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An awesome and ridiculous film that leaves you thrilled beyond the point of your natural endurance
2012
Theatre
The show has suddenly become quite wonderful, and the galvanising factor is the terrific stage debut of Melanie C
Blood Brothers
Music
The British pop music industry may be eating itself but if Muse are the pick of what it can offer the world in 2010 then British music is in rude health indeed
Muse
I was smitten by both Gilberts enormous luxuriant moustache and the intelligence and nuance of this highly entertaining play
I totally recommend Babbo to anyone who is looking for really good and traditional Italian food
Always been a fan but never seen them live. I was ecstatic to be part of this epic event. WOW!
London,
Sugababes: Catfights and Spotlights
John Legend: Evolver
AC/DC: Black Ice
Kenny Garrett: Sketches of MD
Buena Vista Social Club: At Carnegie Hall
We review new albums from the Sugababes, John Legend, AC/DC and Buena Vista Social Club.
Sugababes
Catfights and Spotlights (Island)
***
LIKE Trigger’s broom in Only Fools and Horses, which lasted 20 years with only 17 new heads and 14 new handles, Sugababes plough on unchanging regardless of who’s in the line-up. Their sixth album, the second with Amelle Berrabah as a full-time employee, features more of the same quality, grown-up-friendly pop. There’s a bit more Mariah Carey-style warbling on it than usual, and their current hit Girls was a lazy choice for a comeback single. However, there’s a fun Motown bounce to No Can Do, and the tearjerking Sound of Goodbye is surely a Christmas hit.
David Smyth
John Legend
Evolver (RCA)
****
AFTER just three albums, the former John Stephens is building a substantial, filler-free body of work. This time around he’s more upbeat, funnier (“Do I have a girlfriend? Technically, no,” he hedges on Greenlight) and more loose-limbed. And he’s a master of melody. Guests from Kanye West to Estelle contribute more than their names and in If You’re Out There, Legend has a genuine rarity: a non-mawkish social consciousness song. No Other Love, the Estelle duet, is sultriness itself. Much more of this and those Stevie Wonder comparisons won’t seem quite so far-fetched.
John Aizlewood
AC/DC
Black Ice (Columbia)
****
THOSE who like their noise delivered straight-no-chaser have been a bit worried about AC/DC. Their last couple of albums were below par and it was beginning to look as if Back In Black was the final word. The good news is that Black Ice is a strutting return to form: 15 snappy and concise tracks of controlled rock’n’roll, showing no mercy for wimps. The AC/DC worldview remains a simple one — Rock ’n’ Roll Train, She Likes Rock’n’Roll, Rocking All the Way — and there’s no room for introspection, no truck with ballads. Angus Young remains a masterful guitar player, setting up simple riffs that lodge in the head and never overstaying his welcome on solos. AC/DC are back in the pink.
Pete Clark
Kenny Garrett
Sketches of MD (Mack Avenue)
****
HAVING signed the real Kenny G, Mack Avenue wastes no time in recording this exciting saxman live as leader. It’s a mystery why his previous labels overlooked such an obvious ploy. Sketches of MD is for Garrett’s former boss Miles Davis but most tracks have a trance-like Coltrane vibe, thanks to guesting tenor-sax legend Pharoah Sanders. Both hornmen have technique to burn but also appreciate space, a rarer insight. Kenny’s singalong encore, Happy People, drags on forever and costs this review a deducted star.
Jack Massarik
Buena Vista Social Club
At Carnegie Hall (World Circuit)
*****
A DECADE after it took place, this is the “live” album of the Buena Vista Social Club concert that formed the climax to Wim Wenders’s film. But if you are one of the eight million people who bought the studio album, do you need this as well? Yes, you do. The rock-star reception to the opening bars of Chan Chan is extraordinary and the performance is completely different, with a soaring trumpet solo from Octavio Calderon. Elsewhere, there are solos from pianist Ruben Gonzalez and Compay Segundo and Ibrahim Ferrer having the time of their life. All have since passed away.
Simon Broughton
Details are correct at the time of publication - please check with venue before booking.
BLOSSOM IN THE DESERT CD REVIEW FOR OCTOBER 2008
Reviewer
Esther Stanford
Presenter Voice of
Africa Radio, London.
African Reparation Human Rights Jurist Consult.
If I were to sum it up in one word, this would be MASTERPIECE.
I am of course referring to the latest blessing from Rising Light Productions restored genre of Songs of Deliverance BLOSSOM IN THE DESERT by veteran songstress and performing arts extraordinaire ZEHORAH.
This sacred composition in the form of a CD is not just a CD, it is an education, an experience, a prayer and a revelation. BLOSSOM IN THE DESERT is a not only a full but wholesome experience. In listening to it we can truly understand why it is has been said that “Music and rhythm find their way into the secret places of the soul”.
It has been said that you can tell the history of a people trough its songs. Well with this latest offering, we get a history of a people who have succeeded in restoring the natural rhythms of the African Edenic peoples to its rightful place in our popular consciousness.
- Yishibah Baht Gavriel, London, UK
