Music news

• Wire: Silver/Lead review – post-punk veterans at their most melodic and enigmatic

  30-03-2017 23:15
  
  (Pink Flag)After mapping out post-punk with their first three albums in the 1970s, and taking various excursions since, Wire’s 16th continues the Indian summer that began Change Becomes Us in 2013. They may not take the brave leaps into new territories they once did, but instead explore the detail in the terrain they themselves uncovered. Thus, repetitive rhythms nestle alongside walls of fuzz. However, this is a slower, more melancholy Wire, one that finds them at their most melodic and e
  
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• Jamiroquai: Automaton review – escapist futurism and libidinous love songs

  30-03-2017 22:45
  
  (Virgin EMI)Jamiroquai’s eighth album straddles two traditional scenarios: a dystopian, digital future and booze-soaked sunny days spent spying on sophisticated ladies. Set to the sounds of French touch, disco funk, Tron movie scores and Bond-style strings, there are agitated prophecies – such as on synth onslaught Automaton – and libidinous love songs: he worships at the feet of a cosmopolitan female on Summer Girl, while Hot Property is about a woman whose mind is so sharp th
  
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• Nelly Furtado: The Ride review – a hit-and-miss patchwork of trendy pop styles

  30-03-2017 22:30
  
  (Eleven Seven) Related: How Nelly Furtado's Loose created a blueprint for modern pop You could never call Nelly Furtado’s career consistent, but it has been consistently surprising: from the chillout pop of her breakout hit from 2000, I’m Like a Bird, to the sexpot grind of Maneater, the Spanish-language album Mi Plan and 2012’s divisive alt-pop outing The Spirit Indestructible. Her comeback is certainly an unexpected ride, bumpily rollercoastering on John Congleton’s eag
  
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• British Sea Power: Let the Dancers Inherit the Party review – written more in hope than despair

  30-03-2017 22:15
  
  (Golden Chariot/Caroline)British Sea Power’s first album of new material in four years was written against a backdrop of what guitarist Martin Noble calls “politicians perfecting the art of unabashed lying, social media echo chambers and electronic toys to keep us befuddled”, and it brims with pre-Brexit panic. However, there is more hope than despair, as the songs look to ordinary people to escape “international lunacy”. There’s real vim in these tunes &ndash
  
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• Mastodon: Emperor of Sand review – metal progressives serve up melodic mischief

  30-03-2017 22:00
  
  (Reprise)Mastodon fans seem to come in two forms: disgruntled diehards who prefer “the early stuff” and an increasingly huge mainstream rock contingent who will doubtless be delighted by the straightforwardly melodic fare that makes up much of the band’s seventh album. The first four tracks all follow a familiar template, with drummer Brann Dailor driving everything along at a breathless clip and big, alt-rock refrains that, as memorable as they are, exhibit little of Mastodon&
  
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• Joey DeFrancesco: Project Freedom review – passionate soul-jazz

  30-03-2017 20:00
  
  (Mack Avenue)The Hammond organist Joey DeFrancesco has been making amiably hard-swinging albums for years, and has often distinguished himself as an intelligent sideman for stars such as David Sanborn. But Project Freedom is one of the Philadelphian’s most personal journeys into his favourite soul-jazz territory yet. Songs by everyone from Sam Cooke (A Change Is Gonna Come) to John Lennon (Imagine) surface on the tracklist. DeFrancesco adds wah-wah effects to the familiar Hammond sound, an
  
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• Tigran Hamasyan: An Ancient Observer review – accessible Armenian-inspired solo piano

  30-03-2017 19:45
  
  (Nonesuch)With the 2015 album Mockroot, Tigran Hamasyan and a powerful trio injected shots of 21st-century hip-hop and funk into folk melodies inspired by the young pianist/composer’s Armenian heritage. An Ancient Observer is a quieter solo piano trip to similar sources, inspired by the ancient and modern contrasts Hamasyan observed on his return home after more than a decade living in the US. His polished classical touch often combines with his affection for the struts and pirouettes of f
  
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• Gimme Gimme Gimmicks: the innovations that changed music videos

  30-03-2017 19:44
  
  Shaking Chains have created an AI-powered video that changes with every play, but how does their attempt rank in the pantheon of music video gimmickry?Even before The Buggles’ Video Killed the Radio Star kicked off the MTV era in August 1981, the music video has proven fertile ground for innovation. The short running times, limited expectation on returns and the eternal quest for something new have combined to give music video directors freedom for pushing the boundaries. For viewers, what
  
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• How Well Do The POWER RANGERS Cast Really Know Each Other?

