Music news

• Duane Eddy’s twang remains one of rock’n’roll’s greatest sounds

  02-05-2024 11:42 via theguardian.com
  
  The late guitarist was rightly ubiquitous in the late 1950s thanks to his otherworldly sound, earning admirers from Bruce Springsteen to John PeelYou could get the measure of Duane Eddy – who has died aged 86 – from a selection of his album titles: Have “Twangy” Guitar Will Travel (1958, his debut), The “Twangs” the “Thang” (1959), $1,000,000.00 Worth of Twang (1960, with Volume 2 in 1962), Twistin’ ’n’ Twangin (1962), “Twan
  
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• Jasmine Myra: Rising review – gently insistent jazz

  18-05-2024 17:00 via theguardian.com
  
  (Gondwana)
  The alto saxophonist leans into her soft and subtle sound with newfound confidence on this second albumWith the release of her 2022 debut album, Horizons, saxophonist Jasmine Myra became a breakout star of the UK jazz scene. Weaving soft and subtle alto saxophone lines through compositions that paired luscious harmonies with snapping rhythms, Myra showcased her skill as a composer rather than an instrumental virtuoso. On her second album, she continues to produce this gently insistent
  
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• Girls Aloud review – a glorious pop institution still calling the shots

  18-05-2024 12:35 via theguardian.com
  
  3Arena, Dublin
  Returning for their first concert since the death of Sarah Harding, old lyrics now have new poignancy – but with motorbikes and mic-stand moves, the mood stays upbeatEleven years have passed since Girls Aloud performed together as a five-piece for the final time, but adoration has endured in the interim – perhaps even intensified in the glow of 00s nostalgia. The group not only hauled themselves out of TV talent show Popstars: The Rivals, but then had 20 back-to-back U
  
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• Lil Nas X: ‘Who do I most admire and why? I have to say myself’

  18-05-2024 10:30 via theguardian.com
  
  The singer on eating junk food in bed, a $100k holiday he didn’t even go on, and the perks of fameBorn Montero Lamar Hill in Georgia, Lil Nas X, 25, rose to fame in 2019 with his single Old Town Road, which won many awards, including two Grammys. In 2021, he released his debut album Montero, which featured the hits Montero (Call Me By Your Name), Industry Baby and Thats What I Want. The following year, he completed his first worldwide tour. The documentary Lil Nas X: Long Li
  
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• Video shows Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs assaulting singer Cassie in 2016

  18-05-2024 02:18 via theguardian.com
  
  Hotel surveillance cameras at InterContinental Hotel in Los Angeles captured incident Combs had vehemently deniedA newly released video shows Sean “Diddy” Combs manhandling and kicking singer Cassie Ventura – his former girlfriend – in plain view of hotel surveillance cameras in 2016, before the rapper, music producer and businessman rapidly settled a lawsuit that she brought against him this past November, according to footage exclusively obtained by CNN.The video in que
  
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• Will Taylor Swift provide a £1bn boost to the UK economy?

  17-05-2024 15:33 via theguardian.com
  
  Barclays’ analysis may be slightly off the mark, but the megastar is tapping into a new trend in spendingTaylor Swift has long been credited with an outsized influence on music, celebrity culture – even politics. But reviving the UK’s flagging economy may be too much to ask, even of the sequinned megastar.Research published this week by analysts from Barclays pointed to the extraordinary spending surge that ensues when Swift touches down, and suggested she could bring a £
  
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• Rhythm Nation: how music gives Haiti hope amid the chaos

  17-05-2024 15:00 via theguardian.com
  
  The country has been hit by decades of crises and catastrophe, but its culture continues to thrive across the diaspora. Here, Haitian musicians celebrate its ’sounds of freedom’Even before March this year, when gun-toting gangs overran the Haitian capital of Port-au-Prince, dictatorships, poverty, health crises and earthquakes had defined the country in the eyes of global media. It passes for the archetypal failed state, a place where Unicef has declared that
  
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• Zayn: Room Under the Stairs review – Nashville-produced minimalism suits him

  17-05-2024 12:30 via theguardian.com
  
  (Mercury)
  The former One Direction singer continues to intrigue with an introspective, acoustic-leaning set with more highs than lowsSince disembarking from the One Direction juggernaut in 2015, Zayn Malik has taken the path less travelled. His 2016 solo debut, Mind of Mine, housed the global smash Pillowtalk, but was followed by the 27-track concept album Icarus Falls. While his former bandmates have toured the world, Malik only recently played his first ever gig as a solo artist. This fourth a
  
