Two decades before Meg and Jack, there was only one white stripe that mattered: the warpaint over the nose of Britain’s biggest pop star: Adam Ant. His look was so iconic that kids copied him everywhere: indeed, me and my cousin Audrey, inspired by his style, attempted to emulate said stripe one summer, using tennisContinue reading “Lost In Music: Adam and the Ants- Kings Of the Wild Frontier”
Tag Archives: Profile
Favourite Cover Versions: Nick Cave and The Bad Seeds – Kicking Against the Pricks
Photo: Alamy This 1986 album, entirely comprising cover versions, shows Nick Cave and The Bad Seeds playing with the duality of their sound. There’s the bombast of their take on The Velvet Underground’s ‘All Tomorrow ‘s Parties’ running counter to Jimmy Webb’s legendary ‘By The Time I Get To Phoenix’ with a softer, but noContinue reading “Favourite Cover Versions: Nick Cave and The Bad Seeds – Kicking Against the Pricks”
Vintage Films: Cabaret
If Sally Bowles was around today, she’d most likely be chronically online, binging on TikTok make-up tutorials and dance crazes.She’d be oblivious to the outside world, unaware of the conflicts in Ukraine and Israel, or the orange menace that is Trump. Bob Fosse’s film has endured, because the theme of “divine decadence” amid the encroachingContinue reading “Vintage Films: Cabaret”
Overlooked Classics: Betty Davis – They Say I’m Different
In her spacesuit collars, hot pants and big boots,prowling around the stage, Betty Davis made Tina Turner look something of a shrinking violet. With her wild, hard -living reputation and unrestrained presence, Davis was allegedly too much for husband Miles, from whom she divorced after just one tempestuous year in 1969. This second studio album,Continue reading “Overlooked Classics: Betty Davis – They Say I’m Different”
Overlooked Classics: Nick Cave and The Bad Seeds – From Her To Eternity
Debut albums rarely feel as raw as From Her To Eternity. The Birthday Party had dissolved pretty messily, amid drug abuse and ego problems, so Nick Cave and The Bad Seeds could have toned things down a little in order to hit that commercial paydirt. Ha, as if. Cave was far too independent, too contrarianContinue reading “Overlooked Classics: Nick Cave and The Bad Seeds – From Her To Eternity”
Overlooked Classics: The Damned- Strawberries
Who said goths don’t have a sense of humour? Strawberries, The Damned‘s fifth studio album, is a fun ride.Drawing upon sixties psychedelia, as with Generals, Dozen Girls and Stranger On The Town, it’s got some gleefully silly lyrics, due in no small part to trickster Capture Sensible and his playful subversion. Indeed, Don’t Bother Me andContinue reading “Overlooked Classics: The Damned- Strawberries”
Overlooked Classics: Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds- Your Funeral, My Trial
The fourth album from Nick and the dapper chaps, released in 1986, remains a little bit sidelined, as far as I’m concerned. It’s Cave ‘s Grand Guignol, one of his most macabre and sexually charged… And that’s going some for someone who is often criticised for the violence of his lyrics. ‘The Carny’ is aContinue reading “Overlooked Classics: Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds- Your Funeral, My Trial”
Disney’s Dream Debased: Alice
Few film makers are as incredible as the mighty Czech surrealist Jan Svankmajer. Like so many people of my generation, I was first aware of him in the early 90s, when Channel 4 screened his singular adaptation of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, abbreviated to simply Alice Alice, created in 1988, was a revelation. Beautiful, disturbingContinue reading “Disney’s Dream Debased: Alice”
“The fruits of isolation”- Ezra Furman
Three new songs from Ezra Furman appeared the other day and a forthcoming tour has been announced for later this year (all being well). Thematically, it’s the usual great Furman stuff: spirituality, love, identity and connection, and her lyrics remain as on point as ever. It all bodes well for the next album. For moreContinue reading ““The fruits of isolation”- Ezra Furman”
The Anti- Amelie: He Loves Me, He Loves Me Not
This classic French film is the antithesis of trite rom-coms. Amelie it ain’t. Angelique (Audrey Tautou) is a fine arts student in love with Loic (Samuel Le Bihan) a much older cardiologist. Angelique is absolutely smitten, and desperately wants him to leave his pregnant wife. She’s an intially charming young woman, popular and well- liked,Continue reading “The Anti- Amelie: He Loves Me, He Loves Me Not”
Hit The North 