  30-03-2017 19:17
  
  Are the Power Rangers ultimate #SquadGoals? We test how well the super crew really know each other!
  
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• Orchestra Baobab: Tribute to Ndiouga Dieng review – classy return for Afro-Cuban stars

  30-03-2017 19:00
  
  (World Circuit)Orchestra Baobab have enjoyed an extraordinary career. In the 1970s they shook up the music scene in Senegal with their unique, lilting blend of traditional African influences and Afro-Cuban dance styles. Then they broke up for 16 years, before returning in 2001 to be hailed as cult heroes. This is only the third new studio album they have released since then, and their first in a decade, following a series of personnel changes. Guitarist Barthélemy Attisso has left to conc
  
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• The unlikely renaissance of Slowdive: ‘Shoegaze became the genre of ridicule’

  30-03-2017 18:55
  
  Twenty years after a Britpop-obsessed music press drove them out of town, the re-formed band’s sound can be heard in the music of everyone from Tame Impala to the 1975. Not that their kids are impressedRachel Goswell can’t pinpoint the exact moment the music press turned on Slowdive. But she knows it was sometime between 1991, when Melody Maker described an early EP as “impossible, immaculate and serene”, and 1993, when a writer from the same publication said he would &ld
  
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• 13 Of The Best Ugly-Cry Proof Eyeliners

  30-03-2017 18:35
  
  All hail the waterproof wonders.
  
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• Exclusive! Go Behind The Scenes Of Kasabian's 'You're In Love With A Psycho' Video

  30-03-2017 17:46
  
  We go on set with Tom and Serge and their alter egos Noel Fielding and Stephen Graham...
  
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• Traces Of Literal Human Poop Have Been Found In Coca-Cola

  30-03-2017 17:22
  
  So that's great.
  
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• Sampha Had Us Feeling All Loved Up After His Show At The Roundhouse London

  30-03-2017 17:07
  
  A wonderful, soul cleansing evening that left us felling warm inside and full of love, thanks Sampha!
  
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• The 8th Door/Bluebeard's Castle review – Scottish Opera's compelling tour of Bartók's horrors

  30-03-2017 16:58
  
  Theatre Royal, GlasgowKaren Cargill is a ravishingly vulnerable Judith to Robert Hayward’s subtle Bluebeard, but a newly devised prequel, The 8th Door, feels aimless and triteWhat to do with Bluebeard’s Castle? Bartók’s single-act opera is so devastatingly complete, so ravaging in musical and emotional impact, that it needs nothing more or less than what unfolds within its own beautiful, horrifying arch. But opera companies like a double-bill. There are prosaic reasons,
  
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• Charli XCX, Years & Years, The Vaccines Confirmed For MTV Presents Gibraltar Calling!

  30-03-2017 16:52
  
  Plus some very special throwback artists on the Classic Stage
  
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• Bob Dylan: Triplicate review – sensitive and exquisite 30-song extravaganza

  30-03-2017 16:51
  
  With his third album of covers, Dylan is a dependable connoisseur, whose choices illuminate his own compositions
  (Columbia)With his third album of covers in a row – this one a 30-song extravaganza of old favourites such as Sentimental Journey, As Time Goes By and Stormy Weather – the casual observer might assume that Bob Dylan is subjecting his long-suffering fans’ forbearance to its most stringent test since 2009’s Christmas album. But on Triplicate – as it was wit
  
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• Shostakovich: Preludes and Fugues CD review – Donohoe's directness brings dignity and power

  30-03-2017 16:45
  
  Peter Donohoe
  (Signum)Shostakovich’s 24 Preludes and Fugues pay tribute to JS Bach, but are they parodies? Sometimes they sound it. Peter Donohoe doesn’t think so. Even where Shostakovich’s music is often mined for sarcasm or coded messages, Donohoe treats these piano miniatures with utmost sincerity. His new recording of the complete set isn’t introspective or showy; it isn’t overly reverent or sensationalist. Above all his playing is frank, sometimes to the point
  
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• Sophie Kasaei Shares Her Bloody Funny First Period Story

  30-03-2017 16:44
  
  Good times.
  