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• Arooj Aftab: Night Reign review – all the heat and mystery of nocturnal life

  17-05-2024 09:15 via theguardian.com
  
  (Verve)
  Mercurial and moody soundscapes are infused with wistful romance in one of the Grammy-winning singer and composer’s most spirited records to dateFew singers can match the delicate warmth and quiet power of Arooj Aftab’s voice. Over the past decade, the Pakistani-American singer has released four albums that showcase her gossamer cadence in ever-quieter settings, from jazz to Sufi qawwalis and finger-picking folk. Her debut Bird Under Water in 2014 paired Urdu poetry with sita
  
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• ‘World domination is a big thing for me’: pop superstar Becky Hill on raving to the top – and her new album’s dark past

  17-05-2024 09:00 via theguardian.com
  
  She’s won two Brits and rivalled Dua Lipa and Adele for streams, but the public is still getting to know the ex-reality TV singer. She explains why snobbery has held her back, but trauma won’tBecky Hill Hill glides up on an ebike in full pop star clobber: leather flares, black strap top with enormous silver buckles, immaculately tousled hair, light green contacts that bestow a feline air. We were supposed to be meeting at her tour manager’s flat in London, so she seems slightly
  
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• Everyone’s Getting Involved review – tepid all-star Talking Heads tribute

  17-05-2024 08:10 via theguardian.com
  
  (A24 Music)
  Cult film company A24’s tie-in merch to its rerelease of seminal documentary Stop Making Sense sounds either like karaoke or disconnected from the source materialResponsible for indie hits like Midsommar, Moonlight and Everything Everywhere All at Once, American film company A24 has created a vast lifestyle brand around its cultish reputation, flogging everything from branded shorts ($48) to a Hereditary gingerbread kit ($62). Now, following its rerelease of Jonathan Demme&rsqu
  
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• Billy Idol: ‘I stole the master tapes for Rebel Yell – and gave them to my heroin dealer’

  16-05-2024 16:00 via theguardian.com
  
  The Generation X punk turned arena rocker answers your questions on near-misses in Hollywood, his overlooked electronic period and how Marc Bolan helped launch his careerIs it true that you stole the master tapes to the Rebel Yell album during a spat with the record label? VerulamiumParkRanger
  It was because of the cover. I was saying: “There’s a flaw in this picture, and if we blow this up it will get worse.” The record company started to say: “We’re leaving it. It
  
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• Jimmy James obituary

  16-05-2024 15:59 via theguardian.com
  
  Soul and ska singer best known for his dynamic live performances with his band the Vagabonds in the 60s and 70sThe singer Jimmy James first arrived in London in 1964 as frontman of the Vagabonds, a Jamaican dance band booked to perform at West Indian clubs across Britain for six months. However, the band’s dynamic performances – they mixed ska and calypso with R&B and big band standards – quickly gained them a sizeable British fanbase, a residency at the Marquee Club in Soh
  
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• Billie Eilish: Hit Me Hard and Soft review – still the great outlier of American pop

  16-05-2024 14:00 via theguardian.com
  
  (Darkroom/Interscope Records)
  On this deeply involving third album, Eilish once again breaks the rules for arena-filling artists: it’s subtle and understated, yet jars the listener with eerie show tunes and explosive noiseBillie Eilish’s third album opens with a track called Skinny. It features a hushed electric guitar figure supporting a lyric filled with very Billie Eilish topics: bitter recriminations about a failed relationship, body dysmorphia, depression and the pressures of fi
  
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• Beth Gibbons: Lives Outgrown review – long-awaited solo debut is a gripping study of ageing and loss

  16-05-2024 12:20 via theguardian.com
  
  (Domino)
  In the Portishead singer’s singular, astonishing soundworld, these songs sit in autumnal gloom but are occasionally dappled with warmth and lightNo one is ever going to accuse Beth Gibbons of over-exerting herself in the rapacious pursuit of fame: her solo debut arrives 22 years after her collaboration with Rustin Man, Out of Season, 16 years after the last Portishead album, Third, and 11 after it was first announced.In fairness, Lives Outgrown has a unique sound you suspect was o
  
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• From Megadeth to Japanese make-up tutorials: the bizarre life of guitarist Marty Friedman

