmas Everybody is the definitive Christmas hit Continue reading...
  
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• Pokémon Generations Episode 18 Trailer: The Redemption

  22-12-2016 17:06
  
  Watch the trailer for the next episode of Pokémon Generations right here!
  
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• Seong-Jin Cho: Chopin review – mature, touching and passionate debut

  22-12-2016 16:30
  
  Cho/LSO/Noseda
  (Deutsche Grammophon)Seong-Jin Cho’s first studio recording brings together the concerto with which the 22-year-old pianist won the coveted Chopin prize: “the composer’s No 1”, with the four Ballades for solo piano. In an interview in the CD booklet, he says some delightfully insightful and mature things about the quiet passages being the ones you have to watch out for, and, given how Chopin’s music needs above all to sing, his excitement at working w
  
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• Moonface and Siinai: My Best Human Face review – strangeness and charm

  22-12-2016 16:30
  
  Take one admired Canadian rock auteur, add a Finnish Krautrock band and the result is an inventive blend of supercharged songs
  No one could ever accuse Spencer Krug of a taking a languorous approach to his music. Over the last decade, the Canadian singer-songwriter’s output has been torrential: he’s released something like 20 albums and EPs, under an impressive variety of names. The most famous is Wolf Parade, a Montreal quartet whose very name can cause a certain kind of Pitchfork-s
  
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• MTV Records: Metronomy

  22-12-2016 16:06
  
  We spoke to Metronomy's Joe Mount about The Beatles, Kendrick Lamar and why there's nothing quite like record shopping..
  
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• Apparently Zayn Malik Has Proposed To Gigi Hadid Just One Year After Ending His Relationship With Perrie Edwards

  22-12-2016 15:46
  
  BUT WHAT DID SHE SAY?!
  
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• The 16 Most Naked Celeb Outfits Of 2016

  22-12-2016 15:10
  
  Butts, boobs and butt nekkid body parts.
  
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• 16 Beauty Trends That Blew Up On Instagram In 2016

  22-12-2016 15:09
  
  The good, the bad and the downright weird.
  
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• How The Snowman melted David Bowie’s heart

  22-12-2016 14:00
  
  The late, great singer’s filmed introduction to the animated Christmas movie might be one of the least well-known parts of his career. But Bowie was a huge fan of Raymond Briggs, as those involved in the film recallIn summer 1984, Iain Harvey was in London’s Charlotte Mews, behind the offices of the animation company TVC. He was wondering how, in four years, he had gone from being finance director at publisher Hamish Hamilton and being interested in doing something with a remaindered
  
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• Ex On The Beach: Geordie Shore's Aaron Chalmers Admits He Gets Sent D*ck Pics On Snapchat - EXCLUSIVE

  22-12-2016 13:17
  
  Don't miss brand new Ex On The Beach 6, starting Tuesday 17th January at 10pm - only on MTV!
  
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• NSFW: Were These The Most Shocking Music Videos Of 2016?

  22-12-2016 13:16
  
  It's safe to say that nobody saw some of these videos coming...
  
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• Readers recommend playlist: your songs about nightmares

  22-12-2016 13:00
  
  A reader picks a playlist to end a year we’re hiding under the pillow from – including songs from Joy Division, Fleetwood Mac and Eminem
  Here is this week’s playlist – songs picked by a reader from your suggestions after last week’s callout. Thanks for them all. Read more about how our weekly Readers Recommend series works at the end of the piece.We’ll begin with the comment that set the nominations off – a note on the year and how in tune we thought the
  
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• 16 Of The Best Celebrity Bums Of 2016

  22-12-2016 12:52
  
  The real life peach emojis.
  
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• Get To Know: Kungs

  22-12-2016 12:48
  
  Get to know Kungs in our exclusive interview...
  
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• This Pokémon Go Fact Is Mind Blowing

  22-12-2016 12:32
  
  We definitely contributed to this.
  
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• 12 Things You'll Only Relate To If You're A Younger Sibling

  22-12-2016 12:11
  
  Hand-me-downs = life.
  
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• Kylie Jenner Posts Another Busty Insta Pic Sparking More Boob Job Rumours

  22-12-2016 11:52
  
  Fans think she’s starting to look more like Kim Kardashian…
  
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• The 25 Stages of Christmas

  22-12-2016 11:38
  
  1. Building up the courage to check your personal finances.
  
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• 10 Lessons Alessandra Ambrosio Taught Us About Becoming A VS Angel

  22-12-2016 11:20
  
  So basically if you follow these rules you can walk in next year's show* (*not guaranteed)
  
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• People On Instagram Are Turning Their Hair Into Christmas Trees And It's Festive AF

  22-12-2016 10:55
  
  Rocking around the Christmas weave.
  
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• 13 of the best holidays for animal lovers

  22-12-2016 10:54
  
  Swimming pigs! Washing elephants! EVERYTHING FLUFFY AND AWESOME!
  
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• Rudimental Tease Niall Horan Collaboration As Liam Payne Registers First Solo Song

  22-12-2016 10:28
  
  We need them and we need them now.
  
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• Celine Dion shares heartfelt video about remembering the 'happy and sad days of the past year'

  22-12-2016 09:43
  
  Celine Dion had a message of love. The songstress took to her Instagram account to share a special pre-holiday message for her fans. In a 30-second video, the My Heart Will Go On singer spoke about reflecting on the past year. "Hi everyone, the holiday season is here again. A time when we remember the happy and the sad days of this past year," the 49-year-old said in part during her message.Celine thanked her fans in a pre-holiday message 
  
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• Underground music gets scrutiny after deadly Oakland fire

  22-12-2016 08:15
  
  The party is over at Purple 33. About a week after 36 people died in a fire at an underground music party in Oakland, inspectors acting on a complaint discovered a makeshift nightclub and unpermitted living ...
  
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• Björk on sexism: 'Women in music are allowed to sing about their boyfriends'

  22-12-2016 00:48
  
  In an open letter posted on her Facebook page, the Icelandic artist wrote about the sexism she and other female artists face when they cover complex subjectsBjörk has written an open letter addressing the sexism she claims to have received, stating that female artists are criticised if they “don’t cut our chest open and bleed about the men in our lives”.The Icelandic artist took to her Facebook page to post the letter, which began with her stating that in her career she ha
  
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