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• Meet The Characters Of Netflix's 13 Reasons Why

  30-03-2017 16:41
  
  Get up to speed on who's who.
  
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• 17 Times The Nintendo Miiverse Got Way Too Real

  30-03-2017 16:39
  
  The online community is one of the most batshit crazy corners of the gaming universe.
  
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• Pergolesi: Stabat Mater/Bach: Cantatas CD review – fiery, sumptuous singing

  30-03-2017 16:30
  
  La Nuova Musica/Bates/Crowe/Mead(Harmonia Mundi)I was excited about this recording because it features two of my favourite baroque voices of the moment – countertenor Tim Mead and soprano Lucy Crowe, but it turns out the instrumental playing is just as enticing. La Nuova Musica, under David Bates, sound lush and languid in two of Bach’s alto cantatas (BWV 54 & 170). They let phrases sigh and breathe and supply a decent amount of bass under properly expressive melodic lines. In Pe
  
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• Warpaint review - shimmering dreampop toughens up live

  30-03-2017 16:19
  
  The Dome, Brighton
  The LA band are a good proposition live, especially dynamic drummer Stella Mozgawa. Though they sound decorative, it’s not twee or wispySometimes success is a puzzle: why should one band triumph, rather than another, similar sounding one? Warpaint make very pleasant dreampop records, but so do plenty of bands. Yet the California quartet are way out in front, and it’s hard to hear why. Until you see them live. Then it starts to make sense.
  As a band, they’re a
  
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• Kate Whitley: I Am I Say CD review – unpretentious and appealingly vigorous music

  30-03-2017 16:15
  
  Multi-Story Orchestra/Stark etc(NMC) Kate Whitley co-founded the Multi-Story Orchestra in a car park in Peckham, London, with several intentions, chief among them getting an audience closer to the music they were hearing and away from ingrained listening habits of the concert hall. A similar drive seems to underpin the unpretentious, appealingly vigorous and visceral music she writes.Related: Orchestral manoeuvres in the car parkContinue reading...
  
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• 16 People Whose Dates Went Worse Than Yours

  30-03-2017 16:08
  Oh gahhhd.
  
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• 12 Of The Most Bizarre Celeb Social Media Rants We've Ever Witnessed

  30-03-2017 16:03
  
  Errr, huh?
  
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• MiC LOWRY Reveal Exclusive 'Whiskey Kisses' Music Video Shoot Pics

  30-03-2017 16:02
  
  Get the vibe of their latest vid first with MTV here...
  
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• Goldfrapp: Silver Eye review – a decent but unsurprising return to synthpop | Alexis Petridis's album of the week

  30-03-2017 16:00
  
  Their first few years saw a series of radical transformations, but as the duo return to synthpop, another big shift – and adventure – is overdueGoldfrapp’s seventh album seems fascinated by the subject of transformation. A song inspired by a documentary about transgender children – “become the one you know you are,” urges its chorus – rubs shoulders with a song in which a man turns into a tiger. It’s not entirely clear whether this second change is
  
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• Dvořák: The Spectre’s Bride CD review – choral music takes a wild nocturnal ride

  30-03-2017 16:00
  
  Šaturová/Breslik/Plachetka/Wiener Singakademie/ORF Vienna SO/Meister
  (Capriccio) There could be the dramatic skeleton of an opera lurking beneath the cantata veneer of The Spectre’s Bride, Dvořák’s choral work which was commissioned for the 1885 Birmingham festival but first tried out in the Bohemian city of Pilsen a few months earlier. Based on a poem by Karel Jaromír Erben, about a young girl who is abducted by a ghost she believes to be the spirit
  
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• Galway Girl (Lyric Video)

  30-03-2017 15:20 via mtv.co.uk
  
  Galway Girl (Lyric Video)
  
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• Father John Misty: ‘I get sick pleasure out of reading about how much people hate me’

  30-03-2017 14:02
  
  Josh Tillman says he has given himself permission to self-destruct again. He talks about turning his latest album, Pure Comedy, into an ‘insane’ musical – and why Trump’s victory was like the Gen-X humour he was weaned on ‘having a cruel orgasm’ in his mindOne wintry evening in London, Josh Tillman, the American singer-songwriter better known as Father John Misty, is sitting on a hotel balcony and talking about Leaving LA, the intensely personal 13-minute-long
  
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• A SECOND Love Actually Sequel Is Happening And It Will Have One Big Difference

  30-03-2017 13:58
  
  There will be a US version of the Love Actually sequel.
  