  15-05-2024 12:36 via theguardian.com
  
  The US musician went from homelessness to multiplatinum success with the thrash metallers – and then became a pop cultural icon in Japan. He explains the weirdest portfolio career in rockIt’s one of the most perplexing questions in heavy metal history: how does a bullet-wearing guitarist for Megadeth end up critiquing beauty products on Japanese daytime TV? “I started getting addicted to the challenge of: can I really do this?”, laughs Marty Friedman. “And the harde
  
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• Teddy Swims review – dark’n’stormy soul singer shakes the room

  14-05-2024 12:34 via theguardian.com
  
  Shepherd’s Bush Empire, London
  The Atlanta viral sensation enraptures tonight’s audience with molasses-thick vocals and bombastic emotion – though he’s a little one-noteLook at Teddy Swims, and you’d think twice before crossing him. The Atlanta, Georgia native cuts an imposing figure: leather trench coat, a face-consuming beard and a body overcome with tattoos, snaking up his neck and crawling on to his face. And then there is that voice. It hits like a tall glass o
  
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• ‘I don’t think it’s going to do well’: the Zutons on Valerie – and Mark Ronson on covering it with Amy Winehouse

  13-05-2024 15:00 via theguardian.com
  
  ‘It’s about a makeup artist I met in Florida called Valerie Star, who had legal bills. When I played it to the band, they all went, “Oh, that’s good.” And I thought, “It is, isn’t it”’When the Zutons were touring in Florida, I met a makeup artist called Valerie Star. We became quite friendly. When we got back home to the UK and the rehearsal room, I started playing the riff. Then I got in a taxi to my mum’s and, by the end of the 15-min
  
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• Riot grrrl pioneer Kathleen Hanna: ‘A lot of men really get off on watching a woman get angry’

  13-05-2024 10:00 via theguardian.com
  
  The feminist punk coined the phrase ‘girl power’ and was responsible for the name of Nirvana’s biggest hit. She reflects on activism, illness, and never letting abuse define herWhen Kathleen Hanna was 19 years old, a man broke into her apartment while she was out and attacked her roommate, Allee. The man beat her, dragged her by her hair and said he would rape and kill her but, as Allee fought back, he lost his grip, allowing her to run into the street and call for help. Hanna
  
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• Warren Ellis on Steve Albini, Mad Max and the best sandwich: ‘Whipped cream and banana on white bread’

  12-05-2024 02:00 via theguardian.com
  
  Asked 10 random questions, the Dirty Three musician talks about watching bad TV with Marianne Faithfull, cleaning toilets and the best advice Albini gave himGet our weekend culture and lifestyle emailWhat’s the worst job you’ve ever had?There was no worst, really. If you have to work, you have to work. I needed money. So I cleaned dishes at a strip club, I cleaned nightclubs. There’s something incredibly meditative about mopping in nightclubs; you have all the base elements of
  
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• Olivia Rodrigo review – shiny pop-punk with real guts

  11-05-2024 15:00 via theguardian.com
  
  Ovo Hydro, Glasgow
  There’s no doubt the former Disney actor is a pro, but she’s also a deft, sincere songwriter who captures the viewpoint of a teen outsider to perfectionPop music made by child actors doesn’t often feature axe duels and headbanging. But tonight, during a song called Obsessed, gen-Z phenomenon Olivia Rodrigo, wielding an electric guitar, faces off against one of her guitarists, Emily Rosenfield, as the rest of the band build a grungy din around them.Pop vocalis
  
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• Will Oldham on Steve Albini: ‘He elevated the quality of the human experience’

  11-05-2024 13:30 via theguardian.com
  
  The artist known as Bonnie ‘Prince’ Billy met the late musician as a 15-year-old fan, and became a creative partner and friend. He explains why Albini’s idealism is more needed than everI met Steve Albini in 1985, when I was 15 years old. Me and some friends had driven up to northern Kentucky to see Big Black perform at a club, which we had to create fake IDs for. Afterwards, Big Black, myself and a couple of other folks from Louisville all retired to the same apartment to slee
  
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• One to watch: the Belair Lip Bombs

  11-05-2024 13:30 via theguardian.com
  
  The Australian quartet’s punchy, hook-packed songs combine immediacy and complexity in a way that recalls the StrokesLush Life, the 2023 debut album by Melbourne four-piece the Belair Lip Bombs, is the kind of punchy, hook-laden rock record that hardly gets made any more, straightforward in sound but borderline unassailable in its construction. Principal songwriter Maisie Everett, formerly of the garage rock trio Clamm, has a singular knack for writing earworm hooks: Lush Life’s firs
  
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• Martin and Roman Kemp look back: ‘I didn’t want a parent v kid relationship. I wanted us to be equal’

  11-05-2024 13:00 via theguardian.com
  
  The musician and actor, and the DJ and presenter, on fame, football and dinner party debates with George MichaelBorn in 1961, Martin Kemp is an actor and musician, best known as the bassist for Spandau Ballet. His son, Roman, 31, is a TV and radio personality, presenting the One Show and hosting a show on Capital FM from 2014 to 2024. He made the documentary Our Silent Emergency, following the death of his friend and producer Joe Lyons, who killed himself in 2020. Roman lives in London, while Ma
  
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• Beabadoobee: ‘I don’t have time for death threats. I’ve got a mortgage to pay’

  11-05-2024 12:55 via theguardian.com
  
  A support slot on Taylor Swift’s Eras tour and a Rick Rubin produced album has given the former TikTok-viral musician a new sense of self-confidence. Not even the internet trolls can stop herAbout a year ago, Beatrice Laus, AKA Beabadoobee, started taking ballet lessons. The acclaimed, perpetually TikTok-viral indie rock musician had been touring hard in 2022, and began to feel her body breaking down. Like most early-20s musicians – or twentysomethings in general – she was, at
  
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• Chaka Khan: ‘Someone said there were too many black people in our band. He put some white guys on stage with us’

  11-05-2024 10:30 via theguardian.com
  
  The singer on being impatient, mourning the death of the planet, and why sleep is her favourite thingBorn in Illinois, Chaka Khan, 71, joined the funk band Rufus in her teens and had hits with Tell Me Something Good and Ain’t Nobody. In 1978, she launched her solo career with the anthem I’m Every Woman. She has released 13 albums, won 10 Grammy awards and was recently inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame. In 1999, she established the Chaka Khan Foundation to help women and
  
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• Steve Albini obituary

  10-05-2024 19:26 via theguardian.com
  
  Frontman for ‘noise rock’ bands Big Black and Shellac acclaimed for his production of albums by Nirvana, Pixies and PJ HarveySteve Albini, the musician and frontman of the alternative rock bands Big Black and Shellac, who has died from a heart attack aged 61, was more widely known for his huge list of credits as a producer, or – as he preferred to be called – recording engineer, of albums by independent artists from the mid-1980s to the present.Notable recordings bearing
  
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• Kacey Musgraves review – sweet and salty country-pop magic

  10-05-2024 13:33 via theguardian.com
  
  O2 Academy, Glasgow
  The Texan star transfixes with her crystal clear voice and flawless band, balancing airy verses on the healing beauty of nature with a dash of darkness‘Looks like you came to party!” teases Kacey Musgraves, radiant in a white dress and matching cowboy boots. With a gentle wave, the Texan country star tells us to take it easy. Tonight’s showcase for her introspective sixth album Deeper Well is all mellow magic – but for every airy verse about the healin
  
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• Les Savy Fav: Oui, LSF review – New York post-punk oddballs make restrained return

  10-05-2024 13:00 via theguardian.com
  
  (Frenchkiss)
  The veteran five-piece’s first album in 14 years has flashes of the old thrill, but doesn’t quite hit earlier heightsA thrilling live proposition since the late 1990s, due in large part to the stage magnetism of frontman Tim Harrington, the New York-based post-punk five-piece Les Savy Fav never quite managed to distil that magic into equally essential albums until 2007’s less abrasive, more melodic Let’s Stay Friends, before hitting a peak with 2010’s R
  
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• Elbow review – a charged night of insatiable yearning and rollicking laments

  10-05-2024 12:41 via theguardian.com
  
  O2 Arena, London
  Beaming, big-hearted and benevolent, Guy Garvey charms with stately songs of heartbreak, unafraid of uneven time signatures and heavy-metal thudElbow looked for a while to be settling into a mellow, beatific serenity. Their last album, 2021’s Flying Dream 1, was a winningly gentle affair, its delicate tracks seemingly competing between themselves to be the most soothingly romantic. You idly wondered if the band were easing into a benign dotage.This impression was spectacul
  
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