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• Selena Gomez Just Released A Chilling Cover Of ‘Only You’ For 13 Reasons Why

  30-03-2017 13:43
  
  ONE DAY TO GO.
  
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• The Geordie Shore Fam Reckon Gaz Beadle Will Make A Great Dad And Reveal Why He'll Be First To Settle Down - EXCLUSIVE

  30-03-2017 13:30
  
  Don't miss brand new Geordie Shore: New Radgie Rampage, Tuesdays at 10pm - only on MTV!
  
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• Having A Hot Bath Could Burn As Many Calories As Working Out

  30-03-2017 13:10
  
  Hot baths ftw.
  
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• 21 Secret Easter Eggs Hidden In 'Zelda: Breath of the Wild' That Change Everything

  30-03-2017 13:01
  
  You might not have noticed these secrets hidden in the new Zelda game...
  
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• Teen Mom UK's Megan Salmon-Ferrari Announces Birth Of Her Second Child

  30-03-2017 13:00
  
  Awww!
  
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• Readers recommend playlist: songs with proverbs and idioms

  30-03-2017 13:00
  
  A reader waxes lyrical in taking us through a playlist from your suggestions. BB King, Frank Sinatra and New Radicals all featureHere is this week’s playlist – songs picked by a reader from your suggestions after last week’s callout. Thanks for taking part. Read more about how our weekly series works at the end of the piece.Confucius aside, and having lived with them for a few days poring over your nominations for this playlist, I find the proverb typically English: conservativ
  
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• Indie music and teen TV: a bromance made in sad boy heaven

  30-03-2017 13:00
  
  No genre of music is better suited to soundtracking the growing pains of teenagers and – as Riverdale proves – it’s still being wrung for every last noteIn the US, Riverdale returns on Thursday to bring us closer to solving the ultimate prime-time mystery: who among us truly cares about Archie Andrews’ music career? Not that Archie’s music-centric storyline is entirely Riverdale’s fault. Sure, he performed in a shirt and tie at his high school’s variety
  
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• Megan McKenna Tells Pete Wicks She Doesn’t Love Him Anymore In Ridiculously Emosh TOWIE Scenes

  30-03-2017 12:47
  
  We're distraught.
  
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• Sophie Kasaei Begs Viewers Who Branded Her Ugly & Disgusting: ‘Please Do Not Get Personal’

  30-03-2017 12:40
  
  Following the events of Geordie Shore’s EXPLOSIVE premiere.
  
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• Marnie Simpson Strips Off COMPLETELY Naked But For A Pair Of Super Hot High Heels

  30-03-2017 12:24
  
  Marnie gets naked.
  
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• Middle Fingers [Explicit]

  30-03-2017 12:19 via mtv.co.uk
  
  Middle Fingers
  
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• Earthquake (Ft. Dominique Young Unique)

  30-03-2017 12:03 via mtv.co.uk
  
  Earthquake (Ft. Dominique Young Unique)
  
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• Geordie Shore Spoiler Video: Chloe Ferry Breaks Down As She's Sent Home After Explosive Fight With Zahida Allen

  30-03-2017 12:00
  
  Don't miss brand new Geordie Shore: New Radgie Rampage, Tuesdays at 10pm - only on MTV!
  
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• Perrie Edwards Posts Seriously Cheeky Instagram Shot Of Her Bum

  30-03-2017 11:45
  
  Perrie posts a belfie.
  
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• Play These Games For Free In April With PlayStation Plus

  30-03-2017 11:38
  
  The lineup of free games has been revealed.
  
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• John, I'm only decorating: David Bowie's old apartment on sale for $6.5m

  30-03-2017 11:37
  
  The New York apartment where Bowie lived in the 90s is on the market – and his piano’s included in the priceIf you’re still mourning David Bowie, and want something to remember him by, then there’s one unique piece of Bowie memorabilia you might be interested in. The only drawback? It will cost you the thick end of $6.5m.The item in question is David Bowie’s old three-bedroom apartment in New York, in which he lived from 1992 to 2002 with his second wife, Iman. It i
  
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• Little Mix Get Their Coyote Ugly On In ‘No More Sad Songs’ Music Video

  30-03-2017 11:23
  
  Only these girls could make riding a mechanical bull not look ridiculous.
  
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